Shame can be a hindrance or a healing agent in psychotherapy. It is incumbent upon the therapist to recognize shame in the client, but, it is equally important to recognize it in ourselves. While our work might start with the client’s shame, we will inevitably be confronted by our own. Dearing and Price-Tangney (2011) define therapist shame as “an intense and enduring reaction to a threat to the therapist’s sense of identity that consists of an exposure of the therapist’s p

"At the core of chronic shame is an absence- the absence of connectedness (DeYoung, p.120). Affective interactions between a child and caretaker shape the brain over a lifetime. When the primary caregiver is emotionally attuned and connected, the child feels understood and secure. When the caregiver has a pattern of being absent or intrusive, the child suffers what relational psychotherapist Patricia DeYoung refers to as "profound misattunement to their young affective/emot