Put the Fun Back in Panic Treatment: Paradox, Defusion, and Acceptance

This workshop uses discussion and audience practice to develop its core premise: the key to successful treatment of panic disorder is to help people recognize, and disarm, their persistent efforts to oppose and control it, and the use of humor and paradox can greatly facilitate that work.

Participants will learn to help clients develop a view of panic disorder as a trick, rather than a disease or a mental illness that must be opposed or cured. Interventions will be presented that help clients find evidence supporting this view in their own lives, and use it to reshape the client's view of panic and anxiety in ways that create progress. Interventions derived and borrowed from several schools of psychotherapy (Paradoxical Therapy, Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, and Acceptance and Commitment Therapy) will be presented, discussed, and practiced.

This session was recorded live at the 2022 Annual ADAA Conference in Denver, CO. Please note this session is not available for continuing education credits.