Schema Therapy Sydney
Therapy for Longstanding Emotional and Relationship Difficulties
Schema Therapy is an evidence-based psychological treatment designed to help people understand and change deeply established patterns in the way they think, feel, and relate to others.
It is designed to help when difficulties feel longstanding or repetitive, when you find yourself experiencing the same painful emotions, relationship patterns or ways of coping.
“I understand why I do this, but I still can't seem to change it”
What is Schema Therapy?
Schema Therapy is an integrative therapy developed from CBT that focuses on deeply established emotional patterns, known as schemas. Schemas develop when important emotional needs are not adequately met during childhood and adolescence.
These patterns or scripts made sense and helped us cope during our growing up years, which is why we held onto them so closely. When these schemas continue into adulthood, they are no longer helpful and keep us trapped in cycles of pain, loneliness and instability.
You may recognise patterns such as:
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feeling fundamentally inadequate, defective or different from others
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expecting rejection, abandonment or betrayal
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repeatedly finding yourself in difficult, unsatisfying or volatile relationships
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putting other people's needs ahead of your own, people pleasing
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finding it difficult to prioritise yourself and set boundaries with others
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being highly self-critical, perfectionistic or demanding of yourself
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experiencing intense emotions that can be difficult to regulate
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emotionally shutting down, withdrawing or avoiding when things become difficult
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finding it difficult to trust or depend on other people, or feeling clingy and unstable when alone
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engaging in self-damaging behaviour such as addiction or risk taking
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feeling that no one understands you or lives up to the expectations
Schema Therapy maps your individual patterns with self-compassion, helps you find healing and healthier ways of treating yourself and relating to others.
What can Schema Therapy help with?
Complex trauma and developmental trauma
Personality difficulties and personality disorders
Persistent depression and anxiety
Relationship and attachment difficulties
Emotion regulation difficulties
Low self-worth, shame and self-criticism
Avoidance and longstanding unhelpful coping patterns
No therapy is 100% effective. For some people, previous therapy has provided valuable insight or coping skills. Sometimes despite the best efforts of the client and therapist, therapy is not working. Schema Therapy can be helpful to try when other forms of therapy might not have worked.
What does Schema Therapy involve?
Therapy involves identifying your schemas and coping patterns, understanding how they developed, and learning to recognise the different states (schema modes) that emerge in particular situations. Schema Therapy is active. Imagery exercises and chair work are used to work with emotional experiences that may not shift through intellectual understanding or conversation alone. For clients who have not worked in such an active way before, this can be new and typically generates some new responses. Sometimes this is laughter and fun. Other times a deep shifting or healing towards parts of oneself occurs, including changes to the specific memories from the past. The therapeutic relationship is a large part of Schema Therapy. Once trust is established, the relationship is used as an opportunity to understand attachment patterns related to the therapy goals. The healing from therapy is then used to break the patterns and refresh the future outlook.
What is a Certified Schema Therapist?
Schema Therapy is increasingly used by psychologists and other mental health professionals across Australia, and many clinicians incorporate concepts or techniques drawn from Schema Therapy into their broader therapeutic work.
Certification in Schema Therapy involves specific and targeted training, intensive supervised clinical practice and demonstrated competency in delivering the full Schema Therapy model. Advanced certification takes years and is undertaken by therapists who are already established in their practice.
Lucie Swaffield is a Clinical Psychologist, Advanced Certified Schema Therapist and Certified Schema Therapy Supervisor with the International Society of Schema Therapy (ISST). As a Certified Schema Therapy Supervisor, Lucie is qualified within the ISST certification framework to provide specialist Schema Therapy supervision to other clinicians, including psychologists undertaking their Schema Therapy training and certification.
What are the benefits for clients?
For clients, working with a Certified Schema Therapist means that their therapist has undertaken targeted and comprehensive training in the full Schema Therapy model. The therapist's clinical skills have been repeatedly observed and measured against defined competency standards, which provides quality assurance. This does not mean certified therapists are superior to others, and you may be helped by Schema Therapy techniques delivered by a broad range of therapists.
Lucie believes in doing a few things well. Her clinical practice is therefore deliberately focused on a small number of areas in which she has pursued extensive training, supervision and advanced professional development. Schema Therapy is one of these core areas of practice. Treatment is always individually tailored to the person, while remaining grounded in the principles and therapeutic methods that underpin Schema Therapy.
Appointments
Schema Therapy is available in person in Sydney's Eastern Suburbs, Woollahra and by telehealth across Australia.
Treatment begins with an initial assessment to understand the difficulties you are experiencing, your history and the patterns you would like to change. This also provides an opportunity to consider whether Schema Therapy is an appropriate treatment approach for you.
If you would like to discuss whether Schema Therapy may be appropriate for you, you can make an enquiry or book an initial assessment.