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Presenter: This patient has been with me for thirteen years. At the beginning of the analysis I didn't know why he came because he didn't seem to have any complaints and apparently knew everything. He even asked me to read several books, and as I was interested I did so.
I have the impression that the analysis falls into three phases. The first was when symptoms and complaints started to appear and he wanted to understand exactly what I said. He brought a dictionary to the sessions and would look up various words I used. Then he brought an etymological dictionary also. I tried to show him that all his efforts were really an attempt to avoid understanding what I was saying.
Bion: What language is being used by the analyst and by the patient? The relationship seems to alter when the patient has ‘symptoms’. Who thought they were symptoms? The patient? Or the analyst? Who called them symptoms?
P: I used the word as a characteristic of the patient at that stage.
B: Did the patient think they were symptoms?
P: At first he couldn't accept anything that might mean he was ill.
B: Yes, I understand that, but what has happened to make him think that there are any illnesses?
P: For a time, both before and during the analysis with me, he tried several different kinds of treatment such as group therapy.
B: The questions I am asking are very difficult to answer. What is going on with this patient? There is no physical illness; no mental illness. But there is a great outbreak, an eruption of treatments and
cures. Would you not begin to be suspicious that there must be some diseases somewhere? Why should there be a concentration of cures and methods of treatment in one place? It seems to me that we have to consider that there is something wrong. What you have been describing here is not an outbreak of patients, but an outbreak of analysts wanting to cure you. You are suffering from somebody who has nothing wrong with him, but who has a whole lot of books with which he can treat you.
Let's