I decided to apply for analytic training after years of rumination. I had graduated twelve years earlier from the first class of my institute's psychoanalytic psychotherapy training program, a rigorous three-year course in theory, which also required three supervised cases, one to completion.

At the time I decided to apply for analytic training, I was a successful, well-respected professional, in practice for almost twenty years, and had participated at several levels of the institute's organizational structure. I had also completed a six-year analysis prior to starting the psychotherapy program, so I thought I was relatively well protected against personal anxieties undermining my pleasure or success in training.