Friends and Family DBT Program
At Front Range Treatment Center

A group of four friends standing shoulder to shoulder, facing a sunset on a grassy hill.

Friends and Family DBT Program

Is your loved one struggling with strong emotions or BPD? Our Friends and Family DBT program can help.

Perhaps your relationship with your loved one is suffering, or you’d like to know how to better support them. Maybe you want education on what your loved one is going through, additional support for yourself, or guidance on how to set better boundaries.

If your loved one is struggling with any of the following issues, Friends and Family DBT might be able to help you.

  • Borderline personality disorder (BPD)

  • Severe depression

  • Suicidal behaviors or thoughts

  • Self-harm

  • Intense anger or emotional outbursts

  • Concerning, dangerous, or unsafe behaviors

Friends and Family DBT Program Options

  • In DBT Skills Classes, persons with BPD (or other issues of high emotion) learn new skills to reduce suffering, improve their quality of life, and build quality relationships. In Family-DBT Skills Class, the loved ones of such persons learn the same skills in a curriculum modified for their situations.

    This class provides education about BPD and teaches DBT skills, tailored for persons who love someone with BPD (whether they are in our DBT program or not).

    Class members learn how to support their loved ones, improve their relationship with their loved ones, while reducing their own distress.

    Contact us to signup for the next round of our class, or signup to be notified when the next course begins.

  • We offer one-on-one sessions for the loved ones of persons with borderline personality disorder. We often work with the family members of persons in our Comprehensive DBT program. We also work with the family members of persons receiving treatment elsewhere, and the family members of persons who refuse to seek treatment.

    In individual sessions, we teach DBT skills. This is so you can learn what your loved one is learning (allowing you to support their treatment), and so you can learn more effective ways of interacting with them. In these sessions we can also offer emotional support. Loving someone with BPD can be difficult, and it is important to take care of yourself. As BPD therapists, we understand the toll it can take, and we can teach new ways of responding that will reduce your own distress.

    Contact us today to request a phone consultation with a BPD specialist in our DBT program, to learn more how we can help you.

  • If you still need additional support, check out our Adult DBT program, Couples DBT program, or contact us for more options.

Person wearing a yellow sweater typing on a laptop at a wooden desk.

Friends and Family DBT Skills Class

Our online Friends and Family DBT Skills Class runs four times a year.

This class offers education and skills for persons who love someone with Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD), BPD traits, or other issues of strong emotions. You’ll learn skills to help you better interact with your loved one, promote your own well-being, and better understand emotion dysregulation.

  • Length: 12 weeks

  • Day and Time: Wednesdays from Noon-1pm

  • Meeting Details: We meet online using Zoom.

  • Cost

    • $900 (if paid weekly, at $75 a week for 12 weeks).

    • You can save $50 if you prepay for a course upfront ($850).

    • You can also receive 50% a second spot when you prepay for yourself and a family member ($1275 for two participants).

How can DBT Skills Class Help Friends & Family?

Learning DBT skills has many benefits. Our modified DBT skills curriculum for Friends and Family is designed to give you skills to better interact with your loved one. In addition, if your loved one is in our Adult DBT Program or Teen DBT Program, it can be helpful to know the skills so you can support their use of skills.

  • One major symptom of borderline personality disorder is unstable interpersonal relationships. When a loved one suffers from borderline personality disorder (BPD), the whole family suffers. When a parent, child, sibling, or spouse suffers from BPD, the effects on the family as a whole can be profound. It affects everyone in the family, and can be very distressing.

  • Often, persons with BPD will alternate between extreme affection and rejection, dependency and anger. They may do or say hurtful things, or engage in dangerous and risky behaviors. It can be very painful to stand by and watch a loved one with BPD engage in such frightening, self-destructive behaviors.

  • Another group of common symptoms can be very distressing to others: threatening to commit suicide, attempting suicide, or engaging in self-injury (such as cutting). All of these things can make it very difficult to love someone with borderline personality disorder.

  • Sometimes, persons with borderline personality disorder are not interested in, or ready for, treatment. In such cases, family members and close friends may be forced to seek help for themselves. If the person with borderline personality disorder is in treatment, their family members may decide to supplement that process by seeking out counseling for themselves.

DBT-LBC Certified Program

Meet our Friends and Family DBT Skills Class Instructor, Shyla.

DBT Therapist Shyla Ford-Marchion

Shyla is a therapist in our comprehensive DBT program. She leads many of our DBT classes, and has taught Family DBT for years.

Shyla Ford-Marchion is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker, licensed in Colorado and Florida. She graduated from Loyola University of Chicago in 2014 with a Master’s of Social Work. Shyla has dedicated over 15 years to helping individuals, couples and families in the areas of mental illness, aging, self harm and suicidality.

Questions about Family DBT? Click here to email Shyla, and she’ll get back to you soon.