A Contribution to the Psychological Explanation of the Arc De Cercle

I have at present a female patient whom I am treating for agoraphobia. I must say at the outset that she has as yet never had an attack accompanied by the phenomenon of arc de cercle, that she has clear symptoms of anxiety-attacks with phobia but without disturbances of consciousness, and that she has almost entirely repressed the physical side of her love-life. I have never had any occasion to speak to her about the arc de cercle.

Very often she tells me of dreams in which the psycho-analytical treatment takes place in the W.C. In one dream she was sitting on the seat and, whilst in the act of expelling fæces, she admired the beautiful sunset through the open door of the closet. (She has artistic talent.) Her dreams very often contain symbols of birth, a child and the male genitals.

In her agoraphobia she feels that she lacks something. Hitherto she has only recognized in this lack the desire for maternal protection and care, and her defensive measures correspond to this idea.

One night she dreamt that she was twisting herself backwards, with the feeling that this would enable her to squeeze something out in the region of the clitoris. She actually had the feeling in the dream that the clitoris had already grown into a protruding excrescence. According to her description of it, the position which she assumed in the dream was that of the arc de cercle. Her association to this position was the expelling of fæces, and with the excrescence she associated a penis. In the dream, by means of the arc de cercle, she changed the concave (feminine) into the convex (forward-thrusting, masculine) posture. She was pressing out the penis, and in this her whole body was assisting her.

Undoubtedly this dream throws light on the meaning of the hysterical arc de cercle. How often does the hysterical attack imitate birth or the acts which in the unconscious are equated with birth!