Psychoanalyst & Writer
Catherine
Baker-Pitts
Clinical work informed by literature. Writing informed by the unconscious. Each practice deepening the other.
Clinical work informed by literature. Writing informed by the unconscious. Each practice deepening the other.
A licensed psychoanalyst and gender specialist consulting with individuals, couples, and families in New York City.
Rarely is psychotherapy a quick fix, but whether in a time-focused consultation or during sessions that span years, it can be a space that offers direction or calm, inspires curiosity and bravery, reveals sources of unsettling tendencies and attachments, and ushers in new possibilities.
The therapy endeavor can be filled with energy and clarity, locating desire and its impediments. Or it may surface conflict and pain, new dilemmas, and doubt. Its specific purpose and aims are personal, but psychotherapy offers the potential for movement, change, and ultimately growth — in a judgment-free atmosphere of compassion and respect.
A true family drama
Contributions to psychoanalytic literature on gender, embodiment, eating disorders, and intersectional feminist practice.
Presentations at the APA, NYU Postdoctoral Program in Psychoanalysis, and psychoanalytic institutes across New York City.
I am a psychoanalyst in private practice in New York City and a writer working at the intersection of clinical and literary life. My ideas flourish where psychoanalysis meets intersectional feminism — buttressed by client-centered principles of Harm Reduction, Gender Affirmative Care, and Health at Every Size.
For over a decade, I was a member of The Body Attachment Group, affiliated with the New School for Social Research — an international team of feminist psychoanalysts, body and movement therapists, and infant attachment researchers studying the transgenerational transmission of anxiety in the body from caregiver to child.
As an adjunct faculty member at NYU and guest lecturer at several NYC psychoanalytic institutes — including ICP, the Gestalt Institute, WTCI, and WAWI — I have taught courses in Gender Trauma, Object Relations Theory, Weight Bias and Fat Acceptance, Critical Approaches to Cosmetic and Weight Loss Surgery, Transgender Health, and Attachment Theory.
I served for nine years as book review editor of the Eating Disorders Journal of Treatment and Prevention, and was a founding member of the National Eating Disorders Association in 2001. I am based in Harlem, New York City.