You may wonder what DBT stands for? DBT stands for Dialectical (not Diabolical) Behavior Therapy and it is a cognitive behavioral therapy created by *Marsha Linehan, Ph.D. (she is my idol!). I was fortunate enough to be introduced to this theory at my first job out of my Masters. I was trained under her protocol that she uses and was blessed enough to meet her in person!!
DBT blends eastern practices of mindfulness with skills training. Clients learn skills such as Emotion Regulation, Impulse Control, and Interpersonal Effectiveness. The core of this program is teaching people to "Create a life worth living." Her theory is pretty amazing stuff!!
If followed in true form, DBT is a year long commitment. Clients participate in weekly individual sessions (skill practice) and group sessions (learning skills). You go through the program twice in that year because it can be a bit overwhelming the first time through. However, once you have the 'light bulb' moment, nothing in your life will EVER be the same. You can't undo or take away the awareness you have now learned.
So, why do I bring this up on a blog for Medifast? Take Shape for Life, in conjunction with Medifast, are all about creating healthy lifestyles. It's not JUST about losing the weight. It's about creating healthy habits to adapt into the rest of your life. DBT is all about creating a life worth living. Teaching people new skills to improve their life through addressing self-esteem, setting healthy boundaries with others, and allowing them to see life can be better.
Many people use food as a coping mechanism for unpleasant feelings, such as fear, sadness, anxiety, and guilt or shame. Most people, when they lose their primary coping skill, begin to supplement with another coping skill, be it positive or negative. DBT is just one of many counseling theories that is effective at addressing life issues. It is by no means the only way. It is the way I was trained, which is why I write about it. I think it's a pretty fantastic theory and I am passionate about sharing it with others, just as I am passionate about Medifast and being a Health Coach. I want to help people improve their life, no matter what that improvement may be.
What I can speak to, is how DBT has helped me in my own weight loss journey, my life, and my outlook on my future. I honestly don't know where I would be without my skill-base from this training. I am more aware of my emotions, how they feel in my body, and judgments and choices I make. I can combat my emotional impulses with logic and talk myself out of negative downward spirals. It has truly helped me stay on track with choosing a healthier lifestyle for myself. However, this is only my personal experience with DBT. As all methods, individual results may vary.
(I personally think DBT should be taught to adolescents/teenagers in every school across the country, but what do I know.)
How have you taken a step to 'create a life worth living?'
Laura
PS-If you are interested in learning more about DBT and want to see if there is a trained facilitator in your area, go to www.behavioraltech.com and you can search for a clinician there.
*I have not been compensated by Dr. Linehan, or her affiliates, for my mentioning her in my blog.
Wednesday, January 26, 2011
What Medifast Has Taught Me
I have tried nearly every diet in the book. And every diet in the book set me up for failure. It's not that their product or technique didn't work, it just didn't work FOR ME. I remember when I first went on Medifast. I had no confidence in myself (or the diet for that matter), I was severely depressed b/c I was miserable and lonely. I had basically crawled into myself and wanted to hibernate the rest of my life away. I was using food to numb out all these feelings that I didn't want to experience. I have used food most my life when I'm happy, sad, mad, or scared. I suspect many of you can relate?
What Medifast allowed me to do was see that I have choices in my life. No matter what the circumstance, there are always choices and there are always natural consequences. After I started losing weight, I started to have more confidence in myself (and the program). I started to say 'no' to people and 'yes' to my life. I'm pretty sure I have angered some people along the way, but that happens when you stand up for yourself and start setting boundaries.
I learned that I am beautiful and worthy of having love. I learned that I am good enough. I don't have to be perfect. "Perfection" is a word that sets people up for failure (I also think "normal" is as well). I can be me and I can make mistakes while being me. I now give myself permission to take time out for self-care (i.e, exercise, massage, acupuncture, etc.). I realize that I HAVE to put myself first, but not in a self-centered, narcissistic way. I have become 'self-focused' in order to love myself and be a healthy wife, daughter, friend, cousin, therapist, and eventually mother (some day).
I have learned so much these past few years. I have been tested over and over again, to brink of insanity sometimes. My clients teach me the most though. Just when I think I've had enough, I hear their stories of survival from some pretty awful trauma. I think, "If they can do it, I can do it." Living my life (and I mean LIVING, not EXISTING) is a choice I make each day when I wake up.
What do you choose for yourself today?
Blessings on your journey to finding your happiness and who you are,
Laura
What Medifast allowed me to do was see that I have choices in my life. No matter what the circumstance, there are always choices and there are always natural consequences. After I started losing weight, I started to have more confidence in myself (and the program). I started to say 'no' to people and 'yes' to my life. I'm pretty sure I have angered some people along the way, but that happens when you stand up for yourself and start setting boundaries.
I learned that I am beautiful and worthy of having love. I learned that I am good enough. I don't have to be perfect. "Perfection" is a word that sets people up for failure (I also think "normal" is as well). I can be me and I can make mistakes while being me. I now give myself permission to take time out for self-care (i.e, exercise, massage, acupuncture, etc.). I realize that I HAVE to put myself first, but not in a self-centered, narcissistic way. I have become 'self-focused' in order to love myself and be a healthy wife, daughter, friend, cousin, therapist, and eventually mother (some day).
I have learned so much these past few years. I have been tested over and over again, to brink of insanity sometimes. My clients teach me the most though. Just when I think I've had enough, I hear their stories of survival from some pretty awful trauma. I think, "If they can do it, I can do it." Living my life (and I mean LIVING, not EXISTING) is a choice I make each day when I wake up.
What do you choose for yourself today?
Blessings on your journey to finding your happiness and who you are,
Laura
Monday, November 29, 2010
Here's what I don't like the most
I think the thing I most hate about the MS is that it requires me to be vulnerable. MS has forced me to recognize that I am incapable of doing everything (I know, this is irrational) myself. It requires me to depend on other people and trust that they can do it (this is not a strength of mine). It asks me to listen to myself and take a rest instead of just pushing through it.
I have 'zombied' (not a real word, but it is for the sake of this post) through life, pushing through the physical and emotional pain, and putting myself on the back burner. I would drop everything I was doing to help (more like rescue) my friends and family. I have high expectations of my friends, so when they wouldn't do the same for me, I would become enraged at them. Upon further internal exploration, I would find I was more mad at myself for sacrificing so much of myself for those I loved. Don't get me wrong, I loved doing what I did, but I ignored so much of my wants and needs that I became resentful. Resentful of myself.
Having MS has forced me to allow (make sense?) myself to be vulnerable by asking for help and setting boundaries regarding what I can and cannot do. I think I've really pissed some people off in my life because of this too. I'm no longer apt to drop everything to run to my friends and family. I put responsibility (which is very healthy to do this-what I was doing was enabling) back on them to help solve their own predicaments. I've had to tell people 'no' over and over again because some times I am just too damned tired to go out or to feel any more emotionally drained. Although change is 'good', change can also be painful because some times you are forced to acknowledge those things that you tried to ignore for so long.
I now have to face all those things I tried to ignore for so long. I won't stuff my feelings any more. I refuse to lead a life based in shame and living up to other people's standards. More importantly, I will no longer lead my life comparing myself to others. I want a joy filled life that focuses on all that I have now because of the MS. Not what I feel I lost because of the diagnosis.
May you find your joy in life and leave behind the shame. Remember, it's a process, not an event.
L
I have 'zombied' (not a real word, but it is for the sake of this post) through life, pushing through the physical and emotional pain, and putting myself on the back burner. I would drop everything I was doing to help (more like rescue) my friends and family. I have high expectations of my friends, so when they wouldn't do the same for me, I would become enraged at them. Upon further internal exploration, I would find I was more mad at myself for sacrificing so much of myself for those I loved. Don't get me wrong, I loved doing what I did, but I ignored so much of my wants and needs that I became resentful. Resentful of myself.
Having MS has forced me to allow (make sense?) myself to be vulnerable by asking for help and setting boundaries regarding what I can and cannot do. I think I've really pissed some people off in my life because of this too. I'm no longer apt to drop everything to run to my friends and family. I put responsibility (which is very healthy to do this-what I was doing was enabling) back on them to help solve their own predicaments. I've had to tell people 'no' over and over again because some times I am just too damned tired to go out or to feel any more emotionally drained. Although change is 'good', change can also be painful because some times you are forced to acknowledge those things that you tried to ignore for so long.
I now have to face all those things I tried to ignore for so long. I won't stuff my feelings any more. I refuse to lead a life based in shame and living up to other people's standards. More importantly, I will no longer lead my life comparing myself to others. I want a joy filled life that focuses on all that I have now because of the MS. Not what I feel I lost because of the diagnosis.
May you find your joy in life and leave behind the shame. Remember, it's a process, not an event.
L
Saturday, November 27, 2010
Is there really a reason for everything?
I've been trying to think of why I got MS when I did or why I did. I don't think anyone ever strives to have an incurable disease in their life, but it's what life handed me. When I read different things about MS, there's one thing we all have in common: we did too much for everyone else and didn't take care of ourselves (or 'took care of ourselves' in really bad ways).
I got the diagnosis at one of the lowest points in my life. In December of 2008, I was rear ended by someone who rushed through a yellow light. Little did I know that day, that things would rapidly spiral downward. Approximately 6 days later, I was laid off from a job that I truly enjoyed, just before Christmas. In February, while still unemployed and trying to keep everything 'together', I woke up to drag my depressed butt to the gym and walked out to a Jeep that had been broken into. I remember looking up to the sky and saying to God "Is there anything else you would like to throw my way right now?" Be careful what you ask for. I awoke a few days later to a leg that I thought I had slept on wrong. It kinda felt like your limbs do when they start to fall asleep. It was slightly cold feeling and numb and tingling. I honestly thought I had a pinched nerve from the accident. Long story short: an MRI and spinal tap later and I had the diagnosis staring me in the face.
Over the next year, I spent my life in a very high stress job in which I doubted my abilities nearly every day. I have never cried so much in my life. I remember in college I had a professor that told us that if we wanted to learn the most, put ourselves working with the most difficult population we can find. He told that class that, after doing that, everything else you do will be easy from there on out. I did that and I threw myself in it. I don't regret the choice I made to take that job and stay there because I learned a lot about myself as a counselor and how to set boundaries with friends and family. However, I was emotionally and physically exhausted all the time. The high stress took a toll on me and the MS. I had to quit, for the sake of my sanity and my relationships.
My first attempt at medication pretty much sucked. I was on one that I took daily, which was a constant reminder of the MS. Not to mention HORRIBLE injection site reactions. It was as if I had 7 mosquito bites on my body at any given time. I itched them so much I would do it in my sleep and they would bruise. That medication did not do as well as it should have and I am now taking one that I truly don't mind. I take it weekly and the side affects are much more manageable. It's nice to not loathe the medication that is supposed to be helping improve the progression of a disease that is incurable.
I have now moved on to a job that is significantly less stressful and that I feel very effective at. I don't always like going to work all the time, but I am happy when I am there. My veil of depression has lifted, at least for now (depression is a side affect of MS-gee, I wonder why?). There are so many things I am thankful for, but even better, I can recognize those things I am thankful for.
It's hard to see the forest from the trees when you are in the thick of things, no?
Blessings,
L
I got the diagnosis at one of the lowest points in my life. In December of 2008, I was rear ended by someone who rushed through a yellow light. Little did I know that day, that things would rapidly spiral downward. Approximately 6 days later, I was laid off from a job that I truly enjoyed, just before Christmas. In February, while still unemployed and trying to keep everything 'together', I woke up to drag my depressed butt to the gym and walked out to a Jeep that had been broken into. I remember looking up to the sky and saying to God "Is there anything else you would like to throw my way right now?" Be careful what you ask for. I awoke a few days later to a leg that I thought I had slept on wrong. It kinda felt like your limbs do when they start to fall asleep. It was slightly cold feeling and numb and tingling. I honestly thought I had a pinched nerve from the accident. Long story short: an MRI and spinal tap later and I had the diagnosis staring me in the face.
Over the next year, I spent my life in a very high stress job in which I doubted my abilities nearly every day. I have never cried so much in my life. I remember in college I had a professor that told us that if we wanted to learn the most, put ourselves working with the most difficult population we can find. He told that class that, after doing that, everything else you do will be easy from there on out. I did that and I threw myself in it. I don't regret the choice I made to take that job and stay there because I learned a lot about myself as a counselor and how to set boundaries with friends and family. However, I was emotionally and physically exhausted all the time. The high stress took a toll on me and the MS. I had to quit, for the sake of my sanity and my relationships.
My first attempt at medication pretty much sucked. I was on one that I took daily, which was a constant reminder of the MS. Not to mention HORRIBLE injection site reactions. It was as if I had 7 mosquito bites on my body at any given time. I itched them so much I would do it in my sleep and they would bruise. That medication did not do as well as it should have and I am now taking one that I truly don't mind. I take it weekly and the side affects are much more manageable. It's nice to not loathe the medication that is supposed to be helping improve the progression of a disease that is incurable.
I have now moved on to a job that is significantly less stressful and that I feel very effective at. I don't always like going to work all the time, but I am happy when I am there. My veil of depression has lifted, at least for now (depression is a side affect of MS-gee, I wonder why?). There are so many things I am thankful for, but even better, I can recognize those things I am thankful for.
It's hard to see the forest from the trees when you are in the thick of things, no?
Blessings,
L
Been a long time comin'
Well, I know my original intentions were to continue to write on this blog at least once weekly. Since my last post was on August 27, that hasn't happened, now has it? I have been meaning to get on here and get some things out of my head, but haven't been able to bring myself to do it. What's been floating around in my head have been thoughts related to the MS, and I truly don't like to think of it that much. This could get messy, so do your best to keep up and I'll do my best to stay on track!
I've been thinking that I would like to refer to 'my MS' as something other than that phrase. 'My MS' is not something that I want to refer to as a friend. I'm definitely not on 'friendly' terms with this disease. I don't like to think of it as something I am fighting either because then I would be fighting against myself. I don't want to do that anymore. 'My MS' is more like something that has taken up residence in my body. I've tried to evict it and the damn thing refuses to leave!! For those of you that are landlords or ever have been, you can imagine how absolutely infuriating this is!! So, I still don't know what to refer to 'my MS' as. I was thinking of referring to 'it' as Lolita or something else ridiculous. I like to have conversations with 'my MS' from time to time, so I do find it important to put a name on 'it' or something. I don't want to be friendly with 'it', but I also don't want to personalize 'it' with 'my MS.'
For now, Lolita it will be, unless someone else has a better suggestion? I do, quite often, refer to Lolita as a pain in the ass or 'the nuisance', so these terms are interchangeable as well. :-)
Peace, love, and all things sunshine
L (not to be confused with Lolita)
I've been thinking that I would like to refer to 'my MS' as something other than that phrase. 'My MS' is not something that I want to refer to as a friend. I'm definitely not on 'friendly' terms with this disease. I don't like to think of it as something I am fighting either because then I would be fighting against myself. I don't want to do that anymore. 'My MS' is more like something that has taken up residence in my body. I've tried to evict it and the damn thing refuses to leave!! For those of you that are landlords or ever have been, you can imagine how absolutely infuriating this is!! So, I still don't know what to refer to 'my MS' as. I was thinking of referring to 'it' as Lolita or something else ridiculous. I like to have conversations with 'my MS' from time to time, so I do find it important to put a name on 'it' or something. I don't want to be friendly with 'it', but I also don't want to personalize 'it' with 'my MS.'
For now, Lolita it will be, unless someone else has a better suggestion? I do, quite often, refer to Lolita as a pain in the ass or 'the nuisance', so these terms are interchangeable as well. :-)
Peace, love, and all things sunshine
L (not to be confused with Lolita)
Friday, August 27, 2010
An Obituary
R.I.P.
Inner Critic
May 30, 1980-August 27, 2010
Dear Inner Critic-
I know we have been together for a long while now, but I've been thinking. I believe deeply in my heart that this 'relationship' we have is no longer a good fit for me anymore. You have been my companion through so many trying times, but, quite honestly, you only made things worse! Although you have been with me the majority of my life, I will no longer tolerate the awful things you say to me. I have believed those lies for far too long and I now choose to think different thoughts. I am coming to see just how beautiful, competent, and sexy (that's right, I said it!) I am. You may have helped motivate me to become, what I thought, was a better person. However, I no longer want to hide behind the veil that you have so painstakingly created for me. I no longer define myself by the thoughts you planted in my mind. I am so much more than what you have been telling me I am. Your words are poison and my antidote is to destroy any remaining memory of you. I know you will try to creep back in my life and I will have safety measures in place.
I have so much more in my life now and it's time for you to move on. For that, I bid you goodbye once and for all. I wish I could say that I am sad to see this relationship end, but I am ready to move on from your grip. You no longer have a place in my life, which is a welcome change.
I love myself more than I have ever loved you...
L
Inner Critic
May 30, 1980-August 27, 2010
Dear Inner Critic-
I know we have been together for a long while now, but I've been thinking. I believe deeply in my heart that this 'relationship' we have is no longer a good fit for me anymore. You have been my companion through so many trying times, but, quite honestly, you only made things worse! Although you have been with me the majority of my life, I will no longer tolerate the awful things you say to me. I have believed those lies for far too long and I now choose to think different thoughts. I am coming to see just how beautiful, competent, and sexy (that's right, I said it!) I am. You may have helped motivate me to become, what I thought, was a better person. However, I no longer want to hide behind the veil that you have so painstakingly created for me. I no longer define myself by the thoughts you planted in my mind. I am so much more than what you have been telling me I am. Your words are poison and my antidote is to destroy any remaining memory of you. I know you will try to creep back in my life and I will have safety measures in place.
I have so much more in my life now and it's time for you to move on. For that, I bid you goodbye once and for all. I wish I could say that I am sad to see this relationship end, but I am ready to move on from your grip. You no longer have a place in my life, which is a welcome change.
I love myself more than I have ever loved you...
L
Wednesday, August 18, 2010
Resurrection
Holy canoli! Has it really been since January that I last blogged?! How time flies when you are making life decisions. So much has changed in that short amount of time, so I'll try to stay on track here.
First and foremost, I am now married to the man I am proud to call my husband. We have also recently invested in a new home for ourselves, so I will be busy with that project very soon. I am no longer vegan-I missed cheese and the occasional cow way too much. I have switched my MS meds and am liking this new one much better! I quit my job I was formerly at and am now an independent contractor back at my old employers location. I have my own space and it smells delightful in my office (that was an issue at the old place-don't ask).
So, this is the beginning of a new blog, a new outlook on life, a new chapter in my life journey. I have had let relationships fall to the wayside as I was weeding my way out the mud and muck, but I have vowed to make amends to this. I have also made a commitment to myself to make me #1 and start taking better care of my physical and emotional needs. It's so easy to lose sight of yourself when you are wrapped up in your own thoughts-ironic, no? It's time to start listening to that little voice inside myself that I, for so long, ignored and tried to make even smaller.
Just like the lotus that grows in some of the worst possible environments, I too shall begin to shine again and reach out for the sun. Along the way, I will remind myself that I am good and worthy of nothing but the best in life.
Love, light, and many blessings-
L
PS-I have made a blogpact with my dear friend Amy (http://seriouslyamy.blogspot.com). Check hers out as well, if you will.
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