Westchester Campus
Four Winds provides trauma-informed care, teaches dialectical behavior therapy principles, and utilizes collaborative problem-solving and applied behavioral analysis techniques to support patients and teach them the therapeutic skills they will most likely benefit from.
Trauma-Informed Care
Trauma-informed care (TIC) recognizes that traumatic experiences are widespread and can profoundly impact a person’s physical, emotional, and behavioral health. The goal is to provide a safe, supportive environment that promotes healing and avoids re-traumatization. Trauma-specific therapies directly target the way your brain and body store traumatic memories and focus on “stuck points”—distorted beliefs like “it was my fault” or “the world is 100% dangerous.” TIC helps you challenge these thoughts to reduce their power.
Six Guiding Principles
Safety
Ensuring physical and psychological safety for everyone
Trustworthiness and transparency
Building trust through clear, consistent communication
and transparent decision-making
Peer support
Utilizing the lived experience of others as a vehicle for building trust and empowerment
Collaboration
Leveling power differences between staff and patients to support shared decision-making
Empowerment
Providing patients
with control over
their own care
Cultural, historical, and gender issues
Addressing historical or systemic trauma
Dialectical Behavioral Therapy
DBT is a specialized form of cognitive behavioral therapy that helps patients reduce self-destructive behaviors and learn how to regulate their emotions. It is a structured form of talk therapy designed specifically for people who experience emotions very intensely. Originally developed to treat borderline personality disorder and chronic suicidality, it is now used for various conditions involving emotional dysregulation.
Patients who exhibit emotional dysregulation or self-destructive behaviors, with concurrent diagnoses such as: depression, anxiety disorders, borderline personality disorder, post traumatic stress disorder, self-injurious behaviors, bipolar disorder, and even psychosis can benefit from this type of therapy treatment.
The “dialectical” part of the name refers to the balance between two seemingly opposite ideas: acceptance of who you are and your current situation, and the need for change to build a better life.
DBT focuses on teaching practical skills in four key areas to help manage distress and improve relationships
Mindfulness
Being fully aware and present in the moment without judgment
Distress Tolerance
Learning to handle painful
situations or crises without
resorting to harmful behaviors
Emotion Regulation
Understanding, labeling, and gaining more control over intense emotions
Interpersonal Effectiveness
Learning to communicate needs, set boundaries, and handle conflict while maintaining self-respect
Applied Behavior Analysis
Four Winds uses concepts from applied behavior analysis to teach skills to our younger children ages 5-12 and adolescents on the autism spectrum. ABA is a reward-based treatment that focuses on communication and social skills. The goal is to use positive reinforcement to promote socially appropriate behaviors and reduce harmful ones. A reward or praise (positive reinforcement) immediately follows a desired behavior to increase the likelihood of it happening again. You may hear terms like a “point plan” and an “alternative behavior plan”. These are behavioral interventions that are evidence-based to help shape positive behaviors.
Collaborative Problem Solving
We use concepts from CPS as another approach to skill-building.
CPS interventions are based on the understanding that patients have lagging skills that interfere with their functioning.
