The impact of pregnancy on the therapeutic space

Presented by Anne Reilly

Tuesday, 11th June 2013

Synopsis: Pregnancy is a ubiquitous experience marking the creation of new life and the transformation of adult roles, responsibilities and psychological inner worlds. The extent of such processes within the potential parents and wider family network is of course variable, depending upon numerous factors such as socio-economic context, past life experiences and attachment histories, personality, health, ethnicity and so on. The continuing universal nature of this process allowing for the advent of recent reproductive technologies serves as a common life experience between people.

As such pregnancy is akin to the psychoanalytic notion of a 'fact of life' (Money-Kyrle, 1968; Steiner, 1993), something that is essential to our being, which can inevitably stir up profound feelings and defences. When this idea is applied to group analytic psychotherapy, news of the pregnancy of a member can ignite early defences, painful affect states and self-experiences.

This talk will centre initially on addressing the psychological impact of pregnancy in general within the individual and family matrix, using Winnicott's (1956) ideas of maternal pre-occupation. I will then debate this concept alongside O'Shaughnessy's (1992) ideas on Enclaves and Excursions, to help us think more about the impact of sex and procreation on the group matrix.

Whilst clinical material will be drawn from an analytic group, I hope to widen the debate to include the impact of a pregnancy on the therapeutic space not just with patients but also therapists too. Men will not be forgotten and I hope the male perspective can be included and discussed too.

Biography: Anne Reilly is a consultant psychotherapist and group analyst working within the NHS in Berkshire. Her interest in thinking about the impact of pregnancy within the therapeutic arena began in her group training, due to having a pregnant group member within the analytic group. This phenomenon then became the focus of her dissertation.

The Many Faces of Self-Harm

Presented by Maggie Turp

Rescheduled for 2014

Annual General Meeting

The Cedars (was Black Horse House)
23rd April 2013
7.30-9.30pm

NOTICE is hereby given that the Annual General Meeting of Reading Therapies Group ('RTG') will take place on Tuesday 23 April 2013 at 7.30pm in Seminar Room 2, The Cedars (was Black Horse House), Whiteknights Campus, University of Reading. For directions see website: www.readingtherapiesgroup.bacp.co.uk /location.html

RTG would like to invite all our members who might be interested in finding out what we do and how we do it. The current Management Committee includes:

• Debbie Livingston (Chair)
• Anita Spark (Treasurer)
• Katrina Likhtman (Deputy)
• Finola Berger (Secretary)
• Joy Abel
• Jack Creagh
• Barry Stebbings
• Lauraine Leigh

AGENDA

1. Apologies for Absence
2. Minutes of the previous AGM
3. Chairman's Report
4. Treasurer's Report
5. Vice-Chairman's Report
6. Election/re-election of Committee Members
7. 2013 Programme Review
8. 2014 Programme
9. Any other business
10. Date of next AGM

Fathers Re-Visioned: Clinical, Political and Personal Perspectives

Presented by Andrew Samuels
Saturday, 16th March 2013

Synopsis: I started work on 'fathers' in 1977 and the situation has changed a lot since then. Men as a whole have come much more under scrutiny and object relations theory, which was mother-centred, has expanded greatly. Now we talk of the 'good-enough father'. However, many clinicians and writers are rather conventional when it comes to the father. They tend to stress his damaging and malevolent aspects, focusing on such things as 'the absent father' or on sexual abuse. But what do ordinary, devoted, benevolent and constructive fathers offer to their children? (And what do they gain from being a parent?) This is less easy to find in the literature. And there is a lot of idealisation of the 'normal' father which leads to a condemnation on psychological (as well as on political) grounds of lone parent families, singleton fathers, and when two people of the same sex parent together.

In no other area of psychotherapy do the psychology and the politics come together so emphatically. There's a lot of professional and political prejudice around. The purpose of the day is to clarify our thinking about the father, with special reference to his body, in both aggressive and erotic contexts. Please bring clinical material you think will be relevant – and also bring your own memories of the presence and absence of 'father' in your life. Let's hope that many fathers will show up to this event, which is suitable for any counsellor, , psychologist, psychotherapist, analyst – or interested mental health professional and informed member of the general public. You might be interested in the recording of a TV programme I made on fathers and sons ('I want my Dad back'). Go to www.andrewsamuels.com, then to Video Lectures, then to second page of Video Lectures, then click on image.

Biography: Andrew Samuels is a Jungian Analyst, university professor, author, activist and political consultant. He is the immediate past chair of the United Kingdom Council for Psychotherapy. Co-founder of Psychotherapists and Counsellors for Social Responsibility and of the Alliance for Counselling and Psychotherapy. His books have been translated into 19 languages and relevant titles include The Plural Psyche: Personality, Morality and the Father; The Political Psyche; and Politics on the Couch.

The uses of Mythology in Transpersonal Psychotherapy

Presented by Paul Margrie
Tuesday, 12th March 2013

Synopsis: Myth is one of the avenues that, in Jungian terms, opens us to the collective unconscious and the realm of archetypal experience. Myth is also one way of discovering the creative imagination; or indeed a way in which the creative imagination communicates with us. Creative imagination is the primary facet that defines the Transpersonal approach to therapy and distinguishes its methodology from other forms of therapy.

I will be looking at the use of myth both in the sense of using pre-existent myths to aid therapeutic process as well as looking at our personal stories in a mythical way.

Biography: Paul Margrie: I have been working as a psychotherapist for over 20 years. My engagement with this work began when I was living in Eire where I owned an organic smallholding and ran a landscape gardening business. I got involved in Co Counselling and found that I truly loved working with people. For about 4 years I ran men's groups in Eire and was becoming more and more involved in therapeutic work. In 1992 I decided it was time to get serious and train properly to be a psychotherapist. I returned to the U.K. after nearly 20 years away and spent the next 5 years training at CCPE (The Centre for Counselling and Psychotherapy Education). I qualified in 1997 and have since completed a supervisor training programme and an Advanced Diploma in Transpersonal Psychotherapy. Currently I run a busy private practice; supervise individuals and groups; teach and facilitate at CCPE; and am a member of the Management Committee at CCPE. I was until recently the CCPE representative to the UKCP and the BACP.

Transgenerational Trauma and the Body

Presented by Morit Heitzler
Tuesday, 12th February 2013

Synopsis: Over recent years it has become increasingly clear – through our own practice as well as through contributions by neuroscience – that trauma is not only remembered, but also communicated via the body. Via mirror neurons, the client's internal state is mapped and represented within the therapist's bodymind system. 'Vicarious traumatisation' can occur when the therapist absorbs clients' trauma non-verbally and subliminally, and thus accumulates unprocessed trauma in their own body.

What is not yet sufficiently recognised is that the same process occurs between children and parents. Children subliminally perceive their parents' unconsciously held trauma states and absorb these into their body where they become part of the child's internal psychological structure. This process is the basis for the transgenerational replication of trauma, often across several generations. The body is the crucial communicator and carrier of trauma, and a main avenue for accessing and addressing it.

This evening will offer counsellors and therapists from across the modalities and orientations an introduction to the role of the body in trauma work generally, and the recognition of transgenerational trauma in particular. Morit will cover some basic theory and then present a particular technique for establishing significant transgenerational dynamics and working with them.

Biography: Morit is an experienced therapist, supervisor and trainer with a private practice in Oxford.

She offers both short- and long-term work with a wide range of clients from diverse backgrounds. Morit specialises in trauma work, and has developed her own integrative approach, incorporating - within an overall relational perspective - Somatic Trauma Therapy, Body Psychotherapy, attachment theory, EMDR, modern neuroscience and Family Constellations.

Through her work in Israel, at the Traumatic Stress Service of the Maudsley Hospital, London, and at the Oxford Stress and Trauma Centre, Morit has gained a wealth of experience in treating traumatised clients, including refugees and asylum seekers, suffering from a wide variety of PTSD symptoms. She has been making a contribution to the profession by teaching on various training courses in the UK and in Israel and she regularly leads workshops and groups. More information about her work and publications is available on her website www.heitzler.co.uk.

Winnicott from the start: the impact of Primitive Emotional Development

Presented by Jan Harvie-Clark
Tuesday, 15th January 2013

Synopsis: I will look at the main points of Winnicott's paper 'Primitive emotional development', together with his emphasis on the mother's 'primary maternal preoccupation'.

I will then differentiate Freud's and Klein's ideas of early infantile development, and look at some neuroscientific evidence; and offer an evaluation and discussion of the clinical use of all this.

Biography: I trained as a psychodynamic counsellor at Highgate Counselling Centre in 1979 and remain a staff member, holding a weekly supervison group. In 1985 I began training with the BAP as a psychoanalytic psychotherapist, and added an adolescent training. I am now a training analyst of the British Psychoanalytic Association, which is now, since 2009, a component society of the International Psychoanalytic Association. I live and work in northwest London.

I have a full time private practice and enjoy teaching and supervising at both introductory and professional levels.

Introduction to Transactional Analysis

Presented by Linda Fenwick
Tuesday, 11th December 2012

Synopsis: TA is a theory of personality that offers a paradigm to help us understand how people communicate, interact and form repeated habitual patterns of relationship and behaviours. It is currently applied in a wide variety of settings and can be used educationally and organisationally as well as clinically.

In the clinical setting TA offers various theoretical constructs of child development and psychopathology and a system of therapy that is appropriate for the treatment of a wide range of relational difficulties, from here and now problems and neuroses through to psychoses and personality disorder.

This presentation offers an overview of the T.A model including its origins and underpinning philosophy, its key theoretical concepts and its application in the clinical setting. Information will be presented in the form of Power Point slides and through didactic discussion. Copies of the Power Point presentation can be made available by request via email.

Biography: Linda Fenwick is a qualified Transactional Analyst and Cognitive Analytic therapist and has been working in the field of mental health since 1988. She currently works for the NHS as a Principal Adult Psychotherapist within Berkshire Psychotherapy Service, offering both individual and group treatments.

Linda has many years' experience of working with people with complex needs, in particular as a group therapist in the Winterbourne Therapeutic Community. She has previously worked with young people aged between 12 and 18 years at the Berkshire Adolescent Unit and as a Family Worker for Daisy's Dream, a charitable Trust for bereaved children and their families in Berkshire. Linda has also had ten years' experience of running her own private practice and has worked within a variety of multi-national organisations offering Transactional Analysis as the basis for management training courses and individual coaching sessions.

Relinquishing the Symptom: The function and treatment of symptoms manifesting in addictions work

Presented by John Beveridge
Tuesday, 13th November 2012

Synopsis: We ask a lot of the patients when we expect them to surrender their symptoms and recover. Using examples from my clinical experience, I would like to compare how the manifestation of symptoms has a similar function in the way an addiction operates as a protection against pain and loss.

By observing the secondary gains in being ill and decoding the communication behind the behaviour a person uses when they act out in the repetition compulsion, we can discover the story of a person's life, flush out the trauma, and facilitate mourning. This requires the spiritual values of surrender, acceptance and forgiveness, often for themselves.

In this talk I would like to explore our own self-care until the energetic exchange can happen between therapist and client which can allow the patient to move on.

Biography: John Beveridge has a practice in both central and North London offering one to one therapy with a psychoanalytic, attachment-based approach. He runs groups for and teaches, therapists in training in the field of sex and love addiction and supervises therapists and group leaders. For over thirty years John has worked with people recovering from chemical and sexual addiction.

What leads a therapist to make a Boundary Violation: an exploration of the factors involved in a complex ethical issue

Presented by Lou Corner
Tuesday, 16th October 2012

Synopsis: As the title suggests, the presentation will consider some of the factors that lead a therapist to violate a boundary in their work with a patient. It will consider what is meant by a "boundary violation", from seemingly minor violations to serious violations, and will use clinical examples, and examples from ethical cases to illustrate.

Biography: Lou Corner is a psychoanalyst working in private practice in Reading. She is a member of the British Psychoanalytic Association and a Fellow of the British Association of Psychotherapists. She has been Chair of the Ethics Committee of the BAP and was the first Chair of the Complaints Hearing Panel for the British Psychoanalytic Council. She has and continues to teach trainees in the BAP and BPA on ethical matters. She also teaches in London and Dublin on Supervision Courses in which she also considers with students the ethical issues concerned in setting up a supervisory contract.

Now you see it...now you don't - a history of psychological trauma

Presented by Suzanna Rose
Tuesday, 12th June 2012

Synopsis: This presentation examines the long history of sequelae to psychological trauma and links this to the relatively new diagnosis of post-traumatic stress disorder. Aside from a historical perspective it will also present current clinical interventions and future directions.

Biography: Suzanna Rose is currently Head of Research and Development and a Consultant Psychological Therapist at Berkshire Healthcare Foundation NHS Trust. She originally trained as a general nurse and health visitor and then under undertook her psychotherapeutic training at the University of Reading and subsequently took her doctorate at the University of London.

Her clinical area is in treating post-traumatic stress disorder and she started the NHS Berkshire Traumatic Stress Service in 1999 where she continues to work one day a week. She is on the Board of the Thames Valley Comprehensive Local Research Network. She was part of the original bid team for IAPT in Berkshire and also for setting up the joint training programme with the Charlie Waller Institute at the University of Reading where she teaches on the mental health care of military veterans. She is also currently the NHS Clinical Champion for Military Veterans for Berks, Bucks, Oxon, Hants and the Isle of Wight. She has been a volunteer member of the British Red Cross for more than 30 years and has specialised in working with the psycho social aspects of disaster both in this country and overseas. She is currently Vice President of Berkshire Red Cross. She has published extensively and spoken at conferences in many parts of the world.

Working with Elderly Clients

Presented by Charles Rigby and Mari Longworth
Tuesday, 15th May 2012

Synopsis: This talk will focus on the NHS service, Older Peoples Mental Health Liaison Team (OPMHLT) which has been operational for over one year and is based at the Royal Berkshire Hospital. The OPMHLT is provided for older people ( ie those aged 65 years or more) with mental health needs in physical care settings at the Royal Berkshire Hospital, Reading, Berkshire. Older people are referred into the service when experiencing some or one of the following: Psychological and emotional problems; Behavioural problems including: agitation and wandering; Feeling very sad or depressed a lot of the time; Feeling scared, worried or anxious a lot of the time; Thoughts of self-harm; Confusion; Memory problems; Thoughts that are distressing or unusual.

The OPMHLT aims to provide a multidisciplinary, specialist mental health service for assessment and evidence based treatments for older patients. Our role extends beyond patient contact into education of medical colleagues to promote the needs of patients with psychiatric symptoms presenting in general hospital settings. This service will work closely with the staff at the Royal Berkshire Hospital, GP surgeries, local authorities, community mental health services, care homes and voluntary services. The support offered by the service will depend on individual needs but will include aspects including: Consultation; Emotional and psychological; Support for service users and their relatives/carers; Medication; Memory assessment; Signposting to other appropriate services; Information and advice. As part of this evening's talk it may be useful to discuss some of the disorders predominantly depression, delirium and dementia that the team deal with.

Biography: Charles Rigby is a trained general and psychiatric nurse, of over 20 years' experience, who has worked in a wide range of settings. However, his forte has been working with older people. Charles has worked in a general hospital, then psychiatric unit, the community and now in general hospital RBH. His colleague Mari Longworth who is also dual trained ( psch/general) also has a broad knowledge and experience is hoping to assist with the presentation.

NHS Service pamphlet is available on line at: www.berkshirehealthcare.nhs.uk/opmhlt.pdf

Older People's Mental Health Liaison Team (OPMHLT)
Royal Berkshire Hospital
London Road
Reading, RG1 5AN

Tel: 0118 3228 320
Fax: 0118 3227 842
E-mail: opmhlt@berkshire.nhs.uk
Hours of service: 9am-5pm Monday to Friday (not including bank or public holidays)

Annual General Meeting

Tuesday, 17th April 2012

NOTICE is hereby given that the Annual General Meeting of Reading Therapies Group ('RTG') will take place on Tuesday 17 April 2012 at 7.30pm in Seminar Room 2, Black Horse House, Whiteknights Campus, University of Reading.

RTG would like to invite members who might be interested in finding out what we do and how we do it. The current Management Committee includes:

Debbie Livingston (Chair)
Anita Spark (Treasurer)
Katrina Likhtman (Deputy)
Finola Berger (Secretary)
Joy Abel
Jack Creagh
Barry Stebbings

AGENDA

1. Apologies for Absence
2. Minutes of the previous AGM
3. Chairman's Report
4. Treasurer's Report
5. Vice-Chairman's Report
6. Election/re-election of Committee Members
7. 2012 Programme Review
8. 2013 Programme
9. Any other business
10. Date of next AGM

Eating Disorders and Addictions

Presented by Gabrielle Epstein
Tuesday, 20th March 2012

Synopsis: This talk reviewed theoretical perspectives on alcohol and drug dependence and Eating Disorders including clinical and biological approaches and vulnerabilities. The focus is on commonalities across the disorders including co-morbidity with some attention paid to what are variously called 'cross-addiction' or 'process addictions'. Learnings from treating the two presentations in a shared programme will be outlined and useful treatment modalities will be explored. There will be opportunity for a general discussion.

Biography: Gabrielle is a Psychologist with over 25 years' experience specialising in substance misuse. Gabrielle has held many senior positions including Head Psychological Consultant at Odyssey House Therapeutic Community, Melbourne and Consultant Psychologist for the Western Healthcare Network Victoria. Gabrielle has lectured in post- graduate medical and pharmaceutical education and provided training and consultancy to police, mental health staff and a wide range of clinicians and organisations including advising on National Occupational Standards. Gabrielle has developed and implemented innovative service systems and has lead on clinical governance for a range of organisations. Gabrielle has been responsible for county wide treatment systems in the UK and has extensive experience in ensuring the delivery of high quality services; most recently as Deputy Director for the South East of England for Addiction one of the UK's largest addiction treatment providers.

How to Work When Therapy isn't Working

Presented by Michael Soth
Saturday, 25th February 2012

Synopsis: Michael Soth is an experienced therapist, supervisor and trainer who has been practising as well as teaching counsellors and psychotherapists for more than two decades. For many years he worked as Training Director of the Chiron Centre for Body Psychotherapy. He is a frequent presenter at professional conferences, and a selection of his publications and presentations are available at: www.soth.co.uk. He has been studying the significance of enactments and their therapeutic uses since the mid-1990's, and has developed a unique relational body/mind approach that builds on an integration of humanistic and psychoanalytic perspectives.

A CPD workshop designed for practitioners based upon a unique and powerful integration of therapeutic approaches. Suitable for practitioners from across the spectrum of therapeutic orientations and modalities. This workshop incorporates some of the necessary theoretical and practical tools to:

• maximise your chances of turning therapeutic impasses and "stuckness" into productive engagement
• survive challenges to your therapeutic position non-defensively and creatively
• confront the client's resistances, avoidances and manipulations effectively
• challenge 'acting out' and other attempts to undermine the therapeutic frame
• access the unconscious and pre-reflexive roots of your client's relational style as well as other patterns, schemas and scripts

The work will be a fluid mixture of experiential, theoretical and skills practice as well as group process, in a variety of formats (pairs, triads, whole group, etc). All teaching will be supported by hand-outs and references. Attendance certificates are available on completion of the workshop (6hrs CPD)

Assessment of Asperger's in Adults

Presented by Trevor Powell
Tuesday, 21st February 2012

Synopsis: Assessment of adults with potential Asperger's Syndrome. There have been considerable advancements in the understanding of Asperger's Syndrome over the last five years, particularly with advances in neuroscience. The syndrome is a variation of Autism where the individual has poor social and emotional skills, but tends to have strong traits in systematizing, good memory for individual details and adherence to routines and special interests. Over the last two years an NHS service has been set up offering a diagnostic assessment service, which has been popular with clinicians and individuals who might want to understand their difficulties. This group of people often have unusual and extreme strengths and weaknesses, life is often a struggle, but there is usually some relief in finding understanding and a diagnosis.

Biography: Dr Trevor Powell is a Consultant Clinical Psychologist and Neuropsychologist who has worked in Berkshire for the last thirty years. He manages the Clinical Psychology Service for the Wokingham area and the Neuropsychology Service across the County. He has written books on mental health and brain injury (The Mental Health Handbook, Head Injury, A Practical Guide and The Brain Injury Workbook - Speechmark Press). His more recent clinical interest has been in the diagnostic assessment of adults with potential Asperger's Syndrome.

Working with chronic trauma Paradigm Change Programme

Presented by Bob Paxman (Talking2Minds)
Tuesday, 17th January 2012

Bob Paxman is a former SAS soldier and the CEO and founder of talking2minds who developed Complex PTSD following his service in the British Military. Having been prescribed a series of unsuccessful treatments for his condition he embarked on a quest to find a solution to his nightmares and flashbacks outside of the medical model.

Bob found his solution with a combination of results focussed alternative therapies that when amalgamated address the root cause of presenting symptomology at the level of autobiographical memory.

The charity Talking2minds has now successfully treated in excess of 350 clients and also focuses on assisting family members in the cessation of their coping strategies. An external validation of the process is on-going and the positive outcomes are now measured out to 7 years. http://www.talking2minds.co.uk

Gestalt

Presented by Simon Jacobs
Tuesday, 13th December 2011

Synopsis: The theory behind Gestalt Therapy takes the premise that Humans are meaning-making and social creatures. We look for patterns and are hard-wired to try to make sense of our experience rather than perceive life as a random series of unconnected events. As group animals we are always thinking of ourselves in relation to others. Even an isolated person feels that way as a result of the lack of contact with others. Rather than offer a monologue about Gestalt therapy, true to the dialogic nature of this approach, we shall as a group, explore the implications of this for therapy - how some of these assumptions that underpin Gestalt theory, lead us to a dialogic and 'here and now' approach. We shall also look at how, as an experiential approach to therapy, Gestalt experiments can be used to raise awareness of the internal conflicts and resistances that lead to depression, anxiety, relationship problems and other typical issues that we encounter in our clients.

Biography: I am a UKCP registered psychotherapist in private practice. With a background in art and creative design within the advertising industry, I bring my experience and interest in creativity to my work with individuals and groups, supporting growth through experimentation and self-expression. I currently run an on-going men¹s group and work at the Priory Hospital as a group psychotherapist running Psychodrama, supportive therapy and experiential groups.

I incorporate a variety of methodologies into my clinical work including aspects of CBT, TA, family constellations and psychodrama. I am particularly interested in relational ways of working within a gestalt framework and continue to be inspired by Gaie Houston's 'plain speaking' approach.

Sibling Transference

Presented by Prophecy Coles
Tuesday, 15th November 2011

Synopsis: Prophecy Coles will address the neglected subject of the sibling transference. The talk will give a history of its neglect in psychoanalytic theory and this will lead to a possible reason for its omission. She will illustrate her understanding of the sibling transference through clinical work and her own personal biography.

Biography: Prophecy Coles trained as a psychotherapist at the Lincoln Clinic. She is also a member of the London Centre for Psychotherapy. She published her first paper on Siblings, The Children in the Apple Tree, in the Australian Journal of Psychotherapy in 1998. This was followed by Karnac commissioning her book, The Importance of Sibling Relationships in Psychoanalysis, published in 2003. She has given many talks and published other papers on the subject since then. Her latest book is 'The Uninvited Guest from the Unremembered Past', published by Karnac, £14.99.

Pain, Shame and Empathy

Presented by Marcus Johns
Tuesday, 11th October 2011

Synopsis: In this presentation I will discuss some links between psychic pain and physical pain. Pain experienced by our patients has to be understood by using our empathy and a temporary conscious identification with the patient. I draw attention to some of the dangers inherent in our work when we are using this very necessary empathy and give a clinical example from my own experience

Biography: I trained in medicine at Charing Cross Hospital and then in psychiatry at the Maudsley Hospital. I then went into Child and Family Psychiatry at the Tavistock Clinic and became Director of the Child Guidance Training Centre within the Tavistock building. I was consultant in charge of the Day Unit for Disturbed Children. Most of my working life has been within the NHS. During this time I trained as a psychoanalyst and became Director of the London Clinic of Psychoanalysis. I now work privately as a psychoanalyst. I have maintained an interest in psychosomatic medicine and still attend a seminar at UCH on this subject.

An Introduction to Alchemy as a Model of Personal Transformation

Presented by Paul Margrie
Tuesday, 14th June 2011

Synopsis: "Only by discovering alchemy have I clearly understood that the Unconscious is a process and that ego's rapports with the unconscious and its contents initiate an evolution, more precisely a real metamorphoses of the psyche." CG Jung (Memories, Dreams and Reflections)

Alchemy is a symbolic representation of the individuation process. In alchemy, believes Jung, processes arising from the individual psyche are described encoded. Peculiar terms that alchemy operates with, such as prima materia, unus mundus, Mercurius, filium philosophorum, lapis and many more are decrypted by Jung through an arduous work of over 10 years and are described at length in his book "Psychology and Alchemy".

This short CPD course is intended to introduce the notion of using alchemical symbolism and maps to navigate the process of personal change and transformation. I will introduce a 4 stage process model with several components described in each stage. The primary motif of this model is the transformation of base metals, such as lead, into gold. In Transpersonal psychology we see this as a metaphor for therapeutic process.

This event will be of interest to anyone involved in the personal process of themselves or others. This is a psycho-spiritual model so there is an assumption that the totality of our being includes a spiritual dimension.

Biography: Paul Margrie: I am 55 years old and have been working as a psychotherapist for over 20 years. My engagement with this work began when I was living in Eire where I owned an organic smallholding and ran a landscape gardening business. I got involved in Co Counselling and found that I truly loved working with people. For about 4 years I ran men's groups in Eire and was becoming more and more involved in therapeutic work. In 1992 I decided it was time to get serious and train properly to be a psychotherapist. I returned to the U.K. after nearly 20 years away and spent the next 5 years training at CCPE (The Centre for Counselling and Psychotherapy Education). I qualified in 1997 and have since completed a supervisor training programme and an Advanced Diploma in Transpersonal Psychotherapy. Currently I run a busy private practice; supervise individuals and groups; teach and facilitate at CCPE; and am a member of the Management Committee at CCPE. I was until recently the CCPE representative to the UKCP and the BACP.

Understanding Sexual Dysfunction:
A TRAINING MASTERCLASS

Presented by Dr Glyn Hudson-Allez
Saturday, 21st May 20111
9.30am - 4pm

Venue: University of Reading, Whiteknights Campus, Building 1 room G74 (RG6 6UR)

The aims of this course are:

• To provide an understanding of sexual physiology
• To elaborate on the various sexual dysfunctions of women and men
• To discuss appropriate methods of treatment
• To have confidence in knowing what questions to ask the client to make a clearer assessment of the difficulty, and whether to make a specialist referral.

Objectives:

By the end of the day, the delegate will be able to:

• Label the various parts of sexual anatomy
• Understand the differences between female and male sexual arousal systems
• List the most common sexual disorders
• Understand the process of treatment to allay the client's fears
• Know to whom to refer for specialist treatment
• Incorporate strategies into your own way of working to help the couple

Programme:

Registration begins from 9.30am, with a prompt start at 10am the programme includes:

• Female sexual dysfunction and treatments
• Male sexual dysfunction and treatments
• Working with the couple
• Case studies Plenary

Full set of comprehensive hand-outs included. The Day closes at 4pm

Dr Glyn Hudson Allez is a Forensic Psychosexual Therapist and psychologist, specialising in counselling and forensic issues. She has worked as a therapist for nearly 30 years, 8 of which were in Primary Health Care, and more recently specialised in working with sexual offenders using a unique integrative style. She has published numerous papers, theses and book chapters, and three books: Time Limited Therapy in a General Practice Setting (1997, Sage), and Sex & Sexuality: Questions and Answers for Counsellors and Psychotherapists (2005, Whurr) and Infant Losses; Adult Searches. A Neural and Developmental Perspective on Psychopathology and Sexual Offending (2010, Karnac), the latter is now in 2nd edition. Glyn has two fellowships: from the Association of Counsellors & Psychotherapists in Primary Care (CPC), and The College of Sexual and Relationship Therapists (COSRT, formerly BASRT).

Please do bring a packed lunch. Soft drinks will be provided and hot beverages are available from vending machines on site.
We look forward to welcoming you.

EMDR

Presented by Richard Mitchell
Tuesday, 17th May 2011

Synopsis: This evening talk is designed to introduce clinicians to Eye Movement Desensitisation and Reprocessing (EMDR). EMDR is a comprehensive, integrative psychotherapy approach that contains elements of many effective psychotherapies including psychodynamic, cognitive behavioural, interpersonal, experiential, and body-centred therapies.

The presenter will explain how EMDR psychotherapy is an information processing therapy that uses an eight phase approach to address the experiential contributors of a wide range of disorders. During EMDR the client attends to past experiences that have set the groundwork for present disturbance, current situations that trigger dysfunctional emotions, beliefs and sensations, and positive experiences that are needed to enhance future adaptive behaviours and mental health.

The presenter will describe how during treatment various procedures and protocols are used to address the entire clinical picture. One of the procedural elements is "dual stimulation" using bilateral eye movements, tones or taps. Dual stimulation involves the client attending momentarily to past memories, present triggers, or anticipated future experiences while simultaneously focusing on a set of external stimulus. Clients generally experience the spontaneous emergence of insight, changes in memories, or new associations together with a significant decrease in levels of distress.

Biography: Richard Mitchell is an EMDR Europe Senior Trainer, consultant and psychotherapist. He is the founding president of the EMDR Europe Association and has contributed significantly to the development and implementation of the highest standards in the theory and practice of EMDR throughout Europe. The EMDR Europe Association is now the largest and most influential trauma related organisation in Europe with over 7000 members. Richard was trained by the founder of EMDR Francine Shapiro.

Richard is chair of the EMDR Europe Standards Committee and is responsible for the monitoring and accreditation of EMDR Europe trainers and training courses. He is also a trustee of the UK & Ireland professional association. He runs EMDR training courses throughout the UK and has also trained internationally as part to the EMDR Humanitarian assistance programme following national disasters, war and civil conflict. Richard is a director of EMDR Works, a leading UK training organisation.

He is a UKCP accredited psychotherapist with a background is in Mental Health Social work and psychodynamic and humanistic psychotherapy. He is Clinical Director of the Trauma Centre in London where he and his team treat a wide range of trauma related conditions.

AGM

Hosted by Chair: Debbie Livingston
Tuesday 5th April 2011 at The Best Western Moat House

NOTICE: is hereby given that the Annual General Meeting of Reading Therapies Group ('RTG') will take place on Tuesday 5 April 2011 at 7.30pm at The Best Western Moat House, Mill Lane, Sindlesham, Wokingham, Berkshire RG41 5DF (for directions please refer to www.bw-readingmoathouse.co.uk)).

RTG would like to invite members who might be interested in finding out what we do and how we do it. Plus, if you are interested in joining the Committee, please do come along and speak to one of our members, who will be happy to help and give you the necessary information. The current Management Committee includes:

• Debbie Livingston (Chair)
• Katrina Likhtman (Deputy)
• Anita Spark (Treasurer)
• Finola Berger (Secretary)
• Joy Abel
• Suzanne Gerstner
• Jack Creagh
• Barry Stebbings

Shame Baby

Presented by Ellie Roberts
Tuesday, 15th March 2011

Synopsis: This paper explores through work in the Consulting Room the internal racist world of a five year old boy as he comes to terms with his mixed race ethnicity. The work with this young boy was an intensive piece of work lasting two and half years and the paper pays particular attention to the process of child psychotherapy in the play room.

Biography: Ellie Roberts is a Consultant Child & Adolescent Psychotherapist and Lead Psychotherapist for Oxon and Bucks CAMHS. She works at the Tavistock Clinic and in private practice in Oxford. She teaches Psychoanalytic Infant Observational Studies in Oxford and Bologna.

Sexual Addiction - Myth or Reality?

Presented by Dr Thaddeus Birchard
Tuesday, 15th February 2011

Synopsis: Since the advent of the Internet we are seeing more and more people presenting with preoccupative Internet use that borders on the obsessive.

This presentation will consider how these and other 'out of control' sexual behaviours are to be regarded and classified: sexual addiction, compulsivity, impulse control disorder, hypersexuality or paraphilia-related disorders. The behaviours will be defined and decribed, the start-up of the behaviour will be illustrated in the family of origin, and the role of shame and self-contempt will be outlined. Additionally there will be time given to examining treatment options both individually and in group processes.

The goal of the presentation will be to give an insight into the problem and to provide therapists with sufficent knowledge to help with 'diagnosis' and treatment. The outline of this presentation includes:

• Sexual Addiction
• This Dreadful Scourge [Krafft-Ebing]
• Criteria for Sexual Addiction
• Sexual Addiction and Affect States
• Narcissistic Damage
• Psychoanalytic Theory
• Paraphilias
• Sexual Addiction and Paraphilias
• Nomenclature [What do we call this?]
• Case Study
• Impact on the Couple Relationship
• Treatment

Biography: Dr Thaddeus Birchard trained at the Whittington Hospital and has a Pg Diploma in Cognitive Behavioural Therapy from London Metropolitan University and an MSc in Psychosexual Therapy from the School of Health and Social Care, London South Bank University. He also has a Doctorate in Psychotherapy from Middlesex University and the Metanoia Institute. He is accredited for practice with the British Association for Sexual and Relationship Therapy and is registered with the United Kingdom Council for Psychotherapy. He is Chairman of the Association for the Treatment of Sexual Addiction and Compulsivity.

Future of psychotherapy in the Internet Age. A Transpersonal perspective

Presented by Keith Silvester
Tuesday, 18th January 2011

Synopsis: We now live in an age of instant communication where contact between people may well be wider than in past generations, but more superficial and transient. With the advent of search engines such as Google and social networking sites such as Facebook we have become accustomed to substituting 'information' for 'wisdom' and valuing the personally explicit and immediate rather than what is mysterious and unfolding in human relationships - what the sociologist Zygmunt Bauman refers to as "the frailty of human bonds". This massive social change has had an impact on the type of client issues brought into the consulting room, reflecting wider systemic issues and anxieties that did not exist even twenty years ago. Many therapists, although not necessarily technophobic, have not grasped the effect of the digital age on the psyche, and often not adapted their theories and perspectives, on the pretext that this is just a generational gap. Others retreat to the 'timeless archetype' as a means of sidestepping the effects and complexities of social change. In this talk and discussion I will look at the some of the ways we might widen our perspectives, yet retain a sense of the timeless, the deep and the numinous in our work."

Biography: Keith Silvester is a psychosynthesis psychotherapist, trainer and supervisor, originally trained in community work. From 2003 to 2010 he was Director of Programmes of the Psychosynthesis & Education Trust in London, where he continues to work on a freelance basis. Prior to that he was Head of the Student Counselling and Advisory at the Central School of Speech and Drama. Currently he is training to become a practitioner of the Alexander Technique, and has had a lifelong interest in modernism and architecture.

Reflections on the Ethics of Supervision

Presented by Chris Mackenna
Tuesday, 7th December 2010

Synopsis: Any number of ethical issues can arise in supervision, and we will consider some of them in this seminar. I will begin, though, by suggesting that the prime ethical purpose of supervision is to safeguard the spirit of the work. There will be time for discussion, and participants are invited to bring supervisory experiences that have raised ethical issues for them. The main aim of the seminar will not be to suggest 'right answers' but, rather, to identify the qualities needed to inform our ethical thinking.

Biography: Chris Mackenna is an Anglican priest and a Senior Member of the Jungian Analytic Section of the British Association of Psychotherapists. He is currently Director of St Marylebone Healing and Counselling Centre, London, and Chaplain and Clinical Director of the Guild of Health.

Learning from Impasses, Enactments and Breakdowns in the Working Alliance

An attempt to find a language across the modalities for these crucial experiences

Presented by Michael Soth
Tuesday, 12th October 2010

Synopsis: This evening talk addresses a crucial experience in the therapeutic relationship: difficulties in the working alliance. What are our options for dealing creatively with them ? And what can we learn from other therapeutic approaches outside our own modality and habitual style that might increase our chances of not only surviving impasses, but maximising their therapeutic potential ?

There was a tendency, traditionally, to consider any breaks in the working alliance as a 'mistake' on the part for the practitioner, a sign of incompetence or the therapist's 'own stuff'. Over the last 20 years, a focus on the therapeutic relationship has increasingly emerged across almost all approaches, and 'Learning from the Patient' (Casement) has become a generally accepted and acceptable notion. The recent paradigm shift towards relationality proposes that breaks and disturbances in the working alliance are essential to the process of therapy and how we respond to them is central to whether and how therapy works, whatever our approach.

Tonight Michael will offer an embodied and relational perspective on impasses and disturbances in the working alliance - a perspective which relies on our capacity to stay close to the bodymind detail of our experience – the client's and the therapist's, including especially non-verbal and right-brain-to-right-brain communications. Becoming aware of and working with these subtle spontaneous processes – usually considered subliminal – is essential in order to access the transformative potential of enactments and breakdowns in the working alliance.

Biography: Michael Soth is Training Director at the Chiron Centre for Body Psychotherapy. Michael Soth is an Integral-Relational Body Psychotherapist, trainer and supervisor (UKCP), practising in Oxford, with more than 20 years' experience of practising and teaching from an integrative perspective. Drawing on concepts, values and ways of working from a wide range of psychotherapeutic approaches across both psychoanalytic and humanistic traditions, he is interested in the therapeutic relationship as a bodymind process between two people who are both wounded and whole.

He has written numerous articles and is a frequent presenter at conferences. Extracts from his published writing (including several book chapters) as well as summaries of presentations are available at www.soth.co.uk. He is currently preparing a training for group leaders and facilitators and is also organising a new project, offering CPD training for therapeutic and helping professionals.

Sexuality and the Analytic Couple

Presented by Viqui Rosenberg
Tuesday, 12th October 2010

Synopsis: Sexuality lies at the crossroads between body, fantasy and emotion. As Freud understood so well, our entire lives are dedicated to mastering its vicissitudes: expressing it, deriving pleasure from it, harnessing it, repressing it. This endeavour shapes the individual psyche when – of necessity – we renounce, transform and sublimate our sexual impulses. Within the parental couple as well as between each parent and infant, sexuality strongly contributes to the matrix of the child's identity. Later on, the very role of the analyst – as it inevitably evokes the parental function – elicits and revives these powerful dynamics. In this way the analyst as a sexual object is overdetermined, coming into focus with all the weight of the transference–countertransference dimension. During analysis, the gradual lifting of well-established repression adds to the force with which sexual feelings emerge in the consulting room: sexuality is on the ascendant and in search of a suitable object. Interpreting the erotic transference, however, does not always follow – the analyst fears confusing infantile longing with sexual desire and staging a scene of seduction. Unchecked, this anxiety might result in a temporary loss of the analytic stance. The paper suggests that the capacity to recognize and accept the significance of the vicissitudes of sexuality as it evolves and transforms in the analytic relationship offers a direct line to primitive, intimate and unconscious levels of psychic functioning, and significantly deepens the analytic work.

Biography: Viqui Rosenberg is a training psychoanalyst and supervisor with the British Psychoanalytic Association and with the British Association of Psychotherapists. She teaches psychoanalytic theory and has a private practice, and also works as a Consultant Psychotherapist in the NHS.

Viqui Rosenberg has given lectures and workshops in a variety of subjects, and has three published papers on transference-countertransference: 'On touching a patient', 'Erotic transference and its vicissitudes in the countertransference' and 'Countertransference: whose feelings?

An Introduction to using CAT with Eating Disorders

Presented by Harriet Gamble
Tuesday, 15th June 2010

Synopsis: Using a case example Harriet Gamble will introduce Cognitive Analytic Therapy when working with eating disorders.

Biography: Harriet Gamble has over 30 years' experience working with general mental health problems in the NHS and the private sector helping people deal with a wide range of emotional, psychological and life problems. She worked for many years as a senior clinician at Guys Hospital, The Maudsley and the Bethlem Royal Hospital. For the last 12 years Harriet has specialised in the treatment of eating difficulties at Berkshire Health Care Trust as well as private health care providers. Harriet Gamble is a clinical psychotherapist, practitioner supervisor specialising in Cognitive Analytic Therapy (CAT).

Learning from Life

Presented by Patrick Casement
Tuesday, 12th June 2010

Synopsis: Experiences that have especially contributed to his understanding of psychoanalytic theory and clinical practice will be described. Patrick will also look at ways in which our own experience can help or hinder us in our work.

Biography: Patrick Casement obtained his degree at Cambridge University, in Anthropology and Theology. He then trained to become a social worker, subsequently training as an analytical psychotherapist and then as a psychoanalyst. Until he retired he was a training and supervising analyst of the British Psychoanalytical Society. His first book 'On Learning from the Patient', published in 1985, became an international bestseller in the field of psychoanalysis, now in over 20 languages. A later book, 'Learning from Our Mistakes', published in 2002, was awarded a Gradiva Award in America for its contribution to psychoanalysis. His last book 'Learning from Life: becoming a psychoanalyst'(2006) is partly autobiographical - an unusual step for an analyst but one he feels able to take now that he has retired.

The Birth of Intersubjectivity

Presented by Gottfried Heuer
Tuesday, 18th May 2010

Synopsis: "I have only mixed with anarchists and declare myself to be an anarchist," Otto Gross told psychiatrists (Berze/Stelzer 1999/2000) who examined him in 1913. He continued, "I am a psychoanalyst and from my experience I have gained the insight that the existing order . . . is a bad one. . . . [A]nd since I want everything changed, I am an anarchist (p. 24)". In the same year, Gross (1913a) wrote, "The psychology of the unconscious is the philosophy of the revolution (col. 385)." So, when Coline Covington (2001), in her recent paper "The future of analysis", writes, "Analysis is essentially a tool for revolution (p.331)", she is echoing something that Gross said nearly 90 years previously. He was not just a psycho-analyst - he was a psycho-anarchist. The psychiatrists in 1913 promptly noted Gross' political views as one the symptoms of mental disorder.

Although the Austrian psychoanalyst and anarchist Otto Gross (1877 - 1920) played a pivotal role in the birth of what today we are calling modernity, with wide-ranging influences in psychiatry, analysis, politics, sociology, literature, and ethics, he has remained virtually unknown to this day. To a large extent, this is the result of an analytic historiography that Erich Fromm (1958) has somewhat provocatively called "Stalinistic (p.195)": dissidents become non-persons and vanish from the records. Today, when we think of the origins of analysis, immediately the names of Jung and Freud spring to mind. But there was someone else who stood between these two, in direct contact with both – who, in a way, has been hidden in their shadow. – And, as we know from Jung (in Tuby 1984), "the shadow can contain up to eighty percent pure gold (p. 13)", its essence is "pure gold". Otto Gross’ first biographer (Hurwitz 1979) called him a "Seeker of Paradise". In this search he was radical and without compromise. He was a revolutionary and hence a dissident. In the historiography of psychoanalysis that was sufficient for making him a non-person.

So who was this "Seeker of Paradise between Freud and Jung (ibid.)"? And what happened for him to become an unknown?

I have divided my talk into two parts: Otto Gross' Life History, his Contributions to Psychoanalytic Theory and Clinical Practice.

Biography: Dr Gottfried Heuer is a Jungian Training Analyst and Supervisor with the Association of Jungian Analysts, and a Biodynamic Body-psychotherapist and Trainer, in private practice in West London. With 35 years of experience in clinical practice, he has published widely on the links between analysis, radical politics, body-psychotherapy and spirituality and on the history of analysis in English, German, Finnish, French, Portuguese and Serbo-Croat. He has contributed papers to The Journal of Analytical Psychology, The International Journal of Psychoanalysis, Harvest, International Journal of Jungian Studies, Spring, et al., and for the International Otto Gross Society (www.ottogross.org), which he co-founded and chairs, he (co-)edited 6 vols. of Congress Proceedings (www.literaturwissenschaft.de). He is also the editor of the forthcoming, "Sacral Revolutions: Reflecting on the Work of Andrew Samuels - Cutting Edges in Psychoanalysis and Jungian Analysis" (Routledge 2009).

Annual General Meeting

Tuesday, 27th April
Refreshments from 7.30pm with the AGM starting promptly at 8pm.

The AGM is open to all RTG members and we look forward to welcoming you on the night.

Paedophilia

Presented by Rob Hale
Tuesday, 9th March 2010

Synopsis: There are few subjects which arouse stronger feelings than paedophilia. In this presentation I hope to explore, through countertransference and transference phenomena, as well as the nature of the act itself and the history leading up to it, an understanding of the mind of the paedophile. Such an understanding must be the basis of any treatment; the paradox is that it is the treatment itself which yields the crucial information on which the theory is based. Clinical material will therefore be a central part of this presentation.

Biography: Rob Hale FRCPsych. M.Inst Psychoanal. I have worked at the Portman Clinic (and Tavistock Clinic) since 1980. My interest has always been in the mechanisms which propel an individual to act out perverse or violent phantasies. My clinical interest has thus been in the areas of paedophilia, violence and suicide. More recently I have been concerned with the effect of the psychopathic mind on the institution which contains them and on the mental health of those charged with their care.

Imago Relationship Therapy

Presented by Bryan Greene
Tuesday, 9th February, 2010

Synopsis: Imago Relationship Therapy was developed by Harville Hendrix, Ph.D., author of "Getting the Love You Want: A Guide for Couples" which has been on the New York Times Best Seller list for over 20 years. It empowers couples to:

• Communicate in ways that help each partner to feel heard and that lead to mutual respect, understanding, empathy and deeper connection.
• Make sense of their conflicts and underlying dynamics.
• Meet their challenges and grow beyond old reactive patterns of behaviour learnt from childhood relationship experiences.
• Heal the wounds/hurts that are sensitive reminders of childhood pain.
• Experience a new safety and greater intimacy, vitality and passion.

Imago Relationship Therapy provides therapists with a theoretical roadmap to help them understand the deep issues behind the seeming chaos and guide their clients on a journey of healing and growth. It provides therapists and clients with specific, useable skills that help achieve this. In this one hour presentation the following will be included and there will be time afterwards for questions and the exchange of ideas:

• Childhood relationships.
• The Imago
• Adulthood relationships
• The Unconscious Relationship
• The Conscious Relationship
• Demonstration of Imago Intentional Dialogue
• Training as an Imago Therapist

Bibliography: Toward the end of a long career in business and Human Resources and as part of my personal and professional development, Byran Greene undertook an eight year transpersonal training in Counselling, Psychotherapy and Supervision at the Centre for Counselling and Psychotherapy Education in Maida Vale, London and began his own practice there in 1993. Bryan initially worked with individuals and then having married and started a family became increasingly interested in relationships and the dynamics between people. Inspired by the work of Harville Hendrix he trained as an Imago Relationship Therapist which left him so impressed that he wanted to make the benefits of Imago more readily available in UK. Bryan subsequently became the founding Chairperson of Imago UK and have since been actively involved in promoting Imago. Bryan Greene currently lives in Bristol with his wife and 3 young boys and has a practice seeing both individuals and couples.

Imago is still relatively unknown in the UK where there are currently only 11 certified Imago Therapists.

The Symbolism and Significance of the Fee - presented by Joan Bristow

Tuesday 8 December 2009
Everyone is welcome to join us for Mulled wine and mince pies at 7.30pm. Talk starts promptly at 8.00pm.

Cost:  Free for RTG members, £8 for non-members.
 
Title:  Money: The Symbolism and Significance of the Fee: Presented by Joan Bristow

Synopsis:  The use of the fee and how money is used symbolically within the counselling profession has been of interest to this evening’s Speaker for a long time.  Nearly one hundred years ago, Freud noted that our approach to matters of money was with inconsistency, prudishness and hypocrisy (1913).  Does this statement still stand today?  The evening will explore our own issues around money and how this can, more often than not, unconsciously be played out in the therapeutic work that we undertake.

Biography:  Joan Bristow began her counselling training over 15 years ago at Wokingham and District Counselling Service (now known as Berkshire Counselling Centre) and initially worked as a volunteer counsellor.  She then went on to complete the Advanced (Graduate) Diploma at Wpf in London. She now works in private practice and is a Senior Accredited Counsellor with BACP, UKCP and BAPPS.  She is also a qualified Supervisor and works in local Wpf network centres, supervising groups of counsellors and individual counsellors within her practice.  She has a keen interest in training and has been involved locally in teaching on Certificate and Diploma Courses, and has lead many clinical seminars, study days and workshops.

CBT for Anxiety: Panacea or Plaster? - presented by Roz Shafran

Tuesday 10 November 2009
Drinks and nibbles at 7.30pm.
Talk starts promptly at 8.00pm.

Cost: Free for RTG members, £8 for non-members.

Synopsis: The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence recommend specific forms of cognitive behaviour therapy for the full range of anxiety disorders. The talk will describe these different forms of cognitive behaviour therapy and the competences that clinicians need to acquire in order to implement them effectively. These interventions are effective in reducing symptoms for the majority of clients with anxiety disorders but questions remain as to which clients are likely to respond and what happens to clients who do not respond. It is concluded that cognitive behaviour therapy for anxiety disorders is neither a panacea nor a plaster, but a range of interventions that must be used skilfully to help our clients improve their symptoms and quality of life.

Bibliography: Roz Shafran graduated from Oxford University with First Class Honours in 1991. She subsequently spent time at the University of British Columbia, Vancouver, studying OCD under the supervision of Professor S. Rachman, who was a pioneer of behavioural theories and treatments for OCD. She returned to the UK in 1992 and began her doctoral research examining different theories of OCD, returning to Vancouver for a further 2 years of post-doctoral study with Professor Rachman from 1995-1997. She obtained her clinical qualification in 1999 and began work as a Wellcome Trust Fellow at the University of Oxford studying cognitive behavioural theories and treatment of eating disorders. In 2007 she became the Charlie Waller Chair of Cognitive Behaviour Therapy at the University of Reading. She is the Strategic Director for IAPT in Reading. She has published over 30 research papers in the topics of anxiety, perfectionism and eating disorders and has given talks on her research at national and international conferences. She is currently the co-Chair of the Scientific Committee of the British Association of Cognitive and Behavioural Psychotherapies and an associate editor of the leading journal in the field, Behaviour Research and Therapy. She is married with 3 children.

The Psychodynamic Understanding of Obesity part two - presented by Anne Reilly

Tuesday 13 October 2009
Drinks and nibbles at 7.30pm.
Talk starts promptly at 8.00pm
Cost: Free for RTG members, £8 for non-members.

Synopsis: Obesity presents the biggest health challenge the nation faces. Currently one in every four adults is obese. If this trend continues, then by 2050, nine out of every ten adults will be overweight or obese. By then, the cost to the NHS will be £4.2 billion. This presentation will not only consider the psychological aspects of obesity alongside cultural trends and biological forces, but also the challenge faced by clinicians within the therapeutic encounter with an obese patient.

Bibliography: Anne Reilly (B.Ed, MA, M.Clin.Sci., MA (Tavistock)) is a Consultant Psychotherapist working at Winterbourne House Psychotherapy Service in Reading. She is a UKCP registered psychoanalytic psychotherapist and a group analyst.

PAUL MARGRIE

A presentation and exploration of dreams from a Transpersonal perspective.
Presented by Lou Corner

The presentation:
I am 53 years old and have been working as a psychotherapist for 20 years. My engagement with this work began when I was living in Eire where I owned an organic smallholding and ran a landscape gardening business. I got involved in Co Counselling and found that I truly loved working with people. For about 4 years I ran men's groups in Eire and was becoming more and more involved in therapeutic work. In 1992 I decided it was time to get serious and train properly to be a psychotherapist. I returned to the U.K. after nearly 20 years away and spent the next 5 years training at CCPE (The Centre for Counselling and Psychotherapy Education). I qualified in 1997 and have since completed a supervisor training programme and an Advanced Diploma in Transpersonal Psychotherapy.
Currently I run a busy private practice; supervise individuals and groups; teach and facilitate at CCPE; and am a member of the Management Committee at CCPE. I was until recently the CCPE representative to the UKCP and the BACP. In this seminar I intend to introduce a way of working with dreams that offers a re-experiencing of the dream for the client so that the various facets and episodes of the dream can be explored and elucidated.
I will talk about how our dream life is one of several ways that we may experience the Creative Imagination; a realm that bridges the human and the divine domains. I will also discuss the relationship between our dreams and the awakening of our Soul's nature.
If there is time I would like to give a brief demonstration of working with a dream in this way, so be prepared to share a dream with us on the day!

Issues for Assessment and Referral
19th May 2009

Presented by Lou Corner

The presentation:
It is hoped that there will be a lot of time for discussion and that those present will bring their own experience of assessment, either undertaking it or taking on patients/clients having first received an assessment report. Whilst the focus will be on psychoanalytic/psychodynamic work, it is hoped that those from other orientations will feel able to contribute, helping us observe both similarities and differences. In addition to talking about the process of the assessment
session itself, the presentation will ask questions such as:

Why do we need to do assessments? Are they useful?

What do we need to have in our minds before we conduct an assessment?

If assessing for ourselves, what do we do if we consider the potential patients/client might not be helped by psychotherapy/counselling?

Whilst the focus will be of work in private practice or voluntary settings, some reference will be made to working
in the NHS and the differences that arise for the practitioner.

Biographical details:

Lou Corner is a psychoanalyst, currently work in private practice in Reading.
She is currently Chair of the Professional Conduct Panel of the British Psychoanalytic Council, having previously been the BPC's Chair. Lou has worked in a variety of settings, including the NHS and the voluntary sector, where she had to undertake assessments and she currently carries out assessments for a number of professional psychotherapy organisations. This includes assessing people for suitability to become training patients for trainees undertaking psychotherapy training.

Green Care for the NHS
21st April 2009

Green Care for the NHS
The micro-management of mental health services is not conducive to creating an environment and culture within which service users can find foundation blocks for recovery and lasting improvement. 'Green Care' is a movement which will provide opportunities for health and well being to be addressed in more fundamental ways. This talk will explain some of the background, illustrate ways in which it can fit into the national agenda for improvements in public mental health, and discuss local possibilities.

Rex Haigh is a consultant psychiatrist, clinical advisor to the Department of Health's National Personality Disorder Development Programme, and training lead for the new National Personality Disorder Institute at Nottingham University. He is founder and project lead of the 'Community of Communities' quality network at the Royal College of Psychiatrists and is involved with several third sector organisations. He has written and published numerous articles about therapeutic communities and personality disorder, and is co-editor of both the Jessica Kingsley "“Community, Culture and Change"” book series and the International Journal of Therapeutic Communities. Currently, he is also working with an EU research think-tank on 'Green Care'.

'Mothertongue counselling service : journeys across cultural borderlands'
10th March 2009

Beverley Costa is the director of Mothertongue multi- ethnic counselling and listening service, a charity based in Reading since 2000. Since its inception, it became the first counselling service in Reading to be accredited by the BACP; it has won the National Charities Award and the regional NHS Health and Social Care Award. This year it was chosen as the recipient of the BACP Award for Excellence. Beverley is a UKCP registered psychotherapist and psychodramtaist and has over 20 years’ experience of training and facilitating groups.

The session will introduce the Mothertongue Counselling service and the community development model on which it is based . We will then explore cross cultural communication in more than one language and will consider a model of acculturation and collective/individual world views.

The session will draw on case material, role play material and excerpts from DVDs. There will be time allocated to discuss and reflect upon how some of the ideas presented can be incorporated into participants' practice.

Date of next meeting
Tuesday 10 February 2009

Drinks and nibbles at 7.30pm
Talk starts promptly at 8.00pm

Cost: Free for RTG members,
£8 for non-members.

Title: The Psychodynamics of Eating Disorders presented by Anne Reilly

Synopsis: It is said that Anna Freud once described 'Eating Disorders as the step child of mental health' referring to the fact that no clinician really wanted to look after them.
This talk aims to outline the psychoanalytic understanding of eating disorders from an object-relations perspective and discuss some of the ideas that have been put forward by clinicians in dealing with this client group. The different classifications of eating disorders will be described alongside some case material.
There will be time for discussion.

Bibliography: Anne Reilly (B.Ed, MA, M.Clin.Sci., MA (Tavistock) is a Consultant Psychotherapist working at Winterbourne House psychotherapy service in Reading. She is a UKCP registered psychoanalytic psychotherapist and a trainee group analyst.

Date of next meeting
13th January

Drinks and nibbles from 7.30pm
Talk starts promptly at 8.00pm
Cost: Free for RTG members
£8 for non-members

Title: Narcissism and Addictions
Speaker: Phil Joslin
Synopsis and Bibliography to follow shortly

Date of next meeting
9th December

Join us for mince pies and mulled wine

Drinks and nibbles at 7.30pm.
Talk starts promptly at 8.00pm

Cost: Free for RTG members, £8 for non-members.

Title: Sickness or sin, therapist or Priest? A search for Healing

Speaker: Felicity Madden

Synopsis: During the evening, Felicity will present a Case Study which explores the interface between psychotherapy and religious pastoral care.

Bibliography: Felicity Madden is a psychoanalytical psychotherapist in private practice. She supervises individuals and groups and is part of the team offering the Master's Programme in Psychodynamic Counselling and Psychotherapy at Oxford University.

Tuesday 11 November 2008

Drinks and nibbles at 7.30pm. Talk starts promptly at 8.00pm.

Cost: Free for RTG members, £7 for non-members.

Title: An Introduction to Music Therapy – presented by Karen Hutchinson

Synopsis: During the evening, Karen will give a broad overview of what Music Therapy is, and how she uses music to help children and adults to interact and express themselves when they may find it hard, or impossible, to do so with words. She will give some case-study examples, and there will be time for exploring and playing instruments too.

Biographical Details: Following a psychology degree, Karen did a Post-Graduate Diploma in Music Therapy, qualifying from the Roehampton Institute in 1996, and has worked as a Music Therapist ever since. She has worked with children and adults, from nursery age to elderly clients, and with a wide range of disabilities and needs. Her main instruments are the piano and clarinet, but she also began to learn the trumpet and to try to play chords on the guitar. She currently works at a school in Woodley which is the first special school in the country to be granted specialist music status.

Tuesday 17 June 2008

Drinks and nibbles at 7.30pm. Talk starts promptly at 8.00pm.

Cost: Free for RTG members, £7 for non-members.

Title: 'Countertransference as the Essential Therapeutic Factor in Analysis: a Post-Jungian Perspective' - presented by Jill Fowler

Synopsis: Unlike Freud, Jung left us with few examples of how he actually worked. However, he does seem to have been the first analyst to have recognised the therapeutic and anti-therapeutic potential in countertransference. Jill's talk will provide us with a brief overview of Jung’s propositions about countertransference and describe the diverse development amongst post-Jungians in the understanding of the phenomenon.

Biographical Details: Jill Fowler is a UKCP registered Jungian Analytical Psychotherapist. She originally trained as a psychodynamic counsellor at the University of Reading, where she also taught for some years on the Postgraduate Diploma/MA in Counselling. She has a long-established private practice and is also currently working part-time as a psychotherapist in the NHS, based at Winterbourne House in Reading.

Tuesday 13 May 2008

Drinks and nibbles at 7.30pm. Talk starts promptly at 8.00pm.

Cost: Free for RTG members, £7 for non-members.

Title: 'Trust – What is it like to live all your life without trust?' - presented by Sydney Klugman

Synopsis: Reading Therapies Group is delighted to welcome Sydney Klugman, who has agreed, at very short notice, to replace our advertised speaker for the May 2008 meeting. His talk will focus on the importance of trust in the therapeutic relationship, through a description of joint work between art and drama therapy. It will explore the process of art therapy in a high secure unit, working with a group of patients with mixed diagnoses.

Biographical Details: Sydney Klugman is an HPC Registered Art Psychotherapist working in a medium secure unit at Blenheim Priory. He has lectured ang. His talk will focus on the importance of trust in the therapeutic relationship, through a description of joint work between art and drama therapy. It will explore the process of art therapy in a high secure unit, working with a group of patients with mixed diagnoses.

Biographical Details: Sydney Klugman is an HPC Registered Art Psychotherapist working in a medium secure unit at Blenheim Priory. He has lectured at Brunel University, teaching Art Therapy to Occupational Therapists and Counsellors and has also worked at Broadmoor as a Forensic Psychotherapist. Sydney also works in private practice, is an experienced accredited supervisor and an artist.

Tuesday 15 April 2008

Drinks and nibbles at 7.30pm. Talk starts promptly at 8.00pm.

Cost: Free for RTG members, £7 for non-members.

Title: The Applied Client – Those Groups Considered ‘Beyond the Pale’ for the Provision of Psychological Treatments - presented by Valerie Sinason

Synopsis: What does it mean when a client group is seen as requiring ‘applied’ analysis or therapy, as if the main core of clinical and theoretical understanding somehow does not apply to them? When Freud considered that people over 40, those with learning disabilities and the psychotic might not be able to use psychoanalysis, he had the humbleness to consider than in future this might alter. However, it seems the human need to put some groups ‘beyond the pale’ continues, even in the provision of psychological treatments.

Valerie Sinason considers this topic with examples from work with clients with a learning disability/ritual abuse background/dissociative identity disorder.

Biographical Details: Valerie Sinason is an Adult Psychoanalyst and Child Psychotherapist, currently Director of the Clinic for Dissociative Studies and she is an Honorary Consultant Psychotherapist to the Cape Town Child Guidance Clinic, University of Cape Town Psychology Department and External Consultant Supervisor to Respond. She specialises in disability, trauma and abuse and is regularly used as an expert in court cases.

She has written extensively on psychotherapy, disability and abuse, with over 70 published peer-reviewed papers, chapters and books. She is also a widely published and anthologised poet, with two full-length collections. She was a Consultant Child Psychotherapist at the Tavistock Clinic, where she worked from 1987 to 1999, a Consultant Psychotherapist at both the Anna Freud and Portman Clinics from 1994-1997, and Consultant Research Psychotherapist/Psychoanalyst at St George’s Hospital Medical School, University of London, Psychiatry of Disability Department from 1990-2006, and President of the Institute of Psychotherapy and Disability.

Tuesday 11 March 2008

Drinks and nibbles at 7.30pm. Talk starts promptly at 8.00pm.

Cost: Free for RTG members, £7 for non-members.

Title: Creative Tools – presented by Chris Ledger

Synopsis: Chris has led weekend courses on the use of creative tools in counselling. This is a method that she believes can be a valuable tool in both long- and short-term counselling. She will be joined for the evening by three counsellors who will each share a particular creative tool that they have found to produce a positive outcome in their work. Part of the evening will be experiential and will involve the use of pictures, sand, ‘givens’, soft toys and Russian dolls.

Biographical Details: Chris has worked for 18 years as a counsellor, supervisor and trainer in NHS Primary Care. She was one of many who were made redundant by her PCT, following which she created her own successful counselling business Loddon Counselling and Psychotherapy Services. She works privately as a counsellor and supervisor. She is involved in counselling training days, and, as co-author, has produced three Christian Insight books Anxiety, Anxiety and Self-esteem and Shattered Dreams (on M.E.).

Tuesday 12 February 2008

Drinks and nibbles at 7.30pm. Talk starts promptly at 8.00pm.

Cost: Free for RTG members, £7 for non-members.

Title: Short-term Psychotherapy: Panacea or Problem? - presented by Alex Coren

Biographical Details: Alex Coren is Director of the Psychodynamic Studies Programme and Director of Studies for Psychology in the Department for Continuing Education at the University of Oxford. Having trained as a Social Worker in the London Borough of Hackney, he then worked as a Psychiatric Social Worker at the National Hospital for Nervous Diseases, London, and at the Camberwell Child Guidance Unit and Maudsley Hospitals. He trained as a Psychoanalytic Psychotherapist with the British Association of Psychotherapists and has worked widely in the fields of adult mental health and Education, most recently at King’s College London and Oxford University. His particular interests are the application of psychoanalytic ideas to short-term therapeutic work in the public and voluntary sectors, and the contexts and curriculum for professional therapeutic trainings. He is a member of both the UKCP and UPCA. He is Book Review Editor for the European Journal of Psychotherapy and Counselling and a member of the Editorial Board of Psychodynamic Practice. He is a regular contributor and Reviewer for professional journals. He continues to work as a psychotherapist, supervisor and consultant in private practice. RTG meetings are approved for Royal College of Psychiatrists CPD: 1.5 external units per session. Sessions may also be used towards your CPD portfolio for the BACP etc. You can pick up a certificate for proof of attendance at the meeting.

Tuesday 15 January 2008

Drinks and nibbles at 7.30pm. Talk starts promptly at 8.00pm.

Cost: Free for RTG members, £7 for non-members.

Title: Personality Disorders - presented by Amanda Stafford

Biographical Details: Amanda Stafford is a psychoanalytically-trained Psychotherapist. She has been a practicing psychotherapist for the past 25 years. She has worked in Berkshire for 5 years and is currently the Manager of the Psychotherapy Service and the Directory of Complex Needs. Amanda has worked both within the NHS and in private practice. RTG meetings are approved for Royal College of Psychiatrists CPD: 1.5 external units per session. Sessions may also be used towards your CPD portfolio for the BACP etc. You can pick up a certificate for proof of attendance at the meeting.