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In this paper the author evaluates her own work as a lesbian feminist psychotherapist from a critical perspective. Using the work of Kitzinger and Perkins, Carter Heyward and Samuel Sandweiss, she suggests that psychotherapy, as constructed today, has become primarily behavioral, cognitive, apolitical, and disconnected from its original purposes. After describing her own midlife spiritual crisis she details, through journal entries, a journey toward a deeper and more absorbed state of mental health. The author then questions how a therapist might utilize techniques drawn from spiritual and body work practices that might help a client find a place inside that is more soul healing, rather than just of the mind. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article chronicles the journey of a therapist and a lesbian feminist activist over the last thirty years. Her path has taken her through many different therapy experiences: Freudian psychoanalysis, Radical Psychiatry, encounter groups, women's groups, gestalt Therapy, Feminist Therapy, Reichian Therapy, Bioenergetics, breath and movement therapy, and Integrative Body Psychotherapy (IBP). Synthesizing all she has experienced and studies, the author has developed Feminist Body Psychotherapy (FBP). Today her work integrates FPB with IBP, an approach similar to hers, which she experienced, studies and now teaches in Los Angeles. This article stresses the importance of integrating the body into psychotherapy to heal the mind-body split. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

First, this article describes and critiques two personal therapy experiences where the author's sexual preference and Jewish identities were part of the presenting problems. In the critique of personal therapy the focus on how the therapists' lack of training about the effects of marginal identities on psychological make-up and functioning was detrimental to healing. Second, the article moves on to an exploration of the author's part-time therapy practice and role as a counselor-educator in academia. The university where she teaches in a conservative, agricultural area, which often makes the concepts important to the author difficult to convey. Finally, the article concludes with guidelines for therapists. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During my early adulthood I sought therapy at a university counseling center. As a result of my therapist's recommendation I attempted, unsuccessfully, to adopt a heterosexual lifestyle. That therapy experience had a great impact on my early adult years and on my professional development and outlook. My understanding of how I was influenced by this therapy experience helped shape my professional views about the therapist's power and responsibility vis-a-vis the client. These views have in turn influenced my approach to educating clinical psychologists: I believe it is important to instill in students and understanding of the power we have over clients and the incredible burden of responsibility that our professional role carries with it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The author chronicles her personal experiences as both a client and therapist from her perspective as a lesbian. Using the timeline of her own therapy, she discusses her personal insights as they arose in her therapy; this includes her decision not to marry as well as uncovering memories of incest. She highlights the major influences and events surrounding her decision to become a counselor and relates her past to the current theoretical framework that she uses in her work. Specifically, she mentions the work of Carl Rogers, the feminist movement, and her current interest in Self Psychology. She discusses her views about sharing personal information with her clients and how it relates to her sexual orientation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article chronicles Dr. Green's experiences as a client in Seattle between November, 1977 and May, 1979. The history includes how the author came to find this particular therapist, the therapists's cutting the author off from family and friends, the shift to a friendship relationship, co-owning a business and being a co-therapist with the therapist and her partner, the disentangling of the whole mess and the aftereffects of that time spent as her client. There is a discussion at the end of the article of how this experience has affected the author's work as a lesbian feminist therapist who does primarily long-term therapy. Recently, Dr. Green has seen more clients who have been damaged by their lesbian feminist therapist. Much of this damage has been done by the slow erosion of boundaries which separate therapist from client. It is this erosion and subsequent exploitation that the author explores in her article. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]