Analysis Interminable Reconsidered

“The business of analysis is to secure the best possible psychological conditions for the functioning of the ego: with that it has discharged its task” (Freud, 1937, p. 250). Through the history of psychoanalytic theory and technique, attitudes toward termination have been dominated by this tenet. The resolution of core neurotic conflicts, the detachment from infantile incestuous bonds, a diminution of transference distortions, and the achievement of autonomous functioning are among criteria for termination cited repeatedly (Hums, 1971; Langs, 1974; Firestein, 1974). Controversies over the role of termination in psychotherapy as opposed to psychoanalysis, over the characteristics of a termination phase, and regarding the specific techniques for termination have arisen, but, with scant exception, the conclusion of an analytic treatment is presumed.

In 1927, Ferenczi argued against the abrupt ending of analysis. He felt that analysis would end properly when patients became convinced that, as a source of gratification, it yielded little. He cautioned, however, against ignoring the neurotic meaning that the wish to leave may carry. Kelman (1971), from a position reflecting Karen Horney's work, similarly expresses “abiding caution” about the meaning of “completion, finality, or end phase” of a psychoanalytic process (p. 420).

In more contemporary writings, Goldberg and Marcus (1985) and Leigner (1986) also challenge the dictate of termination. Goldberg and Marcus pose the idea of analysis being an open-ended process with termination taking myriad forms in response to the individual needs of patients. In Leigner's discussion of termination and modern psychoanalysis, she tentatively broaches the possibility of analysis becoming a continuing source of “emotional nutrition.” While acknowledging the role of healthy interdependency between the analytic couple, Leigner describes psychoanalysis as an “ongoing human process that can never fit into a formula of certainty” (p. 15). S