Judy K. Eekhoff - Böcker

This clinically focused book explores W. R. Bion’s thinking on primitive and unrepresented mental states and shows how therapists can work effectively with traumatized patients who are difficult to reach.The author illuminates how trauma survivors suffer from direct access to primal undifferentiated positions of the psyche that lie outside the symbolic order of the mind and are resistant to treatment. This access, unmediated by symbolic representation but represented in the body, disrupts the normal trajectory of development and of relationship. Integrating theory and clinical application, the book addresses processes of symbolization, somatic receptivity, and the use of countertransference when working therapeutically with undeveloped areas of the mind. It also demonstrates how primitive body relations and object relations include the body of the analyst as part of the analytic frame and are essential in establishing a therapeutic alliance.Illustrated with detailed clinical vignettes, Bion and Primitive Mental States is important reading for psychoanalysts, psychologists, social workers, and educators who wish to understand primitive states of mind and body in patients who have previously been considered untreatable.

This clinically focused book explores W. R. Bion’s thinking on primitive and unrepresented mental states and shows how therapists can work effectively with traumatized patients who are difficult to reach.The author illuminates how trauma survivors suffer from direct access to primal undifferentiated positions of the psyche that lie outside the symbolic order of the mind and are resistant to treatment. This access, unmediated by symbolic representation but represented in the body, disrupts the normal trajectory of development and of relationship. Integrating theory and clinical application, the book addresses processes of symbolization, somatic receptivity, and the use of countertransference when working therapeutically with undeveloped areas of the mind. It also demonstrates how primitive body relations and object relations include the body of the analyst as part of the analytic frame and are essential in establishing a therapeutic alliance.Illustrated with detailed clinical vignettes, Bion and Primitive Mental States is important reading for psychoanalysts, psychologists, social workers, and educators who wish to understand primitive states of mind and body in patients who have previously been considered untreatable.

In Bion’s Emotional Links, Judy K. Eekhoff explores emotion as a bridge between unrepresented and represented states, highlighting the importance of both internal emotional and external relationships in the development of the mind.Informed by Bion’s focus on analytic technique, Eekhoff includes clinical vignettes from her own work with patients who have endured trauma. She explores somatic processes and how effective analysis can break down unhealthy defence mechanisms employed by individuals which often leads to a perpetual cycle of retraumatising the self. Eekhoff shows how, through an understanding of dreams as a representation of the inner self and hope as a means of finding and retaining one’s sense of self, barriers can be broken down to free patients from a cycle of dread and dissociation. She places the individuality of the analyst at the forefront of their vital work, eschewing a dogmatic approach while carefully nurturing and respecting traditional psychoanalytic theories. Through this important work, readers will be equipped with the tools to recognize symbiotic relationships, both those in the patient’s personal life and in the relationship between analyst and analysand.

In Bion’s Emotional Links, Judy K. Eekhoff explores emotion as a bridge between unrepresented and represented states, highlighting the importance of both internal emotional and external relationships in the development of the mind.Informed by Bion’s focus on analytic technique, Eekhoff includes clinical vignettes from her own work with patients who have endured trauma. She explores somatic processes and how effective analysis can break down unhealthy defence mechanisms employed by individuals which often leads to a perpetual cycle of retraumatising the self. Eekhoff shows how, through an understanding of dreams as a representation of the inner self and hope as a means of finding and retaining one’s sense of self, barriers can be broken down to free patients from a cycle of dread and dissociation. She places the individuality of the analyst at the forefront of their vital work, eschewing a dogmatic approach while carefully nurturing and respecting traditional psychoanalytic theories. Through this important work, readers will be equipped with the tools to recognize symbiotic relationships, both those in the patient’s personal life and in the relationship between analyst and analysand.

Trauma and Primitive Mental States: An Object Relations Perspective offers a clinically based framework through which adult survivors of early childhood trauma can re-engage with painful past events to create meaningful futures for themselves.The book highlights the use of the body and the mind in working with these early unmentalized and unrepresented states, illustrating the value of finding language that embodies emotions, and working in the here and now of transference and counter-transference. Including a range of examples of how early trauma can thus be re-presented and clinically understood, the book illustrates how patients can discover themselves and leave their repetitive patterns of suffering behind.Written by a clinician with over 30 years’ experience, this will be fascinating reading for psychoanalysts and psychotherapists as well as any mental health professional working with childhood trauma.