A COUNTERTRANSFERENCE DREAM and the NOVEL COVID VIRUS, A SELF-STUDY
– by Jack Schwartz, LCSW, PsyD, NCPsyA

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Excerpt

As the dimensions COVID-19 pandemic has become an ever increasing and oppressive reality, we as mental health practitioners, beyond the disruption and reorganization of our daily lives and practices, are encountering strong emotional/physiological/psychological counter-transferences that can impact on our ability to be effectively engaged in this time of national crisis. We could take inspiration from the founder of psychoanalysis, Freud himself, who was no stranger to many societal crises during the course of his psychoanalytic journey, having faced the World War I, rabid anti-Semitism, cancer treatments, and even severe pandemics (such as the Spanish Flu). Freud taught the answer to our survival follows two paths, the external truth we must deal with (in his words the reality principle), as well as the internal truth we must master, our unconscious primitive fears and wishes.

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About The Author

Jack Schwartz, LCSW, PsyD, NCPsyA

Jack Schwartz, LCSW, PsyD, NCPsyA is a psychoanalyst/psychotherapist in private practice, NJ. He graduated from the New Jersey Institute for Training in Psychoanalysis, where he is a faculty member, lecturer and control analyst. He is a NAAP Nationally Certified Psychoanalyst, Licensed Clinical Social Worker and Certified Clinical Mental Health Counselor. He holds degrees from Fairleigh Dickinson University Yeshiva University (where he received the Distinguished Graduate Student Award) and International University. He served as the Senior Forensic Psychologist in Passaic County New Jersey for over 15 years, specializing in criminal investigations, probation, child custody issues, and has regularly served the court as an expert witness. Dr. Schwartz maintains a full private practice in Northern New Jersey, working with children, adolescents, couples and adults. He frequently lectures on dream analysis, PTSD, resilience and other matters related to the practice of psychoanalytic psychotherapy. He is a regular contributor to the New Jersey Institute Viewpoints newsletter, and is the editor for the NJ Clinical Social Worker highly regarded newsletter, the Forum. Dr. Schwartz has written both short fiction, and technical articles on Dream Analysis and Holocaust Survivors, and has published a psychoanalytic novel, Our Time is Up, available on Amazon, soon to be an e-book. Dr. Schwartz’s article “Freud’s Irma Dream, The Origin of Psychoanalysis and a Bloody Nose” was published in multi-disciplinary journal MindConsiliums in 2014 (MindConsiliums). It had received a Gradiva® nomination from the National Association for Advancement of Psycho-analysis in 2015.

Articles:

• Schwartz, J. (2019). The Other Side of the Wind…A psychoanalytic perspective on the cinema of Orson Welles. MindConsiliums, 19(9), 1-25.
• Schwartz, J. (2015). The secret of dreams and the case of Sigmund Freud (screenplay). MindConsiliums, 15(12), 1-92.
• Schwartz, J. (2014). Freud’s Irma Dream, the Origin of Psychoanalysis, and a Bloody Nose. MindCosiliums, 14(9), 1-49.

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