Couples therapy has long been regarded as one of the most demanding of all forms of psychotherapy because of the way it challenges therapists to combine insights of dynamic psychology with the power and clarity of systems dynamics. In this exciting new volume, Gordon Wheeler and Stephanie Backman, couples therapists with broad training and long years of experience, present dramatic new approaches that at last integrate the dynamic/self-organizational and the systemic/behavioral schools of thought.

Building on the insights of Gestalt psychology and psychotherapy, the authors show us how a truly phenomenological approach, based on the client’s own experience and goals, holds the key to a dramatic increase in therapeutic power and flexibility. The fifteen engaging chapters demonstrate the application of this approach to issues of intimacy, self-construction, power and abuse, “resistance,” growth, and shame – ad to such diverse and challenging populations as abuse survivors and their partners, remarried couples, gay and lesbian couples, and couples with “personality” or “character” disorders. In the process, the authors offer a fresh perspective that will serve to re-energize the couples therapist’s work in this challenging area. On Intimate Ground contributes new insights to many of the most timey and provocative questions in the field today.

Gordon Wheeler has taught and written in the Gestalt model for many years with a long emphasis on the evolution of Gestalt theory and practice as a basis for relational psychology and the study of intimacy.

Stephanie Backman is a licensed social worker in private practice, a member of the teaching faculty of GISC and author of a number of articles in the field.