Michael Birnkrant | PsyaD, LMHC
Graduate of the Doctor of Psychoanalysis Program and master’s in counseling program*
Before coming to BGSP, I had planned on becoming a medical doctor. However, I also wanted to know more about why people do what they do. Seeking the answers to my questions, I majored in psychology as an undergraduate and started reading Freud on my own. Not yet satisfied, I enrolled in an elective class offered at my school, An Introduction to Psychoanalysis. This course, taught by a BGSP faculty member, piqued my interest even further.
After beginning medical school, I found myself constantly wanting to use my critical and abstract thinking skills to connect me emotionally to the inner processes of the human mind. It was then that I realized that BGSP would offer the opportunity to do just that. Upon transferring into the Master of Arts in Psychoanalytic Counseling program, I not only fulfilled my quest to gain a deeper understanding of why people do what they do, but I also found a place that felt like home, and became actively involved in the student association.
I have since graduated from both the master’s and doctoral programs at BGSP, completed a school-based counseling fellowship program, and became a licensed mental health counselor (LMHC). Since completing the doctoral program, I have been very busy working with children, adolescents, families, and adults at an outpatient psychotherapy practice, and as a psychoanalyst in private practice. Even after graduating from the doctor of psychoanalysis program, I have been continuing my journey aimed at furthering my knowledge and understanding about the deepest mysteries of the human condition.