Drawing from the verbatim record of sessions, the author illustrates how he used the concept of unconscious phantasies in the grief work in a case of a child's trauma. He reviews the origins of the concept and its early tie to somatic life as well as its role in symbolization. Unconscious phantasies are understood developmentally within a large spectrum of psychic events from healthy to maladaptive. In a case of trauma, early unconscious phantasies expressed somatically may play an important role in the attempt to restore a crushed symbolic system and allow enhanced verbal representation. Further adult clinical examples are presented.