Part 2 | Certified Clinical Anxiety Treatment Professional (CCATP) Training

• How you can help your anxious clients understand their own symptoms, feelings, interpretations, beliefs
• What to do when treatment strategies for anxiety produce anxiety
• How to work within the goal of changing the brain rather than the goal of reducing anxiety
• How neuroplasticity makes the brain more resistant to anxiety
• Simple explanations you can share with clients about how anxiety travels through their brain

• Why amygdala management is essential for all Anxiety Disorders, PTSD, OCD, Depression
• The amygdala’s role in the stress/fear/anxiety response and formation of emotional memories
• How to train the brain to stop responding to negative anxiety “triggers”
• The Vagus nerve’s role in recovery from the activation of the sympathetic nervous system
• Interventions that reduce anxiety “fuel” produced in the amygdala
• Using exposure: safely activating the fear circuitry created in the amygdala to generate new connections

• How the cortex constructs reality
• How to resist the effects of anticipation and the healthy (adaptive) use of worry
• “Survival of the busiest” principle — strengthen or weaken specific circuitry
• How to recognize and modify the impact of uncertainty
• Left hemisphere techniques: How to use cognitive defusion, coping thoughts, and fighting anticipation
• Right hemisphere techniques: How to use imagery and music

• The myth of the chemical imbalance
• Tools for assessing medication use during the initial intake
• How SSRIs and SNRIs promote neuroplasticity
• The danger of sedating the brain with benzodiazepines
• An overview of buspirone, beta blockers and sedatives/hypnotics/z-drugs
• The effectiveness of CBT and meds

• Tools for helping clients learn to reduce avoidance and push through anxiety
• How to prepare clients for exposure: psychoeducation, breathing training, cognitive restructuring
• In vivo vs. imaginal exposure approaches
• Interoceptive triggers and methods for exposure
• Use of Subjective Units of Distress/Discomfort Scale (SUDS)
• Concerns associated with safety signals, medications, distraction
• How to troubleshoot problems

• Defining basic emotional reactions: Attachment, Aversion, Indifference
• How to practice self-acceptance and erase the detrimental effect of judgment
• Using mindfulness to explore thoughts, sensations, and emotional reactions
• How to use the power of intention to focus thoughts in new directions
• Tools for coping with common reactions to aversion

• Using CBT and neurological knowledge to strengthen client engagement
• Advantages of the strategic use of neuroscience in CBT
• Why focusing on logic and disputing has limits
• Using skills-based approaches in CBT to provide the brain experiences to learn

• How the hippocampus impacts negative thinking
• Exercises to help clients focus on the positive
• Addressing worry, rumination, and common cognitive errors in depression
• Benefits of goal setting and behavioral activation
• Key role of social support and social interaction

• How to challenge distorted thoughts and unrealistic beliefs and images
• How to identify and stop anxiety-igniting thoughts common in OCD and GAD
• Strategies for helping clients embrace uncertainty
• Making OCD or worry the adversary: Don’t be bullied!
• Why clients should schedule obsessions or worries to bring them under control

• Explaining implicit emotional learning and identifying examples
• How to assist the client to experience the memory structure in the present moment
• How to promote your client’s experiential learning of emotional truth
• Steps for disconfirming the emotional memory with “mismatching” information that invalidates it

Joni Gilbertson, MA, NCC, LCPC, LMHC, BC-TMH,CTMH, is a Clinical Telemental Health Provider, a Board-certified Telemental Health Provider, Licensed Clinical Professional Counselor in Illinois, Licensed Mental Health Counselor in Florida, and the owner/founder of Gilbertson Counseling Services. She has over a decade of experience seeing clients using distance counseling with specializations in domestic violence, anger management, and relationship counseling. Joni uses distance therapy to assist individuals, couples and families with everyday coping in areas such as relationship, depression, suicide, and general coping skills. She is also experienced as a clinical counselor supervising a mental health staff within a hospital setting and within her clinical practice.

Joni completed many trainings in distance counseling and completed and edited numerous online courses for telemental health. She is a certified trainer in mental health first aid and motivational interviewing, and she carries certifications in domestic violence facilitation and selective other methods that enhance client awareness. For many years she trained mental health agencies, children and family services, first responders, jails, prisons, and detention centers on mental health topics along with legal and ethical matters of relative concern to each population. As a former Chief of Probation and Probation Officer, she was responsible for training staff on mental health issues that included motivational interviewing, suicide awareness, personality disorders, substance use disorders and safety strategies.

Joni is also a recently retired college instructor with the Sociology Department where she created and instructed sixteen mental health and legal issues classes. During her employment, she was nominated and presented with the award for “Teachers Who Make a Difference” due to her engaging and dynamic style of teaching. She makes learning an enjoyable experience with her passion for the topic of using technology for mental health.

Click here for information about Joni Gilbertson.

Catherine M. Pittman, Ph.D., HSPP, is the chair and associate professor of Psychology at Saint Mary’s College, Notre Dame, IN. Dr. Pittman is the author of the popular book Rewire Your Anxious Brain: How to Use the Neuroscience of Fear to End Anxiety, Panic, and Worry. She has a background in cognitive behavioral therapy, neuropsychology, fear-conditioning research, and treated anxiety-based disorders in clinical practice for over 25 years.

Catherine’s experience makes her uniquely qualified to provide a clear understanding of neuroscience and how that informs the selection and application of successful anxiety treatment strategies. She regularly presents workshops at national conferences and national webinars on anxiety treatment, and is an active member of the Public Education Committee of the Anxiety and Depression Association of America.