Helping Clients Heal from Self-Harm: A DBT Approach for Teens
A client tells you they have been cutting. What happens in the next ten seconds matters more than anything else you do in that session, because there is a good chance they have told someone before and watched it go badly. Some of them have been discharged by a previous therapist for saying it out loud.
Sheri Van Dijk is direct about why that keeps happening. Most clinicians will meet self-harm and very few training programs teach anyone what to do about it, which leaves practitioners improvising at the worst possible moment. The therapists who end the work are usually not being careless. They are being honest that they do not know how, and the client hears abandonment either way. So she starts with your own response, on the basis that everything after it depends on that.
Three hours on what non-suicidal self-injury is and is not, what actually drives it, and the DBT skills that reduce it. She works through assessment properly, including the questions that get you a real answer, an experiential avoidance model of the behaviour, and how to explain it to a young person and their family in a way that neither blames nor minimises. The material is pitched at older teens and young adults, and it transfers to adult clients with the language changed.
You’ll walk away with
- A way to respond in the first moments of a disclosure that builds trust instead of confirming what the client already expects
- A working distinction between NSSI and other self-destructive behaviours, and why the definition changes what you do next
- The assessment questions worth asking, including how to ask to see the injuries and why it is done matter-of-factly rather than with visible concern
- An explanation of the behaviour that a young person and their parents can both follow, without anyone being blamed for it
- The experiential avoidance model of self-harm, and what it tells you about which skills are likely to help this client
- The reasons people give when you ask, and a way to offer options to a client who genuinely does not know their own
- DBT skills chosen specifically for this behaviour, rather than the whole curriculum handed over at once
- A method for building commitment to stopping in a client who is not yet sure they want to
- A clear read on risk and protective factors, including what social contagion explains and, more usefully, what it does not
- Judgement about when self-harm is historical rather than current, and how to avoid making it the focus when the client has already moved past it
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CPD Information For Mental Health Professionals
Enjoy complete flexibility with 100% self-paced learning you can access anytime, anywhere, and on any device. This course is included with your Tatra Training membership, along with every other course in the library.
Course Duration: 3 learning hours
Certificate and CPD hours: On completion you’ll receive a Certificate of Completion to support your CPD records. Your certificates are yours to keep.
Assessment: Complete a short quiz at the end (80% pass mark), which you can resit as many times as needed.
Revisit Anytime: Come back to the course as often as you like while your membership is active, whenever you want a refresher for practice.
CPD Eligibility: This program may be suitable for CPD for professionals such as:
- Psychologists
- Counsellors and Psychotherapists
- Social Workers
- Community Workers
- Mental Health Nurses
- General Practitioners (GPs)
- Occupational Therapists
CPD requirements vary between professional bodies, so please check with your association or credentialing body to confirm you can claim CPD hours/OPD points for this program and what evidence they require.
Course Content
Meet Your Instructor
Individuals struggling with complex trauma, emotion dysregulation, and treatment-resistant mental health conditions - and the practitioners working with clients whose symptoms don't respond to traditional approaches - may need more than standard therapy to address the deep neurological patterns that drive emotional instability. Sheri Van Dijk has spent over 25 years mastering the integration of Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) with EMDR and cutting-edge trauma treatments, becoming one of the world's leading experts in helping clients develop the emotion regulation skills essential for lasting recovery.
As a bestselling author with New Harbinger Publications and EMDRIA-Approved Consultant, Van Dijk brings exceptional expertise that bridges evidence-based therapy with practical accessibility. Her award-winning book The Dialectical Behavior Therapy Skills Workbook and The Dialectical Behavior Therapy Skills Workbook for C-PTSD (2025) demonstrate her unique ability to make complex therapeutic concepts immediately usable for both clients and practitioners. Her R.O. Jones Award from the Canadian Psychiatric Association for research on using DBT skills with bipolar disorder reflects her innovative work in expanding DBT applications beyond borderline personality disorder to help diverse populations develop emotional stability.
Van Dijk's expertise spans Dialectical Behavior Therapy, Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR), Complex PTSD treatment, trauma therapy, bipolar disorder, borderline personality disorder, and what she calls helping clients move from emotional chaos to emotional mastery. Her approach recognises that many clients struggle not because they lack motivation, but because they've never been taught the specific skills needed to regulate intense emotions effectively. She specialises in working with individuals who experience emotional overwhelm, those with complex trauma histories, clients with bipolar disorder or personality disorders, and practitioners wanting to develop expertise in evidence-based emotion regulation interventions.
What sets her training apart is practical skill-building combined with trauma-informed wisdom. Van Dijk doesn't just teach DBT theory - she shows practitioners exactly how to help clients develop the concrete skills they need to manage crisis situations, regulate intense emotions, and build the distress tolerance that makes recovery possible. Her integration of EMDR with DBT creates comprehensive approaches that address both trauma processing and skill development simultaneously.
For your practice, expect to gain specific DBT techniques for different diagnostic presentations, tools for integrating trauma processing with emotion regulation skills, and frameworks for making evidence-based therapies accessible to clients across various mental health conditions. Her approach particularly benefits clinicians working with emotion dysregulation, those treating complex trauma presentations, or practitioners wanting to develop expertise in DBT and EMDR integration.
Quick Win: Van Dijk's "TIPP" technique (Temperature change, Intense exercise, Paced breathing, Progressive muscle relaxation) helps clients regulate crisis-level emotions - to prevent self-harm or impulsive behaviors while building confidence in their ability to manage intense feelings.
Qualifications
- MSW, Social Work, University of Toronto, Canada, 2003–2004
- BSW, Social Work, York University, Canada, 2001–2003
- B.A., Sociology and Criminology, University of Toronto, Canada, 1993–1997
- Registered Social Worker (RSW), College of Social Workers and Social Service Workers
- EMDR-trained and EMDRIA-Approved Consultant
- Advanced training: Deep Brain Reorienting (DBR), Neurofeedback, Safe and Sound Protocol (SSP)
- 25+ years experience in mental health field
Authored Books
- The Dialectical Behavior Therapy Skills Workbook for C-PTSD (2025, New Harbinger Publications)
- Don't Let Your Emotions Run Your Life for Teens (bestseller, New Harbinger Publications)
- DBT Made Simple (2013, New Harbinger Publications)
- The Dialectical Behavior Therapy Skills Workbook for Bipolar Disorder (2009, New Harbinger Publications)
- Calming the Emotional Storm (New Harbinger Publications)
- The DBT Workbook for Emotional Relief (New Harbinger Publications)
- The Bipolar Workbook for Teens (co-author, New Harbinger Publications)
Professional Experience
- Psychotherapist, Private Practice, Newmarket, Ontario, Canada, December 2003–present (21+ years)
- EMDR Consultant, EMDRIA-Approved
- International Trainer and Consultant, DBT and EMDR
- Mental Health Therapist, Southlake Regional Health Centre, Outpatient Mental Health Clinic, March 2004–July 2018 (14+ years)
- Founder, Ananda Mental Health Workshops, Barrie, Ontario, January 2017–April 2020
Treatment Populations
- Individuals aged 16 and older
- Complex trauma survivors and C-PTSD presentations
- Clients with bipolar disorder and mood disorders
- Borderline personality disorder and emotion dysregulation
- Anxiety disorders, depression, and PTSD
- Eating disorders and substance use disorders (secondary to mental health issues)
Ready to help clients develop genuine emotion regulation skills while processing complex trauma? Discover how Sheri Van Dijk's integrated DBT and EMDR methods can transform your ability to help clients move from emotional chaos to emotional mastery through evidence-based skills designed to work in crisis situations.
Feedback & Reviews
This course includes:
- Lessons 2
- Topics 2
- Duration 3 hours
- Quizzes 1
- Language English