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A clinician's Rosetta Stone for understanding and treating presenting problems

"I highly recommend this book to therapists of all persuasions."--Allan N. Schore, department of psychiatry and biobehavioral sciences, University of California at Los Angeles School of Medicine

In this important book, noted author, teacher, and psychologist Althea J. Horner shows how to reveal, understand, and use the powerful core relationship problem -- which is formed from earliest childhood and creates an image of the self in relation to others -- so it can act as a Rosetta stone for understanding the underlying conflict that repeatedly plays out in a client's behavior. Once this essential element is uncovered, clinicians learn how to work with their clients to successfully resolve common presenting problems. ... Read more

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In addition to a review of the literature on psychotherapy process and outcome, this book contains detailed clinical accounts of seven patients treated by an immensely powerful method of dynamic psychotherapy (intensive short-term dynamic psychotherapy). This treatment is capable of producing major improvements, and even cure, in a wide range of patients. The authors believe that the scientific study of psychotherapy must include highly subjective judgments, provided the evidence upon which they are based is provided in great detail. In the present volume, verbatim transcripts from therapy sessions and follow-up interviews provide this kind of data, which can be evaluated by all who read them. Relying solely on paper and pencil tests, which evaluate only conscious material, is extremely limited and needs to be fortified by the kind of data provided here.

This volume gives an account of what dynamic psychotherapy can achieve at its best.It combines detailed clinical case studies with the scientific research and also gives an overview of the literature available. It is based on the authors’ extensive experience of researching and using psychodynamic psychotherapy. ... Read more

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An excellent resource for clinicians
"Lives Transformed" is not only a testimonial to the effectiveness of Intensive Short-Term Dynamic Psychotherapy (ISTDP) but to the skill of master clinician Dr Patricia Coughlin Della Selva. The treatments of seven of Dr. Coughlin Della Selva's patients are presented through detailed session transcripts and commentary which carefully explain the methodology and interventions.What I particularly appreciated were the detailed follow up reports on each of the 7 patients (4 to 10 years after termination) - something I'd never seen before.Hopefully, this is a trend that other clinician/writers will choose to follow.Treatment results in the 7 cases were dramatic and speak not only to the skill of Dr. Della Selva but to the value of this approach.I'm sure this will become a classic reference in the field of experiential dynamic work. ... Read more

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Clinicians tend to think of interpretation mainly as atype of therapeutic intervention, the communication ofdepth-psychological information to patients based on methods ofinferring latent mental contents.But the interpretive process,Philip Rubovits-Seitz informs us, is first and foremost a form ofinquiry, an attempt to gain depth-psychological understanding in whichthe therapist's job is primarily to learn, not to teach.Depth-Psychological Understanding deals with the unsolved problems,limitations, and scientifically tenuous status of clinicalinterpretation.Rubovits-Seitz shows interpretive inquiry to be anexceedingly complex and incompletely understood process - a processthat involves conscious, preconscious, and presumably unconsciousmental operations along with numerous components and overlappingstages.

Although clinical interpretation originated with Freud, the latter'spositivist preference for purely observational methods made himambivalent toward interpretive methods.According to Rubovits-Seitz,the legacy of Freud's positivism still pervades clinical thinking andinterferes with progress in investigating and improving interpretivemethods.He reviews the paradigm shift in general science frompositivism to postpositivism by way of demonstrating the compatibilityof interpretive inquiry with a postpositivist approach.

Post-Freudian models of clinical interpretation are evaluated, andclinical methods of interpretation are compared with interpretiveapproaches in nonclinical fields.A detailed discussion of theneglected problem of justifying interpretations incorporatesevaluations of specific justifying procedures and a case reportillustrating applications of such methods.The work concludes with aconsideration of common but avoidable errors in clinicalinterpretation along with remedial strategies for dealing with them.

Following Depth-Psychological Understanding, clinicians may no longertake for granted the interpretive process and the accuracy of theirown interpretations.Rubovits-Seitz's scholarly survey marks a majoradvance in comprehending the methodology of clinical interpretationand in setting forth both the problems and promise of interpretivemethods. ... Read more

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This book gives us the broad sweep of a remarkable psychoanalytic writer, Harry Guntrip, whose place is at the forefront of our efforts to explain the role of an emergent and resilient self in the organization and maintenance of human relations. ... Read more

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At the heart of LaBarre’sbook are seven long-term psychoanalytic cases that highlight the richly multifaceted ways in which nonverbal behavior enters into the creation and resolution of psychopathology.Working toward a refined understanding of the nonverbal organized around important phenomenological and psychodynamic distinctions,LaBarre delineates various levels of movement and behavioral interaction in order to sort out the multiple sources and meanings of nonverbal behavior.Whereas certain nonverbal behaviors derive from conflict, she shows, other nonverbal behaviors reflect temperament, aspects of early development, or other issues.And different types of nonverbal behavior, she shows, have different treatment implications.Certain nonverbal behaviors can be directly confronted and discussed in the therapeutic conversation while other nonverbal behaviors will affect the envelope of patient-therapist relatedness and call for altered participation by !the therapist at the nonverbal level. ... Read more

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Psychoanalysis has had to defend itself from a barrage of criticism throughout its history. Nevertheless, there are many who claim to have been helped by this therapy, and who claim to have achieved genuine insight into their condition. But do the psychodynamic or exploratory psychotherapies - the so-called talking cures - really help clients get in touch with their "inner", "real" or "true" selves? Do clients make important discoveries about the real causes of their behaviours, emotions, and personalities? Are their insights, and the psychodynamic interpretations offered them by their psychotherapists, true? Many think so.

Talking Cures and Placebo Effects contests this view. It defends the unpopular hypothesis that therapeutic changes in the psychodynamic psychotherapies are sometimes functions of powerful placebos that rally the mind's native healing powers in much the same way that placebo pills rally the body's native healing powers; and that psychodynamic insights and interpretations are themselves placebos. Few clients know this, and fewer still are informed of the potential placebo effects at play in exploratory psychotherapy, and of the consequent risks of self-misinterpretation and self-deception. Thus does Talking Cures and Placebo Effects target a host of problems that lie at the very intersection of the epistemology, ethics, scientific status, and public accountability of the talking cures. ... Read more

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This work defines and illustrates the Kleinian approach to psychotherapy. Previous books on Kleinian approaches have concerned themselves almost exclusively with psychoanalysis. This book demonstrates how the Kleinian approach is also applicable to once- and twice-weekly therapy. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

very helpful!
This easy-to-read primer is just that:a very clear introduction to Kleinian thought.If you are put off (as I am) by certain aspects of Kleinian theory, don't give up the struggle to grasp it without taking a look through this book, which grounds the theory in easily understood clinical examples and applications.Highly recommended.I came away with a greater appreciation of the usefulness of many Kleinian concepts.

very helpful!
This easy-to-read primer is just that:a very clear introduction to Kleinian thought.If you are put off (as I am) by certain aspects of Kleinian theory, don't give up the struggle to grasp it without taking a look through this book, which grounds the theory in easily understood clinical examples and applications.Highly recommended.I came away with a greater appreciation of the usefulness of many Kleinian concepts. ... Read more

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Almost everyone who crosses the therapist's threshold is looking for a second chance--a shot at living a richer, less restricted life. Understanding how echoes of the past resonate in and shape the present provides opportunities to resolve crippling conflicts and make new choices. Furthermore, such insight produces a sense of mastery. But not everyone is aware that the problems s/he brings into weekly therapy are just the first few bars of his or her song. Jane Hall wrote Deepening the Treatment to help the psycho-dynamically informed therapist help the patient recognize that exploring ideas and feelings is a journey worth taking and that the therapist is a trustworthy guide. Often, people need to wade before they feel comfortable diving into deep waters. Hall introduces a responsible if unconventional application of respectful, nondirective therapy, and she supports her vision with clinical examples and thoughtful attention to issues of basic technique--among them separation, termination, self-disclosure, frequency of sessions, tolerating patient rage, and, of course, interpreting the transference. ... Read more

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excellant
I really appreciate Hall's perspective. She does a wonderful job of explaining her reasoning behind procedures. There are lots of examples. It is an easy read. It is enjoyable and informative.

A reader-friendly reminder to the begining therapist
Ms. Hall has done us all a service by condensing much of what a relatively new therapist should keep in mind.Though I have been doing psychotherapy for twenty years, I also found much to enjoy in it.I was particularlytaken by her use of the concept "benevolent curiosity".She alsounderscores issues of professional boundaries, and reiterates the hardestthing for new therapists to remember--Patience. ... Read more

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Clinician and psychoanalyst Warren S. Poland addresses some of the key questions in the field today. What is an analysis? What is the relationship of the individual patient to the specific analyst and to the work at hand? How can attention to the uniqueness of an individual patient be balanced with the inevitable pressures of the clinical partnership? And, put in the other direction, how can respect for the inevitable imperatives of the dyadic field be balanced with the primacy of the exploration of the patient's mind? How can the interactive context of clinical work be created without compromising the centrality of the search for meanings derivative from unconscious forces within the patient as a singular individual?. Containing clinical examples, this book should be of interest to anyone interested in psychotherapy. ... Read more

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Melting the Darkness Speaks to Professionals and Patients
Melting the Darkness is a book intended for professionals, but it speaksto patients, too.It was recommended to me by my own analyst after myongoing questions about how the "dyad" works.The"dyad," for other non professionals considering this book, is therelationship between the analyst and patient.The dyad is now seen as akey (perhaps THE key) instrument of healing a psyche.I was astonished tosee my own feelings spelled out in this book, feelings understood byanalysts in general.Those of us in analysis tend to feel as though we arealone, but we're not.It is difficult to remember that our analyststhemselves have been through analysis.They DO know what it means to feelvulnerable.

Here are a couple of lines that struck me:

"The veryexperience of being viewed by the analyst may feel disintegrating for apatient with a weak sense of self."Oh.Now I see why feel so selfconscious in session.

"Analysis not only exposes, itintensifies."Oh.Now I see why Ifeel bad on the way to feelingbetter.

"The analyst's silence, too, is a form of statement, often apowerful one."Oh.Now I see why, at least partially, I feel panickywhen he's silent.Now I know why it feels like he's shouting when he'ssilent. For me, a silence often puts me floating in an abyss with nothingto grasp onto.I hadn't told my analyst that before I read thebook.

"Analysis demands profound regression."Oh.Now I seewhy I have to cry, even though I don't want to.Now I see why I want tostay home, under my comforter, and not face the day.

"There arelevels or degrees of insight.Perhaps the deepest level is that in whichunderstanding is most thoroughly integrated, so integrated that one'scharacter and mental functioning utilize the understanding without havingto resort to conscious thought."Oh.Now I see where I'mgoing.

Dr. Poland humanizes the analyst in a way the analyst cannot do.Dr. Poland can generalize.With one's own analyst the relationship is toosingular, too specific.One never knows if a reaction is part of atransference.One never knows if a behavior of an analyst is a personalityquirk or a technique.

The book is also reassuring on the genuinenessfront.For a long time with my own analysis I wasn't sure what was genuineand what was technique.There is too much information to go into detailhere, but by the end of the book, I had a deep sense of the caring andgenuineness that emanates from at least some (and hopefully most) of thepeople who do this work.

Not a quick and easy read, but definitely anenlightening one.

Enjoy. ... Read more

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GETTING STARTED provides answers to questions that confront all beginning therapists, such as How do I start? What do I say? What if the client challenges me? What if the client is silent? How do I deal with fees? What about confidentiality? How should I end the sessions? It also answers those fundamental general concerns, like: how does psychotherapy work? How can I be helpful to my patients? Many books claim to be simply written and easy for an inexperienced therapist to understand. This one really is. It is user friendly and written with a minimum of jargon. Dr. Joel Kotin gives numerous examples of common situations and problems that therapists regularly encounter and hen tells the reader how to approach them. Dr. Kotin's tone is reassuring and supportive throughout. ... Read more

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The Ego and Analysis of Defense, by Paul Gray, without a doubt represents a major advance in analytic technique. How therapists listen and what they do with what they hear must be the primary issues that any technical approach addresses. Paul Gray shows how technique has, until now, lagged far behind theory in addressing these and other important questions. This book is essential reading for every practicing clinician. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Excellent theory and practice of psychoanalytic therapy
This collection of 25 years of writings describes Gray's approach to "close following" of the immediate present in "essential psychoanalysis" and intensive psychoanalytic psychotherapy.Hismethod is difficult but the results are compelling.All therapists shouldread this.People who consult therapists might also be interested inmatching their therapies with Gray's admittedly difficult standard. ... Read more