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Our early childhood experiences shape our future, rooted in our first relationships. As we are cared for, disciplined, and taught by the example of our parents and caregivers, we absorb messages about who we are, whether the world is safe or unpredictable, and how well we are equipped to handle it all.

Dr. Galit Atlas applies her psychoanalytic lens to better understand relationships and intimacy in light of our early attachment experiences. Her book, Come Closer: Childhood Wounds, Adult Love, and the Secrets of Emotional Intimacy, illuminates six child archetypes that give meaning to our relational struggles in light of our past.

Q: Share a bit about your background and what inspired you to write Come Closer.

Galit Atlas: I’ve been teaching the class on sexuality at the New York University Postdoctoral Program in Psychotherapy & Psychoanalysis for the past 12 years. My thinking has always focused on the unconscious forces that drive our relationships and intimate lives. I started writing about sexuality about 20 years ago. I always joke that I did so right after I moved to New York; my parents were far away and didn’t speak English, and I didn’t know anyone here. That gave me a lot of freedom to explore what was unspeakable in the home I grew up in: issues of sexuality and intimacy. My project with Come Closer has been to find ways to share what I’ve observed over the past 25 years of this work, using psychoanalytic theory, clinical material, and stories from my own life to bring readers into the heart of this work.

Q: What are the six child archetypes that you have identified through your work as a psychoanalyst?

Galit Atlas: In Come Closer, I........

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