Schema Therapy
For people who feel stuck in repeating emotional patterns despite years of insight, effort, overthinking, or therapy. Schema Therapy offers a compassionate, depth-oriented path to lasting change.
What is Schema Therapy?
Schema Therapy is an evidence-based, integrative approach that blends attachment theory, parts work, cognitive therapy, and emotion-focused healing. It’s particularly effective for people who:
-
Feel emotionally reactive, shut down, or disconnected
-
Struggle with chronic guilt, shame, or self-criticism
-
Have difficulty trusting, setting boundaries, or feeling safe in relationships
-
Find themselves repeating painful family, work, or romantic patterns
-
Have tried therapy before, but still feel “stuck.”
This approach is especially well-suited for people whose struggles stem not from one traumatic incident but from years of unmet emotional needs, inconsistent caregiving, emotional neglect, or ongoing relational stress. In other words, schema therapy is an effective treatment for complex trauma.
Schema work is designed to heal early life trauma, to break the behavioral patterns we get caught in as a result of that trauma, and to integrate the many different aspects of ourselves.
Chronic, habitual thinking, feelings, and behaviors that hold us back from reaching our true potential are called schemas. These patterns are lifelong negative core beliefs that we have about ourselves, others, or the world at large.
Schemas arise out of early childhood experiences in which our core emotional needs were not met.
Rachael is certified in Schema Therapy in North Carolina and works with clients across the state, both in person in her Asheville office and online via telehealth.
Parts Work: A Central Element of Schema Therapy
Modes (or parts) are the different moods and behaviors we get into or enact when we are triggered by the activation of our schemas. Modes are similar to the “parts” of the Internal Family Systems model of therapy.
We all have many different modes that we go into, often unconsciously. Some of us have a “work mode” when we’re on the job a “parent mode” with our children. At other times we may find ourselves in a “rebellious mode” if we feel we’re being controlled or an “protective mode” if we feel we’ve been threatened.
In Schema Therapy there are some common modes that exist in all of us, including the Vulnerable or Inner Child mode.
Each of these modes ultimately seeks integration into the larger whole of your personality. Through working together we can understand the modes that you tend to use, mitigate the negative effects of the dysfunctional modes, and work toward amplifying the healthiest parts of you.
How Schema Therapy Works
At the heart of Schema Therapy are schemas: deep emotional patterns formed early in life when important needs for safety, connection, validation, or autonomy weren’t consistently met. These patterns shape how you:
- See yourself
- Experience closeness
- Respond to conflict or rejection
- Set (or struggle to set) boundaries
- Interpret emotional cues
Over time, these responses become automatic survival strategies. What once helped you cope may now be keeping you stuck.
In our work together, we gently identify your schemas and the protective “parts” of you, such as the inner critic, caretaker, avoider, numbing part, or overachiever, that developed to help you survive. Then, through emotional processing, relational repair, and embodied practice, we help you build new internal experiences of safety, worth, and choice.
The Core Maladaptive Schemas
Emotional Deprivation
The expectation that a normal amount of emotional support from others will not be met.
Mistrust/Abuse
The expectation that others will abuse, hurt, manipulate, cheat, lie to, or take advantage of oneself.
Emotional Inhibition
Excessive inhibition of feelings, communication, or actions. Usually to prevent feelings of shame or disapproval from others.
Entitlement/Grandiosity
The feeling that one is superior to others, entitled to special rights or privileges, or that the standard rules for others do not apply to them.
Vulnerability to Harm or Illness
An exaggerated fear that imminent catastrophe will strike at any time and that one will be unable to prevent it.
Defectiveness/Shame
The feeling that one is unlovable, bad, unwanted, or inferior in important respects.
Social Isolation/Alienation
A pervasive sense that one is unlike others, or not connected to any group or community.
Dependence/ Incompetence
The belief that one is unable to handle life’s responsibilities without considerable help from others.
Abandonment/Instability
An exaggerated fear that those one relies on most for connection or security will not be available in moments of need, will abandon you forever, or will neglect you over long periods of time.
Failure
The belief that one has failed, will fail, or is fundamentally inadequate in areas of achievement compared to peers.
Enmeshment/ Undeveloped Self
Excessive involvement in relationships with others at the expense of full individuation and personal development.
Subjugation/Invalidation
Excessive surrendering of control because one feels coerced and is unrealistically afraid of the response from others (anger, criticism, abandonment, retaliation).
Insufficient Self Control/Self-Discipline
An inability or refusal to utilize frustration tolerance, self-control or self-discipline, or an inability to restrain one’s inappropriate expression of emotions or desires in order to achieve one’s goals.
Unrelenting Standards/Hypercritical
An underlying belief that one must meet very high internalized standards of behavior or performance. This can lead to chronic feelings of pressure.
Self Sacrifice
Excessive focus on meeting the needs of others, regardless at the cost to oneself. A chronic sense of over-responsibility for others.
Negativity/Pessimism
A pervasive focus on the negative aspects of life (including things that could go wrong) and minimization of life’s positive or optimistic aspects.
Approval/Recognition Seeking
Excessive emphasis on gaining approval or attention from other people or on fitting in at the expense of developing a true sense of one’s authentic self.
Punitiveness
The belief that people (including oneself) should be harshly punished as a result of mistakes.
Rachael Chatham, MA, LCMHC
Certified Schema Therapist, ISST
Rachael has been a Certified Schema Therapist since 2021. Whole Self Therapy is located in Asheville, and Rachael works with clients both in person and across North Carolina and Florida via a HIPAA-compliant online telehealth provider.
If you are interested in Schema Therapy in North Carolina or Florida, or if you’re stuck in a behavioral or thought pattern that you’d like to get support with, please reach out.
What You Can Expect
In Schema Therapy with me, you can expect:
-
A warm, grounded, non-pathologizing therapeutic presence
-
Thoughtful pacing that respects your nervous system
-
A blend of insight, emotional work, somatic awareness, and relational healing
-
Space to explore grief, anger, longing, and unmet needs safely
-
Support in developing stronger boundaries, self-trust, emotional resilience, and relational clarity
This work is especially meaningful for those who are ready to move beyond coping and into deeper emotional freedom and authenticity.
Ready to Begin Your Healing Work?
Schedule a consultation to explore whether Schema Therapy is the right fit for you.
Whole Self Therapy® PLLC
Serving individuals in Asheville, across North Carolina, and in Florida via online therapy.