Danny Gellersen, MSW, LICSW is a psychotherapist working in downtown Seattle. For over 15 years, he has worked in a variety of community mental health and group/private practice settings. Additional, Danny has taught graduate classes at the University of Washington MSW program. Psychoanalysis and psychodynamic thinking became an important study for him as a means to better understand unconscious ways the therapist can obstruct the work of the patient. When psychoanalysis is not over-idealized or rigidly implemented it can offer remarkable ways to dismantle our own unconscious racisms, sexisms, mental health stigmas and other biases.
Available In-Service Topics
Dismantling Clinician Anxieties Treating “Personality Disordered” Clients
“Personality Disorders” is a strange term that produces all sorts of anxieties in new and seasoned clinicians alike. This is unsurprising considering how commonly misunderstood and stigmatized these concepts are in modern-day pop-culture and even in many mental health settings. This in-service topic examines what a “personality” is and offers a more humanistic lens for understanding and relating to folks who move about the world with personality constellations informed by trauma. This discussion combines theoretical and practical psychoanalytic techniques to work empathically and effectively with “personality disordered” patients.
Brief Dynamic Therapy
Brief Dynamic Therapy offers a distilled version of psychoanalytic treatment that attends to time and budget constraints that are often present in mental health settings. Utilizing a text by Dr. Hannah Levenson, this consultation topic focuses on the experiential (affect) and relational (attachment patterns) of clients. It is a wonderful introduction in beginning to understand the unconscious and helping patients develop deeper insights into their unique internal systems.