Understanding Trauma: A Psychoanalytical Approach

Revised edition with additional chapter. This book, from the Tavistock Clinic Series, is about what follows the breakdown in functioning, either short or longer-term, provoked by a traumatic event. The authors offer a psychoanalytical understanding of the meaning of the trauma for an individual, illuminating theory with detailed clinical illustration and case histories. A range of therapeutic procedures is described.

Major disasters draw attention forcibly to their effects on the survivors. Less often recognised are the long-term after-effects of the huge number and variety of more private events, either accidental or deliberately inflicted, on an individual's subsequent emotional and working life. This book is about what follows the breakdown in functioning, either short or longer-term, provoked by a traumatic event.

What is distinctive about this book is that its authors offer a psychoanalytical understanding of the meaning of the trauma for an individual, illuminating theory with detailed clinical illustration and case histories. They show the process of treatment as their patients restore meaning to their lives, moving towards a new integration in which the event becomes a part of the whole, no longer dominating either waking or sleeping life. A range of therapeutic procedures is described, including a short series of individual consultations, groups and full analysis. A challenging and innovative work, rooted in psychoanalysis, this collection thoughtfully describes in detail the work for the Unit for the Study of Trauma and its Aftermath in the Adult Department of the Tavistock Clinic.