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Presenter: The patient is forty-six years old. He has three older brothers and two younger sisters. His father was a powerful, wealthy man who died a few years ago. The patient's difficulties go back to early childhood. His testicles remained in the abdominal cavity and two surgical operations were unsuccessful; consequently he is sterile. He didn't finish high-school education and has never had a steady job. His brothers work in the family business, but because his relationship with his father was so bad it was impossible for the patient to enter the business also. He described his father as a violent dictator. The patient left home and lived in a slum for four years. He took to drink and gave his money away to any new acquaintance.
When he started analysis three years ago he was drinking heavily, had hallucinations at night, and was very anxious about the possible death of his father who was very ill.
The first year of treatment was confused: he missed many sessions, drank a lot, and sometimes phoned to say he wanted to come to the session but was too afraid. He made the analytic work very difficult by lying all the time.
In the second year, after his father's death, he changed completely. He became apathetic, stopped drinking and came to the sessions accompanied by his mother. He usually started by saying, “Doctor, I am on foot – I haven't anything to say.”
Member: For how long did he come with his mother?
P: Every day for a year.
Bion: Whose idea was it that his mother should come?
P: The family's, because he missed so many sessions and was apathetic.
B: Why did he miss the sessions? Because he didn't come or
because he didn't listen? Or because his mother brought him – not his own legs and feet? If the mother insists on bringing him, not when he is four or six but forty-six, she comes to the session.
P: During the second year I felt the analysis was empty. Month after month: “I am on foot.” Silence. And a phantasy about having won a football pool, and what he would d