Thicker Than Blood

Salman Akhtar, M.D., is Professor of Psychiatry at Jefferson Medical College, Lecturer on Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, and Training and Supervising Analyst at the Philadelphia Psychoanalytic Institute. He is the Book Review Editor of the Journal of Applied Psychoanalytic Studies, an associate editor of the Journal of Psychotherapy Practice and Research, member of the editorial board of the Journal of the American Psychoanalytic Association, past member of the editorial board of the International Journal of Psycho-Analysis, and an editorial reader for Psychoanalytic Quarterly. He is the author of Broken Structures: Severe Personality Disorders and Their Treatment (1992) and Quest for Answers: A Primer for Understanding and Treating Severe Personality Disorders (1995). His more than 130 scientific publications also include thirteen edited or co-edited books. Dr. Akhtar is the recipient of the Journal of the American Psychoanalytic Association's Award (1995) and the Margaret Mahler Literature Prize (1996), and was named the 1998 Clinician of the Year by IPTAR, New York. He has also published five volumes of poetry.

This book presents an unflinching look at the joys and the heartaches, the benefits and the problems of adoption. Written from the vantage point of separation-individuation theory, and rich in clinical material, it focuses primarily on the complexities of bonding in adoptive dyads, but touches also on such critical matters as transracial adoptions, cultural issues, intrauterine and genetic factors, intervention strategies, the possible negative impact of many well-intentioned government-based regulations, and the value of psychoanalytic treatment as a remedial tool in select cases. The authors speak from broad clinical and personal experience with adoption. Anyone who works within the adoption field will find much in this book that is illuminating thought provoking, and helpful.