Inferno is Catherine Cho’s harrowing and straightforward memoir of her experience with postpartum psychosis. In my nearly 30 years of providing psychotherapy, I have never worked with anyone who has lived with this nor had I heard of the diagnosis. (It is not listed in the DSM-5 as a specific diagnosis.) Luckily this is not widely experienced. Reading Cho’s book certainly expanded my thinking about the human condition and what some people endure. I highly recommend Inferno.
PSYCHOANALYSTS' LIVES
What goes on in the minds of psychoanalysts? What influences us to become listeners at the deepest and broadest levels? How do our personal lives affect the work we do? Steven Kuchuck has compiled a very thought-provoking group of essays by analysts which address these and other questions in Clinical Implications of the Psychoanalyst's Life Experience: When the Personal Becomes Professional. I greatly enjoyed reading it and highly recommend it.
RACIAL JUSTICE
While the torture and murder of George Floyd has receded from much of the public’s attention, racial discord continues to plague our country. It’s all the more painful because it is a continuation of a legacy of injustice that has haunted our country throughout it’s history. I have found The Equal Justice Initiative to be a particularly helpful educational resource and inspiration and, if you’re not familiar with it, I hope you will go to their website and learn more about their work.
EMOTIONS
Some people grow up in families where it isn't safe or accepted to experience certain feelings --- let alone learn to express them. As a result, it can sometimes be difficult as an adult to know what emotions might be swirling inside you. In addition to the ongoing opportunity therapy provides in connecting with feelings, www.atlasofemotions.org can be a helpful tool in identifying feelings that are buried and not so easily accessed.