Psychoanalysis Meets Psychosis proposes a major revision of the psychoanalytic theory of the most severe mental illnesses including schizophrenia. Freud believed that psychosis is the consequence of a biologically determined inability to attain and sustain a normal or neurotic mental organization. Michael Robbins proposes instead that psychosis is the outcome of a different developmental pathway. Conscious mind functions in two qualitatively different ways, primordial conscious mentation and reflective representational thought, and psychosis is the result of persistence of a primordial mental process, which is adaptive in infancy, in later situations in which it is neither appropriate nor adaptive. In Part I Robbins describes how the medical model of psychosis underlies the current approach of both psychiatry and psychoanalysis, despite the fact that neuroscience has failed to confirm the model’s basic organic assumption. In Part II Robbins examines two of Freud’s models of psychosis that are based on the assumption of a constitutional inability to develop a normal or neurotic mind. The theories of succeeding generations of analysts have for the most part reiterated the biases of Freud’s two models, so that psychoanalysis considers the psychoses beyond its scope. In Part III Robbins proposes that the psychoses are the result of disturbances in the attachment-separation phase of development, leading to maladaptive persistence of a primordial form of mental activity related to Freud’s primary process. Finally, in Part IV Robbins describes a psychoanalytic approach to treatment based on his model. The book is richly illustrated with material from Robbins’ clinical practice. Psychoanalysis Meets Psychosis has the potential to undo centuries of alienation between society and psychotic persons. The book offers an understanding of severe mental illness that will be novel and inspiring not only to psychoanalysts but to all mental health professionals.

Covering the last four decades of the 20th century, this book explores the unwritten history of the struggles between psychoanalysis and psychiatry in postwar USA, inaugurated by the neosomatic revolution, which had profound consequences for the treatment of psychotic patients. Analyzing and synthesizing major developments in this critical and clinical field, Orna Ophir discusses how leading theories redefined what schizophrenia is and how to treat it, offering a fresh interpretation of the nature and challenges of the psychoanalytic profession. The book also considers the internal dynamics and conflicts within mental health organizations, their theoretical paradigms and therapeutic practices. Opening a timely debate, considering both the continuing relevance and the inherent limitations of the psychoanalytic approach, the book demonstrates how psychoanalysts reinterpreted their professional identity by formalizing and disseminating knowledge among their fellow practitioners, while negotiating with neighboring professions in the medical fields, such as psychiatry, pharmacology and the burgeoning neurosciences. Chapters explore the ways in which psychoanalysts constructed – and also transgressed upon – the boundaries of their professional identity and practice as they sought to understand schizophrenia and treat its patients. The book argues that among the many relationships psychoanalysis sustained with psychiatry, some weakened their own social role as service providers, while others made the theory and practice of psychoanalysis a viable contender in the jurisdictional struggles between professions. Psychosis, Psychoanalysis and Psychiatry in Postwar USA will appeal to researchers, academics, graduate students and advanced undergraduates who are interested in the history of psychoanalysis, psychiatry, the medical humanities and the history of science and ideas. It will also be of interest to clinicians, health care professionals and other practitioners.

"This ground-breaking examination begins by clearly explaining complex terms and theories from the most significant thinkers in psychoanalysis. Split into 3 parts, it then explores the problems faced when following one specific technique for understanding the psychotic process. Practical as well as theoretical, Part 2 illustrates how to prepare an appropriate setting for the patient, including the importance of listening and the analyst's approach, as well as highlighting key features of the condition, such as delusions, hallucinations, infantile withdrawal and psychotic dreams. Acknowledging that psychosis is a psychic transformation which the mind works as a sensorial organ, the author asserts that the seeds are sown in childhood through emotional trauma, leading to withdrawal in a fantasy world"--

Do psychotic disorders make sense? Are psychotic symptoms amenable to interpretation? Understanding Psychosis: A Psychoanalytic Approach takes the various pathways to psychotic illness outlined by psychoanalytic clinicians and scholars and integrates them into a model that allows a systematic assessment of relevant psychodynamic dimensions in the diagnosis of psychotic disorders, and which serves as a guide to psychotherapy with psychotically ill patients. Joachim Küchenhoff reviews and integrates various psychoanalytic concepts and theories about psychosis into a multi-dimensional psychodynamic model that allows an assessment and understanding of the patient’s subjective experience, objective psychological capabilities, and interpersonal resources. Küchenhoff helps the therapist to establish a basic attitude in working psychodynamically with patients and to understand the dynamics of the therapeutic relationship. Understanding Psychosis also addresses specific issues that can arise in work with clients experiencing psychosis, including understanding imminent crises or precursor states, elucidating semiotic qualities in seemingly negative symptoms, differentiating the psychotic and a non-psychotic part of the personality and providing a dynamic approach to the psychopharmacological treatment. Clinical vignettes and three detailed case reports are included in the book. Understanding Psychosis will be an essential guide for psychiatrists, psychotherapists and psychoanalysts working with patients experiencing psychosis. It will also be of use to psychologists, and academics and students of psychotherapy, psychiatry and psychoanalysis for psychosis.

Psychosis and Near Psychosis offers a psychoanalytically-based approach to an integrated treatment of psychosis and near psychosis, achieved by organizing psychotherapy, medication, hospital and milieu interventions into a powerful therapeutic tool. The author navigates confidently between psychiatric and psychoanalytic approaches, between biological evidence and psychological assessments. According to Dr. Eric Marcus, since the past, so-called heroic psychoanalyses with psychotic patients have clearly been shown to fail, the time is now ripe again to discuss psychosis in terms of the broadened psychoanalytic theory, with the support of medication and a better understanding of the neuropsychological factors involved. This book, which maps out mental illness in concrete and innovative ways, will interest all researchers and clinicians eager to find the best means, both practical and theoretical, to initiate satisfying psychiatric therapies.

This book brings together a number of international writers who are concerned with understanding and treating psychoses. The orientation of the book is psychoanalytic, but the authors understand the need for a multi-disciplinary approach to these disorders for which there remains no comprehensive cure. Detailed clinical cases are presented along with contemporary conceptualizations of psychotic states.

Psychoanalysis of the Psychoses brings together a distinguished international set of contributors, offering a range of views and approaches, to explore the latest thinking in the psychoanalytic treatment of psychosis and related disorders. Drawing on findings from neuroscience, theory and clinical material from many schools of psychoanalytic thought, this book offers a comprehensive guide to understanding how psychosis is conceptualised from a psychoanalytic perspective. It looks at how to work with psychotic patients, typical problems in treating psychosis and the role of pharmacology. It demonstrates the relational dimension, capable of strengthening the patient’s observing Ego and facilitating the integration of the different areas of the personality. This process can identify and work through the main psychological stress factors involved in psychotic disturbances, transforming chaotic thoughts into springboards for important insights, and offering patients the precious chance to construct for the first time a creative relationship with their own existence. Psychoanalysis of the Psychoses will be of great interest to psychoanalysts and psychoanalytic psychotherapists as well as psychiatrists wishing to draw upon psychoanalytic ideas in their work.