1st Edition

Betrayed as Boys Psychodynamic Treatment of Sexually Abused Men

By Richard B. Gartner Copyright 1999

    In the growing professional literature on child sexual abuse, few books focus specifically on the experience of victimized boys and men. Interweaving vital elements of psychodynamic and trauma-oriented clinical practice, this much-needed volume examines how sexual betrayal affects boys, the ways they carry this hurt into adulthood, and how therapists can address the unique needs of men with sexual abuse histories. Exploring the impact of abuse on men's emotional development, gender and sexual identity, and relationships, the book provides in-depth consideration of individual and group treatment issues. Numerous case examples draw readers into the direct experience of these clients and the clinicians who work with them and illuminate their continually shifting relational world.

    Introduction
    1. The Sexual Betrayal of Boys
    2. Encoding Sexual Abuse as Sexual Initiation
    3. Struggles about Masculinity
    4. Same-Sex Abuse
    5. The Familial and Cultural Context of Abuse
    6. The Effect of Chronic Boundary Violations
    7. Dissociation and Multiple Self-States
    8. Intimate Relatedness
    9. The Patient-Therapist Dyad
    10. Gender and the Therapeutic Relationship (with Sue A. Shapiro)
    11. Group Therapy
    Afterword

    Biography

    Richard B. Gartner, PhD, trained as both a family therapist and an interpersonal psychoanalyst. A graduate of the William Alanson White Institute in New York City, he is now Director of the Institute's Center for the Study of Psychological Trauma as well as founder and Director of the Sexual Abuse Program that operates under the Center's auspices. He has written and spoken extensively on the treatment of men sexually abused as boys. Dr. Gartner is a consultant and supervisor at the Center for Abuse and Incest at the Manhattan Institute for Psychoanalysis, is on the editorial boards of Contemporary Psychoanalysis and the American Journal of Psychoanalysis, and serves on the Board of Directors of the National Organization on Male Sexual Victimization. He practices in Manhattan and Brooklyn.

    Betrayed as Boys is a thoughtful and perceptive contribution. Dr. Gartner's voluminous and sensitive clinical material illuminates the difficulties, dilemmas, and rewards of working with sexually traumatized men. Here are insights and useful observations in abundance. This book belongs in the library of all clinicians who treat the victims of childhood sexual abuse. --Richard P. Kluft, MD Clinical Professor of Psychiatry, Temple University School of Medicine, Co-editor, Clinical Perspectives on Multiple Personality Disorder

    This book helps to bring psychodynamic psychotherapy back to its roots, and to lift the veil that has too long obscured the childhood sexual abuse of males. It would be a useful text in a graduate course dealing with the treatment issues of males. --Mic Hunter, PsyD, author of Abused Boys, editor of The Sexually Abused Male

    This much-needed contribution to the trauma literature informs clinicians, researchers, and scholars about the tragic consequences for men who were sexually traumatized as boys. Gartner's presentation of extensive clinical vignettes bespeaks an author who is theoretically sophisticated and clinically experienced, and who has the courage to present his work forthrightly. The book is scholarly, beautifully written, and infused with an affectively gripping immediacy. It is an important and long-overdue resource for anyone interested in a more thorough understanding of the sexual abuse of boys and its sequelae. --Mary Gail Frawley-O'Dea, PhD, Clinical Psychologist and Psychoanalyst, Nyack, NY, Treating the Adult Survivor of Childhood Sexual Abuse
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