Commentary by a Jungian Child Analyst

Natalie seems uncertain where her place is in the room and she is relieved when the therapist offers her the chair. Is this her experience in her family - unsure where she fits, in relation to the others? I was struck with the absence of others in the drawing of the girl having her lunch alone, and I wondered what the tracksuit meant for her (a warm covering garment or a garment in which you compete on racing tracks?)

She tells the therapist that she cries and her tummy aches and she does not want to go to the language classes: ‘they (the parents) pull me and I don't want to move and they can't’.

Is she telling the therapist something about her difficulty in separation, which her parents ‘can't’ help her with? I wondered also from these remarks what the birth experience had been like. Does her remark also indicate her anger/resistance to being moved out and on into language classes and growing up?

Her sobbing seemed to be triggered off by looking into the box and the dolls-house and I wondered if these stood for the insides of mother's body where the babies/ siblings are lodged, i.e. the loss of her infant experience and needs which perhaps were not fully met. The parents' view of her ‘attention-seeking’ behaviour imply a difficulty in thinking about her emotional needs and the more infantile aspects of her personality. My view may be substantiated by the persona of the tracksuited girl and her disregard for the ‘babyish’ toys in Session 2, so she might at this tearful stage be struggling with a phase of the depressive position.

She did respond well to the therapist and could take what was offered, so that her perception of the therapist was not one of a persecuting object.

Session 2

Is it harder to leave mother when her younger brother is there and she cries as she leaves her, and does her depression make her ‘not care’ when the therapist asks her where she wants to sit, though she chooses again the small chair: an indication that this is a place where her infan