Posted by Pfinstegg on July 31, 2003, at 16:47:16
In reply to Re: How is it going? » Pfinstegg, posted by Dinah on July 28, 2003, at 18:00:55
Thanks, Dinah. It's really good to be back in touch with you, too, and I do appreciate your encouraging remarks about the therapy I have embarked upon. I'm discovering that psychoanalysis has undergone a tremendous change in about the last ten years. There are still a lot of those "blank slate" type analysts, but they tend to be older, and are now becoming thought of (behind their backs, of course) as 'fossils"! The newer ones expect that everyone who has significant problems with depression/anxiety in adulthood has had a childhood with major deficiencies in good parenting, and, of course, many have suffered from abuse in addition. They consider the most important part of their work to be enabling the patient to regress back to the earliest times, and, then, to have a new and much better experience with the therapist, who is involved, empathic, emotionally close, very gentle and never pushes you. I agree with you completely- when someone pushes me, I get stubborn and don't want to do anything! In a way, I think the analysts are now catching up to therapists in general. A wonderful book on this general topic is "Relational Psychoanalysis" by the late Stephen Mitchell. It was that book which made me realize that psychoanalysis had something very new and valuable to offer, and I'm certainly finding that to be so. But I don't think that you need an analyst for that- you just need an excellent therapist- like yours, for example!
Pfinstegg
poster:Pfinstegg
thread:226804
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20030711/msgs/247135.html