Autoethnography in Therapy

Joanna Naxton is a psychological therapist, PhD candidate, and lecturer with over a decade of experience working with adults, children, and young people in therapeutic settings. Her integrative approach is grounded in humanistic and person-centred principles, drawing on a range of modalities including psychodynamic and existential theory, Transactional Analysis, attachment theory, and creative practices such as SandPlay therapy.

• Introduction Defining Self-Injury, Situating Autoethnography, and Framing Therapist EmotionsExploring Emotional Landscapes in Work with Self-Injury A Rhizomatic Approach to Emotional Complexity in TherapyAutoethnography as Method Reflective Practice, Ethical Tensions, and Narrative ConstructionInterplay of Fear and Anger Compartmentalisation, Emotional Regulation, and Early ExperiencesCountertransference and Doubt Professional Insecurity, Projection, and Emotional DefencesProjection and Projective Identification Absorbing Client Emotions and Confronting Therapeutic BoundariesThe Terror of the Threat to Immortality Self-Injury, Existential Anxiety, and the Therapist’s MortalityVoyeuristic Desire and Fascination Scopophilia, Erotic Transference, and the Ethics of CuriosityLoneliness and Sadness Bearing Witness to Pain and the Personal Cost of EmpathySelf-Care and Addressing Burnout Emotional Survival, Restorative Practices, and BoundariesGrief, Letting Go, and Return Nondual Consciousness, Radical Acceptance, and Emotional IntegrationThe Process and Learning Writing, Reflecting, and Transforming Through AutoethnographyKey Emotional Experiences Thematic Synthesis of Fear, Shame, Desire, and VulnerabilityImplications and Recommendations Emotional Support in Supervision, Training, and PracticeConclusion and Future Directions Emotional Truth, Mutual Vulnerability, and a Call for Further Research

“This thoughtful and well-crafted volume stems from years of personal experience and current research in the field. At the turn of every page, Jo leads us through sensitive areas of practice that therapists will find enlightening, revealing her skills as author, thinker and enabler to the profession.”Dr Clive Palmer, University of Lancashire, UK.“Autoethnography in Therapy: Exploring Therapist Emotions in Work with Self Injury, is a vulnerable, unflinching, compassionate text that speaks into the silence surrounding the experience of therapists who work with those who self-injure. Jo Naxton's writing is full, warm, urgent, affecting. This is a unique and important book.”Jonathan Wyatt, Professor of Qualitative Inquiry and co-director of the Centre for Creative-Relational Inquiry at the University of Edinburgh, UK