On-demand Webinars

Dr Lynne Jacobs

Gestalt’s paradoxical theory of change suggests that when people allow themselves to be fully and aware in touch with who they currently are, change and growth then emerge as the inevitable and natural outcome of such contact and genuine self-knowledge. This view represents a radical shift from the more commonly accepted tradition of change which puts emphasis on upon client trying to change to conform. Working with paradoxical theory of change can be challenging for the therapist. The therapist needs to decline the role of traditional change agent and become an active partner to develop a greater awareness of all the forces in the field. In this webinar, Dr Lynne Jacobs will explain this Gestalt model of change.

Dr Paul Martin

Therapists often find that their bereaved clients struggle to cope with the death of a loved one in ways that vary greatly between individuals. One person may find it difficult to express the emotional facets of grief whereas another may have a hard time maintaining a meaningful connection to the deceased, and still another will stumble while adapting to changes in their family. A conceptual framework is needed to ascertain what specifically is off kilter and how the individual can cope more effectively with their particular challenges.

In this webinar, Dr. Paul Martin will discuss diagnostic categories that differentiate complicated bereavement from normal grief as well as William Worden’s task model of mourning and how individuals can benefit from managing specific components of the mourning process that are not unfolding well. He will then explore fascinating examples of grief rituals from cultures around the world that facilitate different aspects of mourning.

Dr Kris Rao

Direct-to-Consumer (DTC) digital psychotherapy services have emerged as a way to improve access to mental health care. However, these services lack adequate regulation, raising concerns about safety, privacy, and accountability. This webinar explores the ethical challenges posed by DTC apps that connect consumers to therapists worldwide or rely on artificial intelligence. The webinar will also discuss therapists’ responsibility when using DTC apps

Dr Jamie Rockord

Trauma increases vulnerability to mental illness and stress related psychopathology. Repeated and sustained activation of stress response systems exert ‘wear and tear’ on the body and brain, referred to as allostatic load, which results from the direct effects of persistent activation of the stress response, together with the loss of systems that normally oppose or buffer the stress response. This process of homeostasis will be discussed along with the concept of entropy in trauma, noting that the biological mechanisms that account for the observed changes in the body and mind, ‘how the body keeps the score’ remains inadequately defined.

Considerable pre-clinical data support critical roles for the endocannabinoid system and its main target, the cannabinoid 1 receptor (the most abundant G protein linked receptor in the mammalian brain) in the adaptation of the brain to repeated stress exposure. Endocannabinoids regulate affective states, participate in memory consolidation, retrieval and extinction and modulate the effects of stress on the brain and may have an important role in the biology of play. The endocannabinoid system is altered by exposure to trauma and current evidence indicates a link between the loss endocannabinoid system homeostasis and maladaptive brain changes after trauma and therefore a mechanism for ‘how the body keeps the score.’

Lisa King

It is apparent that many traumatized individuals, as well as those individuals who live with severe mental illness, have suffered, and continue to suffer from symptoms directly caused by perceived threats to their personal power. Their complex problems require creative, individually-tailored approaches synthesized from the examination, deconstruction, and reconstruction of multiple knowledges accessed from the point of resistance (POR) perspective. POR is defined as the point in time and place where questions like “Who am I? Why do I feel so terrible? Can you help me to feel better?” are first posed.

A creative and reflexive interdisciplinary framework recognizes that where there is resistance to oppression, there is the opportunity to learn. By supporting clients to approach their self-narrative with curiosity, the therapist and the client may collaboratively perceive the crucial point at which discourse renders the client simultaneously vulnerable and powerful: the point of resistance. The POR is the starting point for questions, exploration, and dialogue that provides the compass and the means for new direction and change.

Many multidimensional trauma-informed approaches exist “to feeling free to know what you know and feel what you feel without becoming overwhelmed, enraged, ashamed or collapsed” (van der Volk, 2014). Personal experience, peer-reviewed literature, and Lisa’s practice-based evidence working with clients with complex diagnoses informs the origins and theoretical development of her Points of Resistance Theory (PORT). Her experience working with PTSD and trauma, schizophrenia and trauma, attachment trauma, personality disorders and dissociative disorders, indicates that the primary objectives of trauma-informed therapy are the restoration or instillation of hope, self-worth, psychological safety, empowerment and relational connection with self. To help the client know what they know and feel what they feel, Lisa will introduce a new, interdisciplinarian practice framework (PORT). She will discuss a case study that demonstrates how PORT may be integrated into all health professionals’ practice, thereby offering their trauma patients/clients a portal to hope, transformation, and post-traumatic growth.

Dr Jackie Amos

PPCN has been central to Jackie’s Child and Adolescent Psychiatric practice for 20 years. She has successfully used, and trained others in PPCN at Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services in Southern Adelaide. Jackie has more recently supported the inclusion of PPCN into the suite of interventions offered in a family reunification service in Centacare Catholic Family Services. Heather and her colleagues enjoy success working with families in Child and Adolescent Mental health Services and private practice across New Zealand

In this webinar, speaking as highly-experienced PPCN practitioner and trainer (and mother-child relationship researcher), Dr Jackie Amos will discuss the importance of dyadic therapies for parents and their school age children, explain the role of the PPCN therapist, outline the PPCN process with reference to the postulated mechanism of action and talk about how PPCN has been used effectively in Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service, and in a Family Reunification Service in South Australia.

Dr Joan Haliburn

The last decades have seen a substantial growth in studies on attachment and addictions. Similarly, the last decades have seen a substantial growth in studies on attachment and personality disorders. Despite, methodological problems, the link between insecure attachment and addictions today is well established. Attachment Theory describes different patterns based on different experiences in attachment relationships. Many of our patients are found incidentally to have addictions, others directly seek help for their addictions, and still others require specialized treatment centres. In all walks of life, and in all venues of work we encounter patients with substance abuse and addictions. Attachment Theory will provide us some avenues of understanding.Insecure attachments combined with early trauma provide the substrate for the development of personality disorders, and paths to difficulties in emotional regulation.

In this webinar, Dr Joan Haliburn will be discussing Attachment Strategies in more depth and the role of insecure attachments in substance use, polysubstance abuse, overeating, binge-eating and loss of control of eating as in aberrant patterns that characterize the binge-purge subtypes of anorexia nervosa-bulimia nervosa, and their compensatory behaviours.

Prof Melanie Turner

Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is one of the most common neurodevelopmental conditions compromising childhood development. Although it has been conceptualized as a disorder of childhood for about fifty years, up to 90% of children with ADHD continue to experience some symptoms into adolescence and adulthood. In this webinar, Prof Melanie Turner will cover key aspects of diagnosing and therapeutically working with children and adolescents exhibiting symptoms on the ADHD spectrum. Seen through a psychiatric lens, she will also explore the overlap with other causes of similarly presenting challenging behaviours and mood changes, and how to work with those overlaps. 

Prof Turner will also discuss non-medication options for ADHD treatment, especially psychotherapy. In addition to her practice-based experience, she will bring a contemporary research lens to focus on the comparative effectiveness and efficacy of the various medication and non-medication approaches. She will also discuss the significance of working with families, and the importance of communication with schools and Allied Health to align on ADHD treatment approaches. Being a topic of broad interest, the webinar will allow ample time for Q&A.

Dr Valerie Sinason

In 1990 Dr Valerie Sinason had a paper published in the British Journal of Psychotherapy, “Passionate lethal attachments” concerned by the lack of progress of three children seen in three different settings, an EBD School (school for children with emotional and behavioural disturbance), a Day Unit for disturbed excluded children and an outpatient Clinic, Dr Sinason noted a particularly destructive constellation in both their inner and outer worlds when the child is left far more at the mercy of internal attachments which can be lethal. Where a child has a severe intellectual disability, it can be even harder to extricate themselves from a destructive relationship. Thirty three years later, after further understanding of the significance of disorganised and lethal attachment patterns, and more long-term work with adults with dissociative identity disorder, Dr Sinason developed the ideas into “Dying for Love; an attachment problem with some perpetrator introjects” (2017) which was published in the Journal of  Trauma and Dissociation, Vol 18, (3).

 In trying to understand the problem with the children Dr Sinason found profound answers in Dickens’ Oliver Twist. Nancy recognises her lethal attachment to the violent Bill Sykes as a consequence of her earlier attachment to Fagin. She knows it. I am drawn back to him, through every suffering and ill usage; and should be, I believe, if I knew that I was to die by his hand’. Rose knows that is madness but can do nothing to help. At another point she says to her would-be rescuers I am chained to my old life. I loathe and hate it now but I cannot leave it. I must have gone too far to turn back’. In this webinar,  Dr Sinason will discuss the nature and impact of a disorganised attachment pattern that is in fact infanticidal (Kahr 2007) and the issues this poses for therapy.

Prof Andrew Moskowitz

The American psychologist Philip Bromberg, more than any other contemporary thinker and clinician, built a bridge between dissociation and contemporary psychoanalytic thinking and theory. Through his writings and teachings, Bromberg emphasized the core relevance of dissociation to the interpersonal psychology of Harry Stack Sullivan and relational psychoanalysis. He quipped that Janet’s ghost had come home to haunt Freud – who had famously eschewed dissociation for repression. Bromberg argued forcefully for a central role for trauma and dissociation in normal personality, and for pre-emptive dissociation in personality disorders – which maintained interpersonal distance in order to prevent psychological pain. He also believed that effective therapy required the activation of parts of the therapist’s self that could engage with the client’s parts (essential for the enactments he viewed as necessary for therapeutic progress) all the while respecting the other (normal) dissociative parts that were in the background; in addition, Bromberg insisted on – in striking contrast to classical psychoanalysis – the necessity of periodic therapist disclosures in order for therapy to be effective. And in his use of dreams in therapy, as in many of his teachings, he echoed – without apparently realizing it – the writings of another major historical figure who locked horns with Freud – Carl Jung.

Dr Nick Bendit & Dr Kris Rao

The significance of supervision in developing clinical expertise has been acknowledged since the inception of psychoanalysis. Freud hosted weekly evening meetings in his home, where he and other therapists discussed both theoretical and case-related topics, essentially conducting group supervision (Hess, 2008).

When practicing psychodynamic psychotherapy, supervision is essential. However, what happens during supervision is highly variable. In this Masterclass, Dr Nick Bendit & Dr Kris Rao will discuss ‘process supervision’, which is common to most psychodynamic models, as well as cover ‘audio tape supervision’, which is somewhat unique to supervising the Conversational Model (CM) practitioners. The webinar will emphasise managing both difficult clients and supervisees, along with other clinical challenges encountered in the supervisory relationship.

Prof Melanie Turner

Voluntary Assisted Dying (VAD) is now a pathway of health care available in all Australian States and in New Zealand. The laws are similar Australia-wide, but differ slightly in each State, applying to people who have an incurable, advanced and progressive disease, illness or medical condition, and are experiencing intolerable suffering from that. In this webinar, Prof Melanie Turner will disambiguate the facts and myths surrounding VAD, covering key aspects including a summary of each region’s legislation and key differences; how the VAD process works and how people access it; the diverse teams of health-care professionals who provide VAD; what families and clinicians say about being engaged in the VAD process; as well as areas which need further considerations. The psychiatry/psychology view of ethics, neutrality and possible values-clashes, as well as grief and loss are also covered. 

Dr Joan Haliburn

“To be seen as lacking in value, or of no value is shameful, and therein begins the internalization of shame” – Russell Meares(1998).

The concept of depression in earlier psychoanalytic writings pointed to its origins in narcissistic vulnerability, developmental trauma and conflicted anger which had no possibility of expression. Hostility directed inwards, childhood disappointment of healthy narcissistic strivings, loss of an important other who is ambivalently regarded, difficulties with self-esteem particularly when reliant on others for regulation of self-esteem, to traumatically un-empathic parenting resulting in chronic feelings of emptiness and depression; insecure and unstable parenting, rejecting and critical behaviour on the part of parents, leading to the developmental of internal working models of self as unlovable and inadequate and others as unresponsive and punitive, causing vulnerability to later adversity or loss, and seeing such loss as failure on one’s own part; chronic devaluation from caregivers, creating shame and depression.

In this webinar, Dr Joan Haliburn will discuss the psychodynamics and psychopathology of depression, the types of depression, role of shame and guilt, and describe an approach to psychotherapy and some of the difficulties one can encounter when treating depressed individuals.

Prof Onno van der Hart

Chronic childhood abuse and neglect can be understood as severe attachment or betrayal trauma because it usually occurs in the intimate [trust-based] relationships of parents and/or other caretakers. Consequently, a child may develop so-called disorganized attachment (DA) and/or a complex trauma-related dissociative disorder. In adulthood, those conditions can compromise other intimate relationships, as well as challenge the therapeutic relationship. Dissociative disorders are understood as a division of the personality into distinct dissociated parts. Each part has its own first-person perspective, whereby DA can be understood as [those] different parts perceiving intimate relationships differently, i.e., either as [desperately] longed-for, or as [extremely] dangerous. Those perceptions may test the therapeutic relationship, evoking severe approach/avoidance conflicts among these parts.

Clinical experience has taught us, in such cases, it is better to strive for a collaborative therapeutic relationship—also as a model for fostering collaboration among dissociative parts. In this webinar, Prof Onno van der Hart will discuss the clinical challenges of working with Complex Dissociation, with parts integration as a major therapeutic goal.

Dr Joan Haliburn

Borderline Personality Disorder is the most researched of all the personality disorders, the most prevalent, with rates of 10% in outpatient and up to 20% in in-patient settings. There are many models of psychotherapy designed to work effectively with Borderline Personality Disorder. However, they have more similarities rather than dissimilarities and in general traverse the same paths. To work effectively with Borderline Personality Disorder the therapist must be prepared to deal with rather difficult transference and countertransference situations, and the complexities of the psychodynamics situated therein.

In this webinar Dr Joan Haliburn will discuss that single mechanism theories are insufficient, that co-morbidity must be taken into account, and that the forming of the therapeutic relationship – the singular necessity – depends on an understanding of attachment not only in the formation of the therapeutic relationship with safety and security, but also its effects on how the patient relates with the therapist and what the therapist must do in the face of sometimes inexplicable reactions and interactions.

Prof Onno van der Hart

A survivor with a complex trauma-related dissociative disorder once remarked that therapists should realize that dissociative people have a great capacity for imagination, which often remains greatly under-utilized. However, imagination may also act as a liability, playing a major role in the maintenance of trauma-related dissociation of the personality, which consists of dissociative parts mainly functioning in daily life (Apparently Normal Parts of the Personality; ANPs) and parts stuck in trauma-time (Emotional Parts; EPs). EPs may intensely and involuntarily imagine, even hallucinate, that the traumas of the past occur again. Such experiences can be regarded as malignant hypnotic trance states, in which the involved part of the personality is caught, having no possibility to reflect on the experience. Indeed, hypnotic states are characterized by a narrowed field of consciousness, absorption, and (often but not always) suggestibility. In this webinar Prof Van der Hart will discuss the application of two types of hypnotic-like guided imagery work in which clients are assisted in voluntary and deliberately realize reaching mutually agreed positive treatment goals:

(1) Resolving specific problems or symptoms with concrete or metaphoric images. Regarding metaphoric approaches, language is full of metaphors, with so-called metaphoric kernel statements referring to something essential; e.g., the way a patient may experience a particular problem. Whether concrete or metaphoric, these pathogenic kernel statements will be taken as point of departure for guided imagery.

(2) systemic work for fostering safe communications and increased collaboration among dissociative parts, in particular with regard to the construction and utilization of protective imagery, imaginary inner meeting places, safe or calm places, confrontation with and titration of traumatic memories, fusion rituals among dissociative parts.

In this session (Session One), Prof Van der Hart will cover hypnotic language (narrowing of the field of consciousness, absorption, trance logic, taking suggestions literally) as related to symptom-oriented and problem solving approaches (pathogenic kernel statements, metaphoric kernel statements, protective imagery and imaginary medical procedures).

Prof Onno van der Hart

A survivor with a complex trauma-related dissociative disorder once remarked that therapists should realize that dissociative people have a great capacity for imagination, which often remains greatly under-utilized. However, imagination may also act as a liability, playing a major role in the maintenance of trauma-related dissociation of the personality, which consists of dissociative parts mainly functioning in daily life (Apparently Normal Parts of the Personality; ANPs) and parts stuck in trauma-time (Emotional Parts; EPs). EPs may intensely and involuntarily imagine, even hallucinate, that the traumas of the past occur again. Such experiences can be regarded as malignant hypnotic trance states, in which the involved part of the personality is caught, having no possibility to reflect on the experience. Indeed, hypnotic states are characterized by a narrowed field of consciousness, absorption, and (often but not always) suggestibility. In this webinar Prof Van der Hart will discuss the application of two types of hypnotic-like guided imagery work in which clients are assisted in voluntary and deliberately realize reaching mutually agreed positive treatment goals:

(1) Resolving specific problems or symptoms with concrete or metaphoric images. Regarding metaphoric approaches, language is full of metaphors, with so-called metaphoric kernel statements referring to something essential; e.g., the way a patient may experience a particular problem. Whether concrete or metaphoric, these pathogenic kernel statements will be taken as point of departure for guided imagery.

(2) systemic work for fostering safe communications and increased collaboration among dissociative parts, in particular with regard to the construction and utilization of protective imagery, imaginary inner meeting places, safe or calm places, confrontation with and titration of traumatic memories, fusion rituals among dissociative parts.

In this session (Session Two), Prof Van der Hart will cover systemic approaches in working with dissociative parts (inner meeting place, imagery for comfort and care, safe and calm places, containment of traumatic memory work, titration in traumatic memory work and fusion rituals with parts).

Prof Andrew Moskowitz

Delusions are the paradigmatic symptom of psychosis, the essence of irrationality. And yet, is there a way in which they could be understood? If we knew what a person experienced in their early childhood, could we possibly understand their delusional beliefs? This is the thesis put forward in this seminar. Beginning with a discussion of the flawed concept of delusions, we look at the nature of traumatic memories and empirical evidence that delusions can be linked to (adult) traumatic experiences. Pushing back to early childhood, we look at the complicated question of infantile amnesia and the psychological impact of disorganized attachment experiences. The concept of the double bind is also introduced, in a discussion of the psychological purposes that delusions may serve. As an illustration of these ideas, the case of Judge Daniel Schreber, whose father was a famous German pedagogue, is presented; his ‘memoirs’ of his psychosis were analyzed by Freud, Lacan and others to support their theories of mental illness. Others have recognized in Schreber’s delusions the symbolic expressions of experiences of childhood abuse. Finally, the therapeutic implications of these ideas are explored – can delusions be alleviated by accessing memories of the experiences on which they are based?

Dr Darren Haber

Is psychodynamic addiction treatment an oxymoron? Does a patient’s active addiction undermine therapeutic process—if yes, how to proceed? Is it true that until a patient sobers up, “nothing can happen” in their therapy? What do we do, if addiction is not a specialty, when substance abuse unexpectedly rears its head as a treatment issue? Join addiction expert Darren Haber, PsyD, as he discusses the psychodynamic treatment of addictive processes and their impact on the intersubjective field. Haber, speaking from many years of experience as a former rehab counselor and addiction specialist, outlines different ways of thinking and working with entrenched compulsivity, as patients’ aversion of affectivity can provoke analysts’ feelings of inadequacy, frustration, or even abandonment. Two vignettes will be presented to illustrate cases where addictive processes foreclosed emotional intimacy or reflection, typical of rigidly concrete or strictly antidotal self-organizations. One vignette features a patient whose child was addicted, where the therapist was enlisted to help “get” the child to stop, the patient a chronic caregiver whose selfhood is chronically de-centered or collapsed. Our clinical creativity, including revisiting our notions of empathy, becomes necessary to get a foothold in facing headwinds of chaos, self-destruction, or the emptiness that comes with those enslaved in addictive systems, as we too may be tempted to “rescue” or save a patient barely treading water.

Dr Jackie Amos

This webinar will present an attachment-based model of intergenerational maternal neglect and abuse of children. The model integrates two novel hypotheses with existing evolutionary research in the areas of attachment and interpersonal trauma. The first hypothesis is that ‘shame-without-solution’ is as important as ‘fright-without-solution’ in understanding traumatising attachment relationships in infancy. The second addresses the controlling adaptations to traumatising attachments in middle childhood and the corresponding hostile, helpless states of mind in adults with histories of chronic interpersonal traumatisation in important caregiving relationships. These adaptations are increasing recognised empirically as integral to the transmission pathway, and although attachment theory provides an evolutionary explanation of development during infancy few attempts have been made to extend an evolutionary understanding to these important observations in middle childhood and adulthood. Dr Amos will outline a second hypothesis that suggests as development proceeds, parents and children ‘utilise’ dominance and submission hierarchies conserved during evolution, to stabilise fear and shame without solution. The model has direct clinical utility and has been used to predict fundamental objectives of any effective treatment approach. These objectives provide a useful structure to guide intervention with families caught in distressing intergenerational cycles of relational trauma, neglect and abuse.

Prof Andrew Moskowitz

Almost 20 years ago, psychologist Andrew Moskowitz published a pair of articles on the relationship between dissociation and violent crime (Moskowitz, 2004a, 2004b). At that time, the relevance of trauma to violence had been recognized (e.g., The Cycle of Violence, Widom, 1989), but the important corollary role of dissociation had hardly been noted. In these two articles – a broad review of the relationship between dissociation and violence and an analysis of the role of dissociation in different types of offenders – a range of important issues were considered, including: a) the prevalence of dissociation in violence, b) the frequency of amnesia after violent crime and its relation to dissociation, c) violence committed by individuals with dissociative disorders, d) dissociation as a mediator between childhood trauma and adulthood violence, e) peri-traumatic dissociation during violent episodes, and f) the role of dissociation in violent fantasies and Amok-style mass murders. Since 2004, these two seminal articles have been referenced hundreds of times in subsequent reviews and empirical investigations. The continued relevance and importance of the issues raised there will be discussed in the context of recent research and publications, along with implications for research, clinical work and forensic evaluation. In this webinar, Prof Andrew Moskowitz will provide a comprehensive overview of the links and overlaps between the trauma, dissociation and violence.

Dr Nick Bendit

Much of long-term therapy with clients with long-standing disorders (such as BPD, dissociative disorders, chronic depression, etc) involves the modification of emotionally traumatic experiences from early childhood. These disruptive and disorganising early experiences are held in early memory systems. These memory systems are not available for conscious reflection, yet organise our clients lives in chronically disastrous ways. This explains why short-term therapy, particularly therapy that relies on conscious remembering or psycho-education, simply don’t work for so many clients. This webinar will explain how most models of therapy need to be adapted to work with clients with early attachment trauma and will describe one particular psychodynamic model, the Conversational Model, that illustrates many of those principles.

Dr Daniel Goldin

Before YouTube and TikTok, before books and poetry, before writing, humans put their stories together in conversation in order to share experiences and make sense of them. In our prehistory, the story never became a concrete artifact capable of being reproduced in a precise way and disseminated. It lived only in talk. And our ancestors continually tweaked their stories to meet current circumstances, to understand more and better, whether those stories were mythic explanations handed down from the past or current stories about the goings-on in contemporary life. Therapists and patients put together stories in a similarly dynamic way, intensifying a process we have engaged in since humans began to herd together on this earth.

Dr Paul Martin

Loss, grief and mourning are ubiquitous human experiences that pervade the work of therapists, psychiatrists, counselors, and social workers alike. Helping those who have experienced a significant loss can be challenging and confusing. In what ways can we tailor our interventions to accommodate the specific temperaments and psychological needs of our bereaved clients? Dr. Paul M Martin will explore research on the topics of complicated bereavement and attachment theory. He will then share his thoughts on the importance of taking attachment style into consideration when designing treatment plans for bereaved clients. Lastly, Dr. Martin will discuss how grief-focused therapy can be strengthened by working with clients to create personal grief rituals that are catered to their unique psychological needs and grounded in meaning about the specific relationship they are attempting to mourning.

Dr Joan Haliburn

In this webinar Dr Joan Haliburn  will attempt to clarify the differences between these terms often subsumed in the term Developmental Trauma Disorder. She will elaborate the aetiology, developmental lines and symptomatology presented and the importance of elucidating these in anyone who presents with a history of trauma. Dr Haliburn will also touch on the history of how BPD began to be seen as a pejorative label by some, with attempts to replace it with PTSD, only to be debated as being too simple when complex trauma was involved, changing this to Complex PTSD. This is a compromise diagnosis – it does our patients a dis-service depriving them of appropriate treatment, which she will discuss with case excerpts.

Dr Nick Bendit

In this webinar, Dr Nick Bendit will discuss the etiological factors associated with deliberate self-harm, as well as explain what drives and maintains those client patterns. He will also discuss assessment, severity of risk of deliberate self-harm, as well as the importance of managing countertransference responses in therapists. Dr Bendit will also clarify how to treat deliberate self-harm with psychotherapy.

Prof Andrew Moskowitz

This webinar will present evidence and explanations for the presence of psychotic symptoms in posttraumatic (including ICD-11 Complex PTSD) and dissociative disorders (Moskowitz, Heinimaa & Van der Hart, 2019). While the presence of psychotic symptoms is not useful as a differential diagnostic tool, certain aspects of delusions and hallucinations may aid in differential diagnosis. Dissociative symptoms provide a more solid foundation on which to distinguish between psychotic, posttraumatic and dissociative disorders; the most relevant dissociative symptoms in this regard will be highlighted. These clues to differential diagnosis, and the conceptual and clinical implications of these differences, will be discussed and important unanswered questions raised.

Dr Joan Haliburn

The term narcissism is most often regarded as a triad of vanity, exhibitionism and arrogant ingratitude, but it also needs to be seen as a state of developmental arrest, vulnerability, where the sense of SELF lacks sufficient inner resources to give meaning to life, simply through living it fully. The role of relational trauma needs to also be understood in the precocious attainment of autonomy, early idealization and identification with the other, seen in the developmental psychopathology of some narcissistic personality disorders. They occur on a spectrum and cannot all be lumped together. We must develop this understanding in the psychotherapy of Narcissistic Personality Disorders. In this webinar, Joan Haliburn presents a developmental understanding of Narcissism and Narcissistic Personality Disorders and the complexities of psychodynamic psychotherapy in these disorders.

Dr Nick Bendit

In this webinar Dr. Nick Bendit will provide some didactic information about suicidality, and then explore why patients become suicidal, and what the function of suicidal thoughts and urges are. Dr. Bendit will develop a general psychodynamic hypothesis about the origins of suicidal thoughts, and the relationship between deliberate self harm and suicidal thoughts. He will then differentiate between acute suicidality and chronic suicidality, and briefly outline the different treatment needs of each group. Dr. Bendit will also discuss how the fear of suicide structures the therapy, and influences the therapist’s response. Finally, some important prevailing myths about suicide prediction, assessment and prevention will be described.

Dr Kevin Keith

Case formulation would appear to be a necessary skill for mental health practioners. Nonetheless, exactly how and when such skills are best applied may be more art than science. Case construction emerged from the historical practice of medical science. However, the transformation of psychotherapy into a form of “medicine” remains dissatisfying incomplete, if not a flawed endeavour. After a brief introduction into the history and evolution of case formulation, the webinar will turn to five challenges as defined by Eells (2007) inherent to engaging formulation in practice. A selection of current modality examples will be noted. In addition to exploring context and specific client needs/goals, considerations will also be given to cultural and social challenges. Focus will also be given to how we might practically apply formulations to the common practice of working in pluralistic multi-modality, when we lack any consensus on what might be considered an integrated therapy approach. The webinar concludes with a discussion of differential applications of formulations to a single model case. Individuals will be asked to generate observations and insights from the standpoints of at least four types of psychotherapy: (1) Traditional CBT, (2) third wave-like therapies (e.g., ACT, MBCT, DBT, CFT), (3) Psychodynamic and (4) the more Humanist. The goal is to demonstrate the possible benefits for each approach to formulation.

Dr Joan Haliburn

Shame is Relational. Shame can be seen as a spectrum of feeling – embarrassment, shame, humiliation, mortification – and is different from guilt. Why a spectrum? When you look at shame that one feels because you judge yourself as inadequate it is qualitatively different and has different implications from the shame caused by sadistic abuse. Embarrassment is mildly related to shame, and mortification is at the level of wanting to die, in the moment of shaming. Guilt does not weigh in about one’s self-worth, its about regretting something one has said or done. Contempt and grandiosity are both reactions to actual or potential shaming and loss of sense of self. Contempt for self – that self is less than worthwhile is often difficult to hear and seemingly impossible to challenge. When we look at Shame as a spectrum, we are better able to tailor our reflections in a proportionate manner and appreciate the extent to which physiology and affectivity are highly linked. As therapists we need to take care to be in a certain frame of mind, create a shame-free frame, with empathy and a sense of not knowing, being non-judgemental, aware of our own shame, and a readiness to create a right-brain interaction, in order to give Shame, light and air (DeYoung, 2015) and restore in varying degrees a sense of Self. In this webinar Dr Joan Haliburn discuss Shame, the spectrum of Shame, identifying and working with shame in psychotherapy. Dr Joan Haliburn will also look at what happens when Shame is Dissociated or when Shame blocks the process of therapy, and how one proceeds to rectify this and restore Self.

Dr Daniel Goldin

When children come to therapy, they come to play. Children organize their experiences by pretending and enacting incidents in the here and now. When adults come to therapy, they come to tell their stories, constructing a unitary, continuous sense of being by matching feelings to events and events to sequences in the immediate medium of another’s mind. In this webinar Daniel Goldin will focus on how narrative emerges from breaks in the canonical ways of a culture, whether it is the culture of the home, the workplace, or a way of being together that emerges in the clinical situation. We will look at narrative first from a developmental perspective, considering how children start by describing “timeless” routines of their surround and move only gradually to elaborating particular episodes that have to do with violations of these routines. We will look at telling experiences as falling along a continuum, on one end chaotic and nonlinear, on the other rehearsed and rigidly adhering to a cultural template. We will then consider the ideal middle ground of the coherent narrative that remains stable and yet open to revision. We will also examine how an ever-evolving self emerges from this process. Lastly, we will consider applications of these ideas to the clinical situation, advocating an elaborative rather than an interpretive stance.

Dr Joan Haliburn

Time is of the essence in most people who come for help from mental health clinicians, and STDIP has been proven to help such individuals in 10-20 weekly 50-minute sessions. Based on the Conversational Model, and on a long history of short- term dynamic psychotherapies, Short Term Dynamic Interpersonal Psychotherapy (STDIP) is an integrated, contemporary, relational and dynamic model, suited to the needs of adolescents and adults who present with anxiety and depression and associated relational difficulties. It is also trauma-informed and can be successfully used in those with suicidal ideation and self-harm. As an active, structured, flexible, phase-oriented, focussed and time-limited approach, STDIP provides therapists with additional skills to work with individuals in a goal-oriented manner. STDIP has been proven to help such individuals in 10-20 weekly 50-minute sessions. In this webinar, Dr Joan Haliburn will introduce Short Term Dynamic Interpersonal Psychotherapy (STDIP) using case examples.

Dr David Schreiber

Psychoanalytic theory is continually evolving, with deep and lasting changes regularly occurring in the way clinicians conceptualize psychopathology and treat patients. Intersubjective-systems Theory (otherwise known as Phenomenological Contextualism) has played a major role over the past four decades in bringing attention to the contributions of both the analyst and the patient in the clinical setting, cementing into place the two-person psychology mindset which has been concurrently (and at times conjointly) developed in the broader, contemporary, relational psychoanalytic tradition. As developed by George Atwood, Bernard Brandchaft, Donna Orange, Robert Stolorow and many other collaborators, Intersubjective-systems Theory has evolved more recently into both a philosophically-influenced understanding of the psychoanalytic process, and a reconsideration from a contextualist and phenomenological perspective of all the major themes in psychoanalytic treatment, including unconsciousness, trauma, psychoanalytic action and affective experience. n this introductory webinar we will explore the theory itself, along with consideration of the practical implications for treatment. We will also take into account the broader context of the development of psychoanalytic theory, and where Intersubjective-systems Theory differs, and is similar to, other contemporary psychoanalytic models.

Dr Darren Haber

“To describe a language game is to describe a form of life.” – Wittgenstein

All language, including that of emotionality, assumes meaning within specific contexts and instances of use. Our understanding of emotional experience takes shape via mutually created language games that are intersubjectively situated; we learn spoken meaning in lived contexts. But what happens with patients raised in accommodative or misattuned surrounds, coerced into speaking the scripts of others—alienated from their own mother tongue? Here the therapist may also find themselves estranged, from familiar language worlds of empathic attunement and curiosity, shunted aside in favor of spoken prescriptions or metaphysical ‘cures.’ ‘Talk therapy’ is a misnomer; we are attempting nothing less than transforming patients’ ways of living, a context lived rather than distantly described or conceptualized. In this webinar Dr Darren Haber will explore how Wittgenstein revolutionized our understanding of language, underscoring its bewitchment via our intelligence, when words and phrases carry assumed ‘truth’ through repeated use and familiarity. He will introduce new ways of thinking about the language world of patients, and what hidden assumptions may be at play in what is or is not being said; describe how both participants are vulnerable to reifying bewitchment; and examine how our own theoretical languaging can make us susceptible to becoming frustrated, confused, or otherwise frozen in dyadic processing.

Dr Joan Haliburn

The importance of the therapeutic relationship has occupied scholars, researchers and clinicians for decades; no consensus has been reached as to what comprises the therapeutic relationship; however, a substantial body of empirical research now supports its importance in predicting change in psychotherapy. Transference, countertransference, therapist ruptures and therapist self-disclosure, have been the basis of some studies attempting to describe the process of psychotherapy and the role of the therapeutic relationship, but each is subject to different variables, which need to be further studied. The concept of the therapeutic relationship went mainstream when it moved from psychoanalysis to the field of general psychiatry, namely goals, tasks and bonds and more recently to other approaches, where the relationship is now considered important.

Along with historical information, Dr Joan Haliburn will embark on another aspect of the therapeutic relationship which has not been pursued to any great length, and quoting Bowlby: “the psychotherapist may become a temporary attachment figure for the patient by becoming a reliable and trustworthy person in the patient’s exploration of his/her experiences – a secure relationship”. Dr Joan Haliburn will, with the use of case examples, explore this idea further, drawing from developmentalists – Daniel Stern, Colwyn Trevarthen, Michael Basch and her own interest in this area both as a psychotherapist and supervisor for more than 30 years, and raise discussion around attachment security and the therapeutic relationship – a new experience

Dr Lynne Jacobs

“To exist is to be in relation”

Buber saw the meeting between I and Thou as the most important aspect of human experience because it is in relationship that we become fully human. The I–Thou relationship is characterized by mutuality, directness, presentness, intensity and ineffability. Therapists view the client – therapist relationship as the foundation of all therapeutic growth because it fundamentally affirms of human connection, validation and participation. The attempt at understanding the subjective inner world of the client is not a one-way street because the therapist must account for their own influence upon the client as both participants come into psychological contact. The I–Thou is a relational event that is co-created; it does not fully reside in one participant or the other. This interpersonal encounter contains wonderful potential that far exceeds two separate people in conversation.

Dr Joan Haliburn

Eating Disorders are common in Australia. The conceptualization of eating disorders has expanded rapidly in the last ten years to include binge-eating disorder (BED) and Avoidant-Restrictive Food Intake Disorder (ARFID) in addition to the existing Anorexia Nervosa (AN) and Bulimia Nervosa (BN). Adolescence is occurring much earlier nowadays and includes children from 10 to 18 years of age and is a time for first occurrence of any of these eating disorders. They are characterised as disabling, chronic and relapsing conditions with high relapse rates, particularly for those treated as in-patients. In this webinar, Dr Joan Haliburn will discuss the clinical features of these disorders and emphasise the need for their early recognition as well as their co-morbidity, the latter often leading to failures in treatment if unrecognized. Treatments will be briefly looked at, and there will be time for discussion.

Dr Kris Rao

The current worldwide Covid-19 pandemic has seen many professionals transition to working online, and away from offices and organisational sites. Even prior to the pandemic, there were already moves worldwide toward online-based therapy; from SMS- and chat-based crisis support to teletherapy using teleconferencing apps like Skype and Zoom. As a therapist or counsellor, you may already be considering moving your practice online. What is online therapy really like? What are the pitfalls and advantages? What should you do to:

Continue working effectively with clients online?
Implement best practice standards online?
Protect client privacy and safety?
Protect your business as an ongoing concern?

This 120-minute webinar, created and delivered by psychotherapist Kris Rao, will cover key aspects of setting up your online therapy practice; including:

What online therapy looks and feels like; the best practices and what to avoid.
Transitioning existing face-to-face clients to online engagement.
Technology to maximise accessibility, privacy, and business continuity.
Appropriate legal protections for your business.
Special ethical considerations in an online environment.
Responding appropriately to likely emergencies.

Best-practices discussed include:

How to explain and demonstrate teletherapy to clients.
Online therapy tips for clinicians
Protect client privacy on your computer and online.
How to manage rapport interruptions from technology failures.
Understand your legal responsibilities with international/interstate clients.

Complimentary materials provided:

Effective online therapy checklist
Online therapy tips chart
Ethical decision-making display chart
Professional Development Portfolio