CAT is a Narrative Therapy

CAT’s integrative and relational approach works by holding four ‘therapy’ stories open and apart from each other. The first two are the story of the past and the present. They can all too easily get lost in each other.  The third is the story of the reformulation. Its job is to bridge the past and the present without one being reduced to the other. Finally, there is the story that can be overlooked in brief focused therapy. It is the healing narrative, or the story of how the therapy helps a process of change and recovery.  In this lecture I will describe how to use writing, mapping and voice work in and between sessions to generate a healing narrative that works with the links and the gaps in and between these four stories.  It makes CAT a narrative therapy.