Treatment Resistance in Therapy: A Patient's Perspective

By Marshall Donnelley

Why do some patients in therapy make progress and others do not? This book examines treatment resistance in therapy, through the lens of my 13 years in therapy, including as a patient at the Austen-Riggs center for 8 years. I talk about my frustration about my lack of progress in therapy, in helping with my depression and anxiety, despite the rapport with 3 out of the 5 therapists I've had. While my depression and suicidality eventually improved, partially due to my years at Austen-Riggs, I'm not sure how much the one-on-one, traditional talk-therapy had much to do with it. I talk about my experiences in therapy, my experiences at Austen-Riggs, and what I feel are the ways psychoanalytic theory needs to develop to help treatment resistant patients. I think there are many different kinds of therapeutic treatment resistance, and I outline a specific example of treatment resistance - the child of "blurred parents," loving parents who nonetheless were confused in the role and had no sense of themselves as parents, leading to a confused sense of self for the child. I wish to gratefully acknowledge the support of my own parents, and the hard work of my last 3 therapists, without which this book would not have been possible.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: B0BTNNMXF8
• ISBN13: 9798375839714
• Release Date: February 2023
• Publisher: Independently published
• Length: 215 Pages
• Weight: 0.85 lbs.
• Dimensions: 9.0" x 0.5" x 6.0"