More than one in six boys in the United States is sexually victimized by the age of 16. Yet in the growing professional literature on child sexual abuse, few books focus specifically on the experience of victimized boys and men. This much-needed volume examines how sexual betrayal affects boys and the ways they carry this hurt into adulthood. Blending psychoanalytic understanding with insights from trauma-oriented theory and practice, Richard B. Gartner presents effective strategies for meeting the unique therapeutic needs of men with sexual abuse histories. Filled with evocative clinical material, the book draws readers into the direct experience of these clients, the therapists who work with them, and the constantly shifting relational world they inhabit. -- from the publisher
Contents:
Introduction
1. The Sexual Betrayal of Boys
2. Encoding Sexual Abuse as Sexual Initiation
3. Struggles about Masculinity
4. Same-Sex Abuse
5. The Familial and Cultural Context of Abuse
6. The Effect of Chronic Boundary Violations
7. Dissociation and Multiple Self-States
8. Intimate Relatedness
9. The Patient Therapist Dyad
10. Gender and the Therapeutic Relationship (with Sue A. Shapiro)
11. Group Therapy
Afterword
Reviews:
"[A] comprehensive, insightful book....Should be of great interest to all therapists working in this burgeoning area of clinical practice." -- American Journal of Psychotherapy
"Relevant and rewarding to clinicians of all theoretical orientations. The book is especially valuable in building bridges between psychoanalytic concepts and newer conceptualizations of trauma and its treatment. Gartner's treatment of masculine gender identity and intimacy issues for both heterosexual and homosexual males is especially sensitive and compelling." -- Psychiatric Times
"This book is recommended reading whether abuse is the focus of treatment or not. Gartner presents effective strategies for dealing with such difficult childhoods by blending insights from trauma work with his interpersonal psychoanalytic perspective. In this much-needed volume, Gartner presents new information and new enlightenment that help unravel the tangled cultural, developmental, and dynamic issues that shape men's reactions to early sexual abuse." -- The Psychoanalytic Quarterly
"This volume provides important tools not only for clinicians working with individuals, families and groups, but also for educators and others interested in psychodynamic perspectives on trauma, gender, and sexuality." -- Digest of Neurology and Psychiatry
"Gartner offers a scholarly and clinically astute contribution to an increasingly rich body of literature on the traumatic aftermath faced by men who were sexually abused as boys. He discredits some harmful myths....Abundant and perceptive clinical vignettes evoke deep and often disquieting responses....This is important reading for everyone working with sexually abused men; for psychodynamic psychotherapists and students, it is required." -- Readings |
