Acknowledgments

In the first edition of Psychoanalytic Diagnosis, I thanked my clients and virtually my entire community of colleagues. It is even truer now that this book is a product of a whole “climate of opinion” (to steal W. H. Auden’s moving image of Freud). I emphasized in that volume that my organization of personality levels and types was not “my” taxonomy but my best effort at representing mainstream psychoanalytic ideas. At this point, given current controversies among analysts about whether diagnosis itself is valuable (the topic of a 2009 online colloquium of the International Association for Relational Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy), I cannot presume to represent the diagnostic center of gravity of the psychoanalytic movement. And yet this book encompasses far more than my own thinking. For several years I have been asking practitioner audiences to e-mail me with criticisms of any statements in the first edition that do not fit their clinical experience. A great number of therapists, including many who practice in other countries and in settings very different from mine, have written to say that this conceptualization supports their own clinical experience. Some have taken me up on the invitation to criticize, and I have integrated many of their suggestions when rewriting various chapters.

Beyond those I named in 1994, there are too many people to enumerate here who have contributed to this revision. But I should single out Richard Chefetz, who spent many hours critiquing the chapter on dissociation and educating me about contemporary findings in traumatology. I am also grateful to Daniel Gaztembide (and to Brenna Bry, my department chair—a radical Skinnerian who appreciates psychoanalysis—who astutely assigned him to me as a “work–study” student). Daniel sent me regular briefs about relevant research and theory. For his psychoanalytic wisdom and his fine ear for tone, I have depended, as always, on my friend Kerry Gordon. For his eagle eye in spotting typos, I thank Tim Paterson. Finally, for their friendship and candor, I want to acknowledge some colleagues who have influenced me in the years since the first edition: Neil Altman, Sandra Bem, Louis Berger, Ghislaine Boulanger, the late Stanley Greenspan, Judith Hyde, Deborah Luepnitz, William MacGillivray, David Pincus, Jan Resnick, Henry Seiden, Jonathan Shedler, Mark Siegert, Joyce Slochower, Robert Wallerstein, Bryant Welch, and Drew Westen. And thanks to the many unacknowledged others whose ideas have found their way into this book. My mistakes and misunderstandings are my own.