Unfortunate Love

 

Dr. Thomas Kirsch has just written a review of my book on Amazon. A respected elder in the Jungian world, past president of the San Francisco Institute and former longtime vice president and president of the International Society of Jungian Analysts, Dr Kirsch writes: I am writing a memoir myself, but it is much less personal than this one. The author writes about her falling in love with her patient and what she did about it. She went to a lot of therapy and supervision, and she was still in love with the patient. She ends up marrying the patient. She is an excellent writer, and she describes her process very well. Unfortunately, this happens too often in depth psychotherapy work. A good read if the subject interests one.

I am honored that Dr. Kirsch reviewed my memoir in spite of the line “Unfortunately, this happens too often in depth psychotherapy work.”

I rather find it unfortunate that those who practice depth psychology are unable to openly accept and honor the mysteries of love and the ways of the Self when that translates into an intimate relationship conceived in analysis and born outside its boundaries. Dr. Kirsch acknowledges this happens often. “Too often,” he says. Who knew?

It is time to ask how this happens, and how often. And why it is never discussed.

Every trained therapist knows about transference and the ethical mandate regarding the boundary between the personal and the professional. Analysts work within the tension of power and love, a tension that weaves between responsibility and compassion inside a frame of time and fee for service. The patient’s welfare, healing and individuation must be front, center and the essence of the work.

But what happens when that tension breaks the analytic vessel, when the psyche of the patient and the psyche of the analyst converge in a depth of connection that defies professional boundaries?

I know enduring and loving relationships can and do evolve out of every kind of psychotherapy. It would be interesting to hear the stories of those whose fate has led them down this road. But a seemingly impenetrable silence surrounds these stories.

Jung wrote that truth needs a language that alters with the spirit of the times and that as our consciousness increases we are confronted with new situations that require new ethical attitudes.

One could argue that indeed our greater consciousness around abuse and power has informed contemporary collective psychological codes of ethics, but what of love and healing and the individual experience of the archetype of the Self? What would a more finely differentiated ethical attitude that holds the tension of those opposites look like?

It is so easy to judge where you haven’t been.

The Coming of Winter

 

Most writers of memoir need not expect the chill and silence that has followed in the wake of my words. My story touches upon the history of a psychoanalytic community, and while mine is not a narrative about the New England Society of Jungian Analysts, it references, in part, my experiences within it. Over a period of thirty-some years this institution and ever-changing collection of analysts have played a major role in my life.

Because of my love for the man who is my husband, who was initially for a period of nine months my patient, I have lived under the threat of professional excommunication for twenty-three years. For the most part mine was not an unknown story because from the start I turned to many of my colleagues for help and because of the surefire spread of gossip. In the early 90’s there was no ethics code that spelled out “A member shall not engage in physical contact of a sexual nature with a former analysand for at least two years after cessation or termination of the professional relationship.” But there was the written expectation that the analysts of this society “shall conduct themselves in their work according to the highest ethical standards and shall act in the best therapeutic interest of their analysands.”

It was clear to me from the start that I was stepping across a line that involved wearing a scarlet letter. I was also told from the start that to tell my story would be professional suicide.

Everyone should be free to love who they love, President Obama said in a recent speech referring to the LGBT community. Albeit for complex reasons, this is not true in the psychological community. Yet no one speaks of that.

I have colleagues and friends who support me in the telling of this story, even those who may not be in agreement with my beliefs, and I am forever grateful to them. And then there are those whom I have known for decades who receive the announcement of my book without a word.

Carl Jung based his psychology on the principle of individuation, becoming true to a higher Self that contains the opposites and I believe strives ultimately for the good. I have written a memoir that includes the breaking of silence as part of my individuation process.

 

What does it take to hold the tension of the opposites, between silence and speech, between your truth and my truth, to hold the still point and the talking point in a dialogue that moves us ever closer to the center and heart of our humanity?