Webinars and Workshops with COPE Centre founder, Dr Hugo Gonzales

Workshops

 

Dr Gonzales offers a wealth of knowledge and an extensive background with over 25 years experience working with a wide range of issues including (but not limited to); anxiety disorders, depression, trauma & PTSD, grief, personality disorders (borderline & narcissistic personality disorder), stress and anger management, cross-cultural counselling, addictive behaviours and child behavioural and emotional problems.

Workshops and Webinars on offer

Trauma from a Psychodynamic Approach

Grief, Loss and Bereavement

Explore how you can approach clients who present with traumatic backgrounds. This workshop will focus on early Relational trauma, how to recognize its sequelae or derivatives, and clinical interventions in response to it. Early trauma interferes with the development of certain capacities or ego strengths that are important in psychodynamic psychotherapy, e.g., tolerance of affect, especially of a disturbing nature, and the capacity for self-reflection. What do these capacities look like in the clinical situation

Grief is a reality of life that we will experience when we go through a Loss. Grief is a natural response that may involve intense sadness, anger, shock or denial. A primary loss can be experienced as the ending of a relationship, while a secondary loss may be moving house as a consequence of the ending of the relationship and tertiary be the loss of a married identity. There are several models of Grief including Kubler-Ross’s, continuing bonds, Wanganeen’s, dual process, Worden’s and Bowlby’s model.  Additionally, Loss and Grief are experienced differently in cross-cultural context.

Addiction

Autism

The workshop, Psychodynamics of Addictions, will survey the analytic literature on addiction misuse and explain the clinical practices of using psychoanalysis to work with people suffering from various addictions. Psychoanalyiss views addiction as a disorder of self regulation. Individuals with histories of exposure to traumatic childhood circumstances from a physical, sexual or psychological nature.

The diagnosis of autism spectrum disorder has increased hugely in recent years.  Autism Spectrum Disorders represent significant neurologically based impairments in mentalization that disrupt the normal course of development. Many counsellors do not feel equipped to respond to the specific challenges that autism presents to ‘the talking cure’. This workshop will present a psychoanalytic framework drawing on psychoanalyst research and first-hand accounts of autism. The aim is to move from theory to practice over the course of the day.

ADHD in adults

Narcissistic Personality Disorder

Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is a neurodevelopmental disorder that will present with symptoms of inattention, hyperactivity and or impulsivity. Together with medical approach, psychological interventions may be required to address difficulties experienced. Psychoanalysis had defined the triad of symptoms as a “disturbance in the synthetic, organising and integrative function of the ego” (Guilmore, 2000).

Narcissistic Personality Disorder is a condition in which people have an unreasonable sense of importance. They need or seek attention and want people to admire them. People with NPD may find difficult to understand or relate to feelings from others. Although the present an aura of confidence, behind that are very troubled.  The development of NPD can be traced back to traumas experienced in their childhood. The transference process is critical in managing people with NPD.

Borderline Personality Disorder

Couples Therapy

True to its name, borderline personality disorder (BPD) confronts therapists with ideas and situations that seem to be on the edge of what is acceptable, expectable, and even tolerable. Our practice may also then gravitate toward such an edge. A psychodynamic approach can help to manage occasions when borderline personality disorder presents in therapy. Using a variety of psychodynamic theories to illuminate participants’ case material, this workshop will deal with the phenomena of boundaries, splitting and difficult feelings the therapist may experience.

This “Couples” workshop introduces an analytically-oriented approach to couple therapy. We explore the differences between individual (one-person) and couple (two-person) models and view the therapist as a “participant-observer” and significant “third” in the tri-personal field. Clinical presentation integrates classical, object relations and relational models, applying contemporary research in attachment, self-psychology, childhood trauma, “multigenerational transmission”, sociocultural issues related to class, race, religion and other constructions and the “location” of the analyst in a diverse field.

Multicultural Counselling

Foundations of Psychodynamic Therapy

With 1 in 4 Australians being born overseas, awareness, knowledge and skills are needed to work with multicultural clients. 

Identify multicultural competencies required to assist people from diverse cultural backgrounds, Cultural formulation and diagnosis (as recommended by the DSM-5 & Describe Psychotherapy techniques for working with people from diverse cultural backgrounds

This workshop offers insight into the foundations of psychodynamic therapy. A majority of this workshop focuses on listening to the patient in psychodynamic treatment, understanding the nature of the patient’s and therapist’s conscious and unconscious thoughts and feelings, watching carefully for non-verbal expressions and learning to use effectively what we hear and see in the treatment.

Transference / Counter-transference

How defensive mechanisms are actually applied in psychotherapy

This course will cover different aspects of the therapist-patient relationship as a significant factor in the therapeutic process. The workshop will explore the roles of the therapist and of the patient, techniques for listening to the patient, techniques for exploring what experiences, feelings, and memories are unfolding within a session, the clinical concepts of transference and countertransference, how to use them in sessions, and the therapist’s self-revealing versus self-disclosure. There will be a focus on the therapeutic concepts involved in the readings and an emphasis on clinical application. The workshop will include ample clinical examples that demonstrate the concepts and techniques from the readings

Defence mechanisms were initially thought to be ways in which the person kept from awareness their sexual and aggressive drives, and managed internal conflict. The contemporary relational view is that these unconscious mechanisms are initially protective and adaptive and serve their purpose well, that is, prevent overwhelming fragmentation of self in the relatively helpless child. However, as they continue to be used into adulthood, they prove to be maladaptive and unhelpful to the patient. Defences are almost always embedded in relatedness when one evaluates the personality of a patient. Specific defences are typical correlated with specific personality types or, in some cases, personality disorders. In therapy (and in daily life), defence mechanisms are always in-play. It is important for the therapist to be aware of the patient’s defence mechanisms, and the purposes they serve, and to work empathically with the patient to recognise and identify the mechanisms, improve their self-awareness and gain a new enduring understanding and control of their own behaviours.

How to treat depression from a psychodynamic approach

To learn about costs and availabilities, enquire below

This workshop provides awareness of insight-oriented approaches in working with patients experiencing depressive symptoms. This approach focuses on increasing patients’ awareness and insight about problematic patterns and core relational themes related to depression.

CONTACT DETAILS
Phone No: (08) 6556 6460
E-mail: [email protected]
Location:
Level 3, Suite 5/1111 Hay Street, West Perth WA 6005