Anxiety Disorders Fear of Flying Addictive Behaviors Office Location & Parking

What does your addictive behavior do for you? "A" for Antecedent (Trigger) Every behavior has a trigger. When it comes to your addictive behavior, what is yours? The self-monitoring exercises I will invite you to do will help you identify what what was going on just before you lit up the cigarette, twisted off that cold beer, or sat down at the poker table. When was it?; Where where you?; Who were with?; What were you thinking?; What were you feeling in your body? "B" is for Behavior Triggers lead you to take action.  And the actions you would be looking at are the number/kind of drinks or cigarettes you smoked, etc. "C" is for Consequence Every action has a consequence.  Did the cigarette give you relief from a stressful day? Did the drink help you "numb" the anxiety you were feeling? Maybe the drink lead to some thoughts, for example, "It's just one, I can handle it." Learning the ABCs of your addictive behavior will help us find the skills that will help you manage this behavior.  In other words, knowing what the behavior does for you will lead you to ways to help prevent you from doing it more in the future.   Staying on the Road Once you and I feel that you have made sufficient progress, we begin working on a plan to help you continue driving in the direction of the life you value.  Changing behaviors--whether it is quitting smoking or managing panic attacks--are like taking a journey. You are the driver of your life and I am your traveling companion. We take our time helping you decide what direction to drive. And by this point in the therapy, you have made choices about what roads to take, and where you hope to be headed.  Lapse prevention is all about helping you to keep driving in the direction of the life you have always wanted. At this stage of therapy, we take stock of where you have been, noting what helps you stay on your course.  And we also look at what skills you learned that have been especially helpful. We put all that together in a plan for helping you stay on the road.  We also plan for any "roadside emergencies". Say, for example, you take a drink. Think of that as a flat tire. You are not back where you started.  You are just going to stop, go to the side of the road if you will, to figure out some things. How did get your flat tire? You would be looking at what triggered your flat tire.  And then you are going ask yourself: How will change your flat tire? Here, you will be looking in your trunk for all the "tools" you learned in therapy that will help you change the tire. With a solid lapse prevention plan in hand, you can more safely navigate past the triggers that might come up as you drive in the direction of the life you value.