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Integrative Psychotherapy

How does Integrative Psychotherapy work?

Integrative Psychotherapy is composed of a collection of developmentally-based and relationally-focused concepts about the practice of psychotherapy.
The original and primary meaning of “integrative psychotherapy” was composed by Dr. Richard G. Erskine in 1972

The theories and methods of Integrative Psychotherapy allows the client to integrate their affect, physiology, cognition, and behaviour into a cohesive sense of self so that behaviour is by choice in the current situation and not stimulated by fear, compulsion, or conditioning. The unaware, unresolved or fragmented aspects of the self are integrated.
This is accomplished in part through the use of the therapist-client relationship — the ability to create full interpersonal contact in the present as a stepping stone to healthier relationships with other people and a satisfying sense of self.

Integrative psychotherapy refers to the process of integrating the personality. It involves the psychotherapist facilitating clients‘ development of a comprehensive and congruent narrative of their sense of self; replacing archaic means of self-protection with mature forms of self-stabilization and self-regulation; and, becoming aware of unconscious relational patterns so that the person can learn and grow from each experience in life.

Through integration, it becomes possible for people to engage the world with full contact and to have the courage to face each moment openly and freshly, without the protection of a preformed opinion, position, attitude, or expectation.

The relational methods of Integrative Psychotherapy distinguish it as a unique school of psychotherapy and provide a major contribution to the entire field of psychotherapy. In a developmentally-based, relationally-focused Integrative Psychotherapy the theory of methods can be encapsulated in one sentence: the healing of the physical and emotional effects of stress, repeated relational disruptions, cumulative neglect, or traumas occurs through a contactful therapeutic relationship.

Dr Ruth Birkebaek is a Certified International Integrative Psychotherapist Trainer and Supervisor (CIIPTS-IIPA), a Certified Transactional Analyst (CTA and PTSTA), UKCP registered psychotherapist and a Medical Doctor. She offers training courses in psycotherapy and counselling 

She also offers therapy and counselling from her practice in Kew, Richmond upon Thames .
Psychotherapy sessions can also be online.

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