As the years go by Life brings challenges for all of us. This book brings to you the reader, some of the insights and understandings that I have learned from my patients over many years of practice. The people that I have worked with have almost all been well-functioning men and women, professionals, people in business, academics, politicians, working people, wives and husbands, parents of children, and children of elderly aging parents. I am doubly Board Certified as a Specialist Psychiatrist in both the United States and Canada, and since my training days my clinical work has almost entirely been in Psychodynamic Psychotherapy and Independent Assessment. That means that I have been listening to people and trying to understand together with them the various challenges in their lives that they have been undergoing that led them to come to see me. It has been a great privilege to have had so many wonderful people share some of the most personal intimate aspects of their lives with me in their search to understand themselves and live their lives more peacefully and happily. What I believe is special about this book, is that it contains many vignettes, aspects of their stories, that illustrate the various difficulties throughout our lives that all of us go through, and how we can understand them better. My hope is that in passing on to you dear reader some of the lessons of life that I have learned from my patients over the years, that you too will have a broader understanding of your own lives and relationships. A book like this that is the accumulation of more than forty five years of seeing thousands of patients can only be written with the ongoing support of a number of important people in my life, to whom I am profoundly grateful. My dear wife Judy has been there with me all the way, supporting me, caring for me and often offering her own valuable insights about life, as have our wonderful daughters Hadassah, Elisheva, Shoshana, and Zehava. Most of their children, our grandchildren, are now young adults or teenagers and they too have offered the very useful perspectives of younger generations on some of life's problems. The Rabbi of the synagogue I attend most often, Rabbi Uri Kaufman, has often provided provocative stimulation from his wealth of Jewish knowledge, and my therapist, Dr Michael O'Mahony, has listened patiently to me for a number of years. But ultimately, this book contains my own thoughts and insights. Over the years in my academic presentations and writings and in my political work I have encountered many people disagreeing with me. Indeed, I have said frequently to my patients and others that if you become involved in any sort of community or political work you can guarantee that whatever viewpoint you express there will always be at least one person - if not more - who opposes you. But I believe that most of my insights are valuable, and will stand the test of time. And I offer them to you with full confidence that you will find here much that will greatly benefit you.
About the Author: Joseph Berger graduated in Medicine with Honours from the University of London, England, and then trained in Psychiatry in the United States. He moved with his family to live and work in Toronto, Canada, and became doubly Board Certified as a Specialist in Psychiatry in both the United States and Canada. For more than twenty five years he was a Board Examiner for the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology in the Oral portion of the Specialty Board Examination, and he also taught for some years as Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Toronto. His first published book was The Independent Medical Examination in Psychiatry, (ButterworthLexis Nexis) and he is the author of a number of clinical and research articles published in medical journals. He has been President and Chairman of the Board of Directors of a large private high school, and has been involved in a number of other community activities and charitable organizations. He has been a speaker and made many presentations to various professional groups and organizations, in the United States and Israel, as well as Canada. He and his wife Judy have four fantastic daughters and a number of amazing grandchildren, and recently became very proud great-grandparents. Dr Berger has run five marathons, still plays soccer, and enjoys travelling, reading and writing, chocolate desserts, and most of all his wonderful family.