Cognitive Behaviour Therapy
“We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them”
Albert Einstein
What is CBT?
Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT) can help people who are experiencing a wide range of mental health difficulties, that include, but are not confined to: anxiety, depression, OCD & panic. What people think can affect how they feel and how they behave. This is the basis of CBT.
During times of mental distress, people think differently about themselves and what happens to them. Thoughts can become extreme and unhelpful. This can worsen how a person feels. They may then behave in a way that prolongs their distress.
CBT practitioners help each person identify and change their extreme thinking and unhelpful behaviour. In doing this, the result is often a major improvement in how a person feels and lives.
Cognitive and behavioural psychotherapies are a range of therapies based on concepts and principles derived from psychological models of human emotion and behaviour.
If you have experienced traumatic events or experiences, you will be offered an adapted form of CBT – called Trauma Focused CBT.
Theoretical Perspective of CBT
The term ‘Cognitive-Behavioural Therapy’ (CBT) is variously used to refer to behaviour therapy, cognitive therapy, and to therapy based on the pragmatic combination of principles of behavioural and cognitive theories.
What to expect from Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT)
Your therapist is likely to take a didactic, or teaching approach, to help you to identify the links between your thoughts, feelings and behaviour. The aim of this ultimately being that you will learn the skills to become your own therapist, and can apply these skills to other situations. You will establish a ‘problem hierarchy’ meaning that we will collaboratively establish the priority of issues that CBT will focus upon. CBT will also require you to undertake tasks between sessions, for instance, once you have understood the basic principles, you may be asked to keep a diary so that the content of your thoughts in certain situations can be identified. You will be taught how to ‘evidence base or challenge’ the content of these thoughts, in order to reduce your distress.
There may also be situations you are avoiding due to how you are feeling, these will also be discussed with you, and you may be taught some anxiety management techniques in order to help you to begin to expose yourself to situations that you are avoiding, (this is called ‘situational exposure’). There will be an agenda for each session, which will begin with the progress of between-session activity. The idea of engaging in cognitive challenging, and situational exposure is that your anxiety will reduce, and that functioning will increase, thus leading to an increase in your mood, and an improvement in your overall wellbeing.
Intensive CBT (usually more than 8 sessions) will involve your therapist offering you a ‘formulation’ of how your difficulties have developed, and will seek to address more deep seated, core beliefs and cycles of behaviour. Once you have challenged these beliefs, it is hoped that you will experience enduring release from long standing distress.
I am interested in finding out more about CBT @ Nine Wellbeing –
What should I do?
Please contact to find out more about booking an initial consultation with Nicola.
You can find out more about the consultation process here.
Nicola Forshaw holds a Masters Degree in Counselling (with distinction), a diploma in Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, and a certificate in Dialectical Behaviour Therapy. Nicola is a highly experienced trauma/PTSD therapist and is fully qualified in EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitisation and Reprocessing). She is accredited by BACP (British Association of Counselling & Psychotherapy), and is also a registered member.