Families and DBT Skills
DBT Skills for Adolescents and Families[MUSIC PLAYING] As a parent, DBT skills can be incredibly effective. If you have a dysregulated teenager, and you don't know how to navigate their upset, their emotions, their behaviors, there's a whole curriculum that parents can use, the DBT curriculum, that they can learn with their teen simultaneously, have the same language at home that's applied to all people, and then be able to practice that with coaching as needed. So the parents need to learn more effective ways of validating their kids, unplugging and disconnecting when necessary, and behaviorally, how to reinforce the behaviors we like. For the caregivers, to learn these DBT skills, there's a lot of advantages. First advantage, of course, is you're going to be able to manage your own emotions and distress in a whole different way.
And even if you're a highly functional professional and spouse, and you're functioning well with your other children, learning these life skills as it relates to this one child alone can be life-changing just for you, day to day. Secondly, it also helps with navigating the conflict and the friction you might have with your identified teen who is struggling. So you may learn specific strategies that help to de-escalate your child in a whole different way, and communicate in a different way, that changes the kind of whole transaction in a way that you'll have much better outcomes in negotiating curfews, helping them deal with their homework, and all kinds of day-to-day, familiar family activities that otherwise might get sticky. So you will have much better outcomes as a family if you can learn these skills.
For the child, or the teenager, to be able to have their parent learn these skills, even though most kids say, oh please, don't bring my parents into skills group. I don't want them there. When their parents show up, and they do, your life will be forever changed, because they are showing their commitment to you, they're going to learn this language with you, they're going to apply the same skills on themselves, and the whole family dynamic is going to shift. You don't have to thank me now. You will thank me when 24 weeks of skills class is over. But you're going to see some real dramatic outcomes in how you guys are getting along and communicating.
There are so many parents who are well-intentioned, who love their children, and have so much compassion, and yet, inadvertently, step in the wrong direction, say things, do things that end up exacerbating their child's emotional dysregulation. So if we could teach them more effective ways of communicating, and validating, and tolerating their own distress, which, at the end of the day, may really help prevent some major, serious life events, like suicide, addiction, and other life problems.