factsWhen: Thurs 29 October

Time: 19h30

Where: Ububele

CPD points: 1.5

Cost: R100 (students R50)

Bookings: palesa@ububele.org

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Institute for PsychodynamicChild Psychotherapy

# 18the

Newsletter SEPTEMBER / OCTOBER 2015

On blinds and binds When one gets to the heart of the matter, ‘To be seen or not to be seen?’ is probably one of the most profound and philosophical questions many of our patients grapple with. The paradox of longing to be kept in sight [and in mind] but at the same time fearing it, creates an endless tension. To add a twist to the Gordonian Knot is the idea that not only do we often hide parts of ourselves from others, we also endeavour to hide parts of ourselves from ourselves. We do this for a multitude of reasons and in extraordinarily inventive ways – one of the most impressive and effective has to be the repetition compulsion.

In a nutshell, and as strange really as hiding from ourselves, we repeat things so as to avoid remembering them. This repetition can be broken down into four central motivations: l we have another bash at righting a

wrong, or mastering a situation; l the known is better than the unknown

and we believe we have more control over something, however horrid;

l there is nearly always a certain amount of gratification [often sexual] in the repetition and;

l a form of punishment which allows, for a time, our guilt to be assuaged.

Over and over, we return to the scene, or a variation of it, of the original ‘crime’, but what remains hidden are conscious and felt reactions and thoughts about it. A bizarre kind of red herring that we believe keeps us safe, but very often does the opposite. However, and as dramatised brilliantly at An Afternoon With Oedipus organised by Barnaby Barratt earlier this month, the horror of discovering the truth can drive one to another kind of self-inflicted blindess – ‘blindess by brooch’!

It’s a bit like ‘you are damned if you do and damned if you don’t’ but, as a rule, turning a blind eye to what is going on both around you and inside you is unlikely to end well. And, in many ways, although they don’t often realise it, patients have understood this...they knock at our door and ask: ‘Will you see me?’

Repetition. Graem

e William

s*

threadread

www.ipcp.co.za

“Her pure and eloquent bloodSpoke in her cheeks, and so distinctly wrought,That one might almost say, her body thought”

– Donne in The Second Anniversary

thought

I-sightTurning a blind eye or daring to see: a patient’s struggle to open his eyes to psychic truth is the title of a paper by Dr Louise Emanuel which she will deliver at a scientific meeting on 29 October at Ububele.

This paper describes the first three years of intensive psychotherapy with a young man suffering from depressive episodes and mood swings, linked in part to the fear of losing his eyesight.

Louise, a Consultant Child and Adoles-cent Psychotherapist comments: “The emergence of a link between his perceived deteriorating eyesight, and his propensity to ‘turn a blind eye’, (Steiner 1985) to painful truths, sabotaging his capacity to see clearly, highlighted his Oedipal struggles. The often primitive nature of his mental states raised issues about how to work technically with such a patient, and the paper refers to the value of my initial training as a child psychotherapist in undertaking this work.”

Strictly Come Infant ObserversIf you have completed an infant observation, you have put in hours of dedicated work – your 10 000 hours as Malcolm Gladwell might say [in Outliers]. However, there are just a few more sentences to go before you can pen a full stop and close the chapter.

There is an old adage, roughly-speaking, that suggests the last ten minutes of a journey are often the most difficult or perilous. Many infant observers who have navigated this heroic path struggle to get in their final assignments or portfolios for their infant observations. We encourage everyone who has work outstanding to take this last step in order to get these assessed and accredited by the Tavistock examiners.

NB deadline March 2016. If you consider your draft copies ‘not good enough’ still hand them in and we’ll check them for you. You deserve the satisfaction of completing the journey.

Questions? Contact Shayleen Peeke: shayleenp@gmail.com

DeaDline

P.S. If anyone knows

of a mother-to-be

interested in having

an infant observer

present for the first

year/two years of

her baby’s life – let

us know (preferably

in the Greenside/

Parkhurst area).

picture it *

Dream timeDream work is a surprisingly neglected area of our practice and our training. Summer has brought with it some new life. Things are waking up.

The Jungian Group in Johannesburg has recently had a weekend workshop run by Jungian Analyst Renee Ramsden. Founder member of the SAAJA and training analyst she presented her work Individuation as the Labyrinthine Path to the Self: A Dream Process.

For more information on the SAAJA visit www.jungsouthernafrica.co.za The gates of horn and ivory is the title of an upcoming four session workshop on dream interpretation in clinical practice run by JHB-based psychoanalytic psychotherapist Joan Schön. For further details on this clinically, as well as theoretically relevant workshop, contact: jschon@netactive.co.zaWorking Therapeutically with Fantasies, Phantasies, and Dreams is a workshop to be run by Barnaby Barratt in Cape Town this weekend (16 Oct (13h30-18h15) and Saturday 17 October 8h45-17h15).

Try your luck for a last minute booking and contact Lulu Bräsler lulu@brasler.co.za/083 246 3686

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factsWhen

28 October Where

Lefika La Phodiso, Art Therapy Centre, Cnr Joubert Street & Empire Road, ParktownTime

09h00-12h30 (am session)13h30-15h00 (pm session)Cost

R600 (Students: R300)Bookings

kamal.naran01@gmail.com

Under 5 lifeThe IPCP has organised a workshop run by Dr Louise Emanuel – A Psychodynamic approach to work with Under Fives: Theory, Technique and Practice. Louise is a Consultant Child and Adolescent Psychotherapist working in the Child and Family Department at the Tavistock Clinic, London.

The workshop will include reflections and clinical vignettes on the following:

l Understanding young children’s non-verbal communications, through close observation, drawing on transference and countertransference phenomena;

l Work with the parent-couple relationship; and also

l Louise’s recent thinking on understanding the sometimes cruel nature of young children’s physical and psychological attacks on their baby siblings – concretely as well as in phantasy.

In the afternoon there will be a clinical presentation by school counsellor, Anne Reeves, Thinking Psychodynamically about the complexities and challenges of working in schools.

Thinking couplesA six-week Psychoanalytic Couple Therapy Course run by Tertia Myers begins in November.

The course will provide a psychoanalytic understanding of couple relationships and an introduction to working psychoanalytically with couples. From the outset of a relationship, projective identification plays a pivotal role in partner choice and the ongoing interactions with a partner. The course will explore the many manifestations that this takes in couple relationships and how the couple therapist can attempt to disentangle some of the less functional projective identifications.

The implications for the couple (and the therapist) of confronting the ‘intolerability of the other’; the fear of difference and separateness; the struggle of being a creative couple, as well as the lack of curiosity found in more narcissistic relating, will be explored.

The course will additionally focus on how to assess couples and their developmental levels by noting the couple interaction and the therapist’s countertransference; and other challenges that are particular to working with couples, such as affairs.

For more see page 3 or contact: Tertia Myers on 082 337 5010 or e-mail: tcmyers11@gmail.com

new

Let’s face it

Glen Gabbard proposes that the undefined boundaries

of the internet offer new possibilities in how people

connect with each other (Gabbard, 2001). In the spirit

of finding creative ways to engage, facilitate thinking

and connect with one another, the IPCP has created a

facebook page. The page has links to other organisations

all over the globe, and often posts thought-provoking

articles about infant development, literature and other

interesting titbits to add to your facebook reverie.

Turn idle facebook meandering between patients and

the heavy work of thinking, into creative connecting

and active engagement. Be sure to like the page

by searching for “Institute for Psychodynamic Child

Psychotherapy”, invite your psychology-minded friends

to like the page too, share interesting posts with us;

and let us know what more you’d like to hear about

from the IPCP, what events you’d like to see organised

and in what ways you’d like to get involved. You can

also use the facebook page to find out about upcoming

events, to link up to the IPCP webpage, and to learn

about volunteering opportunities.

www.facebook.com/

InstitutePsychodynamicChildPsychotherapy

For matters to do with posting, linking and liking,

contact Wendy Cain on wendy_cn@yahoo.comPoet Langston Hughes also warns us about the dire consequences of deferring our dreams. Make sure you attend to dream life – both your own and your patients’. It means something.*

‘Hold fast to dreams

For if dreams die

Life is a broken-winged bird

That cannot fly’

Langston Hughes*

“In the couple relationship the process of relinquishing projections will never

thought

be fully realized. Some degree of narcissistic relating is inevitable, and necessary, to sustain an intimate relationship that, unlike an analysis, at least promises to be interminable, for better or for worse.”

– Ruszczynski, 2006

relevant read-ings

These three readings are all available on PepWeb.

Hill, A. (2006). To see or not to see one partner

alone in couple therapy? Psycho-Analytic Psychotherapy in South Africa, 14(2), 1–19.

Mary M. (2010). Unconscious beliefs about being a couple. Fort Da, 16:36-55

Ruszczynski, S. P. (1992). Notes towards a psychoanalytic understanding of the couple relationship. Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy, 6(1), 37–41.

[two]??

contact Newsletter Editor Frances Williams – francesw@iafrica.com

Cape head space Imperatives

[three]

Art of the heart Two workshops are coming up in Cape Town which promote personal well-being and professional efficacy. Our

profession can never be described as neglectful – the abundance of courses and seminars currently thriving in our community is testimony to this. However, we are often neglectful of ourselves. These CPD accredited workshops integrate theoretical issues with creative techniques – moving away from a purely intellectual approach to stress and burnout.

Two psychoanalytically-oriented and experienced health-care professionals will guide you in a non-judgemental and mindful way. No previous art experience needed.

Workshop 1 – Difficult Emotions at Work: Tuesday 20 October or Saturday 24 October (8h45-12h30)

Workshop 2 – Ending the Year with Presence: Saturday 28 November or Thursday 3 December (8h45-12h30)

For more details contact the facilitators Carol Cheesman and Melanie Horwitz on 079 427 5217 or e-mail: theheartspace123@gmail.com

Therapeutic parent workAn introductory course Working Therapeutically with Parents will be run in Cape Town in November. Check out the details in the facts box below and pay an online visit to the two very worthwhile projects www.babiesinmind.co.za and www.childreninmind.co.za

factsWhere

Devil’s Peak, Cape TownWhen

Monday 9 November @ 8h45-13h30 Cost

R400 for licensed Babies in Mind practitionersR620 for non-practitionersCPD Points: 4

Contact

Jenny Perkel on 082 928 5548 or jenny@perkel.co.za

Futures for our childrenThe Project for Assessment of Learners in Schools (PALS) was initiated in June 2015 and a number of psychologists responded to the appeal in the read thread by volunteering their time and offering a pro-bono assessment to a struggling youngster. Their generosity and compassion will make the world of difference to each child assessed.

A vignetteSipho at 14 ½ years is one such youngster. He was referred for counselling by his teacher who was ‘at her wits end’ and described him as an anxious, angry boy who was struggling academically and battled to concentrate. He was failing at school, but because he had already stayed back twice in his school career, he could not be ‘retained’ a third time.

Sipho’s problems first surfaced when as a child of nine, he had been sent to Limpopo as his mother could not manage his impulsive, uncooperative behavior. In 2014 his mother was killed by her boyfriend. He has since been living with his maternal aunt and attending school in Johannesburg where he has been attending counselling and recently had an assessment as part of PALS.

The excellent assessment has revealed some profound underlying language learning difficulties, worsened by possible visual impairment. His emotional state is characterised by anxiety, sadness and a profound sense of failure. He recently started using alcohol to regulate his mood.

As a result of the assessment, Sipho will be referred to a special needs high school where he will receive the therapeutic and academic support he requires to cope better and realise his potential. He will be seen by a Child and Adolescent Psychiatrist and a visual specialist. He will continue receiving weekly counselling (Johannesburg Parent and Child School Counselling Service).

For Sipho, whose needs were ‘missed’ for the past five years, there may still be some hope for a different future. He is just one of the many, many children struggling with undetected difficulties who could be helped by the intervention of an assessment.

If you are interested in even just doing a once off pro-bono assessment contact Gillian.berkowitz.com.

Celebrate the past – help for the futureTo celebrate 20 years of service to the community and to raise funds for the future, Khanya Family Centre will be hosting a Gala Dinner on Friday 6 November at Isolomzi Place,59 Hawthorn Street, Palm Ridge, from 18h00-22h00.

The Khanya Family Centre is a Katlehong based registered non-profit organisation that provides psychosocial services for children, youth and families from disadvantaged communities.

In the past 20 years it has reached over 25 000 people through counselling, and more than 20 000 in training workshops and seminars. As a non-profit organisation, services are partly funded by subsidies from government and donations from the public. The Department of Social Development has been a consistent source of support. In addition, the Department of Health has provided some much needed assistance.

“We request your company to sponsor a table for a minimum of R5 000. The gala dinner will not only be a celebration but also a fundraising event. The funds will go towards running costs, toiletries and/or food parcels. Your support will help us to execute our operations and reach those needing these services.”

For more information contact: nomathemba@khanyafc.org.za

Adding valueLefika La Phodiso (The Art Therapy Centre) is looking for volunteer psychotherapists to assist with individual therapy. It has a number of Community Art Counsellors (practicing and trainees) that could benefit from this service. As the Psychoanalytic Community Art Counselling training is based on an experiential approach, it is important for trainees to have a therapy space in order to contain some of their own difficulties in order to contain others.

Although this is an outreach opportunity, the potential adult clients could pay a minimal fee towards covering travelling costs. Lefika has a space available for the service to take place. Your assistance, contribution and experience would be extremely valuable and highly appreciated.

For more information contact: kamal.naran01@gmail.com

IPCP member Coralie Trotter has created a magical list of children’s literature and describes how it [literature] can capture the insides, holding the mental solids of the child...and captivates the child without dismantling defences.

As she says: “Good literature reflects back to children what they already know dwells inside them – shadow truths and dangerous passions. It is the grown-ups who have forgotten how to broker this internal crucible. The publication of Where the Wild Things Are created a furore in the world of children’s literature in 1964. It was described as ‘a pointless and confusing story, not a book to be left where a sensitive child may come upon it at twilight’.

“Children’s books are there to be ignored, cannibalised, abandoned, absorbed, used and recreated until they become magical, useful internal objects, and children know just how to do this.

“In his speech accepting the Caldecott [award] Maurice Sendak responded to his critics by questioning children’s books that offer ‘a gilded world unshadowed by the least suggestion of conflict or pain, a world manufactured by those who cannot – or don’t care to – remember the truth of their own childhood. I remember my own childhood vividly...I knew terrible things but I knew I mustn’t let adults know I knew. I would scare them’.”

Here are four samples. If you would like the full list which comes with wisdoms and Coralie-isms e-mail her on coralie@tiscali.co.za

When Sophie Gets Angry – Really, Really Angry...by Molly Bang. (1999)

Llama Llama Mad at Mama by Anna Dewdney. (2007)

Little Mouse’s Big Book of Fears by Emily Gravett. (2007)

The Soul Bird by Michal Snunit. (1998).

Working committee: Hayley Berman, Gill Berkowitz, Wendy Cain, Nichi Casati, Irene Chait, Gwyn Choles, Yvette Esprey, Lauren Gower, Julie Green, Carol Long, Trevor Lubbe, Tshidi Maseko, Shayleen Peeke, Linda Rudenburg, Brandon Swanepoel, Mary-Anne Tandy, Marnie Vujovic (chair), Felicity van Vuuren, Frances Williams Cape: Carol Cheeseman, Judith Davies, Nicola Dugmore, Melanie Horwitz, Trish Leaver, Diane Sandler, Tanya Wilson, Bea Wirz

Institute for Psychodynamic Child Psychotherapy

Institute for PsychodynamicChild Psychotherapy

notes to self...Last quarter of 2015

The Parkmore 2015 Seminars – seminar opportunities in psychoanalytic thinking and practice by Barnaby Barratt.

For more details: DrBarnabyBBarratt@Yahoo.co.za

13 – 15 November

Peter Hodson, psychiatrist and Jungian analyst based in Cape Town will be giving a talk on T.S. Eliot’s Four Quartets: A Poetic description of Individuation (Delta, Road No 3, Victory Park. Cost: R130. No need to book).

More info?: Susan Ingle 011 482 7482

[four]

Good Reads

Open MinedInside Out

Bizarre, imaginative and authentically psychedelic…an emotional roller-coaster, the new Pixar animation Inside Out could easily have been called ‘Out There’, says The Guardian newspaper. We agree and think it a perfect fit for the read thread’s column Open Mined.

Riley, who is uprooted from her Midwest life when her father starts a new job in San Francisco, is like all of us guided by her emotions – Joy, Fear, Anger, Disgust and Sadness. The emotions live in Headquarters, the control centre inside Riley’s mind, where they help advise her through everyday life and her recent change of life. Although Joy, Riley’s main and most important emotion, tries to keep things positive, the emotions conflict on how best to navigate a new city, house and school.

However, comments The Guardian, it’s in the way that the story depicts the fading of childhood’s mental furniture, and explores the mechanics of forgetting, that Inside Out achieves a universal significance.

For more on this cool film: www.the guardian.com

thought“Acts of infidelity rely profoundly on the manic defence because this dynamic provides both an idealised object in the form of an illicit lover and the illusion of escape from pain.”

– Nathan, 2012

Bodies and minds of babiesThe title of the Gauteng Association for Infant Mental Health’s (GAIMH) and the University of the Witwatersrand’s upcoming conference is The bodies and minds of babies in relationship: Dialogues in a multidisciplinary context.

There is an impressive line-up of local and international experts in the field of infant mental health including: Alessandra Piontelli, Peter Cooper, Cora Smith, Tessa Baradon, Linda Richter, Kerry Wallace, Amina Abubakar, Louise Emanuel, Astrid Berg and Mark Tomlinson.

The conference promises to be a great opportunity for multidisciplinary dialogues around parent-infant work in South Africa while at the same time giving professionals access to cutting-edge resources that promote infant mental health.

e-bulletinThe South African Psychoanalytic Confederation (SAPC) has recently launched an e-bulletin. Filled with detailed feedback on its recent Meeting of Groups initiative and articles such as The Way Forward by Gael Beckett, it is another exciting and contextually relevant offering for members of our community.

For more details contact: sapccontact@gmail.com

factsDate

30 and 31 October 2015Venue

University of the WitwatersrandCPD points

12 For registration

www.gaimh.co.za For more information

about group rates, excellent ones if you are part of an SAPC group, e-mail gaimh2@gmail.com