A Female Analyst's Use of Desire

SINCE FREUD'S CURIOSITY ABOUT WOMEN was guided by his male point of view, his attempts to shed light on the "dark continent" were colored by presumptions that consequently structured his theory. Despite his explicit wonder, Freud believed he knew what it was that women wanted and, because of their biology, could never have. In his paper, Femininity, Freud (1933/1974) wrote, "The feminine situation is only established … if the wish for a penis is replaced by one for a baby" (p. 87). For Freud, "What does a woman want?" was posed rhetorically.

In this same paper addressed to his colleagues Freud also wrote, "If you want to know more about femininity, enquire from your own experiences of life" (p. 93). Therefore, from a female analyst's perspective, I will explore the idea that what a woman wants has more to do with processing desire than with substituting acquisitions. As analyst, diagnostic understanding and interpretive selections are derived by filtering clinical data through the exquisitely sensitive instrument of the professional gendered self. Therefore, in the context of her work, "What does a woman want?" interests the female analyst because it asks her to maintain self-awareness while guiding the treatment process. I propose that the female analyst's attention to her desire in the countertransference engages a sensual element of interpersonal process that informs and enlivens the work.

Regardless of theoretical approach, the analyst and patient share a transactional field that is comprised of each participant's fantasies, wishes, and expressive style. One's identity as female or male involves the presentation and communication of underlying psychic-relational patterns influenced by cultural role expectations (Person, 1985). Woman and man, as analyst or patient, must each contend with aspects of self-definition structured in large part by gender proscriptions. For example, being a man is predicated