Product Description

Hope began her treatment with Dr. Marcus by telling him that her training analysis had been very helpful, but had not enabled her to get to the bottom of her difficulties. She made it clear that if this new analytic journey were to be successful, their true selves would have to meet. This is the story, told from both points of view, of how Hope helped her analyst develop the courage to risk responding directly from his unconscious, allowing their true selves to meet, while still maintaining the analytic frame. Intervening in this way the analyst sang to his patient, told her a dream he had about his daughter, and engaged in a spontaneous psychodrama in which they both expressed feelings of love, lust, frustration, anger and sadness. It was this emotional meeting of their true selves which seemed most responsible for the excellent outcome.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #624668 in Books
• Published on: 2007-09-28
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 128 pages

Review
Among the most important steps that psychotherapists need to take is to find meaningful ways to obtain feedback from patients about how they experienced the therapeutic work. For psychoanalysts this is an especially difficult and tricky problem since we cannot take conscious responses at face value and because we must always consider the transference. In this trailblazing book, Donald Marcus and his patient, "Hope," make a first brave effort to collaborate so as to explore a rather unconventional and innovative analysis from both sides of the couch. Exploring self-disclosure, interpreting from the unconscious, erotic countertransference, dual-relationship, and post-analytic contact, this moving narrative will present a clinical and ethical challenge to all clinicians. -- Lewis Aron, Ph.D., director, New York University Postdoctoral Program in Psychotherapy and Psychoanalysis

By challenging many of our assumptions about analytic technique, this innovative, daring book makes a valuable contribution to the debate on the therapeutic action of psychoanalysis. The joint collaboration of patient and analyst provides rare insights into the healing process in a successful analysis and raises many intriguing questions about the way that therapy works. This is a book that should be read by all those engaged in the field of analytic therapy. -- Theodore J. Jacobs, M.D., training and supervising analyst, New York Psychoanalytic Institute and New York University Psychoanalytic Institute

From the Publisher
Special Features: The focus is on the clinical material itself, with the analysis of it being in the form of commentary by both analyst and analysand. The co-author patient is also an analyst who presents her own history and her own view of what transpired in the analysis. The most effective interpretations and interventions were made directly from the analyst's unconscious responses without first being processed consciously. In this he yielded to his patient's desire that his responses reveal his "true self," so that their "true selves" could meet. The analyst freely disclosed his responses to his patient, contrary to what is generally taught in psychoanalytic training. A new kind of enactment takes place, based on implicit relational knowing. Analyst and patient take dramatic risks in expressing spontaneous passionate feelings in psychodrama play arising directly from the unconscious.

Customer Reviews

The analysis was of one psychoanalyst by another, with startling results.
I've discussed preparations for this book by email with Dr. Marcus many times in the past five years, as we started writing after Don wrote a complimentary letter to one of my published articles in Academy Forum, a quarterly publication of the then American Academy of Psychoanalysis. My article on the benefits of good psychoanalysis was upbeat and he promptly emailed much support and encouragement, which was greatly apreciated. We started a dialog commenting on each other's ongoing work. I told him about a special case of mine and he offered helpful insights and suggestion to promote the work and understand it more deeply. He is very good at discerning sutble and deep dynamics in the relationship, which many analysts do not touch, because they are risky. They are risky because the transference and countertransference is about love, sexual and romantic love, but of course there was no physical acting out. The love was on a high plane, but deeply felt and communicated as such, a topic often avoided for various reasons, even though the understanding and talking about it is necessary for the work and the ultimate release of loving feelings uncovered in the sessions were transferred to her husband who was ill. In essence, the love of the therapist grew, which he freely admitted, and that enabled the patient to overcome her resistance to receiving and giving love, based on early trauma. The analysis ended very successfully and was terminated with deep feelings of both part on the feelings for each other and the obvious success of the work. Hope had worked previously with another analyst and had achieved an impasse, and work with Dr. Marcus was intended to break through that impasse and continue the work. That it did, but the risky part involved the therapist telling the patient of his loving feeling toward her, which he knew she needed to hear, and eventually this was received well and promoted the work. In recent presentations, the old guard was skeptical that such work is valid and beneficial, but the younger analysts were more positive and enthusiastic. There is a growing trend for intersubjectivity, the knowledge and sharing of unconscious material from both patient and therapist. The degree of openness and disclosure may well be the psychoanalysis of the future, a pioneering effort, which is catching on, more and more. This work of combining notes retrospectively by the two analysts gives a beautiful example of a uniquely successful analysis, which should encourage more analysts to do likewise, especially when there are impasses. This book is a beautiful and learned collaboration by two excellent analysts to present their work to a larger audience. I can only hope the book will sell well and will be used extensively in the training of new psychodynamic and psychoanalytical psychiatrists.

A Courageous and Inspiring Work
"Taking Risks from the Unconscious" lives up to its name. This is a chronicle of great candor and courage. I am not a psychoanalyst, nor a mental health professional of any kind. In fact, this is the first account of a psychoanalytic process that I have every read, and I found it strikingly intimate as well as instructive. Dr. Marcus does not appear to edit or sanitize his session notes nor, to his great credit, does he try to justify his approach, no matter how unconventional it may be. His is not an "old school" psychoanalysis, with a remote and "objective" analyst handing down elegant, scholarly interpretations. Far from it. He has the daring to move beyond his thinking mind and respond to Hope, his patient, from a deeper, non-linear intuitive knowing. Dr. Marcus even goes so far as to break the signature taboo of his profession, sharing his inner feelings with the analysand, thereby breaking down the hierarchical doctor-patient relationship that so frequently undermines success. That this unflinching intimacy is just what Hope needs is made abundantly clear by the patient herself in her commentary on their analytic process, also included in this volume. This is a love letter, in the best sense of the term, between two highly skilled and evolved co-equals, each of them intent upon the same end--personal freedom for the patient. We root for them to succeed... And succeed they do!

Takings Risks, Evaluating Ramifications
A refreshing and intimate look at an analysis gone right. From the perspectives of both of the participants, it makes for an affecting read.