The Weekly DBT Diary Card helps individuals record and manage their emotional intensity from zero to ten (with ten being the most extreme, and zero meaning essentially not present at all), in the morning, afternoon, and in the evening— while in the Women’s Treatment Program (WTP) at McLean Hospital’s Hill Center. They were exceedingly strict—thankfully—by way of their insistence that all patients fill in the diary cards and write in a daily mood journal (also very useful), and because keeping up a practice can be challenging when it is emotionally difficult and there is less time strictly dedicated to the betterment of one’s mental health, it is too easy to slip up; to start forgetting to keep this practice up, especially if you run out of blank diary cards.
Since I push DBT like nobody’s business, I thought it was only fair to make one of my own, and then realized how helpful it may be to share. I created one in Excel, which allows me to save the diary cards electronically, and easily look at the sum of each emotion’s rating for the week—or longer—and in conjunction with my mood journal, I am able to observe which emotions rendered which outcome. The PDF is nice if you don’t have Excel, or just prefer to go the pen and paper route (I often do).
Try to stick with it. It is so illuminating.
{Excel: DBT Weekly Diary Card }
{PDF: DBT Weekly Diary Card }
