Two other work-books we use regularly with patients are Overcoming Depression – A five Areas Approach and “Overcoming Anxiety – A five Areas Approach”, both by Chris Williams. We find these are helpful for patients with specific disorders of depression or anxiety. The work-book on anxiety focuses on panic, agoraphobia, phobias, obsessive compulsive disorder, generalised anxiety disorder or worry, and physical health anxieties. In both workbooks they help you to identify areas that need attention. Then individual workbooks take you over the steps to defeat these problem areas. Problem areas that are addressed in these books are: problem solving, being assertive, changing unhelpful thinking, overcoming avoidance, overcoming unhelpful behaviours, overcoming sleep problems, understanding and using substances (legal, illegal and prescription) and planning for the future.

Other books we can recommend are from the "Overcoming..." series. All the authors are renowned Cognitive Behavioural Psychotherapist. Accompanying the text, the books have exercises that help you to understand your problems better. These are excellent texts for explaining specific problems and some steps you can take that might be helpful. We use these books regularly with clients who present with these problems and they are always found to be useful and helpful. They are self-help guides using cognitive behavioural techniques giving very good examples and explanations how CBT treatments can help your problem. Patient’s relatives and friends have also found them useful in understanding more about a specific condition. All of these books (below) are under £6.50 from Amazon so we think they are excellent value.

As the aim of therapy is to help patients become their own therapists, some people have found it useful reading texts on cognitive behavioural therapy written for students and therapists learning how to use cognitive therapy. Links to ideal teaching texts written clearly with a step-by-step style are given below.