| Summary: | Clinical psychologist George Stricker conducts the last of five sessions with a middle-aged African American single mother presenting with depressive symptoms following a divorce and a year of unemployment. The client had not come to the previous session in what had been a planned six-session course of therapy because she was visiting an ill uncle. After mutual acknowledgment of this absence and the fact of the current session as the last, Dr. Stricker opens space for the client to reflect on the therapy. The therapist remains attuned to the client's sadness and frustration over her uncle's illness, potentially an indirect expression of her feelings about ending the therapy. Integrating more structured techniques within the psychodynamic approach, Dr. Stricker consolidates the work of the therapy, enouraging the client's use of self-help techniques and focusing on next steps in her efforts to find a job. While validating her wishes for her own business, he gently confronts her overinvestment in one idea and encourages more realistic thinking. By helping the client separate out a successful career of many years from the emotionally chaotic recent events, he opens the possibility for her to consider a return to this work.
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