What is it about?
I wrote this book review for The British Journal of Psychotherapy. Suzanne O'Sullivan writes a really interesting and engaging account of what it's like to encounter and attempt to treat people with unexplained medical conditions. She challenges us to take a curious and non-judgemental approach to physical, neurological and psychological conditions.
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Why is it important?
The book is important because of how difficult it is to not see illness as primarily physical, but that it could also be understood in a variety of ways which bring the physical, neurological and psychological together to better understand what ails us, rather than stigmatize us when illness is considered to be 'all in your head'.
Perspectives
As a psychoanalytic psychotherapist I have worked in neurological wards in hospital, and with patients in private practice who experience episodes of illness which do not 'add up' in terms of a physical or neurological diagnosis. O'Sullivan's perspective brings a medical perspective into the world of psychotherapy and hopefully vice versa. This is a particular interest of mine in my professional work.
Mrs. Mary Pat Campbell
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: It's All in Your Head: True Stories of Imaginary Illness by Suzanne O'Sullivan. Published by Chatto & Windus, London, 2015; 326 pp; £16.99 hardback, British Journal of Psychotherapy, April 2016, Wiley,
DOI: 10.1111/bjp.12215.
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