Marsha M. Linehan

Marsha M. Linehan, born May 5, 1943, is an American psychologist, professor, and author best known for creating dialectical behavior therapy (DBT). This evidence-based psychotherapy merges cognitive restructuring with acceptance, mindfulness, and shaping. DBT represented a significant breakthrough in psychology, proving effective for patients who had not responded to existing treatments, and it opened up new approaches for managing chronic suicidality and borderline personality disorder (BPD), later showing benefits for other conditions as well.

Linehan is an Emeritus Professor of Psychology at the University of Washington in Seattle and directs the Behavioral Research and Therapy Clinics. Her primary research focused on developing DBT for borderline personality disorder, applying behavioral models to suicidal behaviors, and addressing drug abuse. She has authored two treatment manuals and a memoir. Additionally, she founded Behavioral Tech LLC, which trains mental health professionals in DBT, and co-founded the DBT-Linehan Board of Certification (DBT-LBC) to certify providers of evidence-based DBT. Linehan is also trained in spiritual direction and serves as an associate Zen teacher in the Sanbo-Kyodan School in Germany and the Diamond Sangha in the U.S. In the foreword to her memoir *Building a Life Worth Living*, Allen Frances called her one of the two most influential "clinical innovators" in mental health, alongside Aaron Beck.

Linehan was born in Tulsa, Oklahoma, the third of six children. Her father was a vice president at Sunoco Oil, and her Cajun mother was active in church and volunteer work. Both parents were image-conscious, and Linehan often felt invalidated; she believed her family loved her but that the love was poorly expressed. She felt out of place, and her mother tried to change her to help her fit in. She attended Catholic school and was popular, joining a high school sorority that made her feel validated but later leaving because she felt she needed to make a sacrifice. Her mental health then declined, with worsening depression and persistent headaches. Weeks before high school graduation, she was hospitalized at the Institute of Living in Hartford, Connecticut, diagnosed with schizophrenia, and admitted as an inpatient. While there, she cut herself and underwent electroconvulsive therapy, long seclusion, extreme cold pack therapy, and treatment with Thorazine and Librium. She described the experience as hellish, saying she cannot find words to adequately convey the searing emotional pain she endured.

During her more than two-year stay, Linehan engaged in suicidal behavior. Though not diagnosed at the time, she later said she believes she actually had borderline personality disorder, as her symptoms matched today’s diagnostic criteria. In a 2011 interview with *The New York Times*, she stated she does not remember taking any psychiatric medication after leaving the institute at age 18. At 20, she returned to Tulsa after her doctor broke her pattern of suicidal behavior. She made a vow to God to get herself out of hell and then go back to help others escape it, a vow that has guided her life. Back home, she experienced significant memory loss from her time at the institute, strained relations with her parents, and continued self-harming. She moved into a YWCA in downtown Tulsa, where she attempted suicide twice. Determined to move forward, she enrolled in night school at the University of Tulsa, focusing on suicide, and worked as a mail girl and receptionist, aspiring to become a psychiatrist. After discovering a man she was dating was married, she moved to Chicago to live near her supportive brother, Earl.

In Chicago, Linehan learned her father’s friend had created a college trust fund for her. She began studies at Loyola University Chicago, a Jesuit school, finding community in Catholic groups, studying in hotel lobbies, riding the L, and speaking often with the university chaplain. She joined a lay religious order, taking a vow of poverty, and volunteered with Little Brothers of the Poor. She graduated cum laude in 1968 with a B.Sc. in psychology. When she struggled financially, Loyola faculty helped her find work to complete her education. Realizing psychiatry lacked effective treatments for the patients she wanted to help, she pursued graduate studies in psychology with faculty assistance. At Loyola, she supported liberation theology, opposed the Vietnam War, and engaged with socially active Jesuits. She earned an M.A. in 1970.