| Page 3 | Letter from the Editors Josette ten Have-de Labije, PsyD |
| Page 5 | Alike: a patient who gave up, lost and regained his orange colour Elzbieta Brodowska, MSc |
| Page 26 | When wounds bleed again Tatiana Nassar, MA |
Elżbieta Brodowska, MSc
Summary
The article describes parts of the therapy process with a patient who presented himself at the initial interview with psychosomatic complaints, low self-esteem and symptoms of persistent depression. In establishing the working alliance with this patient it had been essential to help the patient to undo his projection, and help him to have hope again , believing in his own capacities to accomplish own wishes, goals and understanding his feelings with love, care,
precision and honesty. It had been part of his job as a manager to screen a short animated movie and in doing so, his evoked feelings and understanding of his own self destructive mechanisms had been an accelerative force for the patient to deepen the working alliance with the therapist, to retrieve painful memories from his unconscious, to face his feelings, no matter how painful.
Tatiana Nassar, M.A.
Summary
The 37 years old woman, a Palestinian refugee, described in this article, was referred to the author by a friend of hers. She had been in 3 previous unsuccessful psychodynamic psychotherapies. It soon became clear that her reluctance to be helped must have been the patient’s part in the limited success of her prior therapies. After a successful therapy of 24 hours, the patient and therapist met again in September 2020 (after the Beirut blast) for 4 sessions and in July 2021 (after the evacuation of Palestinians from the West Bank in June 2021) for another 4 sessions. This article describes a) parts of the 3-hour initial interview and parts of the following 14 sessions of 90 minutes, b) the sessions after the Beirut blast, c) the sessions after the evacuation of Palestinians.