Sunday, May 22, 2011

On the DSK (Head of IMF) case



So the head of the IMF is alleged to have sexually attacked a maid. His friend, the philosopher Bernard Henry Levi wrote a piece in France saying, “I am a close friend of Strauss Kahn for 25 years and I know he would not do anything like that. He is not that kind of man.” So you say. But does he really think he knows anyone? Does he know what goes on in private in a man’s home? Can he tell a man’s sexual proclivity through a friendship? I doubt it. Why? Because nearly all of us have secrets and a secret life. It is the nature of neurosis that we hide part of us; that we have fantasies no one would even dream of. I treated a famous athlete who needed to wave his penis at women. He was at that moment out of control. Do you think his friends would know about that? How about another well known athlete who was addicted to porno magazines. And addicted to have to dress up in women’s clothes. Do you think his friends knew about that? We got to the basis of all that: his mother left him when he was five to go to work. He was left with a cold nanny who never touched him. The only way he could feel close to his mother was to hold her clothes and later rub them on while he masturbated; a way of getting relief from his terrible tension and unfulfilled need. He was close to his mother. It was his way of feeling loved; something we will need and something we nearly all act out in different ways to feel some warmth. It can be stuffing ourselves with food, to feel fulfilled, acting out sexually in order to feel held and touched; you name your poison.

So let us get back to Mr. Kahn. He comes out of the shower and he sees a maid. He is supposed to have jumped her. If I tell you that at that moment he was psychotic would you believe me? So let us define it. He gets sexually aroused; now on top of that there is triggered many other imprinted impulses lying deep in the brain/nervous system. And for that moment it is all bursting through his neocortical control apparatus.

There is any number of current studies indicating that our memories are imprinted dating back to just after conception. Those memories are imprinted low in the brain, beginning with the newly developing brain stem and limbic/feeling brain. They are imprinted into the reptilian/alligator brain. There is indeed a snake running around in our heads and it contains the memories engraved why back before birth that have a life-or-death urgency to them. Under current emotional/physiologic stimulation those memories/impulses are dredged up with the current situation through a process called resonance. They join together and become a dangerous ensemble threatening our control apparatus. In everyday life there is not enough stimulation to cause that dredging; but when sexually aroused it can be all triggered off. It can happen when we are extremely frustrated or furious about something. We really don’t know anyone until we see her or him under stress or some kind of excitement. So Mr. Levy you really don’t know. You are not going to see it at a dinner party. But you will see it in our therapy when we lift the lid of repression and a patient becomes immersed in all of those early memories. That is how we really get to know someone. Otherwise, in the absence of great emotional stimulation the shrink knows very little about his patient. He only sees the surface; so even the doctor cannot see what the patient is really like. We help put the patient under stress; not by threatening to hurt her, but by simply finding a way to allow emotions to rise; emotions that are a serious threat to the integrity of the organism. In one patient every time he got close to his deep-lying pain he had an erection.
There we saw the connection…..between emotional arousal and sexual behavior.

So at a certain moment deep-lying pain resonates with sexual arousal; critical judgment is gone and one is in control by unconscious pain. That is, his thought/judgment is waylaid by all of his impulses at once. In psychosis it is a permanent affair; all of one’s very early pain takes control of mental processes and the person is delusional and paranoid. He is psychotic. The difference is that in sexual assault it is momentary, set off by high level sexual arousal which then triggers off other deep-lying pain.
Sexual arousal raises the stakes, as it were. If she were an older person it may not have been a problem. But otherwise he was out of control; in control by deep forces. His possible lack of early love or trauma while being carried by a (just an example) highly depressed mother lowers the bar of acting-out. His gating system cannot hold back the tide. Others who do not have those early imprints can have a functioning repressive/gating system that can keep control. So it is the nature and strength of the gates that determines who will act out (out of control) and who won’t. And those gates depend on the nature and strength of early trauma for their strength. Gestational trauma, followed by an early lack of love in the home, plus traumas in school can all bind together to produce leaky gates and a subsequent act-out.

So who gets pushed over the boundary and who doesn’t?

We are meant to be controlled by our reptilian brain because it involves basic survival mechanisms. To get of the way fast, to hide when in danger, and to attack when necessary, etc. Some of us had traumatic gestation and some only had major traumas after birth. The earlier the trauma the more powerful it is. That last point: to attack when necessary gets mixed up with current sexual stimulation. His snake brain took control and he (allegedly) attacked. When the neocortex can safely put the snake back in his hold there is no more danger.



19 comments:

  1. I thought the same thing: the reptilian brain at work. that's because you had mentioned it in an earlier post about psychopaths I think ( are they the same species?). This could not be a starker contrast. The hyper successful, super polished head of the IMF is also a rapist.
    Dr. Jekyll and mr. Hyde. The tragic dimension of the brain, capable of understanding the deepest mysteries of the cosmos but also driven by unconscious forces of attacking a poor woman.
    Steven

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  2. A thought.

    I've often thought that we tend to put on the very opposite front of what's really behind it, in particular with respect to our most socially unacceptable qualities. The biggest perverts are probably the one's who never fail to turn up to church on Sunday morning, for example. And if you want to bugger little boys then you had better go all out with the virtue thing and become a priest.

    Maybe we are so afraid of being 'found out' that we don't dare even allow for the existence of our 'hidden realities' to be contemplated in another man's mind.

    But yes, I'm just speculating.

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  3. I agree with you but i don't like the example because you are tallking about a person who is waiting to be jutge. Nobody Knows if he is guilty or not. By the way i don't like the american criminal justice the way they treat the suspect and how they ruin the live of a public man before he is condemened.

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  4. Chyron: If you notice I use the word "alleged."` My aim is to enlighten all of us, including me. I got several letters saying that people who really know him believe there is no way he can be guilty. And I say in my piece which you have read that we never know anyone very well. Especially those who are repressed and search other other repressives as friends. While on the subject, I would add that no therapist really knows his patient until he sees her under great stress in a feeling therapy. Then we know. If the therapist does cognitive therapy and is personally skimming along on the emotional fringe we know he cannot plumb the depths of his patients. How can we treat someone who is an emotional stranger to us? Art Janov

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  5. Just want to add that the IMF works with the governments of different countries.

    http://heritage.org/Research/Reports/2007/10/The-World-Needs-Less-IMF-Not-More


    and a great article on this guy:

    http://www.slate.com/id/2294227/

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  6. How brave of you to dare showing publicly your insight about this DSK case, inspite of the awareness of the risk of getting replies such as chyron's one. Respectfully Lars

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  7. Interesting how Art's theories get manifested in news headlines. Then again, why wouldn't they since said "theories" are supposed to explain everyday life.

    I often bristle at feminists who act like Victorian harridans when it comes to male sexuality. The idea that only females can be "sexually harassed" angers me no end. I wish schools had "womandatory" courses on male sexuality...teaching females about the need to respect it as much as they expect men to respect theirs.

    I hate the shame games that go on, too. It's intended to make half the world feel terrible about its sexual needs. Yet how many male "perverts" were born that way? I'm not saying that if the IMF guy did what he's accused of that it was good. I'm just asking how the hell he got that way?

    And how likely was it that he'd deal with his wounds if he was shamed about them? How many altar boys were beaten and scolded and shamed for telling the truth about THEIR experiences?

    It's like the "penis waver" Art mentioned. Suppose he HAD talked to someone about his tendency. They probably would have had him arrested...even though the genesis of his act-out was caused by others.

    I also hate the idea that people, especially men, are supposed to either "suck it up" (that is, neither show nor feel pain) or simply (how?) "move on"...so their feelings don't upset and/or resonate with others.

    It's a real problem. Where does male pain go if it's not expressed in healing ways? To booze, drugs, excessive sex? To no sex at all and/or self-denial? To harming others?

    It's as if society prefers males to become murderers and bullies rather than see "a grown man cry."

    In the 1960s I thought the Pill would usher in a Return-to-Eden. Sex wouldn't be a hassle and folks would be happier all around. Instead, laws were passed pressuring men to be ever-more guarded.

    I also thought experiments with drugs and "new" therapies would let everyone relax. Never in my worst nightmares did I think millions of young boys would be drugged in class now by "authorities" simply for being boys.

    Plus, perhaps most foolishly of all, I thought war would be passe...like reel-to-reel tapedecks. Instead, today we blow the shite out of innocent others for sport...using remote-controlled drones. At least samurai, for centuries, believed you had to personally face the person whose life and limbs you threatened.

    Someone said that happy people want others to be happy, too. So what does our current world tell us?

    Because we fear to fully feel our own feelings, we deny them in others. We then don't "get" why others hate us and fail to "feel" the pain we inflict on others.

    I wonder how a president who, aside from Harvard Law, had graduated from The Primal Institute would act....

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  8. last night i was trying to write a comment here, but i couldn't find the right words. i could feel an uneasy feeling in the background - driving me to think think think. that's why i couldn't think. i was stuck here for HOURS late into the night. eventually i gave up and went to bed. i fell asleep and then all hell broke loose.

    i experienced what i think was a very clear example of psychosis. i think Art's description is exactly right; psychosis is a group of separate feelings and images and ideas which all combine to create a messed up interpretation of reality. however, when i woke up from this horrendous nightmare (it was very scary) i recognised the possible separate origins of those feelings and ideas, and i could see how they were mixed together.

    the nightmare kept cycling back and forth. first i was gripped by a demonic force. i was paralysed and screamed and screamed (my throat was restricted and i doubt my screams could be heard in real life). occasionally a hand would come out of nowhere to grope at the right side of my groin. each time the terror subsided, i was face to face with a teacher. he looked very similar to Art. he accused me of letting the force become dominant. he said all the other students were dealing with the force, and all of them had completed their studies. i had completed nothing. the teacher was frustrated and seemed like he had given up on me. i felt like all was lost. the demonic force kicked in again. screaming screaming. eventually it passed, then i faced the teacher again. this pattern went on and on and on. at one point the hand came out from between the teacher's legs and grappled at my groin again - causing a horrible jabbing pain. it was a heavy, arduous nightmare. nothing was getting resolved. nothing made sense.

    when i finally woke up i made some observations (not to be confused with insights). i am concerned that i will not be able to keep up with my animation course which is a diploma crammed into one year. if i can't write a simple comment to a blog without being derailed by a background feeling, how can i do this course? i am also worried about the amount of time it will take to earn the money for primal therapy. i'm getting older and older. and when i was very young i had an operation on my right undescended testicle - perhaps this is the origin of my many groin-related nightmares. it would seem that my present feelings of doom are being fueled by, and mixing with feelings from the past. it's a big soup of anxious feelings and none of it can be felt properly.

    lying awake in bed it would be nice to think i have returned to sanity, but i haven't. instead, i am acting out. by writing, i am giving myself hope. i hope the relevant people will read this and understand that i need them to be patient. this hopeful thought is helping to push my feelings into the background. i won't be psychotic until i fall asleep again.

    and i want to write in a way that makes it clear to all the sceptical people. we all have our 'demons' (repressed memories of real events). feelings must be extracted in an orderly fashion. that is the only way they can be properly experienced and resolved. bad therapy will allow a feeling to mix with other feelings and ideas, in the same way that mine did. bad therapy becomes a psychotic nightmare. if you can't recognise the nature of psychosis (mixed up feelings and ideas), or abreaction (the clash of feelings and defences) you may well believe you are healing. after all, when you wake up out of your nightmare, you will be full of new thoughts relating to your profoundly horrible experience. you might say to yourself "wow....i primalled...and now i have all these insights!"
    don't fall into that trap, ok Marco?

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  9. Hi,

    No sooner do we speculate from a real situation about the motives driving it, that the discrepancy between the social facade and who we really are emerges. It's a great dilemma that we ourselves are often the last to see the "disconnect".

    Thus in a strange way we could rely more on others' view of us than our own.

    Of course, nowadays, I wouldn't chooses a banker to rely on for anything if I could possibly avoid it!

    Paul G.

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  10. Dr. Janov,

    Kahn’s behavior as we know has a reason - childhood trauma.
    But, if we try to explain his adult action with trauma, we release him from his responsibility as an adult.

    Fact is, not all childhood-traumatized people become rapists, but all rapists experienced childhood trauma.

    This would be devastating if all perps get away, by using trauma as an excuse.

    Recently there was a lawsuit in Germany where a perpetrator got parole instead of the required sentence. His attorney’s plea was his childhood trauma.
    Sieglinde

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  11. An email comment:
    "Man, that is so true , as Janov writes in this article, that you can at least start to really get to know someone in stressful situations or when something excitable is evoked, or in a situation when controversy ensues (otherwise most people in this alienated society feel comfortable under their masks...and ALONE, the devil's price you pay for your protection and phoniness. True human encounters should be a lot simpler and easier than that!) . Take for instance an encounter with a woman I just met in a park accidentally, and who I have talked to superficially for years in AA meetings (this superficiality is typical of AA). She is a beautiful statuesque top-model type, with a flashing smile when she walks in to the meetings, quite dazzling. I always wondered if that was a mask, and I think it was (dazzling smile yes, but still a mask like all those Hollywood starlets). But ,in the park, she was more subdued, alone, easily irritated, moody, and introspective; probably that was her more regular state. Now I probed a bit into her interests in spirituality and psychology to get something real going, and right away : resistance ,as well as the idiotic AA line that she did not want to get into any controversies, a typical defensive AA attitude, a pacifist pillar of AA and most "spiritual" types. It was also like that old gestalt attitude: you do your thing, and I do mine, and if we get together, beautiful; otherwise it can`t be helped. Yeah right, spare me: as if that hippy attitude will give you the drive to achieve intimacy , which demands emotional reality , commitment, work, vulnerability, sometimes anger and controversy. The jist of this is this simple more real encounter seemed not only to reveal what she was really partly about, but also what AA is about:
    Using "spiritual" platitudes about universal love and brotherhood to usually avoid real encounter and relationship. All those false hugs and smiles...So , anyways, she gets up and leaves, disturbed that some of her narcissistic certitudes were directly and indirectly questioned (not attacked), and rationalizing her avoidance of a meaningful encounter by saying everyone`s right in some way, so let`s avoid controversy. Anyways, that`s my interpretation of my time with her (maybe she just plain does not like me). Really, it`s just so hard to get to know people; at least it is for me.

    Let me just add that one of the many things I like about our good Dr Janov is that one can sense a real person coming out of his writings, besides the incredible insight. So thanks, that is so refreshing!

    As far as this Strauss-Kahn, I do not mean to offend any women (or men) who are understandably outraged at (alleged) rape, but I feel sorry for this guy. To see a life ruined always makes me sad.Let me add for the political types that Mr Strauss -Khan had a good reputation in progressive circles as having been a little more open to the sufferrings in the Third World as IMF head, sufferings usually exacerbated by odious economic policies coming out of the usually imperialist IMF. And I would rather have had this guy run France than Sarkosy."

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  12. Trevor: About the weinie waver, no disrespect intended. I saw one man who simply had to look deep into his mother's eyes and beg her: "Look at me" that was it. He had to do this over and over until the pain went away. When the pain was there he was forced to act out to strange women, look at me!!! No pain no more act out. art janov. He needs to see emotion and shock on a woman's face. His mother was stone cold, a cement like visage. We need emotional contact.

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  13. everyone knows that females are physically weaker than males. that is why women are physically abused by men, more often than the other way round. that is why most women in the world are regarded as inferior to men. women's actions are often passive and defensive - inferior traits in the eyes of the dominant male. women are inferior according to religion (a set of laws written by men). blacks are inferior to whites because they still struggle to integrate with the white man's world - a world forced upon them at gun point. children are inferior to adults because they are smaller and weaker. this is how the world works. neurosis turns us into very simple animals.

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  14. Hi everyone,

    The hazard of and the price we pay for becoming more conscious and less automatically defensive is in seeing "the terror of the situation".

    I completely agree with the sentiments expressed in all these contributions, my heart gets heavy with the inevitable depressing effect that so called 'ordinary peoples' superficiality has.

    Superficiality is terrifying to the conscious mind; watching others breeze over, gloss over, dismiss, detach, confabulate and avoid personal empathy or responsibility. Life is short and so much goes to deliberate waste this way. Simply discard the disdainful, isn't it?

    In my opinion neurotics suffer the most because we tend to struggle with our own symptoms. The repressors don't have symptoms do they?!

    must fly, got another appointment, (with my narcisistic self), Bye!

    Paul G.

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  15. Paul, it's lonely at the top. You need to come down to the Primal Center.

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  16. Hi Trevor,
    Thanks for bringing up some of the disappointment about how the sixties/seventies movement faded away.
    It is still confusing for me that all these developments stopped (due to economic crisis and change of generations) and that we came to this point.
    The use of drugs in that time I did not like at all.
    By the way the pill changed the biology of woman in such a way that they are no longer attractive.
    Paul

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  17. Recently I have read a book that challenges that supposed idea of the weak woman.
    Very interesting because I don´t believe that either.She writes that woman are dominant in relationships for a very long time and that they cheat (manipulate) and get away with that.
    According to her investigation of ancient myths she comes to the conclusion that it was the female who was dominant and that actually all the restrictions of Christianity are a compensation to the dominance of the womans sex drive,man were afraid of in primitive times.

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  18. Hi Richard,

    It's lonely at the bottom too, which is actually not far from the soles of my worn out trainers!

    I've had my intake interview, now I'm trying to find the wherewithal to make it. . .

    Paul G.

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  19. Hi Paul NL,

    I've heard of a mythological sounding rumour circulating in anthropological circles that there were once matriarchal societies in which men were unaware of their genetic role; ie: Men hadn't sussed that the children were also related to the fathers as well as the mothers. This so because the men were part of a 'boyfriend network', hanging about waiting for the next screw. . .

    There's some mileage in this speculation invented to explain why the archaeological record shows a sudden flush of smashed venus de milos. . . Who smashed up these icons and why?

    Anyway, my beautiful ex-partner summed up the situation perfectly after dinner one evening:

    -"Paul, I know how anxious you are to get back up there"-

    We both smiled at the joke, though I knew of course, the joke was on me.

    Paul G.

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Review of "Beyond Belief"

This thought-provoking and important book shows how people are drawn toward dangerous beliefs.
“Belief can manifest itself in world-changing ways—and did, in some of history’s ugliest moments, from the rise of Adolf Hitler to the Jonestown mass suicide in 1979. Arthur Janov, a renowned psychologist who penned The Primal Scream, fearlessly tackles the subject of why and how strong believers willingly embrace even the most deranged leaders.
Beyond Belief begins with a lucid explanation of belief systems that, writes Janov, “are maps, something to help us navigate through life more effectively.” While belief systems are not presented as inherently bad, the author concentrates not just on why people adopt belief systems, but why “alienated individuals” in particular seek out “belief systems on the fringes.” The result is a book that is both illuminating and sobering. It explores, for example, how a strongly-held belief can lead radical Islamist jihadists to murder others in suicide acts. Janov writes, “I believe if people had more love in this life, they would not be so anxious to end it in favor of some imaginary existence.”
One of the most compelling aspects of Beyond Belief is the author’s liberal use of case studies, most of which are related in the first person by individuals whose lives were dramatically affected by their involvement in cults. These stories offer an exceptional perspective on the manner in which belief systems can take hold and shape one’s experiences. Joan’s tale, for instance, both engaging and disturbing, describes what it was like to join the Hare Krishnas. Even though she left the sect, observing that participants “are stunted in spiritual awareness,” Joan considers returning someday because “there’s a certain protection there.”
Janov’s great insight into cultish leaders is particularly interesting; he believes such people have had childhoods in which they were “rejected and unloved,” because “only unloved people want to become the wise man or woman (although it is usually male) imparting words of wisdom to others.” This is just one reason why Beyond Belief is such a thought-provoking, important book.”
Barry Silverstein, Freelance Writer

Quotes for "Life Before Birth"

“Life Before Birth is a thrilling journey of discovery, a real joy to read. Janov writes like no one else on the human mind—engaging, brilliant, passionate, and honest.
He is the best writer today on what makes us human—he shows us how the mind works, how it goes wrong, and how to put it right . . . He presents a brand-new approach to dealing with depression, emotional pain, anxiety, and addiction.”
Paul Thompson, PhD, Professor of Neurology, UCLA School of Medicine

Art Janov, one of the pioneers of fetal and early infant experiences and future mental health issues, offers a robust vision of how the earliest traumas of life can percolate through the brains, minds and lives of individuals. He focuses on both the shifting tides of brain emotional systems and the life-long consequences that can result, as well as the novel interventions, and clinical understanding, that need to be implemented in order to bring about the brain-mind changes that can restore affective equanimity. The transitions from feelings of persistent affective turmoil to psychological wholeness, requires both an understanding of the brain changes and a therapist that can work with the affective mind at primary-process levels. Life Before Birth, is a manifesto that provides a robust argument for increasing attention to the neuro-mental lives of fetuses and infants, and the widespread ramifications on mental health if we do not. Without an accurate developmental history of troubled minds, coordinated with a recognition of the primal emotional powers of the lowest ancestral regions of the human brain, therapists will be lost in their attempt to restore psychological balance.
Jaak Panksepp, Ph.D.
Bailey Endowed Chair of Animal Well Being Science
Washington State University

Dr. Janov’s essential insight—that our earliest experiences strongly influence later well being—is no longer in doubt. Thanks to advances in neuroscience, immunology, and epigenetics, we can now see some of the mechanisms of action at the heart of these developmental processes. His long-held belief that the brain, human development, and psychological well being need to studied in the context of evolution—from the brainstem up—now lies at the heart of the integration of neuroscience and psychotherapy.
Grounded in these two principles, Dr. Janov continues to explore the lifelong impact of prenatal, birth, and early experiences on our brains and minds. Simultaneously “old school” and revolutionary, he synthesizes traditional psychodynamic theories with cutting-edge science while consistently highlighting the limitations of a strict, “top-down” talking cure. Whether or not you agree with his philosophical assumptions, therapeutic practices, or theoretical conclusions, I promise you an interesting and thought-provoking journey.
Lou Cozolino, PsyD, Professor of Psychology, Pepperdine University


In Life Before Birth Dr. Arthur Janov illuminates the sources of much that happens during life after birth. Lucidly, the pioneer of primal therapy provides the scientific rationale for treatments that take us through our original, non-verbal memories—to essential depths of experience that the superficial cognitive-behavioral modalities currently in fashion cannot possibly touch, let alone transform.
Gabor Maté MD, author of In The Realm of Hungry Ghosts: Close Encounters With Addiction

An expansive analysis! This book attempts to explain the impact of critical developmental windows in the past, implores us to improve the lives of pregnant women in the present, and has implications for understanding our children, ourselves, and our collective future. I’m not sure whether primal therapy works or not, but it certainly deserves systematic testing in well-designed, assessor-blinded, randomized controlled clinical trials.
K.J.S. Anand, MBBS, D. Phil, FAACP, FCCM, FRCPCH, Professor of Pediatrics, Anesthesiology, Anatomy & Neurobiology, Senior Scholar, Center for Excellence in Faith and Health, Methodist Le Bonheur Healthcare System


A baby's brain grows more while in the womb than at any time in a child's life. Life Before Birth: The Hidden Script That Rules Our Lives is a valuable guide to creating healthier babies and offers insight into healing our early primal wounds. Dr. Janov integrates the most recent scientific research about prenatal development with the psychobiological reality that these early experiences do cast a long shadow over our entire lifespan. With a wealth of experience and a history of successful psychotherapeutic treatment, Dr. Janov is well positioned to speak with clarity and precision on a topic that remains critically important.
Paula Thomson, PsyD, Associate Professor, California State University, Northridge & Professor Emeritus, York University

"I am enthralled.
Dr. Janov has crafted a compelling and prophetic opus that could rightly dictate
PhD thesis topics for decades to come. Devoid of any "New Age" pseudoscience,
this work never strays from scientific orthodoxy and yet is perfectly accessible and
downright fascinating to any lay person interested in the mysteries of the human psyche."
Dr. Bernard Park, MD, MPH

His new book “Life Before Birth: The Hidden Script that Rules Our Lives” shows that primal therapy, the lower-brain therapeutic method popularized in the 1970’s international bestseller “Primal Scream” and his early work with John Lennon, may help alleviate depression and anxiety disorders, normalize blood pressure and serotonin levels, and improve the functioning of the immune system.
One of the book’s most intriguing theories is that fetal imprinting, an evolutionary strategy to prepare children to cope with life, establishes a permanent set-point in a child's physiology. Baby's born to mothers highly anxious during pregnancy, whether from war, natural disasters, failed marriages, or other stressful life conditions, may thus be prone to mental illness and brain dysfunction later in life. Early traumatic events such as low oxygen at birth, painkillers and antidepressants administered to the mother during pregnancy, poor maternal nutrition, and a lack of parental affection in the first years of life may compound the effect.
In making the case for a brand-new, unified field theory of psychotherapy, Dr. Janov weaves together the evolutionary theories of Jean Baptiste Larmarck, the fetal development studies of Vivette Glover and K.J.S. Anand, and fascinating new research by the psychiatrist Elissa Epel suggesting that telomeres—a region of repetitive DNA critical in predicting life expectancy—may be significantly altered during pregnancy.
After explaining how hormonal and neurologic processes in the womb provide a blueprint for later mental illness and disease, Dr. Janov charts a revolutionary new course for psychotherapy. He provides a sharp critique of cognitive behavioral therapy, psychoanalysis, and other popular “talk therapy” models for treating addiction and mental illness, which he argues do not reach the limbic system and brainstem, where the effects of early trauma are registered in the nervous system.
“Life Before Birth: The Hidden Script that Rules Our Lives” is scheduled to be published by NTI Upstream in October 2011, and has tremendous implications for the future of modern psychology, pediatrics, pregnancy, and women’s health.
Editor