From Autism and Mutism to an Enlivened Self A Case Narrative with Reflections on Early Development

Part I: IntroductionAnna Chapter 1: From missing relationship at birth to missing name and language at age 5 Chapter 2: The four critical months before the 6^th birthday: from learning her name to reading to learning to speak in 1000 hours Chapter 3: New life begins: discovering the world beyond Legos and puzzles 1992 Spring to 1993 Fall Chapter 4: Coming to America becomes a window to the world

Part II: Commentary on Two Remarkable Journeys – One Therapeutic for Dr. Diana Thielst and Anna; and One of Discovery for Psychiatry and Psychoanalysis; Section 1: The Recognition of Autism as a Developmental Disorder; Kanner’s Approach;  A Comment on Terms; The Etiology of Early Infantile Autism; Two Other Experiences of Children with Autism; Gus: To Siri with Love: Mother, Her Autistic Son, and the Kindness Of Machines (Newman, J. 2017); Owen: Life Animated: A Story of Sidekicks, Heroes, and Autism (Suskind, R., 2014); Interest and Purpose: Expanding the Scope of Being a Doer Doing Section 2: At Birth What Becomes Activated in Normal Development and Fails to Become Activated in Neonates with Autism; Comparing Adaptive Qualities and Capacities Normally Emerging in the First Year of Life with the More Limited Resources of the One-Year-Old Infant with Autism; Section 3: A Doer Doing and The Core Sense of Self; Infant-Mother Face to Face Interactions and the Development of Conversational Language; Faces – The Pathway to Intimacy; Inanimate Objects – The Pathway To Mastery; The Pathway to a Healthy Body, Physical Functioning, and Mind-Body Connection; Turning on to Human Relatedness; The Turn on of Adapting Infants; Early Steps that Unfold and Integrate in Adaptive Development

Biography

Joseph D. Lichtenberg, M.D., is Editor-in-Chief of Psychoanalytic Inquiry, Director Emeritus of the Institute of Contemporary Psychotherapy and Psychoanalysis, past President of the International Council for Psychoanalytic Self Psychology, and a member of the Program Committee of the American Psychoanalytic Association.

Diana Thielst, M.D., is a pseudonym under which the co-author of this book is writing about the treatment of her autistic daughter. She is a scientist and musician.

"For any parent of a child diagnosed with Asperger’s Syndrome or Autistic Spectrum Disorder, this is a must-read book. Part I movingly narrates a child’s gradual emergence from a world cut off from emotional intimacy into one in which she blossoms as a vitally alive, creative human being. Anna’s story, as movingly told by her mother, Dr Diana Thielst, demystifies an autistic developmental state, despite facing a barrage of social opprobrium and blame from family and professionals.

In Part II, Lichtenberg employs a developmental perspective to explicate the modes of human relatedness harnessed by Dr Thielst to facilitate Anna’s emerging sense of self in relationship with others in her social world. In a clear, precise and masterful way, he details the interactive, intersubjective, and relational components active in Dr Thielst’s and Anna’s relationship that reawakened in Anna a sense of emotional relatedness, and fostered her impressive adaptive development. This book will be an indispensable resource for professionals working in this field and is warmly recommended." – Paul Renn, Forum for Independent Psychotherapists, author of The Silent Past and the Invisible Present: Memory, Trauma, and Representation in Psychotherapy