ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the phenomena attached to the pregnant therapist, the expectant father-therapist and the adoptive parent-therapist within multi-person therapies. Psychotherapists perceived individual psychotherapy patients as having more intense reactions to the pregnancy than group psychotherapy patients. The chapter outlines patient reactions and therapist reactions to the therapist's pregnancy. It includes some observations about fathers who are group psychotherapists. The therapist as a figure might be less focal in family and couple therapy relative to other modalities. For couples, the customary reaction to the therapist's pregnancy is likely to rest upon their own developmental stage as a couple. In much of family therapy, the family members' reactions to each other are more important than their reactions to the therapist. The chapter suggests that women are somewhat more open to the therapeutic opportunities presented by their therapists' pregnancies than are men for both individual and group psychotherapy. Both therapist and clients have distinctive reactions as a consequence of the therapist's pregnancy.
