April Showers

DBT
Written By Nissa White, LPC

I am sure you have heard the phrase “April showers bring May time flowers.” What I bet you have not heard is that April is technically National Stress Awareness Month. Both of these two things relate. The showers we tend to have in life involve some sort of stress or worry. We know that “May” will come and our stress will pass, however, in the moment it feels very overwhelming.

In Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) we teach body skills and brain skills. A body skill that is very specific to stress is TIPP. The last two letters stand for paced breathing and progressive muscle relaxation. A certain type of breath work, square breathing, has been concluded as one of the most effective methods for stress specifically. Along with stress comes body tension. To release body tension from stress you can inhale and squeeze the areas of your body that are tense and when you exhale, release your tension in your muscles and tell yourself to “let go”.

So the next time you feel like the April showers are taking over, remember to use TIPP to get you through to the May time flowers.

Nissa White, LPC

Nissa is a professional counselor and intensively trained DBT therapist, who provides individual and group therapy for patients struggling with anxiety, mood disorders and executive functioning issues. She enjoys working with children, adolescents and adults. She is also trained in rehabilitation counseling and integrates educational rehabilitation and work rehabilitation into her treatment planning through coaching. She integrates these modalities with behavioral skills training in order to provide effective treatment for her patients.

Previous

Power of Poetry
Next

Spring into Mindfulness