Psychoanalytic Practices and Russia's War Against Ukraine

Reflections and Clinical Observations

Mariana Velykodna, Oksana Yakushko, Adrienne Harris

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2026
• eBook ISBN:
  9781040630242
• Topic: Psychology
• Index: Psychology

This book looks at the impact of multigenerational trauma, severe psychopathology, and ethical struggles through the lens of Ukrainian psychoanalysts working amidst the Russian invasion.

The contribution examines psychoanalytic responses to Russia's aggression against Ukraine, including via lived experiences of Ukrainian psychoanalysts who practice under conditions of continued threat. The book offers analytic observations and exploration of psychoanalytically informed care with Ukrainians who are experiencing profound distress and war trauma. Contributors describe their work with diverse Ukrainian groups, including children and adolescents, war refugees, individuals experiencing severe physical and psychological crises, Ukrainian Jewish community, and Ukrainian diaspora.

This will be a valuable resource for readers interested in understanding and responding to impact of wars, specifically genocidal wars. They are invited to witness the profound challenges, creativity, courage, human and professional dilemmas, and pain that are witnessed and responded to by psychoanalytically informed practitioners.

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Endorsements Page
• Half-Title Page
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• List of Contributors
• On Psychoanalysts’ Avoidance of Knowing More About Wars: Introduction
• 1 In the Nets of Trauma: Ukrainian Case
• 2 Phenomenology of Psychic Processes and Relationships in Wartime Ukraine
• 3 Oedipal Conflicts During Wartime: War and the Infantile Fantasies
• 4 “I Do (Not) Want to Kill”: Trauma Beyond Words
• 5 The Mental Void: Impact of War on Non-Neurotic Structures
• 6 Psychoanalytic Practice in Wartime Ukraine: Challenges to the Ethics
• 7 Effects and Affects of War in Psychoanalytic Practice
• 8 War-Forced Terminations of Psychoanalysis: Cases from Ukraine
• 9 Avoiding Talking about the War? Features of Transference During Counseling with Ukrainian Refugees
• 10 The Crisis of Group Identity During the War: Experience of Working with the Ukrainian Jewish Community
• 11 The “Severed Roots” People: Psychoanalytic Reflections from Running the Psychological Hotline Work with Ukrainian Refugees
• 12 Psychoanalytic Therapy with Children in the Realities of War: An Analysis That Cannot Be
• 13 Wartime Supervision as Psychoanalytical Research of Clinical Cases and Psychic Phenomena
• 14 He. She. War: Transforming War-Related Experience Through the Intervision Group Dynamics
• 15 International and National Psychoanalytic Initiatives in Wartime Ukraine: History of 2022–2023
• Index