Schema Therapy in Practice: An Introductory Guide to the Schema Mode Approach

Schema Therapy in Practice presents a comprehensive introduction to schema therapy for nonspecialist practitioners wishing to incorporate it into their practice. The authors—world leaders in the field—reveal how the goals of schema therapy are to heal self–defeating schemas, to help patients stop using maladaptive coping styles, and, instead, to have patients’ emotional needs met in everyday life. Within this broad framework, they show how schema modes are the moment–to–moment emotional states and coping responses that we all experience, how they are triggered by life situations that we are oversensitive to, and how they can lead us to overreact in damaging ways. While schema therapy was originally developed for clients with borderline personality disorder, this book takes a much broader approach and shows how it can be applied across different personality disorders, as well as to chronic axis–I disorders. Featuring clear, straightforward language and numerous case examples and treatment guidelines, Schema Therapy in Practice is an invaluable resource for clinicians and therapists at all levels who wish to acquire practical knowledge of the latest schema–therapy techniques.

About the Authors vii Acknowledgments ix Introduction 1 PART I CASE CONCEPTUALIZATION 3 1 Basics 5 2 The Mode Concept 41 3 Communicating the Mode Concept to the Patient 91 PART II TREATMENT 101 4 Treatment Overview 103 5 Overcoming Coping Modes 117 6 Treating Vulnerable Child Modes 141 7 Treating Angry and Impulsive Child Modes 193 8 Treating Dysfunctional Parent Modes 217 9 Strengthening the Healthy Adult Mode 245 References 255 Index 259

Arnoud Arntz is Professor of Clinical Psychology and Experimental Psychopathology at Maastricht University, the Netherlands. He is Scientific Director of the University’s Research Center of Experimental Psychopathology. He studies psychological theories and therapies for anxiety and personality disorders, and is the principal investigator for a series of multicenter trials investigating the effectiveness of schema therapy for various personality disorders. He also practices CBT and schema therapy. Gitta Jacob is a Clinical Psychologist, Cognitive and Schema Therapist in the Department of Clinical Psychology and Psychotherapy, University of Freiburg, Germany. She is a founding board member of the International Society for Schema Therapy, and a past Chair of the Working Group on Borderline Personality Disorders at the Department of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, University Hospital Freiburg.

"The writing style is concise and grounded in the clinical setting, the case examples are clear and informative and the FAQs at the end of each chapter are well conceived. ...Arntz and Jacob manage to provide a captivating insight into what we might observe if looking in on a schema therapy session, and I think go some way toward convincing us that these are some genuinely novel ideas and methods that may deserve a place in our own consulting rooms."  ( The Psychiatrist , 1 June 2013)