If you appreciate conversations about detransition, you’re not going to want to miss this episode. Today we are graced by an elder psychotherapist who has been helping people with transition regret, including men who have had irreversible surgeries, revert to living as their biological sex ever since I was a child.
Bob Withers is a Jungian analyst with over 35 years’ experience as a psychotherapist. During that time he has worked with several transgender people in various stages of transition and detransition. He has written a series of articles about that work including the 2020 article ‘
Transgender Medicalization’. Bob is a former senior lecturer on the University of Westminster’s master’s program, where he specialized in the history and philosophy of the mind/body relationship in medicine. He is also co-founder of
The Rock Clinic, a charitable, community based psychotherapy and counseling service in Brighton England, where he lives.
In this episode, we explore from a depth psychology perspective the various reasons people seek “transition,” ranging from internalized homophobia and auto gynephilia, to abusive fathers and fear of toxic masculinity, to insecure attachment and even psychosis. Plus: what are therapists trying to avoid in ourselves by colluding with trans medicalization? And what can we learn from therapists who worked during the era of lobotomies?
In this conversation, Bob mentioned two books, both by Michele Moore and Heather Brunskell-Evans, which Bob wrote chapters of. You can find these books and many more in my
bookshop or using these Amazon affiliate links below. Either way, your purchase supports the show. Thank you!
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What is You Must Be Some Kind of Therapist?
A podcast at the intersection of psychology and culture that intimately explores the human experience and critiques the counseling profession. Your host, Stephanie Winn, distills wisdom gained from her practice as a family therapist and coach while pivoting towards questions of how to apply a practical understanding of psychology to the novel dilemmas of the 21st century, from political polarization to medical malpractice.
What does ethical mental health care look like in a normless age, as our moral compasses spin in search of true north? How can therapists treat patients under pressure to affirm everything from the notion of "gender identity" to assisted suicide?
Primarily a long-form interview podcast, Stephanie invites unorthodox, free-thinking guests from many walks of life, including counselors, social workers, medical professionals, writers, researchers, and people with unique lived experience, such as detransitioners.
Curious about many things, Stephanie’s interdisciplinary psychological lens investigates challenging social issues and inspires transformation in the self, relationships, and society. She is known for bringing calm warmth to painful subjects, and astute perceptiveness to ethically complex issues. Pick up a torch to illuminate the dark night and join us on this journey through the inner wilderness.
You Must Be Some Kind of Therapist ranks in the top 1% globally according to ListenNotes. New episodes are released every Monday. Three and a half years after the show's inception in May of 2022, Stephanie became a Christian, representing the crystallization of moral, spiritual, and existential views she had been openly grappling with along with her audience and guests. Newer episodes (#188 forward) may sometimes reflect a Christian understanding, interwoven with and applied to the same issues the podcast has always addressed. The podcast remains diverse and continues to feature guests from all viewpoints.