The Anxiety Code by Roger Di Pietro, PsyD

April 2018 (reprint)

GoodReads Giveaway

Original publication: Oct 2014, Nov 2015

Nonfiction, digital, education 

ISBN: 9781312136601

418 pages

1/14/2021

 

I received a complimentary digital copy of this book from GoodReads Giveaway in exchange for an unbiased review. It appears that this book has been reprinted on several occasions and the version I was granted access to is at least 2 years old. 

 

The title is a little off putting labeling anxiety as neurotic which carries a negative connotation of a medical disorder. I totally respect a well educated and trained clinician but am taken back by how that might translate as condescending. It’s impressive when a person with an impressive pedigree can translate their knowledge and experience in a manner which relates to people without judgment.

 

Admittedly, the author does advise that this book isn’t a self-help text not should it be used for diagnosis but rather conversation and discussion. 

 

“Consistent with Dr Adler’s recipe for accessibility, this book’s instructive, yet controversial style palatably blends its ingredients of art and sciences.”

 

The author embraces his interpretation of the teachings of Alfred Adler, MD, an Austrian psychotherapist who founded the school of individual psychology. His theories are based on social psychology and the importance of the feelings of inferiority and superiority in the role of personality development. Unlike Dr Adler, I find this author’s perspective paradoxically demeaning. The term neurotic anxiety was coined by Sigmund Freud and hasn’t been used since 1700’s to describe mental, emotional, or physical reactions that are drastic and irrational. 

 

In 1980, the American Psychiatric Association removed the term neurosis from its diagnostic manual as part of a revamp to standardize the criteria for mental illnesses. So, it the author’s intent was not to provide self help or diagnostic assessment then it seems he accomplished the goal of providing a “controversial style” but disagree that it “palatably blends” with what most would understand as the goals of understanding anxiety. 

 

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2759253320