The Couple State of Mind

This long awaited book aimed at an international audience of practitioners, students and teachers of psychoanalytic couples therapy will describe the TCCR model of couple psychoanalytic psychotherapy drawing on both historical and contemporary ideas, including the author’s own theoretical contributions. It will reference contemporary influences of other analytic approaches to couples, particularly from an international perspective.

In Chapter 1, couple analytic theory is conceptualised incorporating unconscious determinants from the couple’s pasts, the relationship in terms of psychic development, the difficulties in the present in being with an other, and the possibilities for the creative relating in the future. The aim of couples therapy is discussed linked to the internalisation of a couple state of mind.

Chapters 2, 3, & 4 discuss the essential issues of assessment, engaging a couple in treatment and the specific couple therapy setting. Chapter 5 looks at a psychoanalytic understanding the couple relationship, expanding the theoretical ideas in chapter 1 in terms of clinical practice, for example the couples projective system, and the tension between narcissistic relating and creative coupling.

Chapters 6 & 7 focus on technique e.g. transference, countertransference, interpretation and other couple interventions. Chapter 8 looks at what ending means in couples analytic therapy.

The final chapter provides a glossary of terms for the developing terminology in the couple analytic field.