Demystifying Love: Plain Talk for the Mental Health Professional

by Stephen B. Levine

Intended primarily for mental health professionals, Demystifying Love deals plainly with topics rarely written about for clinicians. The book discusses in a small package highly readable and useful topics, such as love (as both noun and verb), psychological intimacy, sexual desire, as well as infidelity, both in background concepts and clinical guidelines.

As the book shows, love is the logical point of departure for a clinical understanding of sexuality and its problems. It is the most conventional framework for understanding sexual behaviors, the one that is broadly endorsed across many cultures, often as the ideal context for sexual expression. The book integrates an analysis of love in patients dealing with intimacy, sexual desire, infidelity, forgiveness and reconciliation. Detailed with compelling case studies, the author's skill as a therapist comes through in the discussion of these topics-many of which are at the heart of numerous couple problems.

In creating this illuminating work for mental health professionals, Dr. Levine may have underestimated its appeal. Dr. Levine's ability to shed light on our internal processes as we love and attempt to be loved throughout life may prove to be of interest to a far broader audience.

184 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2006

About the author

Dr. Stephen Barrett Levine is clinical professor of psychiatry at Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine (Cleveland, Ohio).

Reviews

[Kate · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book was less helpful than I had hoped for working with patients. It turns out that Longwood did teach us most of this!

[Daniel Seifert · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good source for deconstructing the language of love in today's culture and in one's own thinking whether in one's practice of "love"
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