The CBT Dive

What keeps you up at night? And how does a thought-restructuring tool help with sleep? In this special episode, I interview two sleep medicine specialists based in Australia. We discuss what drives sleep disturbance and insomnia and behavioural approaches to support people who struggle with getting good sleep. Have a look at the D-BAS 16 questionnaire below to see if you have dysfunctional beliefs...

Did your parents want you to be a doctor or an engineer? Perhaps they came from a place of precarity and unintentionally undermine your efforts to carve out your own path to be a creative, to freelance, to take risks. In this episode, Nino processes his preparation-avoidance ahead of a job interview. His avoidance is rooted in negative self-talk and self-doubt. But, who's voice is it? He worr...

Being a single gay man isn't easy. Many of us long to be in relationships. We're intentionally crammed into urban centres to have access to one another and yet the dating culture feels a bit unkind. This is complicated by any mental health struggles because being able to know your needs and communicate them is a whole other skill set mired in stigma. In this episode, Kareem talks about w...

This special episode is a departure from using intervention tools in real-time and instead explores their value from a population-based mental health perspective. In this episode, we explore what it means for Sogand Zakerhaghighi to be a visibly Muslim mental health professional living in Canada (and in Alberta specifically). We both delve into what mental health conversations look like in our res...

We're so proud of ourselves for having secured rights and increased representation of queer people in popular media. But there's so much that continues to be problematic within our own communities that needs attention. For gay men, femmephobia and bottom-shaming top the list (no pun intended). In this episode, we explore what is at stake in connection seeking when gay men own their prefe...

What is the connection between aerophobia and grieving the loss of a parent with whom you had a complicated relationship? On the surface, these things are seemingly unrelated. However, for my special celebrity guest Zoë Ligon who examines her experiences of panic while flying, we began to understand the panic as a trigger for past trauma and terror about returning to a time of compromised safety....

Do you (or someone you know) struggle with following through on personal projects? It's really hard to have a brilliant mind and always second-guess yourself. This is the struggle for many adults living with ADHD including this week's guest on The CBT Dive. In this episode, we explore how Zee compares himself to others whose job performance and career trajectories seem linear and straigh...

Gay men talk quite a bit about body image concerns and pressures to either achieve or maintain a particular physique. This preoccupation is about optimizing the ways they can participate in gay men's spaces, including dating and hookup culture. In this episode, we meet Al who seemingly has the body he's always wanted but we dig a bit deeper into the culture of 'never being enough&ap...

ABOUT THE CBT DIVE PODCAST The CBT Dive is a video podcast that brings therapy skills to the real world. Each episode welcomes a new guest who wants to explore a challenging situation using the most common cognitive behavioural therapy tool: the thought record. ABOUT HOST Rahim Thawer is a queer, racialized social worker and psychotherapist based in Toronto. He's created The CBT Dive podcast...