The Presenting Past

The Presenting Past provides a detailed understanding of the key psychodynamic themes of trust and dependency, authority and autonomy, and cooperation and competition. It moves beyond a fixed developmental approach, showing how the real issues which concern people are present at every point in life. The connections between theory and practice are highlighted through the use of compelling case examples.

Michael Jacobs is widely respected and one of the founders of psychodynamic counselling and therapy; his work has had enormous influence on the counselling practice in the UK and internationally. The book is an important resource for all psychotherapists and counsellors working in the psychodynamic tradition.

In this new, fifth, edition of The Presenting Past Michael Jacobs and Dawn Freshwater provide a clear modernisation on this classic, well-loved text. Bringing the literature up to date as well as providing reflection on contemporary issues which have come to the forefront within the helping professions in the past 10 years.

The new edition will retain the accessible style of the book while providing a more nuanced engagement with issues surrounding sex, gender and power making it a must read for students and practitioners alike. The accompanying exercises, hosted online, will enable readers to lead group training sessions which encourage engagement and reflection with a number of core approaches to common therapeutic scenarios in a range of settings.

Michael Jacobs is one of the pioneers of psychodynamic counselling in Britain. He developed the counselling and psychotherapy programme at the University of Leicester up to his retirement in 2000. He is best known for the clarity of his writing in his many books, and in the editing of different series on the theory and application of different counselling models.

Dawn Freshwater is adjunct Professor of Mental Health at the University of Leeds and the University of Western Australia. She trained as a psychodynamic psychotherapist, clinical supervisor and trainer before moving into academic roles in the UK and Oceania. She remains an active researcher and writer, with many texts and papers focussed on the application of counselling theories and practice in multidisciplinary contexts, including prisons and hospitals.