10th ANNUAL PSYCHOANALYTIC COUPLE PSYCHOTHERAPY EVENT
Complex and Creative: The Technique of Interpretation in Couple Psychoanalysis
NCSPP and PCPG (Psychoanalytic Couple Psychotherapy Group) are pleased to announce the 10th Anniversary of our Annual Psychoanalytic Couple Psychotherapy Lecture. This year, we are honored to host esteemed couple psychoanalyst from Tavistock Relationships, Mary Morgan, who will be focusing on technique in psychoanalytic couple psychotherapy. She will be addressing the complexities of what is meant by a “couple interpretation” and what can go wrong, including “incorrect” interpretations, problems with the timing of interpretations, and those involving unprocessed countertransference enactments. A particular focus will be given to the triangular nature of couple therapy and the way the therapist can move between the different relationships in the room, while holding a “couple state of mind.” Other kinds of interpretations will also be addressed, including those to the transference, countertransference, the couple’s projective system, unconscious beliefs, phantasy, symbols, and dreams. Following the presentation, Shelley Nathans will serve as interlocutor in conversation with Mary Morgan, and Ortal Kirson-Trilling will present a clinical case to Mary Morgan in the afternoon.
Please join us at the end of the day for a wine and cheese celebration of our 10th anniversary!
- Participants will be able to describe the therapeutic purpose of interpretation to the couple.
- Participants will be able to list two ways couple interpretations differ from interpretations in individual work.
- Participants will be able to list three types of couple interpretations and their therapeutic aims.
- An Object Relations Approach to the Couple Relationship: Past, Present and Future Couple and Family Psychoanalysis Vol 6, No. 2 Autumn 2016
- What does ending mean in couple psychotherapy Couple and Family Psychoanalysis Vol 6, No. 1 Spring 2016
Mary Morgan is a psychoanalyst and couple psychoanalytic psychotherapist and a Fellow of the British Psychoanalytical Society. At Tavistock Relationships, she is Reader in Couple Psychoanalysis. She has published many papers on psychoanalytic work with couples and is currently completing a book entitled, A Couple State of Mind: Psychoanalysis of Couples – The Tavistock Relationships Model. She is a member of the IPA’s Family and Couple Psychoanalysis Committee, board member of the International Association for Couple and Family Psychoanalysis, and on the international advisory board of the journals Couple & Family Psychoanalysis and Interatzioni. She has developed and led couple psychotherapy trainings in several countries, lectures internationally, and has a private individual and couple analytic practice.
Ortal Kirson-Trilling, Psy.D., is a personal and supervising analyst trained at the PINC. Dr. Kirson-Trilling is on the editorial board of the Journal of Couple and Family Psychoanalysis and is the Director of the Intensive Study Program for the Psychoanalytic Couple Psychotherapy Group (PCPG). She is a faculty member of PCPG and the SFCP. She teaches analytic couple theory, practice, and technique locally, nationally, and internationally and maintains a private practice in Oakland, California.
Shelley Nathans, Ph.D. is on the faculties of CPMC, PCPG, and PINC. She is the director/producer of the film Robert Wallerstein: 65 Years at the Center of Psychoanalysis. Her most recent publication is “Whose Disgust is it Anyway?: Projection and Projective Identification in the Couple Relationship” (Psychoanalytic Dialogues, 2016). She is co-editor (with Milton Schaefer) of Couples on the Couch: Psychoanalytic Couple Psychotherapy and the Tavistock Model (Routledge, 2017). Dr. Nathans is in private practice in both San Francisco and Oakland.
The Psychoanalytic Couple Psychotherapy Group is dedicated to bringing modern psychoanalytic ideas to bear in working with couples. It began as a three-year training course through NCSPP with the Tavistock Centre for Couple Relationships in London. Some members of the original group have continued to study and train together as the PCPG, which has become a Bay Area locus for education, training, and study in psychoanalytic psychotherapy with couples.
PCPG offers an intensive study program in psychoanalytic couples psychotherapy: “Making Meaning in the Grip Of Reality.” The program features a rich array of theoretical classes, case conferences, film events, and workshops, taught by a hybrid faculty from PCPG, Tavistock Center for Couple Relationships (TCCR), and other noteworthy psychoanalytic couple psychotherapists. PCPG’s first class of nine students has just completed a three-year program of study, which included a week of classes at TCCR in London.

