One hundred and ten years ago Freud published the first case of a child treated for a phobia using a psychoanalytic framework to understand the symptom. Since then other explanatory perspectives have added vital new dimensions to our understanding of childhood and familial psychic suffering, and how to treat it.
We will examine the mental sufferings of children and families using the tools of psychoanalysis, developmental and attachment theories, family systems and intergenerational theories, social contextual ideas, evolutionary and neurobiological concepts, so as to understand and diagnose the dynamics of the system causing the symptom.
We will address the diverse forms of psychological treatment that have evolved over the last centu- ry, and will show that they each tend to address a crucial and different aspect of what is needed for chil- dren and their families to heal. Interpreting the drives or mirroring them, who to include in treatment, who really is the patient, that is, where is the greatest hurt in the system, where to aim our own speech to shift something in the child, the family, the social system, these and many more questions will be dis- cussed.