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The Empty Couch, edited by Gabriele Junkers, shines a light on the uncomfortable topic of ageing and the ending of an analyst's life. Exploring the subject from a number of perspectives, sometimes with a laser focus and sometimes with a broader, more encompassing view, the authors in this collection of essays create a comprehensive picture of the personal and institutional challenges that are being initiated by our ageing population and changing social conditions.
The empty couch, which was chosen to symbolize our analytic work, evokes an immediate personal, emotional response and directs our attention to the possibility of an emptiness in our future lives, a time when the intensity of our analytic practice and the opportunity it provides to immerse ourselves in the mysteries of another person's psyche is no longer available. What substitutes will we find to replace it? Who will we be then and what will we call ourselves?
I'm personally aware that the Empty Couch is fast becoming more of a reality among my colleagues and, as an ageing analyst, it creates an uncomfortable nudge that the same situation is in my near future. My reluctance to confront this possibility was revealed in the approach-avoidance dynamic that I experienced in reading the book. At the same time, I noticed a sense of relief that the topic was being addressed, because even though the subject of ageing is gaining momentum in the collective, in my experience there is little discussion of these issues in analytic circles. The paucity of articles pertaining to retirement, possible illness or death of analysts is also striking.
Divided into three parts, the book begins with a Prologue, a conversation between Guiseppe Civitarese and Antonio Ferro about couches, and the rhythm of the empty and full couch that every analyst experiences. Whether it is to burnout, ageing or illness, analysts gradually, through their professional lives, begin to lighten the weight of the couch. As ageing and losses begin to sh