David Spiegel
David Spiegel was born on January 1, 1945, and went on to pursue his education at two of the most established institutions in the American northeast. He completed his undergraduate studies at Yale College before continuing his medical training at Harvard Medical School, a sequence that grounded him in both the liberal arts tradition and rigorous clinical preparation.
Following that training, Spiegel built his professional life as both a psychiatrist and a psychotherapist, working within the overlapping dimensions of diagnosis and therapeutic practice. These dual roles reflect engagement with distinct but related bodies of clinical knowledge, encompassing the medical and the psychological aspects of mental health care. In recognition of his contributions to the field, he received the Strecker Award, a distinction presented within psychiatric medicine.
The Library of Congress Name Authority File records him under the entry "Spiegel, David, 1945-," with the open date indicating that the record remains current. As a citizen of the United States, Spiegel has worked throughout his career within the American professional and institutional context, maintaining his standing as a psychiatrist and psychotherapist. The Strecker Award stands as a documented marker of recognition within his field.
Quotes by David Spiegel
If no one wants to talk to you about the fact that you're dying, you feel very isolated, ... That's one of the powers of a group.
My patients call that the prison of positive thinking. There is no truth at all to the idea that if you get sad, angry or frightened about cancer that you're giving in to it and allowing the cancer to grow.
My patients joke with me. They ask me, 'Doctor, am I living longer yet?' I say, 'I don't know, but you're living better.' The goal in our groups is not to pretend you're going to make your cancer go away but to live well in the face of cancer.
The personalities may have quite a complex and subjectively compelling inner world, in which they have alliances, relationships and civil wars among themselves.
The term 'multiple personality disorder' has historical precedent but it perpetuates the mistaken idea that the proliferation of personality is its key feature. The problem is actually not more but less than one personality: a difficulty in integrating fragments.