Teaching junior doctors psychotherapy is a difficult task. This paper charts the progress of clinical psychologists setting out on this task, initially finding it impossible, but thinking and working together to develop creative, working groups in which the junior doctors and group leaders learned and developed.

We detail how we run the teaching groups and what it is like to be a member of such a group. We consider the costs and benefits of clinical psychologists teaching junior doctors and the differing cultures of psychiatry, psychology and psychotherapy. We discuss institutional and group defences which create obstacles to learning. We propose a training model based on maternal containment as opposed to pseudo-paternal identifications. Containment of anxiety appears to be necessary for the creation and maintenance of a safe space for junior doctors to learn about psychotherapy.