CO-HOST · INSIDE THE CONSULTING ROOM
Richard Raubolt, PhD, ABPP
Board Certified Psychoanalyst
Nearly five decades in the consulting room.
Still curious. Still questioning.
And still finding reasons to laugh.
Richard brings a wicked sense of humor, insatiable curiosity, and a deep respect for the complexities of being human—qualities that have shaped nearly five decades of thinking about and practicing psychotherapy.
A LIFE IN PSYCHOTHERAPY
Experience hasn't made the questions smaller.
It's made them more interesting.
Richard Raubolt is a board-certified psychoanalyst and clinical psychologist with nearly five decades of experience practicing, teaching, supervising, and writing about psychotherapy. His work has been shaped by an enduring interest in psychoanalysis, trauma, and the complexities of the therapeutic relationship.
His professional life has included founding the West Michigan Psychoanalytic Society, serving on the Board of the International Forum for Psychoanalytic Education, and becoming the first internationally elected member of the Portuguese Association for Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy and Psychoanalysis.
Richard is the author of three books exploring trauma and psychotherapy—Power Games, Theaters of Trauma, and The Intimate Edges of Psychotherapy for Complex Trauma—as well as two clinical training manuals and five films examining psychology in its broader social and cultural context.
Throughout his career, consultation has remained an essential part of Richard’s work—not simply as a way to find answers, but as a place to question what we think we know. That spirit of curiosity, openness, and willingness to be surprised is at the heart of what he brings to Inside the Consulting Room.
IN THE CONSULTING ROOM
The longer you do this work,
the less certain the easy answers become.
Richard approaches psychotherapy with the perspective of a psychoanalyst and the curiosity of someone who still expects to be surprised. His work is grounded in psychoanalytic thinking, but shaped by decades of listening closely to the complicated, contradictory, and often unexpected ways people make sense of their lives.
He is particularly interested in what happens beneath the surface—in the stories people tell, the patterns they repeat, the things they avoid, and the moments when something new becomes possible. His extensive work with trauma has deepened his respect for both the resilience of the human mind and the complexity of meaningful change.
And despite the seriousness of the work, Richard has never believed the consulting room needs to be solemn. Humor, playfulness, irreverence, and a well-timed question all have a place there. Sometimes seeing something differently begins with being willing to look at it from an angle you hadn’t considered before.
OUTSIDE THE CONSULTING ROOM
Nearly five decades of psychotherapy.
Fifty-five years with the same sweetheart.
For all the time Richard has spent thinking about psychotherapy and the human condition, some of the relationships that have taught him the most began long before he entered a consulting room.
He has been married to his college sweetheart, Linda, for 55 years. Together they raised two sons and now have three grandchildren—a family life that has unfolded alongside nearly five decades of clinical work.
Away from psychotherapy, Richard has walls filled with books, though fiction is what he reaches for most. He loves Sunday afternoons spent watching classic black-and-white films, and listening to early recordings of Miles Davis or Coltrane is his idea of heaven. The Red Wings break his heart, but he still tunes in. Bourbon neat is his drink of choice, and he always seems to be writing something.