"Circumstances are beyond human control, but our conduct is in our own power. "


Posts tagged with 'child abuse'

Non-drug treatments for bipolar disorder (1st post) - the value of psychotherapy

5th April 2016

I am due to give a talk for the Lothian branch of "Bipolar Scotland" on "Recent research on non-drug treatments for bipolar disorder". Here is the downloadable Powerpoint presentation (with pictures removed to reduce the size of the file) and here is a slide illustrating the main points that I …

Our minds work associatively: this is of central importance for psychotherapy and for life in general

24th December 2012

(this post is downloadable both as a PDF file and as a Word doc) In his brilliant book "Thinking, fast and slow" published last year, the Nobel Prize winner Daniel Kahneman says his aim is to help improve our "ability to identify and understand errors of judgement and choice ... …

Imagery, associative networks, embodied cognition and the transformation of meaning

16th December 2012

Research on the therapeutic use of imagery is blossoming ... so much so that it can be difficult, at times, to make sense of the wealth of emerging findings. In today's post I want to look briefly at three areas that currently interest me. One is a puzzle about why …

Arntz & Jacob's new book "Schema therapy in practice": rescripting traumatic memories

14th December 2012

I have already written a series of blog posts - both on Arntz & Jacob's new book and on working with traumatic memories. In today's post I want to explore imagery rescripting more fully. The memorably named Mervin Smucker is an important figure in cognitive therapy's development of rescripting with …

Working with traumatic memories: trauma-focused CBT and an introduction to rescripting

19th November 2012

"Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the judgement that something else is more important than fear." James Hollingworth Yesterday I wrote a post "Working with traumatic memories: KISS (keep it simple, stupid) and the virtues of straightforward prolonged exposure". Today I would like to consider what fuller …

Arntz & Jacob's new book "Schema therapy in practice": links with trauma-focused CBT and Marylene Cloitre's work on complex PTSD

17th November 2012

I've written a couple of recent blog posts - "Arntz & Jacob's new book 'Schema therapy in practice': some introductory comments" and "Arntz & Jacob's new book 'Schema therapy in practice': links with attachment theory and with therapies for self-compassion". In today's post I want to look at ST's focus …

Arntz & Jacob's new book "Schema therapy in practice": links with attachment theory and with therapies for self-compassion

16th November 2012

Yesterday I wrote a post "Arntz & Jacob's new book 'Schema therapy in practice: some introductory comments" about the recently published and potentially broadly applicable extension of this Dutch team's previously successful treatment approach for borderline personality disorder. So the authors comment "While schema therapy was originally developed for clients …

Arntz & Jacob's new book "Schema therapy in practice": some introductory comments

15th November 2012

Arnoud Arntz & Gitta Jacob's new book "Schema therapy in practice: an introductory guide to the schema mode approach" was published last month. The book's back cover states "Schema Therapy in Practice presents a comprehensive introduction to schema therapy for nonspecialist practitioners wishing to incorporate it into their practice. The …

Leeds BABCP conference: workshop on emotion processing in chronic fatigue syndrome - new ways to improve outcomes? (4th post)

29th June 2012

I wrote yesterday on stress, abuse & mind-body links that might be relevant for some chronic fatigue syndrome sufferers. There is a good deal of research too on other - possibly linked - vulnerability factors that may predispose some people to later development of fatigue problems - including a number …

Leeds BABCP conference: workshop on emotion processing in chronic fatigue syndrome - stress, abuse & mind-body links (3rd post)

28th June 2012

I wrote yesterday about current outcomes achievable through using CBT or GET for chronic fatigue syndrome. The results of the PACE trial produced something of an outcry in several patient organizations. Chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS), like for example chronic low back pain, is a very genuine disorder with major disabling …