This study group is based on a book authored by Carl Shubs, PhD, titled Traumatic Experiences of Normal Development: An Intersubjective, Object Relations Listening Perspective on Self, Attachment, Trauma, and Reality (Routledge, 2020). It describes a new conceptualization of trauma, so we can be better prepared to work with it. The book presents a psychoanalytic and attachment-based perspective on trauma entailing a reconstruction of object relations, an integration with relational and intersubjective approaches, and their intersection with a redefinition of trauma, as well as a recognition of how those experiences manifest in the body. It considers traumatic incidents of all kinds and examines how those experiences have roots in normal development and how they are significant factors in the development and persistence of such things as addictions, eating disorders, affairs/infidelities, relational patterns, and character structure. It addresses our understanding of anxiety, depression, crisis, trauma, and the relationships between present and past experiences. It also presents a frame of reference, a listening stance, which helps us to understand more deeply the roots of how individuals uniquely process the events that confront them and how we can be more effective in helping them.

Participants will be expected to have read the book prior to the start of the study group. During the first meeting, Dr. Shubs will provide an introduction and overview of the material to come. Future meetings will be broken up into three segments each, starting with a half-hour open Q&A, followed by two half-hour segments, with each segment being an opportunity for one of the members to ask questions or present case material from their own practice as a springboard for their questions about how to understand and apply the SAO/TEND listening perspective.

Carl H. Shubs, PhD, is a psychologist in private practice in Beverly Hills, California, since 1984, working with individuals (children age six years and older, adolescents, and adults) and couples. His specialties include working with people dealing with trauma, PTSD, anxiety, depression, addictions (substances and behaviors), LGBTQ+ issues, and infidelities. Dr. Shubs has written several books on trauma and its treatment, the first of which is Traumatic Experiences of Normal Development: An Intersubjective, Object Relations Listening Perspective on Self, Attachment, Trauma, and Reality, published by Routledge in 2020. He also authored three articles about working with trauma, published in the peer-reviewed journal Psychoanalytic Psychology. He was granted the Award for Outstanding Practice, 2020, by The American Psychological Association, Division 56 (Trauma Psychology) in honor of his contributions to the field. His psychoanalytic training has been via independent study, primarily with Larry Hedges, Ph.D., Psy.D., ABPP, Founding Director and currently a training/supervising analyst at Newport Psychoanalytic Institute and The Listening Perspectives Study Center, and author of 21 books about psychoanalysis and psychoanalytic psychotherapy. Dr. Shubs’ orientation integrates somatic psychotherapy (via contemporary Bioenergetic Analysis, derived from Alexander Lowen and Wilhelm Reich) with his trauma-based, attachment-based, and reconstructed object relations psychoanalytic (SAO-TEND) listening perspective.

Dr. Shubs' book, Traumatic Experiences of Normal Development, presents a new concept of trauma and a reorganization of object relations theory. Listed below are just a few of the earlier publications that were significant in the book’s evolution.

1) Bromberg, P.M. (1994). “Speak! That I may see you”: Some reflections on dissociation, reality, and psychoanalytic listening. Psychoanalytic Dialogues, 4, 517–547.

2) Grotstein, J.S. (1994b). Remembering, repeating, and working through childhood trauma. Northvale, NJ: Jason Aronson.

3) Hedges, L.E. (2000). Terrifying transferences: Aftershocks of childhood trauma. Northvale, NJ: Jason Aronson.

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The American Psychoanalytic Association designates this Live Activity for a maximum of 9 AMA PRA Category 1 Credit(s)™. Physicians should claim only the credit commensurate with the extent of their participation in the activity.

HPS, through co-sponsorship with the Center for Psychoanalytic Studies, also offers approved CEUs for Texas state-approved social workers, licensed professional counselors, and marriage and family therapists.