Disillusionment:
Developmental Necessity
and
Clinical Challenge
A Saturday Morning Seminar
presented by
Jane Tillman, PhD, ABPP
Saturday, November 12, 2016
9:00am–12:15pm
University of Tennessee Medical Center
Morrison Education and Conference Center
1924 Alcoa Highway
Knoxville, TN 37920
Description of Program:
The terms disillusion and disillusionment are linked to painful states of dysphoria and disappointment, and yet the capacity to be disillusioned and to bear the painful feelings associated with disillusionment is a necessary aspect of human development across the lifespan.
In psychoanalytic treatment, disillusionment is an essential feature of the resolution of the so-called transference neuroses. Both illusion and its counterpart disillusion have adaptive functions as well as moments of risk when they are prone to pathological expressions, one of which is suicide. Suicide in response to pathological illusions may be based on fantasies of reunion with the dead (failure to mourn), and triumphal states (grandiosity or revenge), among others. Suicide may also represent an outcome of pathological disillusionment, where time is foreclosed by a certainty that the agonies of the present moment will last forever, or a totalistic belief that all life has to offer is loss, betrayal and rejection leading to a nihilistic position.
Dr. Tillman will frame the psychological and clinical states of illusion and disillusion with their adaptive and pathological aspects, and then using Flannery O’Connor’s short story “The Lame Shall Enter First,” will deepen the discussion of the interplay between illusion, disillusion, and suicide. Participants should read O’Connor’s short story prior to the meeting.
Click here for Flannery O'Connor's short story.
Schedule:
8:30am Registration and Continental Breakfast
9:00am Presentation on Disillusionment: Theoretical and Clinical Perspectives
10:30am Break
10:45am Group Discussion: The Lame Shall Enter First” as a complex examination of the interplay of the pathologies of illusion and disillusion.
12:15pm Complete Evaluations and Adjourn.
Educational Objectives:
After attending this intermediate-level program in full, participants will be able to:
1. Identify adaptive aspects of illusion and disillusion in development across the lifespan.
2. Formulate experiences of disillusion and illusion in the transference situation.
3. Describe how pathologies of illusion and disillusion contribute to suicidality.
Presenter:
Jane G. Tillman, PhD, ABPP is a psychologist and psychoanalyst at the Austen Riggs Center in Stockbridge, MA where she is the Director of the Erikson Institute for Education and Research. Dr. Tillman has a research interest in suicide, and has published papers on the effect of patient suicide on clinicians, states of mind preceding a near-lethal suicide attempt, and the intergenerational transmission of suicide.
Participants:
This program is open to all APS members and other interested mental health professionals who may not be members. It is not limited to individuals practicing in a predominately psychoanalytic mode. The material will be appropriate for clinicians with intermediate levels of experience and knowledge.
Registration Fees and Policies:
Professional Members and Scholars: $45 through November 7, 2016, $55 after November 7, 2016.
Non-members: $60 through November 7, 2016, $70 thereafter.
Free to Early-Career Professional Members until November 7, 2016, $10 thereafter.
Graduate Student Members: Free.
Online registration will close on November 10, 2016.
Although walk-ins will be accepted, please register online at www.aps-tn.org in advance to assure adequate food and seating.
If you prefer to pay by check, please print the form: Saturday Morning Seminar Registration, and mail with your payment to:
Elaine Erickson, PhD
APS Treasurer
515 Booth Street
Knoxville, TN 37919.
Refunds honored with written/electronic notice at least 24 hours before date of conference. Contact Elaine Erickson, PhD.
Contact the APS President Heather Hirschfeld, PhD to negotiate fees, if needed.
Facility is accessible to persons who are physically challenged. If participants have special needs, we will attempt to accommodate them. Please address requests, questions, concerns and any complaints to Heather Hirschfeld, PhD.
APS Membership:
Eligible professionals can join APS or renew their membership for the 2016-2017 program year for $70. Scholars can join/renew for $50 and Early-Career Professionals can join/renew for $35. Graduate students may join or renew for $25.
American Psychological Association Approval Statement:
Division 39 is approved by the American Psychological Association to sponsor continuing education for psychologists. Division 39 maintains responsibility for this program and its content.
Continuing Education:
This program, when attended in its entirety, is available for 3.0 continuing education credits. With full attendance and completion of a program Evaluation and Learning Assessment, a certificate will be issued. Psychologists will have their participation registered through Division 39.
APS and Division 39 are committed to conducting all activities in conformity with the American Psychological Association’s Ethical Principles for Psychologists. APS and Division 39 are also committed to accessibility and non-discrimination in continuing education activities. Participants are asked to be aware of the need for privacy and confidentiality throughout the program. If program content becomes stressful, participants are encouraged to process these feelings during discussion periods.
Selected References/Recommended Reading:
Linehan, M. M., Goodstein, J. L., & Nielsen, S.L., C. J. A. (1983). Reasons for staying alive when you are thinking of killing yourself: the reasons for living inventory. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 51, 276–286.
O’Connor, F. (1962). The Lame Shall Enter First. The Sewanee Review. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/27540791
Reisenberg-Malcom, Ruth (1999). Pain, sorrow, and resolution. In On Bearing Unbearable States of Mind. London: The New Library of Psychoanalysis Series: International Psychoanalytic Association. pp.150-162.
Tillman, J. G. (2016). The Intergenerational Transmission of Suicide: Moral Injury and the Mysterious Object in the Work of Walker Percy. Journal of the American Psychoanalytic Association. http://doi.org/10.1177/0003065116653362
Tillman, J. G. (2006). When a patient commits suicide: an empirical study of psychoanalytic clinicians. The International Journal of Psycho-Analysis, 87 (Pt 1), 159–177. http://doi.org/10.1516/6UBB-E9DE-8UCW-UV3L
Contact:
Please address requests, questions, concerns and any complaints to APS President Heather Hirschfeld, PhD.
There is no commercial support for this program nor are there any relationships between Division 39, APS, presenter, program content, research, grants or other funding sources that could reasonably be construed as conflicts of interest. During the program, the validity/utility of the content and risks/limitations of the approaches discussed will be addressed.