Chapter 21. Brasilia 1975. Clinical Seminars

Presenter: The patient is a thirty-nine-year-old woman who started analysis four years ago. She complained of feeling very strange; she didn't know who she was any more, she only knew that she was not herself and was afraid she would never come back again. She thought a ‘head shrink’ would be able to bring her back.

I am reporting a session that took place four months ago. She said she wanted to tell me something that happened the previous day. “We were on our way to a party but couldn't find the number of the house where it was to be held. I began to feel bad, as if I was going to disappear. I quickly got into the car and felt more secure. My husband backed the car and we found the right house. The moment I was under a roof I felt secure – it seems that the roof and walls give me a great feeling of security. In the living room I felt very well, but the moment my husband asked me if I was feeling well, remarking that generally I don't feel well in unfamiliar places, I started shaking and feeling bad. I was talking to some friends and looking at the food – I couldn't wait to start grabbing it.”

Bion: She seems to be telling two different stories: one is about the feeling of security; the other is the answer to her husband. I don't know to whom the first one is the answer, but it is probably what she feels able to tell the analyst, and even to some extent herself. But the moment the analyst becomes somebody who wants to know, “Are you feeling well?” – like the husband – then the language she speaks is suddenly quite different. Why are there these two different stories? Is the one she tells her husband told in that particular language in order to make it easier for him to understand, or to make it more difficult? What she told her husband or anyone else is, in my opinion, of very little importance. What is important is what sort of language this

patient is likely to speak to the analyst. I would ask myself whether I would be able to do analysis if the patient speaks t