JUDIANNE DENSEN-GERBER, FOUNDED CENTER FOR DRUG ADDICTS

Los Angeles Times

Dr. Judianne Densen-Gerber, a psychiatrist and lawyer who founded Odyssey
House, a controversial treatment center and program for drug addicts, has
died. She was 68.

A resident of Westport, Conn., Dr. Densen-Gerber died May 11 of cancer in
New York City.

Heiress to the Densen box manufacturing business, she once said she felt
compelled from childhood to carry on the family name.

Soon after she founded her program in 1967, she won the support of top New
York officials, including Gov. Nelson Rockefeller and New York City Mayor
Edward I. Koch. The program expanded through the 1970s, with centers in New
England, Louisiana, Michigan, Utah and Nevada, as well as New Zealand and
Australia. Densen-Gerber also launched an affiliated treatment program for
addicted mothers.

In time, however, her authoritarian management tactics and extravagant
lifestyle and financial troubles at Odyssey House cast a shadow over her
work. While her drug-free treatment for recovering addicts gained wide
support, the group therapy tactics came under fire.

Critics saw her strong personality being played out in her psychotherapy
methods. "I'm feisty, abrasive, difficult, demanding, short-tempered," she
told New York magazine in 1979. "I don't need to be liked."

Complaints by former residents of Odyssey House and a state investigation
showing irregularities in Dr. Densen-Gerber's use of public funds for the
program led her to resign in 1981. The next year, she refunded $20,000 to
the state. After she resigned, she remained active in several offshoot
programs of Odyssey House.

She also wrote a number of books on addiction and child abuse, including
"We Mainline Dreams: The Odyssey House Story" (1971) and a
semi-autobiographical "Walk in My Shoes: An Odyssey into Womanlife" (1976).

Born in New York City in 1934, the only child of two lawyers, she was
raised with a household staff and graduated from Bryn Mawr college. At her
parents' insistence, she completed Columbia University law school before
she entered medical school at New York University.

She later said her work with drug addicts helped her resolve some of her
own painful experiences from childhood. Her strong-willed parents, she
said, left her feeling inadequate and dependent.