Psychotherapy remains a mysterious process to many. In society’s collective unconscious psyche, we often slip into believing modern psychotherapy resembles something from early Freudian days — the patient lays on a couch and the therapist sits out of sight of the patient while they recount their day or week, and earliest childhood memories. There is often a mistaken belief that therapy is never-ending.

But modern psychotherapy doesn’t much resemble that stereotype any longer. Today, therapy is often time-limited and more goal-focused, helping teach the client new skills or ways of looking at a situation or issue in their life, and gaining new insights into their motivations.

Therapy Case Notes is a blog that is intended to highlight interesting interactions in psychotherapy sessions — things that shed light on a particular issue or dynamic within the therapy session. The purpose is to try and demystify psychotherapy, and demonstrate the powerful healing abilities of the process.

All identifying patient information has been stripped and/or anonymized to protect the confidentiality and privacy of the patients.

We welcome Joseph Burgo, Ph.D. as the host of this blog — and the person who came up with the idea for it. You may recognize his name, as he previously blogged on movies and mental health (now retired) for Psych Central. You can learn more about Dr. Burgo here.

Please give Dr. Burgo another warm Psych Central welcome, as we’re happy to have him blogging about psychotherapy topics with us.

Dr. John Grohol is the founder & CEO of Psych Central. He is an author, researcher and expert in mental health online, and has been writing about online behavior, mental health and psychology issues -- as well as the intersection of technology and human behavior -- since 1992. Dr. Grohol sits on the editorial board of the journal Cyberpsychology, Behavior and Social Networking and is a founding board member and treasurer of the Society for Participatory Medicine.

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    Last reviewed: By John M. Grohol, Psy.D. on 15 Mar 2012
    Published on PsychCentral.com. All rights reserved.