Reflections on the Therapist-Supervisor Relationship

Abstract

Supervision provides a space in which two analysts, one of whom has relatively more experience, reflect together on the work of the one who is less experienced and who may be a student or student analyst. When the less experienced person is a colleague, I prefer to call the process ‘consultation’.Within this space there can be room for exploring the content and emotional climate of sessions with a patient, for the sharing of ideas and deepening knowledge of the patient’s inner processes. Insights arise from the discussion and these lead to understanding of aspects of the relationship between patient and analyst and the enhancement of listening with a sense of the symbolic meaning of the patient’s communications, the development of an analytic attitude. Such an intimate and detailed exploration depends on mutual respect and trust between supervisee and supervisor: the former trusting the supervisor’s benign intention and capacity to hold in mind both the patient’s and the analyst’s needs, the latter respecting the supervisee’s integrity and wish to learn. Further, such trust depends on the supervisor’s capacity to maintain the boundary of the space, not only by providing the physical area for the work and the frame of regular times and set fees, but also ‘through continuous attention on keeping to the primary task of helping the trainee to comprehend the nature of the interaction with his patient’ (Szecsody, 1997).