‘The Ancient Cult of Madame’: when therapists trade curiosity for certainty |
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| Authors: | Carlos E. Sluzki |
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| Affiliation: | 1. Professor, Department of Global and Community Health, College of Health and Human Services, and Institute for Conflict Analysis and Resolution, George Mason University, Fairfax/Arlington, Virginia, USA;2. and Clinical Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioural Sciences, George Washington University School of Medicine and Health Sciences, Washington DC, USA. E‐mail: csluzki@gmu.edu. |
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| Abstract: | An experience in which the author followed his own objectives rather than the patient's, leading to a tragic end, is evoked as a frame for the presentation and discussion of a family treatment where the therapeutic process led by the therapist may have exceeded the needs and expectation of the family members. This is followed by a discussion about potential problems caused by a therapist's fascination for family stories, since its effects may be epistemologically discontinuous from, if not contradictory to, Cecchin's recommendation for ‘curiosity’ as a central dictum of the therapist's stance. |
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