Is recognizing a symptom enough to truly understand a patient?
Similar symptoms may arise from entirely different unconscious conflicts, personality structures, and psychodynamic organizations. For this reason, clinical thinking begins not with describing symptoms, but with understanding the psychological processes that give rise to them. This is precisely the focus of our three-part clinical seminar series:
Love, Sex and Aggression
Faculty: Dr. Otto Kernberg, M.D.
Throughout the three seminars, Dr. Kernberg will explore how the interaction of Love, Sexuality, and Aggression provides a framework for understanding the psychodynamics of some of the most complex clinical presentations—from sexual dysfunctions and narcissistic pathology to eroticized transference, the negative therapeutic reaction, and couples psychotherapy.
Registration for this clinical seminar series is available with an installment plan from the Ukrainian Institute for Personality Disorders Studies. For consultation on installment options and registration, please contact us:
- email: contact@uipds.org
- WhatsApp: +380914817665
Program:
September 26, 2026 - Pathology of sexual functioning, homosexuality, narcissism, perversion. In particular, the seminar will address the following topics:
- The continuum of sexual pathology — from the neurotic level to the borderline level with the co-optation of sexuality by aggression
- The impact of identity diffusion on sexual pathology
- The psychodynamics of abandonment anxiety
- Differentiating polymorphous-perverse sexuality from genuine perversions
- A structural approach to perversions: distinguishing neurotic perversions (as a defense against castration anxiety) from severe perversions within borderline personality organization
- Aggression in perversions
- Sexuality in the service of aggression
- The specificity of narcissistic sexuality
- The pathological grandiose self in narcissism as a structural basis for disturbances in love
- Narcissistic sexuality: the role of unconscious envy and mechanisms of devaluation
- The narcissistic fantasy of “bisexuality” and the choice of a partner as a “mirror twin”
- Narcissistic fixation on partial objects
- Malignant narcissism and the infiltration of sexuality by aggression
- Narcissism and the erosion of boundaries
- The eroticization of pain and hatred
- Homosexuality in normal development
- Homosexuality across the continuum of structural organization: neurotic level, borderline level, narcissistic spectrum
- A psychodynamic perspective on polyamory, polygamy, open relationships, swinging, and related phenomena
October 24, 2026 - Severe sexual inhibition in men and women, sexual promiscuity. Among the topics of the seminar:
- Primary sexual inhibition
- Secondary sexual inhibition
- Fear of annihilation in the context of sexuality
- Dissociation between tenderness and eroticism
- Radical splitting
- Sexual inhibition — a continuum from neurotic to borderline levels
- Reduced or absent sexual desire; sexual aversion disorder
- Delay or blockage of stages of arousal
- Difficulties achieving orgasm or absence of orgasm
- Sexual avoidance and phobic reactions
- Syndromes of male sexual inhibition (erectile dysfunction, premature ejaculation, absence of ejaculation, anorgasmia)
- Syndromes of female sexual inhibition (arousal disorder, sexual unresponsiveness, delayed orgasm, anorgasmia, dyspareunia, vaginismus)
- Severe sexual inhibition
- Asexuality — a norm or a consequence of sexual inhibition?
- Compulsive masturbation
- Promiscuity in men and women — psychodynamic origins
- The nature of sexual promiscuity in narcissism
- The dynamics of Don Juanism
November 21, 2026 - Therapeutic challenges in the treatment of love and aggression. The workshop will focus on the following topics:
- Assessment of the prognosis for couple therapy
- Erotic and eroticized transference and countertransference
- Specific features of narcissistic transference
- The syndrome of arrogance
- Negative therapeutic reaction
- Management of affective storms
- Management of countertransference
- Bringing sexual enactments into the analytic space
- Strategy of interpretation
- Indicators of structural change
- Integration of love, sexuality, and aggression
Time:
from 1:40-8:00 PM (London time)
from 8:40AM-3:00PM (New York time)
FORMAT & LANGUAGE
Online education in English
With simultaneous Ukrainian interpretation available on a dedicated audio channel.
What does the training participant package include?
Participants of module receive:
- Online Zoom seminar participation
- Handouts for Clinical Case Analysis
- 12-month access to the webinar recordings
- A personalized electronic certificate of participation for each module, and, upon completion of all four modules, a comprehensive program completion certificate.
We encourage you to register for a training that will enhance the effectiveness of psychotherapy in your clinical work.
Link to registration: https://pd.uipds.org/
Best regards,
TFP-Group Ukraine