This paper examines the psychological significance of grandparents through the lenses of Self Psychology and Intersubjective Self Psychology. It explores how grandparents function as vital selfobjects—providing mirroring, idealization, and twinship—and how they contribute to continuity, identity formation, and emotional resilience across generations. Special attention is given to the intergenerational transmission of trauma, illustrating how grandparents may perpetuate or transform unresolved grief. Clinical and cultural examples, including Bruce Springsteen’s family history and Anna Ornstein’s narrative testimony, demonstrate these dynamics. The paper also considers grandparenting as a metaphor in psychoanalysis, illuminating transference, countertransference, and the generative aims of therapeutic work.

 

Two Continuing Education Credits for NYS social workers, psychoanalysts, psychologists, and LMHCs.
 
This meeting will take place online via Zoom. Registrants will be emailed a Zoom link with their confirmed registration and prior to the event.
George Hagman

George Hagman

George Hagman, LCSW, is a clinical social worker and psychoanalyst in private practice in Stamford, Connecticut. He is on faculty of the Training and Research in Intersubjective Self Psychology, and is a training analyst, supervisor, and faculty member of the Westchester Center for the Study of Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy. George is the author of numerous published articles and several books and edited volumes. He is a co- editor-in-chief of the journal Psychoanalysis, Self and Context and the editor of 2 book series for Routledge Press, Art, Creativity and Psychoanalysis and New Directions in Self Psychology. George is also co-editor with Peter Zimmermann and Harry Paul of Intersubjective Self Psychology: A Primer. He is the grandfather of 2 wonderful girls.

Harry Paul

Harry Paul

Harry Paul, PhD, is a founding member, past president, faculty and supervising and training analyst at the TRISP. He is the co-editor and contributor with George Hagman and Peter Zimmermann of Intersubjective Self Psychology: A Primer. He is the co-author of The Self Psychology of Addiction and Its Treatment: Narcissus in Wonderland (2006) and he has authored papers on intersubjectivity and addiction. He is in private practice in New York City and in Chappaqua New York.

Register for this event at Eventbrite