Stages in the Psychological Resolution of Schizophrenia

This paper describes how psychoanalytic psychotherapy may resolve some cases of schizophrenia and schizoaffective disorder in a series of 7 psychoanalytically understandable therapeutic Stages which explain both the... [ view full abstract ]

This paper describes how psychoanalytic psychotherapy may resolve some cases of schizophrenia and schizoaffective disorder in a series of 7 psychoanalytically understandable therapeutic Stages which explain both the therapist's and the patient's perspectives of the treatment.

Dr Michael Robbins identified these 7 Stages from the therapist's perspective of his schizophrenic patients' progress, which exactly match the phases of Dr Gillian Steggles' schizoaffective patient's recovery, according to the Psychodynamic Pentapointed Cognitive Construct (PPCC) Theory which describes the patient's perspective.

This therapeutic process of making real change happen consists, overall, of the patient initially feeling isolated, miserable and introverted, with poor communication skills; then becoming able to communicate meaningfully with the analyst; then adopting what the analyst says about reality and rejecting previously held false beliefs, attitudes and assumptions; and then gaining personal integration, autonomy and independence, and becoming able to separate from the analyst at therapeutic termination of the treatment.

Psychoanalytic psychotherapy is able to bring about this real change because the analytic environment permits the patient's whole self to partake in the therapeutic process, so their whole mind is mobilized, and, particularly, mobilized in the long term which encourages long term change. Other treatments tend to be short term and do not permit the enduring, long term, fundamental changes in the patient's mind which are made possible by the analytic process.  

Not all schizophrenic or schizoaffective patients are suited to psychoanalytic psychotherapy. It is most suitable for those patients who are able to withstand the isolation, loneliness and often pain that it can bring to the surface at different times during a therapy. But if these can be tolerated, the patient's capacity to cope with life may really be changed and enhanced, like the results of other treatments where the focus is on gentle adjustment to reality.