Bipolar Affective Disorders and Group Analysis

Abstract

Group-analysis historically developed from psychoanalysis but it added a multipersonal or social dimension, which is important in the understanding and management of patients suffering from bipolar affective disorders—as they often experience significant relationship difficulties. There is empirical evidence that homogeneous therapy groups for bipolar patients are beneficial, particularly those using psychoeducational and integrative approaches. There is additional evidence from process and case studies research that bipolar patients can benefit from group-analytic psychotherapy. However, the group conductor has to work harder than usual to make the group into a therapeutic tool. This may require that the therapist is especially vigilant on boundaries and limit setting. Transference interpretations may need to aim at translating the, at times, difficult behaviour of the bipolar patient into the language of interpersonal problems. This article includes clinical material from a heterogeneous analytic group, which was pushed to breaking point by a 40 year-old bipolar patient.