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Presenter: The patient came on time, looked very anxious, lay down on the couch, and was silent for a long time. Then she started to talk, saying that she couldn't come last Friday; she was cut off by the rain when she was leaving her job, so she couldn't take the car or get a telephone message to me. She was silent for a short while and then said, “Today I notice that I am afraid of you”. She said she became aware of this fear when she heard there was a very famous psychoanalyst in Brasilia. She wondered if, being a psychologist, she could attend some meetings. People came to ask her how they should go about getting a place at the talks this analyst was giving. She didn't know the answer so she thought she would ask me about it. She said she was carrying on an inner dialogue with the following argument; “If I ask her, I know she won't give me the answer; if I don't ask her, I shan't know where the meetings are going to take place”. So she decided to speak out and to explain the situation to me. I pointed out that the conversation with herself was a way of avoiding speaking directly to me.
Bion: Why did she say she knew she wouldn't get an answer?
P: Later on I raised this question. Her answer was that this arose from the kind of relationship she had with me.
B: How often does she come?
P: Four times a week. I have the impression that sometimes she feels in contact with me, and I myself feel in contact with her, but only occasionally. She has been in analysis for over a year. She has a baby girl, eighteen months old. A month ago she got a job as a psychologist, but not in the clinical field. Since she started working full time, her sessions are at the end of the day after she has finished work. Before this she never missed sessions or forgot to
pay the account or came late; now she arrives late and sometimes misses one session a week.
B: What about this point that when she does come you feel that she puts distance between you and herself? How does she do that?
P: I get