First Meetings in Analytic Therapy: Poetics and Pragmatics

Abstract

In this paper, first meetings in analytic therapy are considered thematically, experientially and pragmatically. Attention is given to how we think and feel about beginning therapy, and how these first sessions can be structured so as to facilitate the start of a collaborative analytic project. The history of ideas about first meetings is reviewed and the perspectives in this paper are located in this unfolding narrative. The contributions of several psychoanalytic writers whose ideas have influenced my own are considered. The focus throughout is on the hopes and anxieties of both patient and therapist and how these emerge experientially and procedurally in first meetings. The relational traditions introduced in first meetings can structure opportunities for collaborative, transformational work over the course of time. The ideas presented in this paper are illustrated by an extended case example.

Keywords:

• analytic frame
• first sessions
• psychoanalysis
• psychotherapy
• relationality
• temporality

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Eric Mendelsohn

Eric Mendelsohn, PhD is Faculty and Supervisor at the National Institute for the Psychotherapies, Training Institute and National Training Program; The Westchester Center for the Study of Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy, Psychoanalytic Training Program and Supervisory Training Program; The Postgraduate Program in Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy, Adelphi University; and Faculty, Institute for Contemporary Psychotherapy and Psychoanalysis, Washington, D.C. Eric writes about the patient-analyst relationship and the analyst’s subjective experience. He has a clinical practice of psychoanalysis, psychotherapy and consultation in Westchester, NY.