You do not currently have permission to view the full text for this document. Please sign in to an account with an active subscription or contact support.
In child psychoanalysis there are ample and exhaustive varieties of theoretical models which can be fully transmitted; this is why so many Schools of psychoanalytically oriented child psychotherapy have been established. Being very saturated models, however, they are severely limited in that they often prevent the development of free creativity in each therapist who adheres to that particular model (at times becoming a mere “applier”). To an even greater extent, they prevent new discoveries and new lines of thought and development. Often these saturated models appear to require unquestioning acquiescence and even seem to crush numerous possibilities of creative and innovative research. Bion maintained that it was impossible to be “bionian”, because, to be a true analyst means to have the desire and ability to live in isolation from theories, and from schools. This implies a personal, unique and unrepeatable way of seeing events in the analysis room.
Barbara Piovano's book can be placed in the folds of these remarks and can accordingly be considered authentic psychoanalytical research born in the field of her daily experiences at a Child Neuropsychiatric Service where she had to find a way to use psychoanalytical tools in an institutional context. As she found ingenious and original solutions and orientations, the author went even further and transposed to private practice (the more usual setting for analysts) what had been experimented and partially theorized in the institutional context. The model of “parallel psychotherapy” is the focal point of the book and constitutes, in my opinion, an authentic piece of research that cannot be ignored, whether one agrees with it or not.
As mentioned, the author does not reach the proposed model through the application of theories, which is confirmed by the structure of the book, But develops it, starting from the requirements of a “front line” territorial service; she then extends it to the point of inventing, elaborating and la