A Meaningful Experience…

by Alexandra Kaghan and Nancy Wachtenheim, Associate Co-Directors of Membership

Serving on the ICP+P Board over the past 2 1/2 years has been an enriching experience for us. As our term as Associate Co-Directors of Membership comes to a close this May, we have been reflecting on our involvement in ICP+P.
We decided to become Board members after we served as Conference Chairs for ICP+P’s 2016-2017 Institute, Embodying the Unspoken Self: Attachment, Trauma, Neurobiology and the Body. The featured speakers gave state of the art science and theory presentations on trauma and the body. The experiential component in the small groups that met throughout the Institute brought the material alive. Our membership was exposed and opened to new ways of working with attachment, trauma, and incorporating the body into psychotherapy.
In an effort to bring our excitement and enthusiasm from the Institute to the Board, we decided to run for the position of Member Relations. As part of the Board, we soon learned about its democratic process of decision making and we were involved in decisions regarding conference speakers, budgets, and envisioning the future of ICP+P.
As Co-Directors of Membership, we see one of our most important jobs is to help new members feel welcomed. We have personal contact with each new member. We offer them an opportunity to be interviewed and introduced in the ICP+P newsletter, and to match them with an experienced ICP+P member (known as the Mentorship Program). We organize greeters for conferences and we provide opportunities for new members to get to know each other. We also encourage new members to become involved in our community by volunteering.
Another important goal for us has been to reach out to emerging professionals and graduate students to become members. As our organization ages and in order to keep membership vital and thriving, we helped to develop a new fee structure for those who are new to ICP+P, emerging professionals, and graduate students. This has been significant in that 53 new members have joined during our term and 15 of those new members have been emerging professionals or graduate students. ICP+P is striving to have a more diverse membership. We welcome members of all identities and varied psychotherapy approaches. We look forward to the time when ICP+P has a significantly more diverse membership.
We have also been in charge of the Elections Committee over the past 2 cycles. We reached out to members to recruit possible candidates for open Board positions. Now we are excited to have a triumvirate of John Gershefski, Ruth Migler, and Adrienne Simenhoff who will work as a team in the Director role. There are several other open Board positions for the term beginning in May 2020. We encourage you to reach out to us if you are interested in being a part of a dynamic Board of Directors. It is an exciting time for the ICP+P community.
We gave to the ICP+P community during our terms over the past 2 1/2 years, and we have certainly received many gifts. In our role as Co-Directors of Membership, we have experienced connection, camaraderie, intellectual stimulation, and professional growth.
We would like to end with this poem by Alberto Rios, “When Giving Is All We Have,” as it speaks to the journey of giving and receiving in relationships.
When Giving Is All We Have
Alberto Rios – 1952-(1)
    One river gives
    Its journey to the next
We give because someone gave to us.
We give because nobody gave to us.
We give because giving has changed us.
We give because giving could have changed us.
We have been better for it,
We have been wounded by it—
Giving has many faces: It is loud and quiet,
Big, though small, diamond in wood-nails.
Its story is old, the plot worn and the pages too,
But we read this book, anyway, over and again:
Giving is, first and every time, hand to hand,
Mine to yours, yours to mine.
You gave me blue and I gave you yellow.
Together we are simple green. You gave me
What you did not have, and I gave you
What I had to give—together, we made
Something greater from the difference
(1) From https://poets.org/poem/when-giving-all-we-have

Join the Couples Therapy Training Program in September

by Michael Wannon, Chair – Couples Therapy Training Program

Many experienced therapists feel energized to engage in couples therapy. Yet as time passes, they often feel overwhelmed or “stuck.” Those trained and familiar with couples’ work know this phenomenon all too well. As the couple’s issues around communication, sex, trauma, affairs, rage and hopelessness unfold in the therapist’s office, the work can feel taxing and overwhelming, often deskilling the most seasoned therapist.
ICP+P’s Couples Therapy Training Program focuses on integrating psychodynamic theory and specific clinical skills, so that clinicians can feel effective in therapeutically addressing the challenges of this work. The program consists of weekly three-hour meetings, divided between didactic learning and group supervision on active couples cases.
The program focuses on:
  1. Contemporary Psychodynamic Theories as they apply to Couples Therapy
  2. Addressing specific challenges for couples, including sexual impasses, high conflict, distant and cut-off forms of relating
  3. The challenges inherent in collaborative work between couples and individual therapists
  4. The exploration of countertransference reactions as a tool to effective intervention
  5. Incorporating the contributions of neuroscience and control-mastery to a psychodynamically oriented approach
  6. Specific interventional techniques that facilitate growth and effective couples treatment
Many graduates of the program continue to collaborate and work together on clinical cases long after the program is completed. The program also offers graduates many ongoing professional and social events, and the opportunity to belong to a warm professional community.
The program is for licensed therapists from all disciplines, and runs from September-May. Classes are held each Wednesday from 11:30 am-2:30 pm. To request more information or set up an informational meeting, please contact Dr. Michael Wannon at 301-951-9488.

Upcoming Training + Education

Conference

Clinical Reflections

Saturday, February 22, 2020, 9:00 am – 12:30 pm (3 CEs) ~ Silver Spring Civic Building at Veterans Plaza, Silver Spring, MD

Please join your friends and fellow ICP+P members to hear them share their scholarly, creative and clinical work with the community. This year we’re proud to present speakers with cutting edge work. Shoshana Ringel will share her work with a patient suffering with relational trauma using telehealth as the main modality. Dana Harron will share her experience of writing and publishing a book about eating disorders. Martha Gibbons will present a moving portrayal of her internal process in the face of a loved one’s journey into end of life. Each session will have a Q & A period allowing for a collaborative process and community engagement.

Register Here!

Shoshana Ringel will describe a video assisted treatment with a patient who presents with a history of childhood trauma, shame, and dissociation. She will explore with participants the ways in which the absence of embodied intersubjective experiences between patient and therapist variously hinder and facilitate a deeper therapeutic process.

Dana Harron will discuss the book publication process as she experienced it and will outline the steps involved in using this method to bring your message to the larger community.

Martha Gibbons will discuss how terminal illness provokes not only the individual who is dying, but challenges those most affected by the impending loss as well. The hallmarks of maturation and development over the course of life – empathy, humor, transience and wisdom-are studied within the framework of a relationship that has endured forty years and is threatened by imminent expiry. The exploration examines the impact of these concepts on both the individual who will die and the one who will be left behind. Celebrating the power and possibility of life, the journey leads to a discovery of the ways in which dying is a gift to both members of the relationship.

At the conclusion of this conference, participants will be able to:

  1. Discuss the pros and cons of video assisted treatment with survivors of childhood trauma.
  2. Explain the purpose, nature and components of a book proposal and the steps involved in the book publication process. Also explain how to communicate your message most effectively to the public in the book format.
  3. Describe four of the traits that Lachman identifies as the hallmarks of successful maturation and development over the course of life.
  4. Embody and identify particular limitations imposed by a terminal illness (ALS) through an experiential exercise.

This conference is appropriate for mental health professionals at all levels of experience and offers 3  CEs.

Register Here!

Short Course

Suicidality: Changing the Narrative
with Simone Jacobs, MSW, LCSW-C and Joanne Zucchetto, LICSW, LCSW-C
Friday, February 14, 2020, 10:00 am – 1:15 pm (3 CEs) ~ ICP+P Office, 4601 Connecticut Ave., NW, Suite 8, Washington, DC 20008

America is in the midst of a suicide crisis. Last year, the Center for Disease Control released statistics showing that the rate of suicide increased by 33% between 1999 and 2017. Since 2008, suicide is the 10th leading cause of death for all ages. That rate only increases when there is a history of childhood abuse and neglect. Most therapists received little, if any training, about how to manage a suicidal crisis. Most of the training that is available focuses on ‘fixing’ the problem of suicide through prediction and prevention techniques.

In this presentation we will ask our participants to re-consider current understanding of suicidal behaviors as the problem, and demonstrate through case examples, how suicidality holds meaning for our clients, that requires exploration. We will present techniques to help clinicians work through the many emotional, practical, and ethical problems that can arise from an acute or chronic suicidal crisis. We hope that clinicians will leave with a new language and tools for a new kind of conversation about suicide, one that leaves both survivor and therapist with a sense of hope, in what has traditionally been a hopelessness inducing experience.

More Information and Register Here!

Short Course

Integrative Psychotherapy with Autistic Children and Their Families, Emphasizing Neurodiversity Principles

with Tom Holman, PhD

Sunday, March 1, 2020, 1:00 – 4:15 pm (3 CEs) ~ ICP+P Office, 4601 Connecticut Ave., NW, Suite 8, Washington, DC 20008

This short course will feature discussion of neurodiversity, psychotherapy, and autism spectrum disorder (ASD). The course will begin with a brief background on ASD and neurodiversity. Participants will be encouraged to reflect on their own experiences with neurodiversity and neurotypical privilege.
Therapeutic work is illustrated in the treatment of a moderately-functioning 10 year old boy. The patient had two family members with ASD, and neurodiversity was extremely important to the family.
The therapist’s subjective experiences are emphasized, particularly since the patient insisted that he hated the therapist throughout the treatment. The meanings of his avoidance, meltdowns, and concrete demands, as well as therapeutic responses to these, will be discussed. The therapist’s mistakes and recovery will be discussed. The evolution of patient-therapist relatedness through largely nonverbal means is emphasized. The necessity of the therapist’s relatedness, engagement with, and learning from the parents is also illustrated. We will discuss the need for more than one type of data and more than one theoretical approach.

More Information and Register Here!

Short Course

Deepening Psychodynamic Clinical Engagement: Reflections on Contemporary Models of Transference and Countertransference
with Elizabeth M Carr, APRN, MSN, BC & Ruth Migler, MA, MSW
Sunday, March 29, 2020, 2:00 – 4:00 pm (2 CEs) ~ ICP+P Office, 4601 Connecticut Ave., NW, Suite 8, Washington, DC 20008
We will begin by exploring how participants think about transference and countertransference. What importance does a focus on these phenomena play in their clinical work? Although both concepts are considered to be foundational aspects of a psychodynamic approach, therapists may feel uncertain about how to apply them clinically as psychoanalytic theory has evolved and changed. We will share a contemporary model which views these concepts as fundamentally related to subjectivity and intersubjectivity. In this, transference is viewed as the patient’s subjective experience of the therapist and countertransference as the therapist’s subjective experience of the patient.
We will focus very carefully on the myriad ways the patient’s experience of the therapist is expressed in ongoing clinical interactions. We will provide a range of clinical vignettes that illuminate how to identify and work with the patient’s subjective reactions to the therapist. We see these implicit and explicit moments as pivotal to the process of deepening the exploratory work of psychodynamic therapy. On a parallel track, we focus on the therapist’s ability to face intense personal responses as they emerge in the heat of clinical encounters. We will illuminate the clinical practices associated with listening for, recognizing, and wearing the patient’s attributions. Our approach calls for the therapist to be authentically open—open to one’s own subjective reactions as well as to how these reactions may influence or be influenced by that of the suffering patient.
Through participation in this short course, we hope to expand participants’ capacities for understanding complex clinical interactions through an intersubjective lens and to come to realize deeper engagements with themselves and with their patients.

More Information and Register Here!

2019-2020 ICP+P Training

  • February 14, 2020, Short Course: “Understanding the Paradox of Surviving Childhood Trauma: Techniques and Tools for Working with Suicidality and Dissociation” with Simone Jacobs, LCSW-C and Joanne Zucchetto, LICSW, ICP+P Office, 10:00am-1:15 pm, 3 CEs. Register Here
  • February 22, 2020, Conference: “Clinical Reflections” with Shoshana Ringel, PhD, Dana Harron, PsyD, and Martha Blechar Gibbons, PhD, APRN, BC, Silver Spring Civic Building, 9:00am-12:30pm, 3 CEs. Register Here
  • March 1, 2020, Short Course: “Integrative Psychotherapy with Autistic Children and their Families using Neurodiversity Principles” with Tom Holman, PhD, ICP+P Office, 1:00-4:15 pm, 3 CEs. Register Here
  • March 29, 2020, Short Course: “Deepening Engagement in Psychodynamic Therapy: Reflections on Contemporary Models of Transference & Countertransference” with Elizabeth Carr, APRN, MSN, BC and Ruth Migler, MA, MSW, ICP+P Office, 2:00-4:00 pm, 2 CEs. Register Here
  • May 1, 2020, Pre-Conference: “Misogyny, Hatred and Envy” with Adrienne Harris, PhD
  • May 2, 2020, Conference: “Gender Fluidity and Gender Fixed: Contemporary Intersectional and Psychoanalytic Models of Gender and Gender Development” with Adrienne Harris, PhD. Georgetown University Conference Center, 9:00 am-5:00 pm.
  • May 2020, Short Course: “Self Psychology & Aggression: Keeping Culture in Mind” with Marie Hellinger, LICSW and Elizabeth Carr, APRN, MSN, BC, ICP+P Office.
  • September 26, 2020, Conference: “The Use of Somatic Approaches to Augment and Deepen Psychodynamic Psychotherapy” with Amy Gladstone, LCSW, PhD, 9 am to 12:30 pm.
  • Saturday, November 7, 2020, Short Course: “It’s OK to act it out: Exploring our counter-transference with psychodrama techniques” with Monica Meerbaum, PhD, 1:00 -4:15 pm
  • December 5, 2020, Conference: Bruce Wine Conference on Ethics with the Red Well Theater Group, Silver Spring Civic Building, 9 am-12:30 pm.
  • February 6, 2021, Conference: “Imagination, Mentalizing, and Metaphor” with Robert Benedetti, PhD and Team, Silver Spring Civic Building, 9:00 am-12:30 pm.

News + Notes

Robert Benedetti, PhD has been named Faculty Member and Consulting Psychoanalyst of the National Training Program in Contemporary Psychoanalysis (NTP) National Institute for the Psychotherapies (NIP) New York, NY. He will Co-Chair the NIP Annual Conference in 2021.

Bulletin Board

Georgetown Office for Rent

Beautiful, large (275 sq. ft.) office on the 5th floor of a well maintained building in Georgetown at 1010 Wisconsin Ave. The building is accessible 24/7 with elevator access, garage parking for therapists and clients (for an additional fee) in a secure suite with keypad entry. The suite has 7 other well established psychotherapists. The office has one wall of windows looking out onto historic Georgetown rooftops as a backdrop. It is large enough for full groups and easily able to create intimate individual, couples, and work space. The suite has a large waiting room, separate bathrooms for clients and therapists and a kitchenette with refrigerator and microwave. The monthly rental, $1,645, includes most utilities. Contact Rob Rix, robrrix@gmail.com or 202 625 0782.

Dupont Circle sublet available

Dupont Circle sublet available immediately on Thursday afternoons from 3pm on and all day Saturdays and Sundays. Located in the historic Anchorage Building, 1/2 block from Dupont North metro. Four office suite with waiting room, bathroom, kitchen, and friendly colleagues. Please call Kathy Beck (202) 462-0404 or email kbeckmsw@gmail.com if interested.

For sale - seven office suite, Foggy Bottom

Seven-office suite, Foggy Bottom, Three Washington Circle, for sale. Five offices overlooking Washington Circle, two offices on inner courtyard), waiting room, two bathrooms, kitchenette, administrative space (or possible additional therapist) inner office, another inner office containing copier, fax, water cooler, etc, subsidized patient garage parking, two parking spaces also for sale. For more information please contact the Washington Psychiatric Group, Audrey Thayer Walker, 202-363-0276, audreythayerwalker@gmail.com.

Bethesda office space to rent

Bethesda Office Space. Interior, furnished office (10′ x 9′) in attractive suite on the 11th floor of downtown Bethesda office building. Perfect for part-time or beginning practice. Ten minute walk from Red Line. On street & county parking. Complimentary coffee and tea for patients. Private, insuite restroom for therapists. Wifi and fax/copier, office cleaning included. Available immediately. Contact Jacob Melamed at 301-656-5360 or email jmelamed@jacobimelamedphd.com.

Full-Time office in Bethesda available

Full-Time Office Sublet in Bethesda available. Large office with temperature control and window overlooking trees. Share suite with two other collegial therapists. Waiting room with kitchenette and bathroom. Limited on-site parking/2 blocks from Metro and county garage. Reasonable rent. Full-time only. For more information, contact Jonathan Lebolt at Therapy@Doctor-Jon.com or (240) 507-7696.

Beautiful DuPont Circle office available to rent

Beautiful DuPont Circle Office Available to Rent in the Corcoran House Building at the corner of 18th and Corcoran Sts. NW, all day Friday + additional half day on Tuesday. Spacious, recently painted and re-decorated, a sunny office, waiting room and private bathroom. Many other amenities available, including wi-fi and fax. Excellent location, 2 blocks from DuPont Circle metro. 2 parking spaces available (1 inside bldg. and 1 outside for patients). If interested, please contact Sarah
Pillsbury, PhD by email, pillsburysarah@gmail.com or by telephone at (202) 904-7510. Photos are available. Thank you.

Noontime Men’s group forming on Wednesdays

Noontime Men’s Group forming for men of all ages to start in late January. Relational approach; leader is Certified Group Psychotherapist with many years of experience collaborating with individual therapists. The group will meet weekly and focus on improving relationships with self and others (partners, family, friends, colleagues) and issues in members’ lives, including recovery from childhood trauma for some members. The group will meet on Wednesdays at 12 pm beginning January 29. Bethesda office near Metro and county garage. Sliding fee scale. For more information, contact (or have client contact) Jonathan Lebolt at Therapy@Doctor-Jon.com or (240) 507-7696.

Case consultation group openings

This group has been ongoing for several years, and has developed a style of working that is warm, collegial, curious, and thoughtful.  Not only do members have the chance to learn from the group leaders, but it is expected that each member brings additional perspectives to the ongoing dialog and process of the group making it a meaningful relational and dynamic endeavor. At this point, the group is eager to incorporate new members.
The group works from a broadly psychodynamic standpoint. Cherian Verghese has expertise in self psychology and relational theory and practice, as well as contemporary racial and cultural issues. Barbara Wayne has taught British object relations theories, especially Fairbairn, Winnicott, and Klein, as applied to both individual and couple psychotherapy.
Especially interested in developing the therapist’s use of the self as an instrument of assessment and engagement. Accordingly, group members present cases on a rotating basis, and also serve as consultants to one another.  The group process is used to illuminate the psychology of client, therapist, and their jointly created relationship, and also to clarify the therapeutic process itself.
The group meets weekly on Tuesdays, 10:00 a.m. – 11:15 a.m. at 5225 Wisconsin Ave., Suite 310, in Friendship Heights (across from the Jenifer St. entrance to the Friendship Heights Metro Station), Washington, DC 20015. The fee is $85 per session. If you or someone else you know may be interested, please contact – Barbara (202) 363-0185 or Cherian (202) 296-2822.

Openings in group for men who survived sexual trauma

Joanne Zucchetto and Cornelia Tietke have openings in their group for men who survived sexual trauma. It is an open-ended, psychodynamic process group that meets Tuesdays from 5:00 to 6:30 PM in Friendship Heights, DC. The fee is $100/session.
Previous members have commented that this group is one of the only places they can be honest and real about their abuse. The group creates space that allows members to become curious about their experiences, let go of shame, and embrace self-understanding and compassion.
If you would like to learn more about the group, please call Cornelia at 202-271-5673 or call Joanne at 410-507-2569.

Space available in a longterm, experiential process group

Space available in an interpersonal process group of high functioning, creative professionals. The age range is from 30 – 57 at present. This group meets on Tuesday evenings from 7 – 8:20 pm. Most clients are in concurrent, individual psychotherapy with me or a referring therapist. Several therapists have self-referred themselves to the group at various times. Group members are motivated to increase their relational capacity within and outside the group with significant others. In the safety of the group, members learn to present their feelings in more vulnerable and authentic ways which help them learn what brings others closer to them and what pushes others away. Such expression leads to healing and personal growth. I’d be happy to talk with you in more detail if you have questions about whether this group might fit your or your client’s needs. ~ Tybe Diamond, MSW, BCD | O: 202.966.1381 |M:202. 213. 9871 | http://www.tybediamond.com | 4707 Connecticut Ave., NW, Ste.205, Washington, DC 20008.

by Alexandra Kaghan and Nancy Wachtenheim, Associate Co-Directors of Membership

Serving on the ICP+P Board over the past 2 1/2 years has been an enriching experience for us. As our term as Associate Co-Directors of Membership comes to a close this May, we have been reflecting on our involvement in ICP+P.

We decided to become Board members after we served as Conference Chairs for ICP+P’s 2016-2017 Institute, Embodying the Unspoken Self: Attachment, Trauma, Neurobiology and the Body. The featured speakers gave state of the art science and theory presentations on trauma and the body. The experiential component in the small groups that met throughout the Institute brought the material alive. Our membership was exposed and opened to new ways of working with attachment, trauma, and incorporating the body into psychotherapy.

In an effort to bring our excitement and enthusiasm from the Institute to the Board, we decided to run for the position of Member Relations. As part of the Board, we soon learned about its democratic process of decision making and we were involved in decisions regarding conference speakers, budgets, and envisioning the future of ICP+P.

As Co-Directors of Membership, we see one of our most important jobs is to help new members feel welcomed. We have personal contact with each new member. We offer them an opportunity to be interviewed and introduced in the ICP+P newsletter, and to match them with an experienced ICP+P member (known as the Mentorship Program). We organize greeters for conferences and we provide opportunities for new members to get to know each other. We also encourage new members to become involved in our community by volunteering.

Another important goal for us has been to reach out to emerging professionals and graduate students to become members. As our organization ages and in order to keep membership vital and thriving, we helped to develop a new fee structure for those who are new to ICP+P, emerging professionals, and graduate students. This has been significant in that 53 new members have joined during our term and 15 of those new members have been emerging professionals or graduate students. ICP+P is striving to have a more diverse membership. We welcome members of all identities and varied psychotherapy approaches. We look forward to the time when ICP+P has a significantly more diverse membership.

We have also been in charge of the Elections Committee over the past 2 cycles. We reached out to members to recruit possible candidates for open Board positions. Now we are excited to have a triumvirate of John Gershefski, Ruth Migler, and Adrienne Simenhoff who will work as a team in the Director role. There are several other open Board positions for the term beginning in May 2020. We encourage you to reach out to us if you are interested in being a part of a dynamic Board of Directors. It is an exciting time for the ICP+P community.

We gave to the ICP+P community during our terms over the past 2 1/2 years, and we have certainly received many gifts. In our role as Co-Directors of Membership, we have experienced connection, camaraderie, intellectual stimulation, and professional growth.

We would like to end with this poem by Alberto Rios, “When Giving Is All We Have,” as it speaks to the journey of giving and receiving in relationships.

When Giving Is All We Have
Alberto Rios – 1952-(1)
    One river gives
    Its journey to the next
We give because someone gave to us.
We give because nobody gave to us.
We give because giving has changed us.
We give because giving could have changed us.
We have been better for it,
We have been wounded by it—
Giving has many faces: It is loud and quiet,
Big, though small, diamond in wood-nails.
Its story is old, the plot worn and the pages too,
But we read this book, anyway, over and again:
Giving is, first and every time, hand to hand,
Mine to yours, yours to mine.
You gave me blue and I gave you yellow.
Together we are simple green. You gave me
What you did not have, and I gave you
What I had to give—together, we made
Something greater from the difference
(1) From https://poets.org/poem/when-giving-all-we-have