Kathrin Stephan

My name is Kathrin Stephan. I practice as a psychological psychotherapist in Tübingen. For many years I worked in a clinic for psychiatry and psychotherapy on various wards (including over 8 years in acute psychiatry), which was very fulfilling for me. Out of enthusiasm for my profession, which is at the same time a vocation for me, I kept learning new therapy methods. I took various additional trainings to expand my „toolbox“. The goal was always to be able to offer different people as many different methods as possible that are suitable for them.

Today, my method suitcase includes the following directions:
Behavioral Therapy / Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (TAVT).
Clinical hypnosis, hypnotherapy (Milton Erickson Society)
Ego-State-Therapy (according to Dr. John Watkins / Dr. Woltemade Hartmann – EST-A)
Somatic Experiencing (body-oriented psychotherapy according to Peter Levine)
Energetic Psychotherapy (EDxTM according to Fred Gallo)
Trauma therapy (according to Michaela Huber)
EMDR (Eye Movement Desentization and Reprocessing according to the guidelines of EMDRIA)
IACD (Induced after-death communication according to Dr. Allan Botkin)
Relaxation techniques: Autogenic training and progressive muscle relaxation (according to Jacobson)

Today’s psychotherapy is mainly based on the building blocks cognition (thinking), emotion (feeling) and behavior. In recent years, awareness of the body has been increasingly added. But what we are still missing from my point of view is the connection to something higher. It is the dimension of what holds the world together at its core. We can call this, for example, „spirituality“, „soul home“ or „faith“.

In psychotherapy, this may only be a topic to the extent that the patient may be picked up where he/she stands in his/her own world view. Today, however, patients are sometimes helpless in this respect. And especially in the pain after a heavy loss they are strongly insecure even in what was natural for them before. (Of course, it must never be a matter of imposing a world view on the patient or even proselytizing him! Especially in this vulnerable phase, they should be protected. Because this is exactly what these rules are there for, but unfortunately they also prevent much else in this form).

One of the greatest pains in our lives occurs when love is no longer reciprocated, through separation or death. At this point, people often come to psychotherapy. Anyone who has experienced such pain understands how infinitely difficult it is to get back on one’s feet and to continue on one’s own path from fullness into the future again.

If people in deepest mourning would still receive one or the other answer of their beloved person (or animal), or if they would know how he or she was when he or she „passed away“, or even very fundamentally, what he or she passed away from, then this would be able to solve many a desperate circle of thoughts. And if the grieving person could even gain certainty for himself or herself that the deceased has only left the body behind, but continues to exist as a soul and still participates in his or her life, then that is a fundamentally different reality for the mourner.

The grief is nevertheless infinitely deep and painful, but the process can then be started and gone through in a completely different way. And for this we need exactly the research that Prof. Oliver Lazar has started with the EREAMS study and the work of very good media like Mrs. Bettina-Suvi Rode and Mrs. Tanja Schlömer. Because what at the beginning may sound so talked about, unrealistic, glorified or pulled by the hair, becomes reality in contact with a serious and good medium. If the medium can bring proofs, which he really could not know. There were some statements that nevertheless could only have been transmitted through the deceased. These could not be explained even with cold or hot reading, because they were significant events in the future, which could not be known to either medium or client. Only at that point it can become believable and infinitely exciting – and above all very comforting.

We still form a society in which death is largely tabooed, although in Germany for a long time on average about 2,500 people die per day from various causes. Death is the only true certain fact in the life of every human being. Do we really want to continue to make this taboo? Or shouldn’t we integrate „death“ into our lives, deal with how things will go on afterwards – and thereby even be able to lose our fears of our own physical end? (Which is not to be equated with the fear of the way of dying.) Also our life in the here and now can become more intensive by this, because we learn to deal with something special in a different way.

We could help many people more if we were allowed to integrate the spiritual dimension into our lives and therapies. If the infinite continued existence of our souls also increasingly developed a more natural view on the subject of death in our society, people could accept more help and be more accepting in difficult situations. It goes without saying that no particular world view or religion should be suggested to patients.

I very much welcome it if spirituality can be scientifically proven. Perhaps it would be a perspective for the future that society in general and people also in the context of psychotherapy can have this spiritual content as a valuable dimension. At least it would be for those for whom it is appropriate and helpful. I am very pleased that the topic of life after death is now also increasingly finding its way into the mainstream media, and so, for example, in the summer of 2020, the Nachtcafé broadcast not one but two programs on the subject.

In this respect, it is a matter close to my heart that spirituality is also given a place in psychotherapy in the future and is allowed to become reality. So that this may be a comforting support for people for whom it is important and appropriate (and only for them).

It is a pleasure for me to be part of the EREAMS team and to be able to support this great team of people who do such wonderful work.