Cognitive Behavioral Therapy v dietitian and why?

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kshama2001
kshama2001 Posts: 27,905 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
If you could only afford one of the following types of professional help for weight loss, would it be Cognitive Behavioral Therapy or a dietitian? Why?

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  • kommodevaran
    kommodevaran Posts: 17,890 Member
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    I used to think I needed both, and a chef, and a PT, and someone to just sit on me when cravings hit. A few simple modifications to diet, food environment and attitude - and I need neither.
  • spiriteagle99
    spiriteagle99 Posts: 3,676 Member
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    It really depends on why you have weight issues. If you are a binge eater, an emotional eater, depressive, etc. you might benefit from CBT. If, like me, you just enjoy fattening foods, then CBT isn't going to do much. I can control what and how much I eat when I want, I just don't always choose to.
  • creatureofchaos
    creatureofchaos Posts: 65 Member
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    earlnabby wrote: »
    kshama2001 wrote: »
    If you could only afford one of the following types of professional help for weight loss, would it be Cognitive Behavioral Therapy or a dietitian? Why?

    Therapist. The info an RD can give you is available elsewhere. The help you get from a therapist is not.

    ^ This.
  • cmriverside
    cmriverside Posts: 33,969 Member
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    @kshama2001you looking for a new career?

    I wouldn't pay either one of those. This site is both. But then, I always knew about calories - I just had to tweak my nutrition and be accountable.

    I've had no luck with therapy in general. Again, this site has been great for that side of my issues. Forums in general are great for internal struggles. I've learned a lot about myself here and on other forums.
  • ziggy2006
    ziggy2006 Posts: 255 Member
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    CBT is a bit different than other therapeutic approaches - you can actually find a lot of effective self-help books and workbooks that are based on CBT and can be very helpful.

    While a dietitian could be helpful, I would probably prefer to spend money on some personal training sessions.
  • collectingblues
    collectingblues Posts: 2,541 Member
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    earlnabby wrote: »
    kshama2001 wrote: »
    If you could only afford one of the following types of professional help for weight loss, would it be Cognitive Behavioral Therapy or a dietitian? Why?

    Therapist. The info an RD can give you is available elsewhere. The help you get from a therapist is not.

    This. My therapist insists that I see an RD, but if I could only afford one, I'd stick with the therapist. My dietitian is helpful in getting me to the point of starting to see that food is not the enemy, but that's hand in hand with the therapist *also* helping me get to the point where I can see that pushing the food boundaries doesn't mean that the world is going to fall apart.

  • amyinthetardis1231
    amyinthetardis1231 Posts: 571 Member
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    Depends on whether you overeat out of not being mindful or because food is a coping mechanism. Either way, it's good to be aware that CBT is far from the only form of psychotherapy that can be helpful with food issues. If your food issues stem from any kind of trauma, I'd advise almost any other kind of therapy besides CBT.
  • kshama2001
    kshama2001 Posts: 27,905 Member
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    suzannesimmons3 wrote: »
    Cbt

    dietician can tell you how to eat but you have to want to carry on eating like that.

    Cbt will fix (hopefully) fix why I eat why I do so I can learn how to be normal with food.

    This was my thinking. Was curious what others had to say. I know plenty about nutrition - what I need help with is tools to encourage me to implement my knowledge and to shut down the Sabotaging Voice.
  • kshama2001
    kshama2001 Posts: 27,905 Member
    edited September 2017
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    cmriverside wrote: »
    @kshama2001you looking for a new career?

    I wouldn't pay either one of those. This site is both. But then, I always knew about calories - I just had to tweak my nutrition and be accountable.

    I've had no luck with therapy in general. Again, this site has been great for that side of my issues. Forums in general are great for internal struggles. I've learned a lot about myself here and on other forums.

    :lol:

    No, it was another thread on which people were encouraging the OP to see a dietitian, which she doesn't feel like she can afford, but she is seeing a therapist.
  • vingogly
    vingogly Posts: 1,785 Member
    edited September 2017
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    CBT is in fact used very effectively with clients whose behaviors are linked to trauma. See for example:

    http://www.traumacenter.org/clients/cbt.php

    To the OP: be careful what you hear in this forum -- if you want to know about CBT for weight loss, talk to someone who actually has training and experience in CBT and working with trauma. For those looking for info on CBT and weight loss who want to try doing it without going to a therapist, I'd suggest Judith Beck's books and workbook (daughter of the guy who invented CBT):

    http://www.beckdietsolution.com/weight-loss-and-maintenance/
  • amyinthetardis1231
    amyinthetardis1231 Posts: 571 Member
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    I'm a therapist with considerable experience working with trauma. There is trauma-focused CBT that some therapists practice, but it is not the gold standard for trauma a treatment. Because it's a behaviorally focused model, the focus is on changing behaviors more so than actually healing trauma. CBT appears to be easier to track success with because the goals tend to be more concrete and therefore more easily measured than many other forms of therapy, but that doesn't make it superior. It's fine for many things but doesn't always provide the long term effects people expect.
  • vingogly
    vingogly Posts: 1,785 Member
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    amyinthetardis1231 wrote: »
    I'm a therapist with considerable experience working with trauma. There is trauma-focused CBT that some therapists practice, but it is not the gold standard for trauma a treatment. Because it's a behaviorally focused model, the focus is on changing behaviors more so than actually healing trauma. CBT appears to be easier to track success with because the goals tend to be more concrete and therefore more easily measured than many other forms of therapy, but that doesn't make it superior. It's fine for many things but doesn't always provide the long term effects people expect.

    I attended a couple of seminars on trauma at a state conference a few months ago -- including an all-day session on Acceptance and Commitment Therapy. There were a number of folks there with experience working with trauma clients, and what I was hearing was that ACT (essentially a form of CBT) was very effective with trauma clients including PTSD. Whether it's the "gold standard" for treatment, I don't know because that's not an area of expertise with me -- it's what I've heard in conferences from people who do work with a lot of trauma clients. I do stand by my statement that people should be careful with the information they hear on these forums. No offense to you.

    https://www.ptsd.va.gov/professional/continuing_ed/actherapy.asp
  • ugofatcat
    ugofatcat Posts: 385 Member
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    So I am a dietitian and have done some training in motivational interviewing. I am by no means an expert, but motivational interviewing is a way to help people explore their readiness and willingness to make changes. We try to elicit something called "change talk". An example of change talk would be a patient saying, "I know I should walk when I get home from work, but I am just so tired." Motivational interviewing tries to get the patient, not the counselor, to make arguments for why they should make the change.

    Please understand that just because you are going to a dietitian, doesn't mean you will only be getting nutrition 101. When I work with patients wanting to lose weight I nearly always end up feeling like a counselor.

    Seeing a CB therapist will be a lot more intensive then anything I could provide, as they are far more specialized and trained then me. However, there are some dietitians who have masters in social work, psychology, etc, as well, so that would probably be ones best bet.
  • lemurcat12
    lemurcat12 Posts: 30,886 Member
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    Mezzie1024 wrote: »
    That would complete depend on why you have issues with weight.

    This. I didn't see either (although I have some familiarity with CBT from other contexts and read Beck Diet Solution). I wouldn't assuming everyone needs to see a dietitian or therapist (in fact, I'd recommend them in a weight loss context to comparatively few people). I do think there are people who would be helped by one or the other, so it would depend on the specifics/what the person was struggling with.
  • amyinthetardis1231
    amyinthetardis1231 Posts: 571 Member
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    vingogly wrote: »
    amyinthetardis1231 wrote: »
    *Snip, no need to quote myself*

    I attended a couple of seminars on trauma at a state conference a few months ago -- including an all-day session on Acceptance and Commitment Therapy. There were a number of folks there with experience working with trauma clients, and what I was hearing was that ACT (essentially a form of CBT) was very effective with trauma clients including PTSD. Whether it's the "gold standard" for treatment, I don't know because that's not an area of expertise with me -- it's what I've heard in conferences from people who do work with a lot of trauma clients. I do stand by my statement that people should be careful with the information they hear on these forums. No offense to you.
    ugofatcat wrote: »
    So I am a dietitian and have done some training in motivational interviewing. I am by no means an expert, but motivational interviewing is a way to help people explore their readiness and willingness to make changes. We try to elicit something called "change talk". An example of change talk would be a patient saying, "I know I should walk when I get home from work, but I am just so tired." Motivational interviewing tries to get the patient, not the counselor, to make arguments for why they should make the change.
    *snip*

    My main reason for challenging CBT as the go-to form of therapy is that in these forums, as in many other places, it's usually the go-to response when people ask about therapy. The true gold standard of therapy for ANY reason is the relationship between therapist and client. That relationship is where healing happens, regardless of methodology. The problem is that when something like CBT becomes popularized and it's all people know about, they assume it'll work for everyone and everything. That's just not the case. It's good for some things and some people, terrible for other things and other people. From my experience, MI (motivational interviewing) is a better way of approaching ambivalence and making changes, and there are a number of other models of therapy I'd recommend over CBT for trauma work based on my own experience. For the reasons I stated previously, researchers often use CBT bc it's easier to measure behavioral changes than subjective client reports of feeling better. Therapy is an art as much or more than a science, it doesn't lend itself very well to concrete measurements.

    I do agree that people should be careful with info they get on forums, which is why I wanted to speak up and point out that CBT specifically will not be ideal for everyone. There are lots of ways of doing therapy out there, no one size fits all!
  • kshama2001
    kshama2001 Posts: 27,905 Member
    edited September 2017
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    amyinthetardis1231 wrote: »
    vingogly wrote: »
    amyinthetardis1231 wrote: »
    *Snip, no need to quote myself*

    I attended a couple of seminars on trauma at a state conference a few months ago -- including an all-day session on Acceptance and Commitment Therapy. There were a number of folks there with experience working with trauma clients, and what I was hearing was that ACT (essentially a form of CBT) was very effective with trauma clients including PTSD. Whether it's the "gold standard" for treatment, I don't know because that's not an area of expertise with me -- it's what I've heard in conferences from people who do work with a lot of trauma clients. I do stand by my statement that people should be careful with the information they hear on these forums. No offense to you.
    ugofatcat wrote: »
    So I am a dietitian and have done some training in motivational interviewing. I am by no means an expert, but motivational interviewing is a way to help people explore their readiness and willingness to make changes. We try to elicit something called "change talk". An example of change talk would be a patient saying, "I know I should walk when I get home from work, but I am just so tired." Motivational interviewing tries to get the patient, not the counselor, to make arguments for why they should make the change.
    *snip*

    My main reason for challenging CBT as the go-to form of therapy is that in these forums, as in many other places, it's usually the go-to response when people ask about therapy. The true gold standard of therapy for ANY reason is the relationship between therapist and client. That relationship is where healing happens, regardless of methodology. The problem is that when something like CBT becomes popularized and it's all people know about, they assume it'll work for everyone and everything. That's just not the case. It's good for some things and some people, terrible for other things and other people. From my experience, MI (motivational interviewing) is a better way of approaching ambivalence and making changes, and there are a number of other models of therapy I'd recommend over CBT for trauma work based on my own experience. For the reasons I stated previously, researchers often use CBT bc it's easier to measure behavioral changes than subjective client reports of feeling better. Therapy is an art as much or more than a science, it doesn't lend itself very well to concrete measurements.

    I do agree that people should be careful with info they get on forums, which is why I wanted to speak up and point out that CBT specifically will not be ideal for everyone. There are lots of ways of doing therapy out there, no one size fits all!

    For the record, I had a variety of modalities of therapy, some for extended periods of time, and some as intensives. I found CBT to be extremely effective in a very short period of time.

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