Summit Counselling Services — Modality
Dialectical Behaviour TherapyFeeling things intensely isn't the problem. Not having the skills to manage that intensity is.
DBT is a powerful, skills-based approach developed for people whose emotions feel overwhelming, uncontrollable, or too big for their lives. It builds the capacity to feel fully — without being swept away — and to build a life that feels worth living.
What Is DBT?
Acceptance and change — held at the same time.
Dialectical Behaviour Therapy was developed by psychologist Marsha Linehan in the late 1980s, originally for people with borderline personality disorder. It has since been adapted and validated for a wide range of presentations where emotional intensity and dysregulation are central. Today it is one of the most evidence-based approaches in clinical psychology.
The word "dialectical" refers to the core tension DBT holds: the simultaneous truth that you are doing the best you can right now, and that you need to change. Acceptance and change are not opposites in DBT — they are both necessary, both valid, and both part of what the therapy works to build.
DBT focuses on helping clients increase their ability to feel emotions fully — without those emotions overwhelming them or driving behaviour they later regret. It does this through a concrete set of skills, organized into four modules, that are designed to be learned and practiced in everyday life rather than just discussed in session.
For people who have always felt their emotions more intensely than others seem to — who have been told they're "too sensitive," "too reactive," or "too much" — DBT is often the first approach that finally fits. It doesn't pathologize emotional intensity. It meets it with tools.
"DBT doesn't ask you to feel less. It asks you to build the capacity to feel fully — without your feelings making all your decisions for you."
Who DBT was designed for
- People who experience emotions as more intense, more rapid, and slower to return to baseline than others
- Those who have been told they're "too sensitive" or "too reactive" throughout their lives
- People whose relationships are significantly affected by emotional intensity or instability
- Those who use self-destructive behaviours — self-harm, substance use, bingeing, raging — to cope with overwhelming emotion
- People with a diagnosis of borderline personality disorder (BPD) or emotionally unstable personality
- Those with chronic suicidal ideation or recurrent self-harm
- People with complex trauma histories where emotion dysregulation is a central feature
- Those who have tried other therapies without lasting effect — particularly when emotional reactivity is the underlying driver
- People with eating disorders, particularly binge-purge presentations
- Those with co-occurring anxiety, depression, or PTSD involving significant emotional dysregulation
The DBT Skills
Four modules — each addressing a different dimension of emotional life
DBT teaches skills across four domains. Together they build a comprehensive toolkit for managing emotion, tolerating distress, improving relationships, and staying grounded.
Mindfulness
The foundation of all four modules. Mindfulness in DBT is not about relaxation or meditation — it's about learning to observe your experience without immediately reacting to it. Noticing what's happening inside without judgment, and choosing how to respond rather than being driven by automatic emotional reactions.
Distress Tolerance
Skills for surviving crisis moments without making things worse. When emotion is at its peak and urges toward self-destructive behaviour are strongest, distress tolerance skills provide alternatives — ways to get through the moment without acting in ways that create more pain. Accepting reality rather than fighting it is a central skill here.
Emotion Regulation
Understanding how emotions work — what triggers them, what maintains them, and how to influence them. This module builds the capacity to reduce emotional vulnerability, increase positive emotional experiences, and change unwanted emotional states using specific, evidence-based strategies. The goal is not to eliminate emotion but to gain agency over it.
Interpersonal Effectiveness
Skills for maintaining relationships, communicating needs clearly, and holding self-respect in interactions with others. Intense emotions frequently damage relationships — this module builds the skills to navigate conflict, ask for what you need, say no, and maintain connection even when things are hard.
What DBT Helps With
DBT has strong evidence across a wide range of presentations
Originally developed for BPD, DBT's evidence base has expanded significantly — it is now a validated treatment for any presentation where emotional dysregulation is a central feature.
Borderline Personality Disorder
DBT was originally developed for BPD and remains the gold-standard treatment. It directly addresses the emotional instability, relationship difficulties, identity disturbance, and self-destructive behaviours that characterize the disorder — with decades of research behind it.
Self-Harm & Suicidal Ideation
DBT has more evidence for reducing self-harm and suicidal behaviour than any other psychological treatment. It addresses both the emotional drivers of self-harm and the specific behaviours — building alternative coping strategies while working on the underlying dysregulation.
Mood & Personality Disorders
Emotional dysregulation is a common thread across many mood and personality presentations. DBT skills reduce the emotional volatility that drives symptoms across a range of diagnoses — including bipolar disorder, where distress tolerance and emotion regulation skills are particularly valuable.
Complex Trauma & PTSD
Complex trauma frequently involves significant emotional dysregulation as a core feature. DBT is often used as a stabilization phase before trauma processing — building the emotional and distress tolerance skills needed to do deeper trauma work safely.
Anxiety & Depression
When anxiety or depression is driven by intense emotional reactivity, emotional avoidance, or a pattern of being overwhelmed and then shutting down, DBT's emotion regulation and distress tolerance skills offer a targeted framework that standard CBT approaches may not fully address.
Eating Disorders
DBT is particularly effective for binge-purge presentations and other eating disorder behaviours that function as emotional regulation strategies. Addressing the underlying dysregulation directly — rather than only the eating behaviour — often produces more sustainable change.
Building a Life Worth Living
The goal of DBT isn't to feel less. It's to suffer less.
Marsha Linehan, who developed DBT, was clear that the goal of treatment was not to eliminate emotion or turn clients into people who feel things less. Emotional intensity is not the enemy. The goal is to build a life that is rich enough, connected enough, and meaningful enough that the intense emotions have something worth feeling for — and enough skill in managing them that they don't constantly derail it.
This is what DBT means by "building a life worth living." Not a perfect life. Not an easy life. A life that has enough good in it, and enough tools for managing the hard, that staying in it feels like the clear choice.
At Summit, our DBT-trained therapists bring this framework into individual therapy — adapting the skills-based approach to your specific situation, history, and goals. Whether you're coming in at a point of crisis or looking to address long-standing patterns, DBT offers a concrete, evidence-based path forward.
DBT & CBT
How DBT relates to — and differs from — CBT
DBT grew out of CBT but added significant elements that standard CBT doesn't include. Understanding the difference helps you know which is the better fit.
Where DBT builds on CBT
- Shares CBT's emphasis on the relationship between thoughts, feelings, and behaviour
- Uses similar cognitive restructuring techniques for unhelpful thought patterns
- Both are structured, skills-focused, and present-oriented
- Both have a strong evidence base and are active rather than passive approaches
- Both involve between-session practice and skill application in daily life
What DBT adds that CBT doesn't
- A strong acceptance component — validating the client's experience rather than only changing it
- Specific distress tolerance skills for crisis survival without making things worse
- A full module dedicated to interpersonal effectiveness in relationships
- Explicit dialectical thinking — holding apparently contradictory truths simultaneously
- Greater emphasis on the therapeutic relationship as a vehicle for change
- Developed specifically for severe emotional dysregulation — more intensive than standard CBT
Book a Session
DBT therapists in Edmonton, St. Albert & Windermere
DBT is available in person at all three Summit locations, and virtually for clients anywhere in Alberta.
Wîhkwêntôwin ᐄᐧᐦᑫᐧᐣᑑᐃᐧᐣ (Oliver)
Grandin Plaza, 2nd Floor
Edmonton, AB
Common Questions
Dialectical Behaviour Therapy — your questions answered
Our Therapists
Summit therapists who use Dialectical Behaviour Therapy
The clinicians below have training and experience in DBT. Start with a free 15-minute consultation — no commitment required — to find the right fit for your specific situation.
Related Approaches
Other modalities we work with
Your emotions don't have to run the show. Let's build something different.
Your first consultation is free — no commitment, no pressure. Just a conversation about where you are and whether DBT is the right fit for you.
We acknowledge that our practice is located in Treaty 6 territory, on the traditional lands of the Cree, Saulteaux, Niitsitapi (Blackfoot), Métis, and Nakota Sioux Peoples, including our Brewery District office in Wîhkwêntôwin ᐄᐧᐦᑫᐧᐣᑑᐃᐧᐣ (Oliver). We recognize that healing and reconciliation is a responsibility shared by all.
Summit Counselling Services is a counselling practice operating our of Edmonton and St. Albert. We provide clinical services to children, adolescents, adults, seniors, couples, and families. We have a talented team of Edmonton psychologists, therapists and counsellors with a wide range of specializations and trainings at Summit Counselling Services who would be honoured to walk beside you on your journey. At Summit, we believe in therapy your way. Our goal is to customize your psychotherapy and counselling sessions to best suit your needs. We believe in the differences and unique perspectives each person brings to therapy and incorporate these into our work with you.