City Research Online

Abstract

In this paper I describe a time-limited piece of work with a mother whose child committed suicide. The client went on to develop serious ulcerative colitis that I have conceptualised as the embodiment of her experience of disintegration in grief. Using Freud’s theory of identification with the lost object, I suggest that her illness represented an unconscious sadistic attack on herself and the identified-with lost object. Unconscious phantasies of harming the lost loved object resulted in guilt and resistance to making a link between her disease and her grief. I experienced this as a projective identification that made it difficult for me to work in the transference. Her failure to make herself better both from her disease and from mourning her son made her continue to feel like a victim. Being believed became a central theme of the work, reflecting the trauma she had experienced and her resulting belief that she would not be understood, annihilating her ability to make meaning.

Publication Type:	Thesis (Doctoral)
Subjects:	B Philosophy. Psychology. Religion > BF Psychology
Departments:	School of Health & Psychological Sciences > Psychology Doctoral Theses School of Health & Psychological Sciences > School of Health & Psychological Sciences Doctoral Theses

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