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Presenter: The patient is a doctor, a pathologist, who has been in treatment with me for five years. During the first month of treatment he had frequent migraines which came at the week-ends. After the first month he became free of these headaches. Recently they appeared again.
Bion: Why did he come for analysis?
P: His chief complaint was difficulty in sexual relationships. He seemed to be very glad that his migraines stopped, but he was never interested in exploring the fact. He has occasionally mentioned it during the five years, but has shown no signs of wanting to go deeper into the matter. I get the impression that the headaches returned because we were dealing with envy in recent sessions. And I think envy also had something to do with their disappearance.
I thought the following session was interesting. He came in, lay down, and remained silent – which was not typical of him. Then he started speaking about his brother who is in analytical training. He had had a phone call from his brother who told him that he had just bought an apartment – he is very wealthy. The patient said he felt very envious and angry, but was nevertheless able to talk to his brother and even listen to him and learn something from him. The patient said he knew that envy was very destructive, and this time he had managed to control it.
B: What did he expect to happen if he didn't control it?
P: I asked him what he meant by controlling his envy. His reply was verbal silence accompanied by movements which he usually makes when he is anxious. He usually lies on his back; this time he lay on his side and kept moving his body. After a while he said he felt
very distressed and, “You are trying to confuse me because I wasn't able to control my aggressiveness”.
B: Well, somebody seems to have been controlling somebody. He started off by saying that he was controlling the envy. Now it appears that one half of the conflict at any rate is inside the analyst. If he wasn't controlling envy, what was he c