Psychodynamic Perspectives on Aging and Illness

Abstract

When the Body Intrudes: Psychotherapy with Older and Medically Ill Adults.- Psychoanalytic theory and the body.- Applying psychodynamic concepts to aging and medically ill patients.- Aging and the medically ill: An increasing population.-Technology, Idealization, and Unconscious Dynamics in the Culture of Medicine.- The hypomanic culture of medicine.- Patient expectations in medicine.- Technology and idealization.- Looking for love (and a cure): Medical relationships.-The Trauma of Medical Illness.- The mental health clinician and medical patients.- Medical illness as adult onset trauma.- Past trauma in the context of aging and illness.-Narcissistic Aspects of Aging and Illness.- The concept of narcissism within psychodynamic theory.- The mid-life crisis.-Transference and Countertransference in Aging and Illness.- Transference and implications for older and medically ill patients.- Countertransference feelings in working with medical patients.-Self-destructive Behaviors, Masochistic Dynamics, and Illness.- Psychodynamic ideas on masochism.- Masochism and the body.- Cognitive Changes and Implications for the Therapeutic Encounter.- Cognitive impairment in the elderly.- Normal physical changes related to aging.- Psychotherapy with cognitively impaired adults.-What We Know and What We Don't: The Influence of Psychological Factors on Medical Illness.- Heart disease.- Osteoporosis.- Cancer.- Child Abuse.- The meaning of the research on psychological factors and medical risk.-Hope and Grief: The Introduction of an Emotional Language.- Alexithymia: Adaptive aspects of psychic detachment.- Alexithymia and hysteria.- Trauma, the sense of self and therapeutic action.- (Epilogue) Resilience in the elderly and medically ill.