hey everybody today we're going to go
over yet another DBT technique and this
is distraction and how to create a
distraction plan so like I said today
we're going to talk about distraction
and creating a distraction plan and as
always because this is part of DBT I'm
working from my handy-dandy dialectical
behavioral therapy workbook and I want
to read from it for just a second
because they talk about why distract
like why should we do this in the first
place and it's why DBT is so amazing so
they say think about all the pain you've
already been through in your life think
about all the people who hurt you
physically sexually emotionally and
verbally does it make sense to continue
hurting yourself even more in the
present does it make more sense to start
healing yourself and your wounds and I
think it does it makes a lot of sense
that we don't need to keep hurting
ourselves we should take this time to
work on ourselves and heal the wounds
that have been created and so one of the
ways to do that is to distract ourselves
from self-destructive behavior and they
just call it self-destructive behavior
because it could be any form of
self-harm whether it's actually cutting
or burning or physically hurting
ourselves to things that we do to kind
of self-sabotage and they talk about
some safer actions that you can use
there are tons they have pages and pages
these so I encourage all of you to pick
this up because it's so helpful but some
of them we've talked about before like
holding an ice cube snapping a rubber
band taking a red marker and marking on
yourself where you'd want to cut
throwing pillows against the wall as
hard as you can screaming into a pillow
write letters to people that you hate or
who hurt you cry dig your nails into
your arm without breaking the skin there
the list goes on and on and on but all
of these are alternatives and ways to
distract when the urges to self-harm get
really strong the second way to distract
is to distract pleasurable activity so
the ones I talked about before are in
the moment when you have the urges to
self-harm you snap the rubber band
right on yourself you squeeze the
IceCube you do those things but there
are so many and this is an even longer
list of pleasurable activities you can
do to distract yourself and could text a
friend you can go eat your favorite ice
cream you can go to the movie theater
watch television listen to the radio
watch a football game go hiking ride
your bike stretch your muscles have sex
exercise organize a party there are tons
of things and they're all very
pleasurable sound really nice like take
a nap I love it take a nap these are all
ways to distract you in positive ways
instead of turning into kind of that
self-destructive self-harm behavior and
it kind of gets us out of that negative
spiral that self-harm can pull us into
and that's why that's why I love DBT the
third way to distract is to distract by
thinking about someone else do something
nice for someone else
volunteer take attention off yourself go
do it says go to a local store shopping
center bookstore Park you can sit and
watch people walk by something that's
kind of fun and there's work for a lot
of my clients is I'll tell them to go to
a public place and to sit and make up
stories about the people that they see
oh that girl her name is Susan she's
from Wisconsin but she moved to LA three
years ago and she's really making her
you can make up anything you want and it
just takes your mind out of that
negative thought process that where the
triggers and the urges to self-harm are
intense and it pulls you into a whole
nother thing it can be really fun and
really distracting the fourth
distraction technique is to distract
your thoughts think about a time in your
life when it was the best that's ever
been a really fun holiday you had with
your family a vacation you took with
your friends that weekend away with your
boyfriend remembering these times and
all the happy little details can just
take you out of it almost like what I
just talked about sitting down and you
know thinking about someone else and
making up pretend stories it takes us
out of our head this instead of focusing
on someone else just puts our attention
into our own imagination like pretending
you're a superhero what would your
superpowers be what would you do
I have imagining your wildest fantasies
coming true or keep a great quote or
mantra with you and you can pull that
out and read it to yourself too and
those are great in the moment when it's
really hard to have the time to kind of
space out for a while while you think
about these things having a mantra you
say over and over could be a quick easy
thing that you can pull from your memory
and do without anybody knowing that
you're doing it the fifth distraction
technique is to distract by leaving I
tell this to my clients all the time if
you have a lot of self harm tools around
you in your home and the urges are
getting really bad get out of the house
leave if it's a bad situation and
someone is really causing a lot of
emotional disturbance and you're feeling
the triggers to self harm getting worse
and worse get out of there I got to go
oh my gosh I forgot to feed my cat oh I
have to wash my hair again oh my friend
is supposed to come over I totally
forgot you can make up any excuse and
get out of there there's no reason to
have to stay in a harmful situation
weather or even by yourself or with if
you're with others and by ourselves I
honestly find to be more more of a
struggle for my clients and so getting
out of the house going to a populated
area like I was talking about before and
focusing on someone else can be a great
distraction tool the sixth and final
distraction tool is to distract with
chores I know a lot of you are like but
I hate chores but it's a great way to
pass the time to get your mind off of
things you can mow the lawn you can
clean your bedroom you can organize your
closet you can get rid of things and
donate them to Goodwill you can do all
sorts of goodies they have a whole list
polish your shoes polish your jewelry
clean the garage wash the laundry there
are so many things that we can do
whether we want to do them or not you
could be a weird organizational freak
like me and you actually like doing that
stuff but if not it's still no matter if
you have people around if you can't
leave if you don't drive yet and you
can't get out of the house that's a nice
way to distract when you're stuck at
home so now we have all these
distraction tools all six options and a
bunch of options under that now what do
we do we have to make our distraction
plan
and the best way that we can do that is
to go through some items think of things
that may work for you we're going to
it's a trial and error basis but we're
doing our best right we're going to
create the best distraction plan that we
can now and then we're going to find out
what works and doesn't and if it doesn't
we cross it out and we replace it with a
new one now I would encourage all of you
go get a three by five card write down
one from each category at least there
might be more that we can do in the
moment keep that card with you all the
time put it in your wallet put it in
your purse make sure you have it with
you all the time
it could have your monitor on it it
could have ways to distract and things
to think about so to fantasize about
what that person is doing or just
pretend you're superhero all sorts of
clues and tricks to help you distract in
the moment now we'll put it together
what are you waiting for
make sure you carry it with you all the
time because we never know what will
trigger us am i right okay now if you
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it out stress tolerance in order
now the next um the next portion of DBT
is emotion regulation because like I
talked about in my borderline
personality disorder video which you
could click here to view