Missoula, Mont., is the site of the first affiliated study group of the American Psychoanalytic Association. This new category of study groups sponsored by the association is designed for communities where there are up to four APsaA-trained analysts and therapists of any discipline who are interested in studying psychoanalysis. The affiliated study group category was passed by the Executive Council last December and was the result of several years of efforts by Marvin Margolis in regard to outreach activities of the American. The Missoula Psychoanalytic Study Group (MPSG) was approved by the Council in May. It currently boasts twenty members.
I moved to Missoula four years ago after having practiced in Dallas for twenty years. I was lured by the beauty of the mountains and rivers and by the promise of a quieter place to live, practice, and write. Despite being a university town with more than its share of writers, artists, and psychotherapists, Missoula had no discernable analytic community. Because I wanted to create an analytic community in which I could live and practice, I began giving talks, then continuing education courses through the University of Montana's psychology department.
I learned that there were many experienced therapists in the community who had been exposed to psychoanalytic concepts and supervision during their training, but who did not have a place in which to explore analytic approaches to their work. In fact, it was somewhat politically incorrect for one to align oneself with an analytic approach. University programs training psychoanalysts in Missoula have tended to disseminate myths about “Freudian” analysis, and the community did not have the benefit of exposure to contemporary psychoanalytic ideas.
Through several presentations, two courses, and a continuous case conference that I conducted, a community of therapists interested in psychoanalytic ideas began to coalesce. David Metcalf, a retired analyst living near Missoula, and Marianne Spitzform, an analyst who had graduated from the Colorado Center for Psychoanalytic Studies, lent their support to the development of a study group, which began to take shape in mid-2000.
Before the May 2000 meeting in Chicago, I was encouraged by Lee Shershow, who was then chair of the ad hoc Committee on New Psychoanalytic Centers (CNPC), to provide Margolis with information about my efforts to develop an analytic presence in Missoula, so that he could present this information to the Council in support of the concept of an affiliated study group category.
In anticipation of the APsaA's ultimate approval of an affiliated study group category, I was also invited to report to the CNPC in Chicago on the development of a study group in Missoula. The committee enthusiastically supported the formation of a study group and graciously sent Sharon Zalusky to Missoula to make an inaugural presentation in October 2000.
Sharon presented a half-day workshop, “New Directions in Psychodynamic Psychotherapy: The Intersubjective Perspective,” and met privately with members of the MPSG. Her presentations were very successful, and the study group members were quite taken with this analyst's openness and astute use of clinical examples to illustrate her ideas. After the workshop and meeting, a reception was held for Sharon at a local art gallery. Sharon describes her time in Missoula:
Besides the warm Missoulan hospitality I experienced, I was extremely impressed with the intellectual curiosity of this diverse and experienced group of clinicians, who seemed to be interested in both classical and contemporary psychoanalytic thought. Their diversity adds to the richness of this group and to their openness to new ideas.
The MPSG was formally approved by the Executive Council in May and will be sending a non-voting representative to the Council at its December meeting. The group meets for two hours monthly; an average of fifteen members attend each meeting. Precirculated papers are discussed and become the stimulus for discussions about the members' clinical work. This first year's program evolved around members' interest in countertransference issues.
By the time of its May 2001 meeting, the MPSG had evolved into a group of clinicians who enjoy one another's company and who look to the group as a real resource in maintaining and developing their professional lives. A party was planned for June near one of Montana's beautiful lakes. The members established an e-mail list in order to communicate with one another over the summer and created a MPSG Web site ().
Fred L. Griffin, M.D., practices in Missoula, Mont. He is a member of the ad hoc Committee on New Psychoanalytic Centers. His e-mail address is .
Harvey Rich came to Missoula in September to present a half-day workshop, “Two Perspectives on the Clinical Encounter with Creativity.” It was open to therapists in Missoula and western Montana, who will receive continuing education credit. He then met privately with the MPSG. These presentations generate revenue for the study group and help defray expenses for other analysts who come to Missoula to speak in the future.
Another program is scheduled for the summer of 2003, when Glen Gabbard will be coming to Missoula. While the details of the program have not been finalized, it is hoped that a meeting will be developed that will attract analysts and psychotherapists from outside Montana to visit Big Sky country during one of its beautiful summers.
The mission statement of the MPSG includes outreach to other disciplines and to the broader community of Missoula in disseminating psychoanalytic ideas. When Rich came to Missoula in September, he helped us with this objective in discussing his book, A Celebrated Life: Capturing the Meaning of Life's Moments, to be published in 2002.
We hope that this presentation appealed to Missoula's artistic, literary, and academic communities and will promote “cross-pollination” among various groups whose lives might be enriched by psychoanalytic ideas.
In this spirit I am teaching a continuing education course in the fall of 2001, titled “The Truth in Fiction: Psychoanalysis, Literature, and the Creative Process.” The participants in this course will be therapists, creative writers, teachers of literature and creative writing, and readers of fiction from the community of Missoula.
It has given me great pleasure to participate in the development of this study group and to see it become a genuine resource for analytically minded therapists in Missoula. It has both met my personal need to live within an analytic community and created an avenue to transmit ideas that are important to me to others who are eager to learn and develop their own analytic thinking and expertise.
I hope that geographically isolated analysts in other communities will take advantage of the support of the APsaA and develop their own affiliated study groups. I would like to invite analysts who would like to make a presentation and/or meet with the MPSG to contact me. The pay is poor, but the aesthetic amply compensates. You would be invited to stay at our home on the side of the mountain overlooking the Missoula Valley. The study group members will love and appreciate you for the generosity of your time and sharing of your ideas. What more could an analyst ask?
The CNPC is actively contacting analysts in communities where there are no APsaA-sponsored study groups and inviting them to apply for affiliated study group status. I believe that Missoula can be a model for the development of study groups in other cities similar in nature and size. If you are interested in developing an affiliated study group, please contact me, co-chairs Richard Ruzumna and Alan Sugarman, or other members of the CNPC.