Life Without Father
A Son Looks for Answers from a Stoic Parent Back from War
By Frank Pittman - Even though I knew I wanted to be a father when I grew up, I didn’t know exactly what skills were required. We of the ’40s and ’50s grew up with fathers who were off at war or at work, and who weren’t part of the family even when they were at home. We were essentially fatherless.
Daily Blog
Six Ways to Find Comedy in Even the Darkest Moments
Shaking Your Clients Loose from Their Tragic Stances
By Frank Pittman - Therapy, in order to shake people loose from their tragic stances and bounce them into the human comedy, is at its best when it is funny, when the tragic family story being acted out is rewritten to provide a happy ending. I urge therapists to keep these simple guidelines in mind as they go through their day.
Daily Blog
The Liberating Power of Honesty
What People Don't Know Can Hurt Them. What They Don't Reveal Can Hurt Even More
By Frank Pittman - When we therapists believe a secret's revelations would be dangerous, the client receives a frightening message about him- or herself and about the world. We may accept our patients and make psychodynamic, systemic or sociological excuses for them, while still conveying that their secret is unacceptable. Thus, while explicitly "supporting" them, we implicitly undermine their sense that they are fundamentally decent, acceptable people.
Daily Blog
Coping and Learning After a Client's Suicide
A Therapist Reflects on What He Might Have Done Differently
By Frank Pittman - I've been in full-time private practice for almost 30 years. In that time, three patients in my practice killed themselves. Each suicide has left me shell-shocked and questioning my therapeutic attitudes and methods. I did not expect Adam to be one of my casualties.
Daily Blog
Turns in the Road
Highlights from the Networker Journey
Out of all the hundreds and hundreds of articles that have appeared in the Networker over the past four decades, we’ve chosen a small sampling that captures the magazine’s most journalistic side, conveying not so much the eternal verities of our profession, but the sense of reading a first draft of the field’s history. Among other things, you’ll find therapeutic methods that, as exciting as they seemed at the moment, didn’t stand the test of time as well as initial forays into discussing complex issues we’re still struggling with today. We’ve also added in a few examples of writing so immediate and compelling that they have an air of timelessness. Prepare yourself for an interesting journey.
Magazine Article
Voices of Truth
By Frank Pittman - When TV finally came, in the early '50s, the world it brought into our living rooms was black and white, and dumbed way down. Newsmen now had faces, and, as eyewitnesses, we could now determine who had an honest face and who didn't. The most honest of the talking heads seemed to be the revered war correspondent Edward R. Murrow. Now the actor George Clooney has put together a reenactment of the public clash between Murrow and the rabid senator Joe McCarthy. It's called Good Night and Good Luck.
Magazine Article
Screening Room
Move Over, Meryl: Kate Winslet Ascends to Center Stage
What separates screen actors who remain enshrined in our memory from those who just momentarily catch our eye?
Magazine Article
Screening Room
Inside Out: Frost/Nixon and Milk Hold a Mirror to Our Fears
Movies are about giving us outsiders in the audience the illusion of being inside the charmed circle of real experience.
Magazine Article
Screening Room
Tell Me a Story: As Hollywood Goes Postmodern, Has Narrative Become Passé?
If you're like me, you've noticed that movies don't make as much sense as they used to. Nevertheless, I suspect that there's still an audience somewhere out there with an old-fashioned appetite for narrative coherence—an audience that wants a story with a beginning, a middle, and an end; a story that inspires, instructs, and offers insights into the human condition.
Magazine Article
Screening Room
More than Just Frivolity: Joel and Ethan Coen Give Us the Antidote to the Happy Ending
The Coen brothers specialize in redefining the rules of whatever movie genre they happen to be subverting.
Magazine Article
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Life Without Father
A Son Looks for Answers from a Stoic Parent Back from War
By Frank Pittman - Even though I knew I wanted to be a father when I grew up, I didn’t know exactly what skills were required. We of the ’40s and ’50s grew up with fathers who were off at war or at work, and who weren’t part of the family even when they were at home. We were essentially fatherless.
Daily Blog
Six Ways to Find Comedy in Even the Darkest Moments
Shaking Your Clients Loose from Their Tragic Stances
By Frank Pittman - Therapy, in order to shake people loose from their tragic stances and bounce them into the human comedy, is at its best when it is funny, when the tragic family story being acted out is rewritten to provide a happy ending. I urge therapists to keep these simple guidelines in mind as they go through their day.
Daily Blog
The Liberating Power of Honesty
What People Don't Know Can Hurt Them. What They Don't Reveal Can Hurt Even More
By Frank Pittman - When we therapists believe a secret's revelations would be dangerous, the client receives a frightening message about him- or herself and about the world. We may accept our patients and make psychodynamic, systemic or sociological excuses for them, while still conveying that their secret is unacceptable. Thus, while explicitly "supporting" them, we implicitly undermine their sense that they are fundamentally decent, acceptable people.
Daily Blog
Coping and Learning After a Client's Suicide
A Therapist Reflects on What He Might Have Done Differently
By Frank Pittman - I've been in full-time private practice for almost 30 years. In that time, three patients in my practice killed themselves. Each suicide has left me shell-shocked and questioning my therapeutic attitudes and methods. I did not expect Adam to be one of my casualties.
Daily Blog
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Screening Room
Play It Again, Denzel: Keeping Alive the Traditions of Yesterday's Stars
American Gangster, Michael Clayton, and 3:10 to Yuma. Our complex relationship with our screen idols is at the root of the Hollywood movie experience.
Magazine Article
Screening Room
Shut Up and Dance: Becoming Jane and Hairspray Evoke a Long Movie Tradition
Becoming Jane and Hairspray. Evoking a great movie tradition of the past, this summer, Fred and Ginger met both Jane Austen and the Linblad family.
Magazine Article
Screening Room
Hearts of Darkness: Finding the Courage to Walk Through the Shadows
A Mighty Heart, Away from Her, and Evening. It takes courage to live life, and to live with the life you chose.
Magazine Article
Screening Room
Getting a Life: Whose Story Are You Living Now?
As we go through our lifetime metamorphoses, we adapt to those whom we like and hate, envy and fear. We fall in and out of love, and emulate and identify with each aggressor and rescuer who comes our way. Some psychologically ambitious recent films have explored how people shape their identities around those whom they venerate or are obsessed by.
Magazine Article
Screening Room
War Is for Heroics: Three cultures try to locate meaning in mayhem
Dissecting the fantasy of heroism.
Magazine Article
Screening Room
Americocentricity: Babel and Borat force us to look beyond our culture
A new generation of filmmakers is taking us beyond the Americocentric world of mainstream cinema.
Magazine Article
Royal Flush
The Perils of Charisma
This fall, at a time when competent, sensible leadership seems in especially short supply around the globe, three films appeared almost simultaneously to explore the nature of both leadership and celebrity, especially their pitfalls.
Magazine Article
A Matter of Life and Death
When the Therapist Becomes the Survivor
I've been in full-time private practice for almost 30 years. I've seen maybe 10,000 families. In that time, three patients in my practice killed themselves. Strangely enough, the three suicides were eerily similar. Each suicide has left me shell-shocked and questioning my therapeutic attitudes and methods.
Magazine Article
Turning Tragedy into Comedy
Bearing All the Reality Life Has to Offer
A young man named Jeff, who was dying from cancer, was a patient of mine 30 years ago. His family cried and prayed over him and pretended he would recover, though they knew he knew better. I was initially called in to relieve Jeff's pain through hypnosis. That worked fine, but he was still lying in bed out of breath, bored, angry and resentful of the fact that his life was being cut short. He demanded to know why God was punishing him in this way.
Magazine Article
No Hiding Place
Understanding the Liberating Power of Honesty
What people don't know can hurt them—and what they don't reveal can hurt them even more. Secrets can destroy lives and relationships. When something is kept secret, it can grow in power and significance until it becomes the center of one's identity.
Magazine Article
Frank Pittman, M.D., is a contributing editor to The Family Therapy Networker and is in private practice.
