DBT-C is a treatment program that helps emotionally sensitive children and their parents. DBT initially focuses on working with parents to create a validating and change-oriented home environment for children who exhibit behavioral and emotional dysregulation.
Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT) is an evidence-based therapy that combines a cognitive behavioral framework with a mindfulness-based approach to help individuals across the lifespan who struggle to regulate their emotions, manage their behavior, and relate to others effectively. DBT has demonstrated to be an effective treatment for trauma disorders, self-harm, anxiety, depression, substance use, eating disorders, and borderline personality disorder.
A comprehensive DBT model includes individual therapy, group skills training, phone coaching, and participation of the DBT therapist on a consultation team that meets weekly. Dr. Mitchell currently participates on a consultation team and conducts weekly DBT therapy and phone coaching as needed. At this time he works with three other local practices to coordinate group skills training participation for adolescents and young adults.
CBT is a structured and time-limited psychotherapy that has demonstrated effectiveness in the treatment of many psychological disorders. CBT utilizes various cognitive and behavioral techniques in a solution-focused, problem solving approach that helps clients identify treatment goals and overcome obstacles presented in their lives. Participation in CBT enables clients to learn skills to change their thinking and behavior so they can improve their functioning and sense of well-being.
The Coping Cat is a cognitive behavioral therapy program designed to reduce anxiety in children ages 8-13, while the C.A.T. Project is the adolescent version of the Coping Cat. The program is 16-weeks long and divided into two parts. The first eight sessions focus on identifying the nature of the child’s anxieties, increasing flexibility in thinking, and learning cognitive and behavioral strategies when the child becomes anxious. The second eight sessions primarily focus on applying the CBT strategies when exposed to increasingly anxiety-provoking situations.
School or home-based observations are typically utilized to assess problems that are causing interference in school but are not necessarily evident in all contexts or in the one-on-one setting of individual therapy. Most often observations are utilized to help diagnose ADHD and disruptive behavior disorders (e.g., Oppositional Defiant Disorder), but they are also useful to identify the presence of selective mutism, social anxiety, depression, and learning disorders.
Patrick Mitchell and Zeke Strober are trained in Supportive Parenting for Anxious Childhood Emotions (SPACE). SPACE, developed by Dr. Eli Lebowitz at the Yale Child Study Center, is an evidence-based treatment for children and adolescents who are experiencing an anxiety disorder and/or OCD.
Structure of SPACE: Over a 12-weeks, caregivers learn how to adjust their parenting style to help their children. SPACE is done with just the parents in 12 weekly sessions. SPACE sessions can be completed either via telehealth or in person in the office.
Goals of SPACE: Parents who participate in SPACE will learn skills and tools to help their child overcome anxiety, OCD or related problems. Parents learn through the 12 week program how to change their own behavior to help their children, how to respond more supportively to their anxious child, and how to reduce the accommodations that they have been making within the home for their child.