Countertransference Quotes

“Within the mental-health system in North America, the borderline victim of severe childhood trauma is usually blamed for her behaviour, which is regarded as having no legitimate basis and being self-indulgent; her trauma history is ignored and not talked about; and she is given as little treatment and follow-up as possible. At St Boniface Hospital in Winnipeg, many staff members expressed the opinion, in my presence, that borderlines and multiple personality disorder patients did not have a legitimate right to in-patient treatment, and the out-patient department would not accept patients with either diagnosis. (1995)”
― Colin A. Ross, Satanic Ritual Abuse: Principles of Treatment

“When . . . the therapist registers an unexpected shift of mood in herself when she is with a patient, she begins a private inner dialogue with herself as to what it might mean. First she checks herself out, as though she is an object of study. What does the patient evoke in her? Why did she feel uptight just then? Why did she feel sad when the patient was making a light remark? Did the patient hit a particularly personal nerve? Such emotional states, which the therapist notices in herself, are called the counter-transference. As she cordons off the feelings and reflects on them, their dissonance alerts her: something difficult needs understanding. Her body, her emotional state, become a stethoscope-like instrument for hearing what might be askew.”
― Susie Orbach, Bodies