natkuhn.com—psychotherapy

The therapy I practice involves various elements but I primarily practice Short Term Dynamic Psychotherapy (STDP). The goal is to help people achieve meaningful change in as few sessions as possible.

STDP starts from the premise that people's difficulties are rooted in problematic ways that people experience or avoid feelings. In STDP, the therapist is active and works with the patient to stay focused on the core issues.

Most of my work in STDP has been in the Affect Phobia model, developed by Dr. Leigh McCullough. As the Assistant Director of Dr. McCullough's Psychotherapy Research Program at Harvard's Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, I've trained many therapists in this form of treatment, and I'm the second author on our book for therapists, Treating Affect Phobia: a Manual for Short-Term Dynamic Therapy (Guilford Press, 2003). More recently, I have also been incorporating aspects of Davanloo's Intensive Short Term Dynamic Psychotherapy (ISTDP) into my work.

Therapy starts with an initial evaluation session (often as long as three hours), generally followed by weekly 50-minute therapy sessions. Therapies in this model tend to run about 20 to 60 sessions, though I also do some long-term therapy. In addition, I am also trained in Eye-Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR).