The Speaker tonight will be Dr. Dorit Saberi, Supervising Psychologist Harbor UCLA School of Psychology and Associate Professor UCLA David Geffen School of Medicine. Dr. Saberi will be speaking about Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) and the Friends and Family Program. There will be a panel of participants from the program.. DBT is a psychotherapy treatment program first developed for treating Borderline Personality Disorder but has now been used to treat other forms of mental illness. This approach works towards helping people increase their emotional and cognitive regulation by learning about the triggers that lead to reactive states and helping to assess which coping skills to apply in the sequence of events, thoughts, feelings, and behaviors to help avoid undesired reactions.

The Friends and Family program is for family members and friends of a person with a mental illness that helps them to communicate more effectively with their loved ones and to better handle difficult situations. Many NAMI Members and graduates of the NAMI Family to Family Program have gone on to participate in the Family and Friends Program. Please come to learn about DBT and how it is used in the Friends and Family Program.