Dynamics are not pathology. It is reasonable to infer character pathology, or personality disorder only when a person’s patterns are so stereotypical that they prevent psychological growth and adaptation. Dr Nancy McWiliams Psychoanalytic Diagnosis 2nd Edition

So-called histrionic and schizoid dynamics represent two sides to the same coin, a dynamic tension organized around the psychological theme of closeness vs distance. Both are thematically preoccupied with how to define themselves in the social context, and differ on their

Differentiating a personality disorder from an essentially neurotically organized psychotherapy client is one of the most strategically important distinctions you can make. One of the best ways to do this is to notice your own authentic reactions to them. With personality

Is “therapy” helping kids—or indoctrinating them? Join MI senior fellows @AbigailShrier & @robkhenderson in Beverly Hills Oct. 16 for a provocative conversation on youth mental health, culture, and resilience. Link to purchase tickets below.

Many have taken swings and hit home-runs, doubles, or fouled out when defining psychoanalysis, psychoanalytic psychology, or the psychodynamic perspective. What we know for sure is that it is both a theory of mental life and a professional technical practice. As a theory, it

“What the patient does with the therapist in the room always holds a key to what caused her problem, what has kept it going, and what has made it difficult for her to benefit from previous efforts to treat it.” —Mary Jo Peebles

Experienced psychiatrists don’t merely assign diagnoses. They construct dynamic formulations. Diagnosis begins the process. Formulation guides the intervention. Here’s how hypothesis-driven thinking reshapes psychiatric practice. 1/12 🧵

Personal meaning must be created, not accepted, and the process of creating it requires testing and experimentation. A false self will neither test nor experiment; it is a defense against experimenting. James F. Masterson #meaning #falseself #defence

Reader Comment: We often talk about rising rates of anxiety, depression, & suicide among young people as if they’re a mystery. But the truth is staring us in the face: we’ve stripped children of their emotional training ground. Childhood used to be where you learned how to

As therapists, it’s crucial to ask when we should/shouldn’t accept a case. Too many therapists jump into “doing therapy” when there is no foundation for doing the work of psychotherapy. But my criteria are very different from those below My criteria: 1) Is there something about

Today is publication day for my book, Shamanism: The Timeless Religion. To celebrate, here are some of my striking clips of shamanic rituals that I came across while working on the book:

Have We Been Thinking About A.D.H.D. All Wrong?

For children,who have no choice about where they live and who may pay a high price for offending a touchy caregiver,the defense of turning against the self can distract them from the more upsetting fact that their well-being depends on an undependable adult. Dr Nancy McWilliams

We've been measuring psychiatric drug effects all wrong. And somehow, no one’s talking about it. A major new paper just dropped in BMJ Evidence-Based Medicine—and it quietly blows up the foundation of how we evaluate psychiatric treatments. Here’s the core issue: In most

We don’t have “better tests” for autism, we expanded the definition so much that it absorbed other conditions and personality traits. It is now a less reliable diagnosis. When someone uses the word autism, they could be talking about any number of individual difficulties.

Patient: Everything is hopeless Fake therapist #1: Things will get better Fake therapist #2: Let’s work on acceptance Fake therapist #3: Let’s practice breathing Fake therapist #4: Here’s a hopelessness worksheet Fake therapist #5: Read this book Fake therapist #6: That’s a

In the new Carlat podcast @MarkLRuffalo interviews Nassir Ghaemi, MD on diagnostic controversies and #psychotherapy: https://t.co/l0gC9oJNwq Covering... > Adult #ADHD > A place for #therapy in severe #depression > Borderline vs cyclothmia

Developmental Psychoanalysis…

"When the patient is asked, 'What brings you to treatment?', the reply is often the defense against the answer. " Jacob Lindy, MD, 1991

Randy Nesse Evolutionary Psychiatry lecture https://t.co/mTpvCMznib via @YouTube