Events

Working with the Unspeakable: Shame, Self-hatred, and Relational Repair Presenter: Cynthia Mulder, LCSW-S

Presented by: Arthur Niesser, Dr. Med., Derek Hook, PhD & Leora Trub Discussion by: Todd Essig, PhD This conference will consider some clinical and theoretical considerations in telehealth versus in-person psychoanalytic treatments. Dr. Niesser will explore if there might be groups of patients for whom online analysis might be advantageous compared to the traditional in-person […]

Presented by Michael Levin Psy.D. This conference will continue exploring aspects of Laplanche's work that we did not have time to cover during the February presentation. It will include a case presentation to facilitate further clinical discussion and learning. Topics covered will include: • Laplanche's view of the metapsychology of psychotic and dissociative disturbances • […]

In-person (at the Austen Riggs Center) and virtual attendance options. Featuring: Ben Kafka, PhD Leora Trub, PhD Christian Thorne, PhD Hannah Schmitt, PsyD (Moderator) The final roundtable examines how digital technologies are reshaping psychic life within the context of place and its disembodied absence. What becomes of presence, intimacy, and therapeutic containment in virtual space? […]

Presented by Dr. Glenda Corstorphine, Psy.D This course will focus on the idea that we can access our unconscious thoughts and images through art, specifically collage. There will be an introduction to “dreaming while awake” referencing both Bion and Thomas Ogden’s thoughts. Participants will be invited to create a collage that represents work with a […]

Anne Erreich, PhD, cites the prominence of theories which locate serious adult psychopathology in the pre-verbal infant’s inability to formulate or represent traumatic experience in her paper presentation. The work of two such authors, H. Levine and D.B. Stern, is briefly considered. The frame of reference for this investigation is that clinical and academic research […]

Presented by: Shir Shanun, PhD Civitarese (2024) writes we have a need to exist in the eyes of others, it is what makes relationships meaningful. Such loving connections and freedom in complex analytic system and the positive relationship between them are at the center of this paper. I will argue that restriction or expansion of […]

2026 Grand Rounds Series Speaker: Hadas Pade, PsyD This session highlights the need to address the current inequitable access to psychological assessment services by acknowledging and embracing different levels of assessment versus a more traditional comprehensive assessment approach, and the potential role of various health care providers other than psychologists. While comprehensive assessments are highly […]

Presenter: Nasir Ilahi, LLM, LP The term "fantasy" is foundational to psychoanalysis, yet its clinical application varies dramatically across the Atlantic. While all schools share a common Freudian root, the British Kleinian tradition added something additional. It developed the concept of "unconscious phantasy" as a continuous, somatic, and structural undercurrent of the psyche. This talk […]

Using vivid clinical material, broad theoretical references, and decades of experience as an analyst, Dr. Sugarman will explore the total situation in child analysis — and why it tends to elicit particularly intense countertransference responses and enactments. He defines transference and countertransference as the interpersonalization of mental structures, examining them not only in response to […]

Presented by Tiffany Hale, LMFT & Jamie Steele, LMFT Bring your cases that are outside of normative bounds. We will draw in our well-worn and well-loved analytic concepts to explore clinical material together. If you have found that your thinking, your lived experience and/or that of your patients has not quite been thinkable within analytic […]

Presented by: Lauren Levine, PhD Discussion by: Janine de Peyer, LCSW Please join us whether or not you have read the book. Some people want to read and discuss the book; others want to learn more before deciding if they want to read it. All are welcome! In this presentation, Dr. Levine examines the transformative […]

A CE-eligible Conference on Grief and Loss will be taught by national experts Dr. Robert A. Neimeyer and Carolyn Ng as well as Chicagoans José A. Hernández Zeind, MS, LCPC, Dr. Froma Walsh, Dr. Molly Witten, and Boston-based Dr. Linda Emanuel, offered in-person in Chicago, IL and online throughout the U.S. and around the world.

Inaugural Talk with Dr. Carolyn Laubender: We are excited to open this new series with an evening conversation with Carolyn Laubender on her book The Political Clinic – winner of the 2025 Book Prize of the American Psychoanalytic Association and the 2025 Book Award of the British Psychological Society. Examining the work of influential British […]

Presented by Salman Akhtar, MD This presentation will address the painful malady of self-loathing. Four types of self-loathing will be described: (i) primal, (ii) shame based, (iii) guilt based, and (iv) remorse based. Therapeutic strategies to lessen such self-hatred and to improve self-esteem will also be discussed. Ample clinical material will be presented to illustrate […]

Speakers: Todd Essig, Phd and Oscar Hills, MD. Generative AI, especially chatbots, presents psychoanalysis with tremendous promise and significant peril. While some benefit tremendously from their AI relationships, others sink into delusion, and for most they threaten to flatten inner life, externalizing what has always been internal. Plus, so called “therapy-bots” are on the near […]