DBT Assumptions About Patients, Therapists, and Treatment
Key Points
- DBT assumptions are beliefs that DBT clinicians must ascribe to in order to effectively treat patients.
- Patients are doing the best they can and want to improve.
- Patients need to do better, try harder, and be more motivated to change. They may not have caused all their problems, but they have to solve them anyway.
- The lives of suicidal borderline individuals are unbearable.
- Patients must learn new behaviors in all relevant contexts, and cannot fail in therapy.
- Therapists need support.
