Change in Psychoanalysis

In this clinically rich and deeply personal book, Chris Jaenicke demonstrates that the therapeutic process involves change in both the patient and the analyst, and that therapy will not have a lasting effect until the inevitability and depth of the analyst's involvement in the intersubjective field is better understood. In other words, in order to change, we must allow ourselves to be changed. This can happen within the sessions themselves, as one grasps the influence of and decenters from one's own subjectivity, with cumulative effects over the course of the treatment. Thus the process, limitations, and cure of psychotherapy are cocreated, without displacing the asymmetrical nature of roles and responsibility. Essentially, beyond the theories and techniques, it is the specificity of our subjectivity as it interacts with the patient's subjectivity which plays the central role in the therapeutic process.

"Perhaps more than any other psychoanalytic author, Chris Jaenicke has by his own example encouraged psychoanalysts and psychotherapists to lift the cordon sanitaire behind which they have been hiding the participation of their own subjectivity in the therapeutic process. Change in Psychoanalysis is vintage Jaenicke. In vividly illustrating the role of his own emotional world in his therapeutic work, he gives flesh and blood to the primacy of mutual influencing, of subjectivity, and of co-determination in the process of therapeutic change. Jaenicke's authenticity will serve as a model for students, trainees, and experienced clinicians alike." - Robert D. Stolorow, author of World, Affectivity, Trauma (Routledge, 2011)"In Change in Psychoanalysis, Chris Jaenicke has put human subjectivity elegantly and persuasively into the center of the psychoanalytic process. His consistent in-depth focus on the patient's subjectivity makes psychoanalytic treatment more potent and specific to each analytic dyad, and his emphasis that the subjectivity of both participants is meaningfully engaged in every analytic endeavor is one of the many gems in this clinically and theoretically rich contribution to our field. Thus, this book is an important addition to the emergence of the centrality of subjectivity in many forms of contemporary psychoanalysis." - Paul H. Ornstein, Harvard Medical School and Boston Psychoanalytic Institute, Massachusetts, USA"This book is a rare treasure. Chris Jaenicke's accessible humanistic voice makes intersubjective systems theory available to the working psychotherapist. Here he invites and challenges us to consider how engagement with our patients all the way down will necessarily change the clinician. He courageously confronts us with the consequences of relational thinking in psychoanalysis and contemporary psychotherapy, without evasion. - Donna M. Orange, author of The Suffering Stranger (Routledge, 2011)"Change in Psychoanalysis, Jaenicke's reflections on the process of the therapeutic relationship, represents a valuable contribution to further exploration of the intersubjective field... Jaenicke's seemingly effortless ability to reveal himself to the reader as well as his patients allows us a glimpse into the healing process of the intersubjective approach to treatment...[the book] offers the reader an exciting opportunity to simultaneously reflect and grow. The value of this book is not in the prose, but in the deeply meaningful personal exploration that Jaenicke brings to his narrative. Jaenicke's writing encourages the reader to reflect not only on Jaenicke's therapeutic work, but also on their own." - Shelley Galasso Bonanno, Division/REVIEW

Chris Jaenicke, Dipl. Psych., is a teacher and Training and Supervising Analyst at the Arbeitsgemeinschaft für Psychoanalyse und Psychotherapie, Germany. An editor of Self Psychology: European Journal for Psychoanalytic Therapy and Research, he maintains a private practice in Berlin.