Individual Psychotherapy
The majority of my practice is devoted to providing individual psychoanalytic psychotherapy to adults of all ages and genders. Most persons in my practice are struggling with anxiety and/or depressive feelings resultant from a wide variety of personal problems. These might include trauma from the past, family issues, marital problems, or relationship troubles that surface in relational, sexual, and/or work spheres. In general, I am interested and have much experience working with inhibited desires, fears of commitment, and thwarted ambition that can surface in relational, sexual, or work realms. Since my approach is psychoanalytic, I am particularly attuned to unconscious patterns that may emerge in all of these arenas – even the most insightful and self-reflective persons engage in unconscious patterns that seem to get the better of us! Feelings, patterns, tendencies, and attitudes arise in the form of anxieties, ambivalences, and destructive attitudes that end up defeating our purposes despite our best intentions. These patterns become evident in our relationships – how it comes about that we seem to get involved with people who hurt us, how to manage the deep-seated ambivalence that underlies much of how we feel, and how to achieve satisfying ways of living, loving, and working so that our lives are meaningful and enriched. The tools of psychoanalytic psychotherapy hold out the promise of sorting out these questions so that we can get out of our own way.
Couple’s Therapy
Relationship patterns, especially those that may be problematic, have a tendency to find their way into our most important relationships. Ironically, we can find ourselves resenting (or even hating) the very thing we had initially found most attractive in our partner(s). The first year of marriage, for example, is notorious for profound disappointments and fears that we may have made a mistake in this important arena. Couples are often relieved to realize that the way they are currently experiencing their partner is not necessarily the way they are destined to engage each other over the long term. Paying attention to unconscious relational patterns that constrain and disappoint can free a couple from destructive and repetitive ways of being together. Because “our unconscious is never married,” it is important to understand the natural expansiveness of our desires, the very energy toward loving that fuels a commitment yet can sometimes cause great pain.
Psychoanalysis
Psychoanalysis is an option for anyone who wants to feel different and make fundamental changes in the way s/he approaches life. It is designed for those who want to experience their lives more fully and intensely, to live an examined life that is most deeply and profoundly felt. By revealing unconscious blockages to more freely felt and expressed feeling, this process can free you to experience life more fully. The process itself is intense, usually conducted 3-4 times per week, lying down on a couch. Because I believe in this very powerful process and want to make it available to anyone who wants it, I am flexible about frequency per week and the use of the couch – indeed, I believe sitting up is as important a part of the process as is lying down. No matter the form, psychoanalysis is the foundation of my style in whatever format your therapy may take.
Often, people come to treatment with a specific problem or symptom of distress. In many cases, this problem is resolved early on but during the course of treatment, it becomes evident that there are other, related and probably deeper areas of distress that can also be addressed. After seeing one problem go away, there is often greater hope and ambition to tackle others as well. Psychoanalysis is a method that goes to the root of unconscious patterns so that more general areas of anxiety or distress can be eliminated. Psychoanalysis holds out the hope for fundamental changes in life, ways of loving, patterns of working, and overall meaningful living.