Richard O’Connor, MSW, PhD, Private Practice
Richard O’Connor, MSW, Ph.D., is a psychotherapist with offices in Lakeville, CT, and New York City. Prior to private practice, he was the executive director of the Northwest Center for Mental Health, a nonprofit outpatient clinic with three locations in northwest Connecticut. He has his MSW and Ph.D. in social work from the University of Chicago. After graduation, he worked in a variety of urban and suburban settings in the Chicago area, while continuing his training with the Family Institute of Chicago and the Chicago Institute for Psychoanalysis. He lives with his wife Robin, and they have two adult children. Dr. O’Connor speaks frequently to self-help groups and professional audiences.
Dr. O’Connor is the author of five books: Undoing Depression has been a perennial best-seller among self-help books; it earned high praise from professionals as well as from readers like William Styron and Larry McMurtry. Active Treatment of Depression was hailed as “one of the decade’s great psychotherapy texts on depression.” Undoing Perpetual Stress received the Books for a Better Life Award as the best wellness book of 2005. Happy at Last is the “thinking person’s guide to joy.” His current book, Rewire: Change Your Brain to Break Bad Habits, Overcome Addictions, and Conquer Self-Destructive Behavior, has just been published by Hudson Street Press/Penguin, and by six foreign presses.
Keynote Presentation:
Depression, Anxiety, Substance Abuse, PTSD, Personality Disorder—A Single Common Pathway?
Depression, anxiety, substance abuse, PTSD, and personality disorders, although treated as unique and separate conditions, rarely exist in pure form. Their symptoms and behavior problems overlap so much that the diagnosis often depends most on where the client enters the treatment system. They all are marked by serious self-destructive behavior, and they all appear to be in part an effect of malfunctioning reward systems in the brain. The patients’ histories are usually marked by trauma, abuse, and/or neglect. This talk will review these commonalities, and the need for modifications to the engagement and treatment process in order to gain these clients’ full participation in their own recovery.