DBT Comprehensive Program

Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) is the treatment of choice for individuals diagnosed with borderline personality disorder and those with suicidal behaviors including self-injury. This treatment is uniquely good as a treatment for individuals struggling with intense emotions, excessive relational conflict, extreme thinking, and/or destructive behaviors. Pauquette offers a comprehensive DBT program for adults, adolescents, and children.

Program Mission Statement

The Pauquette Center as a whole and our DBT program are committed to providing compassionate care to members of our Wisconsin communities. Our program assists clients in achieving a life worth living with a team of therapists that will stand side by side with each of them in their journey to find that life.

Diversity Statement

Our DBT program values the uniqueness of all people and strives to provide a treatment environment that is safe, welcoming, and inclusive for all people regardless of race, ethnicity, religion, age, sexual orientation, gender identity, physical ability, learning style, learning needs, and any other cultural factors. We are committed to providing culturally responsive care. We are dedicated to ongoing learning that will help meet the needs of underrepresented individuals and populations. We strive to deliver and continuously improve services in which all our clients can see themselves achieving their goals.

To this end, we feel it is greatly important to address barriers to these goals including any activity in treatment that may result in exclusion or a compromised perception of safety. Derogatory or abusive statements or behavior toward anyone in our care will not be tolerated and will be addressed with the focus on responding to harm in ways that expand understanding, growth, compassion, and safety for all.

Our Adult Program

The DBT program for adults follows the evidenced-based model of DBT. For individuals 18 years and older (18 year olds must be out of high school) our program includes two, one hour groups and one hour of individual therapy per week. Phone coaching is available to help clients learn to apply skills in their real-life situations closer to the time that they’re experiencing difficulty.

The goal of DBT is to help clients move closer to their life worth living goals by reducing the extremes and obstacles in living and increasing skillful and effective behaviors that enhance their lives.

Our Adolescent Program

For individuals 15+, Pauquette offers a multifamily group that meets once per week for two hours. One caregiver is required to attend with the adolescent client to assist with generalizing learning to the home. The adolescent client will also meet individually with a therapist once a week.

For younger adolescents, a determination will be made during the initial screening as to whether placement in the multifamily group or with an individual
therapist alone is appropriate.

Our Child Program

This DBT-C program requires a greater commitment from caregivers than from the child themselves as the foundational assumption of DBT-C is that the behavior of the child is irrelevant until the environment is prepared to help them change.

Caregivers learn skills about validation, acceptance, and learning/behavior change to assist the caregiver in staying regulated in the presence of difficult behavioral concerns and to create a validating and supportive environment for their child to grow.

Most caregivers participate in the weekly “parent training” group that meets for one hour per week in addition to working individually with a DBT-C therapist. After foundational skills are learned, the child may be incorporated into their own weekly sessions while the caregiver sessions continue.

Our Referral Process

A provider or individual submits a referral. Upon receipt of that referral, someone from Pauquette will call to gather additional information and schedule a one-hour screening with one of our DBT clinicians. The purpose of the screening is to share some basic information about the program and gather information from the client to determine if they meet the requirements of the program. Once the screening is completed, the information is shared with the entire DBT team to assign a clinician. This meeting happens the first Thursday of every month. At that meeting, a client is either assigned to a clinician (if one is available) to proceed with scheduling or, if no clinician is immediately available, the client is placed on the waitlist. The client is informed of the team decision shortly after this meeting.

Once the client is assigned to a DBT provider, they complete a DBT-specific intake and another 3-5 sessions of “pre-treatment.” The purpose of pre-treatment is to provide clients information about DBT, our program and expectations as well as to help clients determine if they believe the program will be a good fit for them and if they’re ready and willing to make the needed commitments. If clients are already established with a non-DBT provider, they should remain active with their current therapist throughout this process until the end of pre-treatment when they are fully committed to and enrolled in the program.