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Some time ago, when I began to evaluate my experience with patients during my pregnancy, I discovered to my surprise that almost nothing has been written about this topic (Hannett, 1949); (LeBow, 1963). Such silence in the usually rich psychoanalytic literature, which abounds in articles on every possible subject and which deals with the pregnancy reactions of analysands during their analysis, struck me as rather singular. I wondered why women analysts, many of whom must have been pregnant while practising, did not report on their experiences as these related to their pregnancy. Birth, on which so many fantasies, wishes and fears centre, is a universal theme, vibrant in every human being. As such, the pregnancy of the analyst, ipso facto, must constitute a unique experience for the analysand. It is consistent therefore with analytic theory to expect that, for the patient, the analyst's pregnancy has a special significance of a highly-charged stimulus and evokes deep-seated childhood conflicts, fantasies and wishes. The patient whose analyst becomes pregnant while he is embroiled in the transference neurosis has a singular opportunity to re-experience many of his pregenital and oedipal struggles. However, as has been discussed by Freud and many others, since there are variations in transference reactions which depend on differences in the aetiology of the particular neurosis, it is to be expected that there will also be differences in the patient's reactions to the analyst's pregnancy. It is likely that specific historic events in the life of the patient and differences in character constellation also evoke individual transference variations.
The analyst's pregnancy, however, cannot be viewed as constituting only a special event in the life of the analysand; it must also be considered in terms of its effect on the analyst. According to Bibring (1959), pregnancy should be considered as a normal psychic crisis which affects all expectant mothers, no matter what