ISPS Israel
There are 18 members in the Israeli group of the ISPS so far. The president is Dr. Ilan Treves, head of a ward in Shalvata Mental Health Center, and a faculty member at the Sackler School of psychotherapy at Tel Aviv University. Treves spent two years at Chestnut Lodge. Orna Ophir-Shacham is the chairperson.
She works in an open ward at Shalvata, as a clinical psychologist, and is writing her PhD on the history of the concept 'madness' in the age of psychoanalysis at the Cohen Institute for History and Philosophy of Science. Other members of the group are psychiatrists, clinical psychologists and clinical social workers. They come from all over the country - and from different mental centres in Israel. At the first meeting we decided to meet every two months for case presentations and discussions.
On the 20th February 2006, ISPS-IL held its second meeting, which was hosted by the Shalvata Mental Health Center. Around 100 participants attended from all over the country - the evening was fabulous and inspiring. Dr. Ilan Treves, the president of ISPS-IL blessed everyone for coming and said how important it is today to be politically involved and how much the ISPS has influence internationally and will have on health organization decisions. After his opening, I introduced the objectives of ISPS, presented the activities of the international ISPS (the conference in Madrid and new books in the ISPS series) and summarised the decisions made during the first meeting of the Israeli group. I also gave an introduction to Dr.Shlomo Mendelovitz’s lecture: "the Multiple Individual - towards a selfless psychoanalysis", stressing the great impact the encounter with schizophrenic people has on the developing of theory and technique. Dr. Mendelovitz’s lecture presented a theoretical development within the psychoanalytic discourse. The development, which is the outcome of a therapy with a psychotic patient and of many discussions with his students at the philosophy department of Tel Aviv University, suggests the theory of the" Multiple Individual". After his eloquent lecture, we had two discussants (both members of the local group): Hayim Deutch, head of the Summit Center in Jerusalem; and Dr. Rafi Springman, former head of ward at the Abrbanel Mental Center in Jaffa (he wrote the book "dialogues with schizophrenia"). The two discussants - both very experienced therapist in the field - were intriguing. After the talks there was an exciting discussion with the audience - at least 15 people shared their thoughts and experiences, and the discussion included thoughts from classical psychoanalysis, to contemporary psychoanalytic thoughts, Western thoughts to Buddhism, modern to post-modern thoughts, Talmudic thought to insights from technology and computer science, from neuroscience to artificial intelligence and so on. All trying to figure out the psychotic situation and the possible way we can reach people in psychotic states. The evening was such a success that people stayed long after it was over to continue talking. The subject of the article (“The Multiple Individual – towards a selfless psychoanalysis”) was a real challenge to everyone's thinking. My concluding remark was that in the encounter with psychosis we have to think "under fire" as Bion said, and if we are accompanying on a daily basis people with bizarre thinking it has to challenge our pre-conceptions, and it eventually makes are thinking much more creative. Each of us has to find his/her own special way in the wilderness of psychosis, where there are no signs nor directions. This makes encounters with psychosis not only extremely ethic (because of the meeting with the Other) but also inspiring, and enriching to the psychoanalytic discourse.
Orna Ophir-Shacham
Chairperson of ISPS-IL
Email: ornaop@clalit.org.il
Spring 2006