The familial menage-a-trois: Mother-daughter sexuality and father-daughter incest

It is proposed that poorly integrated sexual feelings between mother and daughter are frequent early precursors of later incestuous interactions between father and daughter. Father-daughter molestation may be seen as an enactment of erotic urges and fantasies between mother and daughter that find origin in pre-Oedipal, mother-child qualities of relatedness. The familial menage-a-trois is an intrapsychic and interpersonal compromise for mother and daughter between a more deeply disturbed and a more fully severed internal and external bond; it allows both partners enough distance from their dissociated feelings to feel safe, enough proximity to feel vicariously connected, and enough libidinization to maintain an alliance with the exciting object.     

The preconscious and potential space.

Greenberg and Mitchell (1983) have suggested that the drive/structure model and the relational/structure model are mutually exclusive models of psychic life. We regard their contribution as an invaluable one, which makes explicit the fundamental divergences in psychoanalytic theory. We have examined a derivative tendency in the field, for drive and relational theorists alike, to present psychic life as a dichotomy between inner experience and outer experience. We see a tendency to equate the drive model with unconscious motivation, and to the primacy of internal experience. There seems to be an equivalent tendency to equate the relational model with conscious perception and motivation, and to the primacy of external experience. We are advocating, for drive and relational theorists alike, greater focus on the process of intermediation between internal and external experience in the psychic life of the individual. Within the context of the drive model, precedent for such a focus is found in Freud's conception of the preconscious, an essential third dimension whose function was to mediate between the conscious and the unconscious. Within the context of the relational model, Winnicott's notion of potential space serves as a bridge between interior experience and external reality in the life of the individual. Finally, we have argued that by constructing three-part models of psychic life, these theorists have laid the groundwork for a synthetic theory. Though for Freud the drive state is primary, and for Winnicott the relationship between the infant and its environment (mother) is primary, each theorist posits an intermediating zone that fulfills a similar function in the psychic life of the individual. Whether we choose to call that zone the preconscious or potential space, its function is to translate bidirectionally between the infinitely dimensioned realm of interior, or unconscious, experience and the time-and space-bound realm of external, or conscious, experience. By highlighting the parallel constructs, we are not claiming to have created a synthesis between the theories. Our claim is that the eventual road to synthesis appears to reside in the direction of a movement away from the dichotomy between the primacy of inner or outer experience, and toward the common meeting ground of the primacy of an intermediating function.     

Quality of Life,Anxiety and Depression in Soft Tissue Sarcomas as Compared to More Common Tumours: An Observational Study

The aim of this study is to compare the quality of life and the levels of anxiety and depression in a relatively large group of subjects undergoing chemotherapy for soft tissue sarcoma and a control group of subjects undergoing chemotherapy for the most common types of cancer. 56 soft tissue sarcoma affected patients and 56 patients with common tumours, homogeneous in regards to stages of disease and sociodemographic characteristics, were enrolled in two oncological centres in Turin, Italy. Quality of life was assessed by Functional Assessment of Cancer Therapy-General and anxiety and depression by Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale. All patients had ongoing chemotherapy. The comparison between the two groups shows no difference in either quality of life or in anxiety and depression. There are instead gender differences, since females in the group of common tumours show higher levels of anxiety in comparison to those affected by sarcomas, while males show, at a lower degree, the opposite trend. This study suggest that levels of Quality of Life, anxiety and depression are similar in rare and common tumours. The majority of patients are able to cope with the disease in an adaptive manner. However, for some patients the disease poses a threat to their physical and mental integrity; psychological support of these patients may reduce the development of significant morbidity and help patients to better manage the course of the disease and the effects of the treatment.     

The body emerging from the "neverland" of nothingness

The author considers sensory perceptions arising from the body to be the first expressions of self-consciousness and mental existence in patients who are overwhelmed by a dimensionless abyss of nothingness. This perspective can help the analyst in catalyzing the patient's integration with his deepest levels of mental functioning. Clinical material from the four-session-per-week analysis of a psychotic patient is discussed. To this analysis and, finding the body meant finding "the land that never was," a "land" that could begin to exist in analysis thanks to a relational working through within the analytic couple.     

Beyond the Psychosexual: The Body–Mind Relationship Discussion of “Somatic Experiencing”

The author discusses the importance of focusing on the body in analytic work since it functions as an important springboard for the patient to discover his or her unique existence. It also helps develop a dialogue between the mind and the body’s sensory level. This is a more archaic domain than the more often emphasized psychoanalytic tradition of organizing our thinking psychosexually. The author also underscores the differences between psychoanalysis and Somatic Experiencing and the risks and advantages of modulating or heightening sensory experience.     

Knowledge and experience of time in primitive mental states2

The author proposes that time be considered an object of working through during the psychoanalysis of patients whose mental functioning reveals distinct primitive aspects. These so‐called ‘difficult patients’ are particularly intolerant of the temporal limits of analytic sessions and often attempt to undermine the analytic setting. He presents some hypotheses about time and the mind's depth levels. A series of clinical vignettes taken from the analysis of adolescent, borderline and psychotic patients shows several ways in which the analysand's perception of and relation to time surfaces and is worked through in the course of analysis. Analyzing the relationship with time and the conflict between denial and acceptance of temporality proved a significant catalyst in the development of cases that had tenaciously impeded progress. It thus became possible to bring about important changes in the ways such patients experienced affect in the analytic relationship and in object relations, not by acting directly upon these relationships but by working instead on the formal parameters that organize the mind–and primarily on its spatio‐temporal organization.     

Treating Traumatized Children: Somatic Memories and Play Therapy

Drawing on psychoanalytic theories of infant development and children’s preverbal memories, this article explores the somatic memories in young children who experienced trauma and the level interventions necessary to facilitate the transformation of these traumas from concrete to symbolic representations. The clinical case of a 3-year-old boy who experienced hospitalizations and multiple surgeries prior to the age of 2 is used to illustrate the efficacy of play therapy for traumatized children. We argue that children do remember traumas from their infancy, and interventions geared toward re-enacting the traumas through play are necessary to help these children symbolize their experiences and alleviate their trauma symptoms.