The Therapeutic Alliance: The Essential Ingredient for Psychotherapy

 I am currently writing on the ‘therapeutic alliance’ – its relation to mindfulness, psychotherapy, understanding, and ‘being listened to…’   What follows is an interesting article that I came across that may interest some of you…

Excerpt:

Have you ever tried to change the way you do something? It could be anything — the way you hold your tennis racket, blow into a flute, meditate — you name it. If so, think about that experience. No matter how motivated you were to change, and no matter how much you knew that it would help your serve, musicality, or sense of inner peace, it can be difficult and scary to change even the smallest thing. In order to change, you have to give up your old way of doing something first and then try the new way. That means that for a while you’re in a free fall — you no longer have your old habit to rely on and you don’t yet have the new one.

The anxiety of trying to change something as complex and entrenched as how you relate to people close to you or manage stress takes the feeling to a whole new level. Yet, that’s just what you do when you enter psychotherapy. Just as you had to put yourself into the hand of your teachers and coaches, in therapy you need to gradually do just that with your therapist to help you through what can be a harrowing adventure. The foundation for therapy is called the therapeutic alliance (1, 2). When it’s there, you know that your therapist is there to help you, no matter how hard the going gets.

The therapeutic alliance might be the most important part of beginning a psychotherapy. In fact, many studies indicate that the therapeutic alliance is the best predictor of treatment outcome (3-5).

See entire article:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/deborah-l-cabaniss-md/therapeutic-alliance_b_1554007.html

 

A mad world A diagnosis of mental illness is more common than ever – did psychiatrists create the problem, or just recognise it?

When a psychiatrist meets people at a party and reveals what he or she does for a living, two responses are typical. People either say, ‘I’d better be careful what I say around you,’ and then clam up, or they say, ‘I could talk to you for hours,’ and then launch into a litany of complaints and diagnostic questions, usually about one or another family member, in-law, co-worker, or other acquaintance. It seems that people are quick to acknowledge the ubiquity of those who might benefit from a psychiatrist’s attention, while expressing a deep reluctance ever to seek it out themselves…

…While a continuous view of mental illness probably reflects underlying reality, it inevitably results in grey areas where ‘caseness’ (whether someone does or does not have a mental disorder) must be decided based on judgment calls made by experienced clinicians. In psychiatry, those calls usually depend on whether a patient’s complaints are associated with significant distress or impaired functioning. Unlike medical disorders where morbidity is often determined by physical limitations or the threat of impending death, the distress and disruption of social functioning associated with mental illness can be fairly subjective. Even those on the softer, less severe end of the mental illness spectrum can experience considerable suffering and impairment. For example, someone with mild depression might not be on the verge of suicide, but could really be struggling with work due to anxiety and poor concentration. Many people might experience sub-clinical conditions that fall short of the threshold for a mental disorder, but still might benefit from intervention.

See link for interesting article on psychiatry…and bits about the importance of psychotherapeutic intervention…

http://aeon.co/magazine/being-human/have-psychiatrists-lost-perspective-on-mental-illness/

How would you like to be met?

Mental health and psychological problems are still stigmatized, even if 50 % of us will quality for some disorder once in our lifetime. The stigma can be explained many ways. Sometimes, people don`t know enough about psychology, but even people who`ve read a lot, can have prejudices. I have prejudices and problems with understanding, too, but I try to be aware of it.

Have you heard stories about people with psychological issues who weren`t believed or felt ridiculed if they tried to explain what they felt? Unfortunately, I have, and it scares me more than anything. I might even have acted differently myself, because we show dislike or contempt in many ways (and you don`t always notice it yourself). When busy, I must confess that I have a tendency to not meet the eyes of a beggar, and I have stepped back when I`m approached by for example an alcoholic.

When I do, I remember to watch myself from above, and take a deep breath. Usually, it helps, and I have learnt so much that way.

To illustrate what I mean by prejudice, I`ve included some pretty explanatory pictures.

 

 

Bloggen

• The pictures come from this good (norwegian) blog
• Other good blogs

The sound of living like a psychological millionaire

 

 

The art of living as a psycholgical millionaire: To use your energy in a way that gives you a result you need.

A person with the possibility of becoming a psychological millionaire does just this. For this to happen, certain principles must be satisfied. Efficient mental energy has four caracteristic features. Its:

– Adaptive

– Goal-oriented

– Successful

and

– Devoid of waste

Examples of non-efficient living:

Certain diagnostic groups can have enough mental energy, but low mental efficiency. This can for example be clients with AD/HD or Borderline personality disorder. They might do a lot of things, like walking around in a room restlessly or having an emotional outburst. Their problem is using the energy in a good way: They can`t regulate it in a way that makes it able to live a good life. Some groups have too low energy to be efficient, like with depressed or fatigued clients.

When working with dissociation, parts have different levels of mental energy and efficiency. EP`s can actually be the most energetic parts in the system, but have very low efficiency, since they repeat behoviors in a dysfunctional way. It is possible to have a dissociative disorder like DID and borderline PF at the same time. In this case most parts will have borderline features, that is: High levels of mental energy but low efficiency.

Energy and efficiency in trauma

“Looking in a cupboard that is empty, will not work no matter how good the torch is”. Nijenhuis, 2013

Trauma can also be understood by using the concept of energy and efficiency. Trauma can be either too much or too little energy or efficiency. For example, an EP can feel stuck, with high levels of energy, but low levels of efficiency. The EP can`t “get out of it”. There is no symbolization of the event, since it “feels like” the trauma is still going on. The part or the EP is “stuck” in what was. To connect the then with the now, it`s necessary to reach the reach the higher level of language, and that is easier when an empathic therapist helps the EP. Empathy is necessary to tune in to the EP`s experience. If the EP is afraid, the voice of the therapist must be soothing and calm. The therapist must tune in so that the EP is seen and validated. When the therapist tries to understand the EP, the ANP of the patient might learn that it`s possible to collaborate and help EP`s.

Example of working with an EP with enough mental energy

Imagine a claustrophobic EP (picture 1). The EP has trouble breathing because her throat feels constricted. The therapist might observe this, and tune in to this with a low, empathic voice “It looks like you have trouble breathing ?” The therapist observes that the EP tries to nod. The therapist continues: “I see you tried to nod, but it looks like its hard to move?”. The therapist explores the EP`s experience, thereby respecting and validating her.

The therapist can also ask the EP to try to broaden her field of consciousness, by asking if they can try to breathe slower or by asking of if the EP could look at something around her that is comforting. He can also try to tell the EP that she is safe, that boundaries will be respected, or say that everything will be okay. Moreover, the therapits can make it clear that the EP decides what happens next, and that everything will be predictable and safe. The therapist watches the EP and helps her, where she is, there and then.

Working with a non-verbal EP

If the EP is young and can`t talk, one has to communicate non-verbally. For example, if the EP is in “freeze-mode”, the therapist can ask questions about the inner experiences of the EP: “Can you find a place in yourself where you have some ability to move?” If the EP moves the ANP`s finger just a tiny bit, the therapist might say: “Is it possible to move your finger a little bit more?” Gradually, the EP is exposed to new experiences that will be healing in time.

If the frozen EP is able to move, either by actually walking around in the room, the EP learns what it couldn`t when abuse happened. When the therapist is able to intone and be there for the EP`s, magic can happen. I`ve experiences this myself, and every time it feels so meaningful. To see a afraid little EP starting to feel stronger, feels like I`ve been able to lift a heavy weight together with them. Therapy is heavy work. The EP must shred the cloak of repression that weigh down on them, and that cost a lot of mental energy. This means that the client must have enough mental energy available.

If he is tired, starved, physicially unfit or doesn`t do anything inspiring that gives joy or energy, it might be best to wait until more energy is available. Trauma-therapy is hard work, and cost both physical and mental energy. Going into trauma-material before the client has filled up her batteries, is not recommended.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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When Ignorance Begets Confidence

“There are few people whom I really love, and still fewer of whom I think well. The more I see of the world, the more am I dissatisfied with it; and every day confirms my belief of the inconsistency of all human characters, and of the little dependence that can be placed on the appearance of either merit or sense.” _{— Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen}

I begin with this quote to convey the feelings evoked in a recent exchange with a neighbor, one in which surprise (and some horror) was felt during the course of the conversation.  Logic and ‘reasonableness’ had little place in the interchange. I had just been reading a short article that looked at particular German words that gave expression to complex emotional states. An excerpt is as follows: 

“Fremdschämen describes embarrassment which is experienced in response to someone else’s actions, but it is markedly different from simply being embarrassed for someone else….Fremdscham (the noun) describes the almost-horror you feel when you notice that somebody is oblivious to how embarrassing they truly are.” Further…”Fremdscham-inducing events…usually cause one to ask this question: “how on earth can these people be unaware of how stupid they are being right now?”.

I invite you to read this short article on the cognitive bias created in the Dunning Kruger effect – an effect that causes one to be unaware of their performance – and their incompetence.

http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/evolved-primate/201006/when-ignorance-begets-confidence-the-classic-dunning-kruger-effect?fb_action_ids=10202209567024712&fb_action_types=og.likes&fb_source=other_multiline&action_object_map=%7B%2210202209567024712%22%3A483617186047%7D&action_type_map=%7B%2210202209567024712%22%3A%22og.likes%22%7D&action_ref_map=%5B%5D

Related articles

• Dunning Kruger Effect (matznerd.com)

Abusers are only afraid of losing control, if you get up, they fall

I, like many others, have a burning desire to DO something for the world, and I try to do my part every day at work. The last couple of years I have also been reading many books about issues related to the world today, and watched documentaries and movies that also inspired me. After some time, excitement rose as I understood how ideas, psychology and internet have the potential to accomplish things we could not before. Some people say it`s too many bad things out there, we can`t do anything, anyway. I simply believe that is not true. Those words are uttered by bullies not affected by people starving and losing their jobs, as long as they can fly their jets, live in mansions and wear expensive suits.

From working with traumatized people, some of the most lovely persons I`ve ever met, and feeling the unfairness of people USING their kindness and warmth against them, making them feel bad and unworthy, when in reality the roles could have been reversed. Also reading about how psychopaths can climb to high positions in the society EXACTLY because they don`t fear stepping at toes (Watch the documentary I am Fishead for more on this) scares me even more. But, remembering that just 1 – 2 % of the populations truly have no conscious (still the number is so high that we all will encounter one of them quite often. The staggering number is still big when you think about how many people inhabit this planet. Some have even noticed that capitalism is as built for psychopaths, what do they care if Greece goes bankrupt as long as they get their cash and power?

All this made me realize: People trying to make the world worse, will always be a challenge, but they will NOT accomplish this if others protest. The internet makes this possible, and by spreading an attitude of compassion, we can work against this tendency. In his book, “Defense Against the Psychopath,” author Stefan Verstappen outlines the greatest and stealthiest danger in the human jungle. Leaders throughout history – the people we vote for – are rarely moral leaders. For them, lying is as easy and natural as breathing. It is completely unnerving and rattling to face the fact that someone can have absolutely no empathy. This realization is so frightening, most would rather go heavily into denial and fantasize that our helping them succeed is a good thing.

“Because of the tremendous destruction psychopaths reap on society, it is vital for everyone to be aware of their existence and to recognize their behavior traits. Understanding them is the first step to defending oneself against them.”

Peace one day want to make one day a year, a “peace day”, and what about a “kindness day” ? Philip Zimbardo, one of the greatest scientists, have introduced Heroic Imagination Project where he encourage people to take heroic act. Do you know that often it is enough that ONE person protest, for others to join in? In fact, they found that the Milgram Experiment of obedience (where you must deliver shock to others) the willingness to do what they “felt” was not right, went down if they “by coincidence” saw somebody else say no. This means: It helps to follow your heart, when something is not “quite right” even if authority tell you something else. Some do anyway, because they trust their gut-feeling enough to do what feels right, but most people look at what others do (cognitive heuristics) because it is easier.

So, if somebody else does kind things for others, would you not want to, also? If your best friend always smiled at strangers, would it not be easier for you also?

But you need energy, to be there for others. For that reason: Take care of your own needs first! Many feel egoistic if they do, but it`s actually the other way around. By not taking care of yourself, you neglect the energy and happiness necessary for giving others what they need. If an oxygen mask fall down, take your own mask first. Not because you don`t care about your children, but because then you are more able to help others, afterwards.

Read more:

http://www.5minutesformom.com/67453/world-kindness-day-be-kind-every-day/

Project: Kindness to a stranger

Capitalism: A System Run By and For Psychopaths

http://agranstrom.wordpress.com/2013/07/12/the-pros-to-being-a-psychopath

http://articles.latimes.com/2011/may/19/entertainment/la-et-book-20110519

Psychopaths run the world

http://peaceoneday.org/resources/

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2012/oct/07/wisdom-of-psychopaths-kevin-dutton-review

http://drawaphy.wordpress.com/2013/07/11/psychopaths/

Related articles

• Developers wanted for Peace Games scheme (develop-online.net)
• Treading the path to peace: London event explores ways of tackling conflict around world (standard.co.uk)
• Welcome to the Muslim Peace Day Project (meccastars.com)
• The Psychopathic Corporation – A Clinical Diagnosis (PCLR), by Dr. Robert Hare (humanchessdotorg.wordpress.com)
• The Psychopath Next Door (dont-tread-on.me)
• Fight for yourself (forfreepsychology.wordpress.com)
• Thoughts from a female psychopath (forfreepsychology.wordpress.com)
• How to spot disorder: Is your ego being inflated? (forfreepsychology.wordpress.com)
• How to protect yourself from a ‘successful’ psychopath (sott.net)

The vendictive narcissist

Narcissism has many faces.

The following post explores the darker sides of narcissism/psychopathy. This post might trigger reactions in people who have been abused or are in vulnerable positions right now. Feedback is most welcome, and if someone have opinions, we are available on mail (forfreepsychology@gmail.com)

Nina, clinical psychologist

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← Radio Interview About My New Book

The Invisible Child →

The Vindictive Narcissist

Posted on August 29, 2012 by Joseph Burgo

In recent weeks, both within my practice and through emails from site visitors (all women), I’ve heard about several men who have tried to destroy the reputation of their ex-wives with a ruthless and quite thorough assault on their public characters. These men have told lies to friends and family members, attempted to blackmail their former spouses by threatening to spread vicious lies about them, stolen money from them, tried to turn children against their mothers, become explosively angry, even physically violent when challenged, and have uniformly laid blame for the failure of the marriage at the feet of the ex-wife. I’ve also heard from a couple of men confronting vengeful and narcissistic women in their lives, but with nowhere near the level of vindictiveness displayed by these narcissistic ex-husbands.The viciousness can be quite subtle and sometimes invisible to those who don’t know the man well. For instance, the ex-husband of one of my clients sent a very reasonable sounding email to selected members of their church, including the pastoral counselors who’d tried to help them salvage their marriage, portraying himself as a man of God abandoned by his wife, and then directly impugning her mental sanity while planting doubts about her fitness as a mother. She is, in fact, a quite devoted and capable mother while he consistently manipulates their children with gifts to enlist sympathy on his side (but will also dump them on their mother during his custodial days whenever he happens to have a date).

They seldom come to therapy.

The word I use to describe them is reptilian: they seem so cold-blooded, without any genuine feeling for other people, and their desire to inflict pain or even destroy their former spouses seems inhuman, snake-like. At the same time, I feel that I do understand their psychology and what drives them. As a follow-up to my last post, I thought I’d provide a psychological portrait of the vindictive narcissist, making use of the concepts of projection, shame according to my particular views and narcissistic defenses against it.

In that prior post, I discussed what I’ve called the “law of false attribution,” or an in-built human tendency to believe that whenever we experience pain, an outside agent (some other person) has caused us to feel it. For the vindictive narcissist, the subject pain is a profound and quite literally unbearable sense of shame. He has so thoroughly defended against this shame (the felt knowledge of internal defect) that he has no conscious awareness of it. He has constructed an idealized and false self-image as a protection against it, a kind of fortress behind which he conceals his shame, and will defend that self-image with every weapon in his arsenal. When a wife decides to leave a marriage, the narcissistic husband experiences it as a kind of attack (according to the law of false attribution): her rejection threatens to put him into contact with all the shame he can’t bear to feel, and so he must instantly turn against her. If he can’t literally destroy her, as some wounded narcissists have done, he will attempt to annihilate her character. Like the husband of my client, he will try to turn everyone they know against his ex-wife, painting himself as a martyr.

The degree of viciousness and the unrelenting pursuit of revenge point to a truly toxic level of shame. It’s so unbearable that these men must instantly respond with a counter-assault to any person threatening to stir it up. All insults or wounds to his pride will be felt as an attack and provoke the usual blaming and contemptuous defenses; but the public humiliation they experience when their wives ask for a divorce is a narcissistic injury so profound it provokes a retaliatory strike of nuclear proportions. Most people who go through divorce feel some degree of shame, some sense of failure, but the vindictive narcissist feels it a thousand-fold. That pain is felt as an attack, calling forth an all-out counter-assault meant to annihilate the threat to his fragile self-esteem.

If you’ve ever felt hurt or humiliated by someone you know and then entertained fantasies of revenge, imagining that you would show that person up or triumph over him, then you’ll understand (to a degree) what the vindictive narcissist experiences. Unlike you and me, however, he can’t tolerate such painful humiliation, not even for a second, and revenge fantasies are not enough. He experiences the continuing reality of a woman who rejected him as a continual threat, a constant assault upon his ideal self-image; as a result, his defenses remain on continual alert against it. At the least provocation — that is, whenever shame threatens to emerge — he will viciously strike out, like a snake assaulting its prey.

In comments to my post about narcissistic mothers, many site visitors have described similar assaults by their own mothers. Vindictive narcissists are not limited to vengeful ex-husbands. Since such people have almost no interest in or capacity for change, the best you can do is stay clear of them, just the way you’d avoid a snake if it happened to cross your path. Unfortunately, some narcissists can also be quite charming, having learned how to manipulate people to evoke their desire and sympathy; as children, we can’t escape our narcissistic mothers until we’re grown. When escape is impossible in life, perhaps the most you can do is set very firm limits and try not to inflict unnecessary narcissistic injuries upon them. It will only come back to haunt you.

UPDATE: May 23, 2013

Inspired by reader comments to my posts about narcissistic mothers and vindictive narcissists, I’ve released a new eBook on the Kindle platform. It’s a novella-length retelling of the classic Cinderella story, focusing on my usual themes of shame and narcissism, with a look at the tumultuous emotions behind self-injury

Bio

Latest Posts

Joseph Burgo

Joe is the author and the owner of AfterPsychotherapy.com, one of the leading online mental health resources on the internet.

Be sure to connect with him on Google+ and Linkedin.

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How to spot disorder: Is your ego being inflated?

How To Spot Disorder: Is Your Ego Being Inflated? Run.

16AUG201310 Comments

by theabilitytolove in Uncategorized Tags: abuse recovery., ego boosting, ego inflation,how to spot a psychpath, love bombing, Narcissists, psychopaths, sociopaths

     I pontificate a lot about a ‘genuine’ recovery. I’ve gone into what that means. So I’m going into this a little more because I experienced an attempt by a disordered one trying to infiltrate with their little tentacles out, ready to claw into my soul. NOPE. Not going there.

The reason that a psychopath, sociopath or narcissist is able to get into your life and down your pants so fast to seal the deal is ego inflation. Who doesn’t like to be told that they’re wonderful, right?
I think we make ‘nice’ of the reasons our disordered ones were allowed into our lives and I see this when page admins ‘lure’ survivors, when describing what happened: “He exploited all of your GOOD qualities! Bastard! He saw all the GOOD in you and that’s why you were targeted! Yes, he took all of those GOOD things about you, your POOR THING and exploited them for his OWN benefit!” I’m exaggerating this of course, but it’s irritating when I see it. It’s also questionable because it doesn’t feel honest to me.

Recovery is the greatest opportunity you will ever have in getting to know yourself, warts and all.

Well, what they say is only half true. He took your ‘good’ qualities and elevated it to rock star status. Healthy people do not need this kind of ego stroking and healthy people do not need to ego stroke in this way either.

Any abuser, whether it’s a disordered one or not, knows that you’re probably not going to date him if he’s throwing you up against walls and down stairs, or twisting your arm, or devaluing you and calling you names, right?

That’s only logical, but with a disordered one, they study you, they do it through Google searches, your face book page, and they will even create fake profiles and message your friends, claiming to be an old friend of the past and that they want to surprise you but need a little more info, and of course, friends willingly do this without exercising any caution on your behalf with privacy. They are really good at getting information on you, your friends and out of you, with all of that ego boosting, you fill in all the blanks.

So he takes all of this and gets out his ego inflating machine and turns on the air attached to your ego…pump, pump. pump. . . and soon enough, there is enough air in that ego that you’re literally swooning. This is how the disordered creates the mirroring that you’re experiencing, that intense high. It is unrealistic and it is dangerous because NO ONE is that special.

But this is also something that you need to be mindful of in recovery. It’s been really interesting talking to women who are emotionally healthy in ego. What I’ve found consistently with all of them, is that not only do they have a healthy self esteem (ego) but they are also highly aware of their darker sides, their vulnerabilities, so when they’ve experienced targeting in their dating lives, they are able to see the disordered one readily because the over the top flattery and ego inflation looks completely ridiculous to them. They recognize it for what it is,extreme manipulation through ego boosting. It is incredibly distorted and that’s because IT IS.

Survivors can become very defensive about this and it’s frustrating to me when working with them too. I give clear examples of what it means to look at yourself completely, with a great deal of humility and transparency in recovery. It is UNPLEASANT, but ironically, looking at the behaviors, attitudes, poor self esteem, low/no boundaries, mistakes, choices, SETS YOU FREE TO EMBRACE YOUR HUMANITY, and this will be the very thing that will protect you against  targeting from anyone in the future. It keeps your feet on the ground and centered securely in reality, because the psychopath’s love bombing is anything but that, it is fantasy.

The individual love bombing me, was of course, appealing to my ‘great writing’! It’s always nice to be appreciated for the work I do. Sometimes I feel down because it doesn’t feel appreciated so much, but that’s an area of LOW self esteem and not valuing myself.

We all have a human desire to be appreciated for our gifts and who we are. This IS natural and it’s perfectly okay too. I let my friends know often, that they are special to me, and that their friendships or  personal gifts mean a lot to me. A compliment or appreciation given when taken in context and combining the WHOLE person, someone you know well, can really make someone’s day brighter, especially if they’re having a rough time. This is the good stuff.

But when someone is ego inflating me, putting me into ‘rock star’ status with my writing, and continuing on with what a great person I am,  I know I’m being fed bullshit. There are times when I’m asked questions, where the questions in and of themselves are an attempt to inflate my ego with my knowledge about the disorders. At other times, I’m offered other ‘gifts’ that are clearly an attempt to exploit.

I know that my writing is ‘okay’, but I’m no Ernest Hemingway, or Claudia Moscovici! I’m realistic about it, with a level of humility when it comes to my work, where I strive for balance and this helps me to recognize ‘rock star’ status immediately and to ignore it.

At the same time, there are survivors who write to me and tell me that the blog has literally saved their lives with the information they’ve read here. I don’t see that as ‘love bombing’. When someone is grateful to you for your giving to others,it is not the same as the disordered one holding the ego inflater pump. As with everything else when discussing pathological people, it is in the EXTREME. There is a balance. Again, compliments are really nice, but flattery is a major red flag.

I think this part of recovery in acknowledging that the psychopath was allowed into our lives is hard, not because we felt good about ourselves or that our good qualities were exploited, but because we didn’t feel good about ourselves, we didn’t have healthy boundaries and we weren’t aware of our darker sides or vulnerabilities. I know this stuff is incredibly difficult to come to terms with because it already feels like such an injustice with all the pain we are feeling and with what the psychopath appeared to have ‘gotten away with’. It’s hard to admit that in reality, we were duped.

I’m not responsible for any of my psychopaths abuse. But I am responsible now for working on myself genuinely and deeply, so that this never, ever happens to me again and I know how to respond when I’m targeted.

The most dangerous phase of any relationship with a psychopath is the love bombing stage. It is the stage filled with the most deceit, the most ego inflation. This stage is critical to any disordered one approaching you, and the idea is to completely destroy you. Your future destruction by a disordered one is not going to happen without your willing participation. And THAT is not going to happen unless the psychopath can successfully exploit your low self esteem, boundaries and vulnerabilities and the tendency to FANTASY through ego inflation.

Change in recovery, includes rebuilding from a foundation of authenticity about ourselves. Positive and negative behaviors. Building self esteem, boundaries and most especially self awareness of yourself and your humanity, is what a genuine recovery entails. There is nothing more devastating to create a rock bottom than a strategically destructive psychopath.

The psychopath shows us all the wounds we need to heal.

Ego inflation, in my opinion, is the number one way to spot disorder. If you see this, don’t doubt. RUN.

Onward and upward.

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Inspiration: Movies about mental illnesses

– submitted by Ruth Levine, MD, University of Texas Medical Branch, Galveston

Brilliant psychological movie. Dissociation?

 

Anxiety and Anxiety Disorders	Bipolar Disorder/Mania
Copycat (panic/agoraphobia)	Mr. Jones
As good as it gets (OCD)	Network
The touching tree (Childhood OCD)	Seven Percent Solution
Fourth of July (PTSD)	Captain Newman, MD
The Deer Hunter (PTSD)	Sophieís Choice
Ordinary People (PTSD)	Sheís So Lovely
Depression	Psychosis
Ordinary People	Shine
Faithful	I Never Promised You a Rose Garden
The Seventh Veil	Clean Shaven
The Shrike	Through a Glass Darkly
Itís a Wonderful Life (Adjustment disorder)	An Angel at my Table
The Wrong Man (Adjustment disorder)	Personal
Dissociative Disorders	Man Facing Southwest
The Three Faces of Eve	Madness of King George (Psychosis due to Porphyria)
Sybil	Conspiracy Theory
Delirium
The Singing Detective
Substance Abuse
The Long Weekend (etoh)	The Days of Wine and Roses (etoh)
Barfly (etoh)	Basketball Diaries (opiates)
Kids (hallucinogens, rave scenes, etc.)	Loosing Isaiah (crack)
Reefer Madness	Under the Volcano
Long Day’s Journey into Night	Ironweed
The Man with the Golden Arm (heroin)	A Hatful of Rain (heroin)
Synanon (drug treatment)	The Boost (cocaine)
The 7 Percent Solution (cocaine induced mania)	Iím Dancing as Fast as I can (substance induced organic mental disorder)
Eating Disorders
The Best Little Girl in the World (made for TV)-Anorexia	Kateís Secret (made for TV)-Bulemia

Axis II Disorders

Personality Pathology
Cluster A	Cluster B
Remains of the Day- Schizoid PD	Borderline PD
Taxi Driver-Schizotypal PD	Fatal Attraction
The Caine Mutiny- Paranoid PD	Play Misty for Me
The Treasure of Sierra Madre -Paranoid PD	Frances
	After Hours
Cluster C	Looking for Mr. Goodbar
Zelig-Avoidant PD
Sophieís Choice-Dependent PD	Histrionic PD
The Odd Couple-OCPD	Bullets over Broadway
	Gone with the Wind
	A Streetcare Named Desire
	Antisocial PD
	A Clockwork Orange
Narcissism	Obsession
All that Jazz	Taxi Driver
Stardust Memories	Single White Female
Zelig	The King of Comedy
Jerry Maguire	Triumph of Will
Alfie
Shampoo	Mental Retardation
American Gigolo	Charly
Citizen Kane	Best Boy
Lawrence of Arabia	Bill
Patton	Bill, On His Own

Miscellaneous Issues

Family	Early Adult Issues
Ordinary People	Awakenings
The Field	The Graduate
Kramer vs Kramer	Spanking the Monkey
Diary of a Mad Housewife
Betrayal	Latency and Adolescent Issues
Whoís Afraid of Virginia Woolfe	Stand by Me
The Stone Boy	Smooth Talk
The Great Santini
Doctor/Patient Relationship	Boundary Violations
The Doctor	The Prince of Tides
	Mr. Jones
Idealized “Dr. Marvelous” Psychotherapy
Spellbound	Suddenly Last Summer
The Snake Pit	Captain Newman, MD
The Three Faces of Eve	Ordinary People
Good Will Hunting

Steve Hyler directs an APA course on this topic, and
would be a good person to check with.
For more details, you can call me (409) 747-1351. Hope to see you in Maine!

–Ruth Levine
University of Texas Medical Branch

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| Back to the ADMSEP Resources Page |

Recommended: Ability To Love blog

There is a lot of good blogs out there with relevance for psychology. I wanted to present the blog Ability to love, because it is a well-written, important blog based on personal experiences with abuse. The author has herself helped others to recover from abuse, and has gathered a lot of knowledge about Cluster B Personality disorders, how to survive after trauma and what the effect of trauma can be. As a professional, I warmly recommend this if you want to know more about these subjects. Her own presentation of the blog, follows:

About The Ability To Love Blog

This blog is a reflection of years of my personal experience with regards to the Cluster B of dramatic and erratic personality disorders. These are Antisocial Personality Disorder, Borderline Personality Disorder, Narcissistic Personality Disorder and Histrionic Personality Disorder. These are disorders of the low/no conscience/empathy disorders. More commonly they are known as borderlines, psychopaths, sociopaths and narcissists. My background is extensive, being the granddaughter, daughter, ex partner and mother to psychopaths. None of these individuals has been officially diagnosed. Most disordered are not.  All who have suffered in any role with a psychopath are free to participate and heal here.

I do not spend a lot of time on the clinical perspective, or slicing and dicing the disorders, preferring to simplify these experiences for those who have just come out of the relationships with a Psychopath, Narcissist or Sociopath. Once the disorders are understood, which I try to convey as simply as possible in terms that are understandable and clear about the experience, survivors are able to understand what has happened to them in one of the most toxic relationships and with the most toxic  individuals on the planet.

I am not a professional therapist, nor do I possess a degree in the field of psychopathology. I have spent much time researching, reading and reflecting about the disorders in an effort to understand my own experiences. I have read countless books and articles and have listened to the stories of hundreds of survivors recount their relationships of horror with the disordered one.  This blog is for educational purposes to the degree that I understand the disorders, as well as for recovery purposes only and I do not claim that what I write is accurate for each individual’s experiences, but merely my own experiences shared, as well as other survivors who participate on this blog.  Names, some situations and circumstances in my posts have been changed to protect the privacy of the innocent (and not so innocent).

I am a survivor of a psychopathic parent and multiple sexual and chronic childhood abuse. I am a survivor of three narcissists/psychopaths in romantic relationships in adulthood. I also have a disordered son. Psychopathy is, at this point in time pending ongoing and further research, hypothesized to be genetic, although there is no solid scientific proof of this presently  My family, I believe, is genetically predisposed.

I have been  writing about psychopathy/narcissism for about three years now and started this blog in June 2012. I am an advocate, mentor (coach) to survivors whose lives have been nearly destroyed by the disordered. I continue to do this today and I love my work. Every survivor that comes here is treated with compassion and respect and I expect courteous and compassionate exchanges on the blog. I am vigilant about survivors safety, as much as is possible on the internet and on this blog, psychopathic stalkers of any survivor here discovered will be immediately reported to the proper authorities. Yes, it has happened. If you choose to share your story, please be safe and use an alternative identity. No one sees your email address on  your blog  post except me.

My goal is to transparently, authentically and with integrity, add voice on behalf of myself and other survivors who have been abused. Silence is the abusers weapon. It is my hope that with education and support, we as survivors, can work together to remove the weapon of silence out of the abusers hands, while also learning to take responsibility for our own lives and move into personal growth and development through recovery, and healing of our wounds.

Many survivors arrive “after the fact’ from their relationships, to my blog or to my face book or email. My hope is to also educate those who have never been touched by such extremes, in an effort to bring the disorders more to public light.

My blog is very intense, personal and there is raw written material within these posts and it can be triggering for some survivors. Please be advised of this as you read here.

If you are in need of assistance, please see the email guidance page.

If you are a survivor, I especially welcome you. You have a home and a voice here. I hope you find education, support, healing and hope within these pages.

Best wishes.

Here is her page:

the ability to love

 

The following is a list of helpful reading:

1. Without Conscience- Dr. Robert Hare
2. Freeing Yourself From The Narcissist In Your Life- Linda Martinez-Lewi
3. The Betrayal Bond- Dr. Patrick Carnes
4. The Sociopath Next Door- Martha Stout
5. The Highly Sensitive Person- Dr. Elaine Aron
6. Stalking The Soul- Marie-France Hirgoyen
7. Snakes in Suits- Dr. Robert Hare, Dr. Paul Babiak
8. Women Who Love Psychopath- Sandra Brown M.A.
9. The Seducer- Claudia Moscovici
10. The documentary “Fishead”. This can be seen at http://www.fishead.com for free.
11. “I, Psychopath”, youtube.com

http://wp.me/P2snKG-2

Related articles

 

• What is narcissistic personality disorder (forfreepsychology.wordpress.com)
• More about psychopaths (forfreepsychology.wordpress.com)
• Borderline Personality Disorder in the Movies (psychologytoday.com)
• The Psychopath/Narcissist: Why Did He Choose Her and Not Me?! (scott-williams.ca)
• Psychopaths ‘have empathy switch’ (bbc.co.uk)