Quotes from Deborah Anna Luepnitz

This etymology puts me in mind of Winnicott's notion of potential space–that intermediate area between the subjective and objective in which creativity and play occur. Psychotherapy is akin to play, according to Winnicott. Therapy takes place neither inside the mind of the patient nor inside that of the therapist, but in some middle area, in the potential space between them.

Winnicott, I think, would have enjoyed the observation made by novelist Fay Weldon: "The greatest advantage of not having children must be that you can go on believing you are a nice person. Once you have children, you understand how wars start." All relationships

keep the conversation about identity going. This is the work of psychotherapy: to learn both to assume

There is no perfect solution to the problem of writing about therapy patients. But not to do so strikes me as the riskiest choice at a time in our culture when the power to define madness, malingering, and suicide potential is being handed over to insurance company functionaries.

that forgoing recognition of status was a luxury of the recognized.

I have spoken before about the "yes" and the "no" alive in every person who seeks therapy. Listening to Pearl I heard the following: Yes, I would like to confide in you. No, that would displace my loyal family. Yes, I want to get help. No, that would prove I needed it. Yes, I want to change my life. No, I don't. All the things I do and everything I am have taken me this far.

the observation made by novelist Fay Weldon: "The greatest advantage of not having children must be that you can go on believing you are a nice person. Once you have children, you understand how wars start.

For Lacan, desire is what simultaneously defines us as human subjects and what prevents us from ever being whole or complete. To desire something, after all, is to lack something.