Abstract
This portfolio was submitted to The University of Surrey for the completion of the Practitioner Doctorate (PsychD) in Psychotherapeutic and Counselling Psychology. It aims to demonstrate my personal and professional development throughout my four years of training. It comprises three dossiers which reflect the academic, clinical and research work undertaken as part of this degree. The academic dossier contains three essays written on topics of personal interest against the backdrop of theoretical subjects and philosophical contexts that were covered during my training. The first essay deals with the high rate of suicidality amongst individuals with bipolar disorder and considers psychodynamic theories on suicide and on manic-depressive disorder in the search for answers. The second essay looks at the role of the therapeutic relationship in cognitive-behavioural therapy using the example of the treatment of borderline personality disorder through Young’s Schema Therapy. The third and final essay explores the individual dimensions of clinical presentations and, using the example of shame, highlights the necessity to engage with the underlying personal meaning of any expression of human distress. The therapeutic practice dossier introduces the three placements I attended during my training and gives an overview of the kind of work I conducted there. It concludes with my Final Clinical Paper ‘Early Days’ which gives an account of my personal and professional development over the course of my training and of how I engaged with the different therapeutic modalities. Finally, the research dossier contains a literature review and two pieces of qualitative research all concerned with the experience of suicidality in the context of bipolar disorder (BD). The literature review undertaken in the first year highlighted that BD has largely been studied from a positivistic perspective leading to a simplistic view of the condition and a lack of understanding of the idiosyncratic meaning of suicidality. The first study investigates individuals’ experience of their own suicidality. It appeared that participants were experiencing a gradual loss of identity which led to an erosion of their sense of self and ultimately to the experience of suicidal feelings. The second study is a complementary project to the first one and investigated practitioners’ perspective of the nature of bipolar suicidality. The role of empathy and openness to clients’ idiosyncrasies are emphasised throughout the whole of the research.