Newsroom
September
2004 - A Letter to the Editor of the San Jose Mercury News
September 22, 2004
Dear Editor:
On behalf of the San Francisco Foundation for Psychoanalysis,
I would like to respond to the commentary published in the San Jose Mercury News on Sept. 19th entitled, "Hail and Farewell to Sigmund Freud."
John Timpane’s announcement of Freud’s demise is nothing new and yet, it represents a fundamental misunderstanding of modern psychoanalysis.
Freud’s basic contribution to psychotherapy was to recognize that human behavior is influenced in part by factors that are generally outside of our conscious awareness.
The analytic process is not focused per se upon the origins, conflicts and drives that Timpane ridiculed.
Instead, the process focuses on how the patient runs into difficulties in the present and, if applicable, how those difficulties may be a repetition.
For example, a person may have a series of unsuccessful love relationships all ending when the possibility of marriage approaches or a promising employee may repeatedly get into authority conflicts with supervisors.
Many psychoanalytic patients come to psychoanalysis after unsuccessful efforts using briefer psychotherapies.
In addition, many patients treated by psychoanalysts are receiving medication to assist with their recoveries.
In fact, 82 percent of psychoanalytic patients suffer from a wide range of diagnosable disorders that failed to respond to other, usually more superficial, forms of treatment.
(See the website of the American Psychoanalytic Association, www.apsa.org, for more detailed information.)
In addition, the San Francisco Foundation for Psychoanalysis brings the “couch” into the community with numerous community service projects.
The Therapeutic Preschool Consultation Program assists early childhood educators in developing skills to help violent and aggressive youngsters learn to manage their behavior and improve vital relationship-building skills.
A new partnership between the Foundation and Access Institute addresses the shortage of psychotherapy services for low-income residents in San Francisco.
With 3,500 members of the American Psychoanalytic Association and more than 500 analysts and candidates in the San Francisco Bay Area, the field of psychoanalysis continues to grow.
And the seeds that Freud sowed in his revolutionary writings are growing in many fields today, not just psychoanalytic institutes.
Today’s psychoanalytic research is collaborative with neuroscientists and a wide range of psychotherapists, including behavioral therapists, to name just a few.
Psychoanalysis remains a vital bridge that both widens the scope of our understanding of the science of brain functioning and human behavior, as well as offering the promise of better psychological functioning to those who suffer from treatable emotional problems.
Sincerely,
Mark I. Levy, M.D., FAPA
Chair, San Francisco Foundation for Psychoanalysis
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published as a service to the media by the San Francisco Foundation for Psychoanalysis.
Managing Editor: Mary Tressel (925) 798-9421
