Breaking Inner Chains: Dramatherapy and Personality Disorder

Three online sessions focusing on part 2 of Nicky’s book, Dramatherapy for Borderline Personality Disorder: Empowering and Nurturing People through Creativity (2018). Each session will be 1.5 hours, running from 18:30 to 20:00.

Note: All registered participants will receive an email from admin@badth.org.uk 48 hours before the event with joining details.

Session 1: Breaking Inner Chains: Dramatherapy and Personality Disorder

October 7, 2025

An introduction to personality disorders (specifically borderline type) with current statistics, including information about men with BPD. Insights will then be shared about working with women on a tier 4 secure ward for women diagnosed with personality disorder and comorbid conditions. Recurring themes will be highlighted and six styles of intervention described. Dramatherapy with this client group will be considered in relation to both group and 1:1 work, with reference to Schema Therapy, Rowan’s subpersonality work and several Jungian concepts: integrating internal aspects, the shadow and personal individuation. Practical, interactive exercises will also be incorporated.

Upcoming sessions:

Session 2 - A Cry for Freedom: Dramatherapy and Mental Health Disorders

October 14, 2025

Insights from dramatherapy group work with women in a secure step-down service will be shared. All clients had severe and enduring mental health difficulties, predominantly BPD and Paranoid Schizophrenia - also bipolar disorder, schizoaffective disorder and comorbid disorders such as PTSD, Anorexia Nervosa and drug and/or alcohol dependency. The dramatherapy (and linked music group) provided these clients with a space in which to safely voice their frustrations and celebrate their individuality. Three key themes arose through the work: Freedom, Choice and Acceptance. The issue of stigma and mental health will also be discussed in relation to performance born in the therapy space. Practical, interactive exercises will be incorporated.

Session 3 – Dancing Between Life and Death: Dramatherapy clients and therapist

October 21, 2025

Grief will be introduced as an enduring theme that arose on both conscious and unconscious levels within the dramatherapy sessions in the settings explored in sessions 1 and 2. Also, an ambivalence between life and death. Clients struggled with various issues relating to death: many had suicidal thoughts; some had survived suicide attempts and others had friends or family members who had committed suicide or died from natural causes. The emotional pain experienced by clients, whether in response to their past or present, can also have a considerable impact on those working with them. This issue will be explored in relation to personal practice and the complexity of the therapeutic relationship will be considered in relation to attachment and rejection, hope and futility, transference and countertransference. Here, the importance of having regular clinical supervision will be stressed. Finally, a counter theme will be introduced: the suggestion that with belief, hope and courage, individuals can find new meaning in their lives – supported by either individual or group dramatherapy, which has the potential to empower and nurture them. Practical, interactive exercises will be incorporated.