What is Therapy in Treatment?
As you are looking into treatment for mental health or substance use issues, you probably have a lot of questions. For example, what is therapy in treatment?
Therapy consists of talk therapy or perhaps other types of therapies that are helpful in the healing process. Your therapist is licensed and trained, and many of them specialize in various types of mental issues and/or have specific training for different types of therapies. You may want to talk about current issues, such as relationships with family, friends, or others that are impacting you right now. Or you may need to talk about issues from your past. You can discuss stressors, emotions and feelings, or your goals and plans for your future.
Within treatment, therapy can help resolve some of the issues that come up as you address your mental health and/or substance use issues. As you participate in treatment, you may have individual and/or group therapy. Both are very helpful as you learn more about yourself and why you have struggled up until now. As you participate in therapy, what you get out of it depends on what you put into it. Therapy is a tool that is as powerful as you choose it to be.
Why is Therapy Used in Treatment?
When you have mental health and/or substance use issues, there is typically underlying pain which is causing the behaviors you are struggling with. This pain could have been caused by abuse, trauma, bullying, loss of a loved one, or more. It is one thing just to become sober, or to receive medical treatment for a mental health issue. But those things just mask the deeper, hidden issues. Until you dig deep and address your pain, you will not heal.
Therapy provides both healing for both issues on the surface and those that are buried deep inside of you to help you overcome your mental health struggles. By finding someone who you can relate to and talk to like a normal person, you can talk to them about your unique situation. In group therapy, you can participate and learn from others. One of the best parts of this is that you can see that there are other people with similar situations and struggles. As you work together and have fun together, you will learn skills to help your healing, such as communication, trust, being present, forgiveness, and more. As you are learning and growing in treatment, therapy is a big piece of the puzzle to empower you to put` your life back together.
Are there Different Types of Therapy?
The best part of using therapy in treatment is that there is not one simple formula for therapy. There are different types of therapy, or modalities. Evidence-based therapies are those for which there is data and scientific evidence that they are effective in healing things such as mental health and substance use issues. There are some specific types of therapy which have been proven to be especially effective in mental health and substance use treatment. These include:
• Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) – this therapy is based on the theory of two opposing, or dialectical forces: acceptance and change. If you think of yourself as a stone, with soothing waves of acceptance washing over you, and the power of the waves of change all around you – those two forces together will be what shapes you. Only in DBT, you harness the power of the water to shape your life.
DBT also gives you the tools to help you to regulate your emotions better, to improve your communication skills, and to help you manage your stress better, too. DBT is particularly powerful because it puts you in control of changing your life, and gives you the skills to maintain that control better than most other forms of therapy.
• Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) – this type of therapy is perhaps more commonly known, as it has been used for so many issues. CBT is focused on you recognizing and changing your thinking, behaviors, and learning to cope better with the challenges you have. As you work together with your therapist, you can learn how to understand how your own thoughts can sometimes distort what is really happening in your life. You can also learn how to better communicate and understand other people’s behaviors and motivations, and develop more confidence and coping skills. CBT has also been very successful in treating mental health and substance use.
How Can Therapy Help Me?
If you have a mental health or substance use issue, your problems go deeper than just addressing those issues. In order to find true mental or substance recovery, you need to address the deeper pain that comes from bullying, abuse, trauma, loss, or other events that you have not yet healed from. Therapy, such as DBT or CBT, can help you to not only heal those wounds, but to put you back in control of your life all the way around. You can actually prevent future pain and live courageously in the face of all that life throws your way.
Therapy helps you to change your thinking, and even change how your mind works, as well as controlling stressors and emotions so that you can be present and healthy. Therapy gives you power. The power to heal, and the power to move forward with health, strength, and boldness.
Learn more about how therapy can help you by calling Embark Behavioral Health 1-855-809-0409 today. Find your own healing.
