Diversity, Discipline and Devotion in Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy: Clinical and Training Perspectives (The United Kingdom Council for Psychotherapy Series) - Softcover

Mander, Gertrud

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1855754738 ISBN 13: 9781855754737

Publisher: Routledge, 2007

Synopsis

This book is a selection of papers written over 25 years of practising psychoanalytic psychotherapy, of training and supervising psychotherapists, psychodynamic counsellors and supervisors. It reflects a preoccupation with the growth and diversification of counselling and psychotherapy, with the imperatives of training, supervision and regulation, and with the significant changes in the profession due to the invention of brief, time-limited, intermittent and recurrent psychotherapy. An overall theme is the conviction that what patients and therapists share is vulnerability, and that the therapist is a 'wounded healer', whose reparative tendency informs his professional choice, his therapeutic empathy and his capacity to bear the rigours of therapeutic work. Thus an unconscious connection between the helper and the helped is the driving force of every therapeutic relationship, for better and for worse. Its responsible management requires thorough training, ongoing supervision and a firm frame in order to contain the powerful forces operating when two strangers meet for the purpose of therapy.

About this title

About the Author:

Gertrud Mander originally worked as a journalist and translator before retraining as a psychoanalytic psychotherapist at the Westminster Pastoral Foundation in London, where she was as a supervisor and trainer of supervisors for twenty three years. She has published widely in the field, mostly in the British Journal of Psychotherapy, where she is a member of the Editorial Board, and the book A PsychodynamicApproach to Brief Therapy. This book is a collection of essays written over two decades and reflects her wide interests in the field of psychotherapy and counseling.

Review:

“Gertrud Mander brings to bear her many years of practice, teaching and writing together in this books of essays. Although the thrust of the writing is within the psychodynamic framework, she tackles many of the contemporary issues in psychological therapies of all kinds. It will therefore make excellent reading for those practitioners looking for a wider, considered, view.” (Douglass Hooper, Former President)

“Gertrud Mander’s collected papers reflect more than 25 years thoughtful engagement with her major interests in the field and demonstrate the diversity of her thinking on new ways of working, such as once-weekly therapy, and time-limited brief therapy. The papers also shine with Dr. Mander’s devotion to her work, and her love of literature and ideas.” (Michael Jacobs, Fellow of BACP, Psychodynamic Psychotherapist and Visiting Professor)

“Freud contrasted the pure gold of psychoanalysis with the alloys of less intensive psychotherapy. Gertrud Mander energetically champions these less intensive therapies―once-a-week, short-term and recurrent―out of the rich store of her more than 25 years’ clinical experience. In other chapters, she discusses specific issues: the role of fathers, the effect of paternal absence in wars, sibling rivalry, the real nature of Truby King’s contribution. Throughout these highly readable papers we meet a warm, active-minded, practical therapist, firmly earthed in the abundant specifics of the consulting-room, able both to think outside the box and to appreciate deeply the range and richness of the analytic tradition. A democratic voice in a profession often accused of exaggerated hierarchy.” (David M. Black, member)

About this edition

• Publisher: Routledge
• Publication date: 2007
• ISBN 10: 1855754738
• ISBN 13: 9781855754737
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 264