In the 1970s, The Primal Scream dramatically altered the landscape of psychotherapy, becoming an international bestseller and introducing more than one million readers to primal therapy, the lower-brain therapeutic method Dr. Janov applied in his work with John Lennon.

Life Before Birth is just as important. Dr. Janov explains how epigenetics affects a person’s mental health and can later result in disease. He asks for a reorientation of not only our approaches to pregnancy and our use of drugs for a variety of symptoms, but above all, to the modes of psychotherapy we implement to treat everything from phobias and compulsions to chronic anxiety and depression.

Praise for Life Before Birth

"Life Before Birth is a manifesto that provides a robust argument for increasing attention to the neuro-mental lives of fetuses and infants, and the widespread ramifications on mental health if we do not."
— Jack Panksepp, PhD, Bailey Endowed Chair of Animal Well-Being Science, Washington State University, author of Affective Neuroscience: The Foundations of Human and Animal Emotions.

"An expansive analysis! This book attempts to explain the impact of critical developmental windows in the past, implores us to improve the lives of pregnant women in the present, and has implications for understanding our children, ourselves, and our collective future."
— K.J.S. Anand, MBBS, DPhil, FAACP, Senior Scholar, Center for Excellence in Faith and Health, Methodist Le Bonheur Healthcare System, professor of Pediatrics, Anesthesiology, Anatomy & Neurobiology.