Product Description

Many struggles we face in our current interpersonal relationships arise from a core defense formed in childhood known as the “fantasy bond.” As one of the central concepts of Dr. Robert Firestone, the fantasy bond describes an illusion of connection we originally form with our parent or primary caretaker as a defense system to help relieve early anxiety and emotional pain. However, as we grow up, this very defense system limits our ability to pursue or accept real love and connection.

In this Webinar, Dr. Lisa Firestone will explain her father’s concept of the fantasy bond. She will discuss how the original “bond” that is formed in a family can keep people stuck in the past, reliving rather than living their own lives. The incorporation of these early fantasy dynamics can lead to limiting psychological defenses and a critical self-concept that go on to negatively impact how an individual relates to themselves and those closest to them throughout their lives. On an unconscious level, people may turn to the imagined safety of a fantasy connection over the more threatening or painful reality that comes with real relating, genuine caring, or giving value to our loved ones and our lives in general.

In her presentation, Dr. Firestone will help therapists understand how and why this primitive defense develops and how it goes on to affect clients in everything from destructive relationship patterns to self-sabotaging behaviors, from shattered self-esteem to parenting difficulties. She will explain techniques to help clients recognize, understand, and challenge elements of a fantasy bond, a process that can dramatically improve their relationships with their partners, their children, and themselves, while allowing them to live their own lives free of the shackles of their earliest defenses.

Learning Objectives:

1. Become familiar with the concept of the fantasy bond, an imaginary connection formed with their partner that relieves anxiety yet interferes with real relationships.
2. Learn how methods or defenses formed to deal with pain and anxiety in childhood later come to limit people as adults in their ability to develop and sustain attachments
3. Learn to identify the negative thoughts they have toward self, partner, and the relationship in order to provide targeted interventions
4. Apply techniques to identify and challenge destructive thinking in clients.