On Bearing Unbearable States of Mind

by Roth,Priscilla

• ISBN13: 9780415205191
• ISBN10: 0415205190
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Nonspecific Binding
• Copyright: 1999-03-31
• Publisher: Routledge

Summary

Addressing the lack of literature aimed at helping psychoanalysts deal with very difficult patients,On Bearing Unbearable States of Mindprovides clear guidance on how the analyst can encourage the patient to communicate the quality of his or her often intolerably painful states of mind and how the analyst can interpret these states, using them as a basis for insight and psychic change in the patient. Employing extensive and detailed clinical examples and addressing important areas of Kleinian theory, Ruth Riesenberg-Malcolm examines the problems that underlie severe pathology and shows how meaningful analytic work can take place, even with very disturbed patients. Bearing Unbearable States of Mindshould be a useful and practical guide for psychoanalysts and psychotherapists and all those working in psychological settings with severely disturbed patients.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements	p. ix
General introduction	p. 1
The internal world in the transference
Introduction	p. 11
The Mirror: a perverse sexual phantasy in a woman seen as a defence against psychotic breakdown	p. 15
Interpretation: the past in the present	p. 38
The constitution and operation of the superego	p. 53
Construction as reliving history	p. 71
Defences against anxieties of the depressive position
Introduction	p. 87
Self-punishment as defence	p. 93
Technical problems in the analysis of a pseudo-compliant patient	p. 113
As-if: the phenomenon of not learning	p. 125
Hyperbole in hysteria: 'How can we know the dancer from the dance?'	p. 137
Pain, sorrow and resolution	p. 150
Theoretical refinements
Introduction	p. 165
The three Ws: what, where and when: the rationale of interpretation	p. 168
Conceptualisation of clinical facts in the analytic process	p. 181
Notes	p. 194
Bibliography	p. 196
Index	p. 199
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