From 1993 to 2005, a Psychoanalytic Family Workshop took place each month at Ealing Hospital. The format we devised was that a workshop member would present their family twice and for the third month we would invite a discussant who would nominate a relevant paper in advance, having read the write-ups from the previous two sessions.

In 2003, James Fisher agreed to be our discussant. This made for an interesting connection since he had initially practised as a systemic family therapist before training as a couple psychotherapist. It is not appropriate to go into details of the family that was considered, but couple work was involved. James sent us copies of Chapter Six, “That which brings couples to therapy,” taken from his book The Uninvited Guest: Emerging from Narcissism towards Marriage. The Workshop agreed that James was kind, gentlemanly, and made a fascinating discussant. My own personal memory