I just got home from the UK where I attended the three-day IEDTA meeting and a three-day ISTDP immersion course taught by Jon Frederickson and Rob Neborsky. Both were excellent.
Over the past several years, I have been watching a spectrum of ISTDP practice and trying to understand their common elements and differences are. Other than at conferences, most of the work I’ve been exposed to so far has been from Allan Abbass and Jon Frederickson. The immersion was the first chance I had to see Rob Neborsky’s work in the style that he and Josette ten Have-de Labije have developed.
Trying to fit their work together with what I already understood led me to a new way of thinking about it, which I found helpful, and which I’ll describe here. There are no new concepts here, but I think it’s simple, direct terminology that can help us understand what people are doing from a unified standpoint.
Continue reading “Affect Defenses and Relationship Defenses: a Unifying Approach to ISTDP”