Trauma-Focused Therapy After DBT
After DBT: Continuing Your Healing
You’ve worked hard to change how you respond to life’s challenges. Now there may be space to explore the experiences that shaped those responses in the first place.
Maybe you’ve spent months or years in Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT). You’ve learned to recognize your emotions, manage urges, navigate relationships, and make choices that better reflect the life you want to build. You’ve worked hard to get here, and that progress matters.
Yet even with these changes, something may still feel unresolved. Perhaps you continue to struggle with shame, painful beliefs about yourself, or relationship patterns that are difficult to understand. You may recognize what’s happening and know which skills to use, but still feel the emotional weight of experiences from your past.
Therapy can offer a space to explore these deeper layers. By integrating EMDR, parts-oriented work, attachment-based and relational therapy, we can build on the foundation you’ve already developed through DBT. You don’t have to leave behind what you’ve learned. Those skills and insights can continue to support you as we explore what may still be keeping you stuck.
Who this helps
You might recognize yourself here.
- You’ve made meaningful progress in DBT but still feel emotionally stuck.
- You understand your patterns but struggle to change how you feel about yourself.
- Past experiences continue to affect your sense of safety, trust, or connection.
- You’ve developed skills to manage distress but want to explore the pain underneath it.
- You’re ready to consider trauma-focused therapy while building on the progress you’ve already made.
Building on What You’ve Already Learned
DBT provides powerful tools for navigating emotions, understanding behaviors, and responding to difficult experiences with greater awareness and intention. Those skills don’t lose their value when you begin exploring trauma. In fact, they can become important resources throughout the process.
We’ll continue using familiar concepts like mindfulness, validation, wise mind, and understanding behavioral patterns. These provide a shared language for noticing what’s happening in the present, staying grounded during difficult moments, and approaching painful experiences with curiosity rather than judgment.
The goal isn’t to start over. It’s to carry forward what you’ve learned while making room for new understanding and healing.
Common questions
Therapy after DBT, answered.
How do I know if I’m ready for trauma-focused therapy?+
Before beginning trauma processing, it’s important to make sure you have enough safety, stability, and emotional resources to support the work. The skills developed through DBT can provide a valuable foundation, helping you navigate difficult emotions and stay grounded as we explore painful experiences.
If you’re still struggling with harmful behaviors or significant emotional instability, we may need to focus on strengthening those foundations before moving into trauma processing. Together, and in collaboration with your DBT treatment team when appropriate and with your permission, we can explore your current needs and determine whether trauma-focused therapy is the right next step.
How is this different from DBT-PE?+
DBT-Prolonged Exposure (DBT-PE) is an evidence-based approach that integrates trauma treatment into comprehensive DBT. It involves gradually revisiting traumatic memories, including describing experiences in detail, to help reduce the distress associated with them.
EMDR offers another way to process traumatic experiences. While it involves bringing difficult memories to mind, you generally don’t need to describe everything that happened in detail. Instead, we use bilateral stimulation, such as eye movements or tapping, to support the processing of those experiences.
Both approaches can be effective for trauma. My work integrates EMDR with parts-oriented, attachment-based, and relational therapy, while continuing to draw on the DBT skills and concepts you already know. Together, we can explore which approach best fits your needs and goals.
Will we still use DBT skills in our sessions?+
Absolutely. The skills and insights you’ve developed through DBT can continue to be valuable resources in our work together. We may draw on familiar concepts like mindfulness, wise mind, validation, and understanding behavioral patterns to help you navigate difficult emotions and experiences. Rather than starting over, we’ll build on what you’ve already learned, integrating those skills into trauma-focused therapy in ways that support your continued healing.
For DBT Therapists and Treatment Providers
I welcome opportunities to connect with DBT clinicians and treatment programs supporting individuals who may benefit from continued trauma-focused therapy.
My approach builds on clients’ existing DBT skills and incorporates EMDR, parts-oriented, attachment-based, and relational therapy, with attention to clinical readiness and continuity of care.
If you’re interested in learning more about my approach or discussing whether a referral might be a good fit, I’d be happy to connect.
Related ways to work together
A gentle first step
Begin exactly where you are.
You don’t need to have the words figured out. A first conversation is simply a place to start, no pressure, no commitment.