ABSTRACT
Throughout this book, we have demonstrated how the basic elements of body-to-body communication, which we observed in the interactive dialogue between babies and parents, remain active in adult life. In this chapter , we focus on the details of movement occurring between an individual adult patient and psychotherapist in session. Cases here demonstrate the similarities in structure and function between the early baby-parent relational dialogue and those of the patient-psychotherapist (Frank, 2001, 2004, 2005; La Barre, 2005, 2008). From the moment an adult walks into the consulting room, then settles, sits or lies down, gestures, and shifts positions, we note the nonverbal signals between patient and psychotherapist, coorganized, sent, and received using the same movement qualities, dimensions, and fundamental movements present between babies and their parents. The psychotherapist is moving all the time as well. The contours of change in their moving bodies are mutually affecting as each modulates and adjusts in response to the other person.1
