This paper first summarizes the theory of psychoanalytic couple therapy form the point of view of contemporary object relations theory(s) and then locates psychoanalytic couple therapy in the larger context of psychoanalysis. The author then asks the question why some individuals get the therapy they need by being brought in by their partners. These patients seem to enter treatment because of a threatened break-up of the couple or a breakdown of one of the partners. The author observes that in these cases unresolved aspects of the self have been located in the partner to such an extent, that at least one partner will initially be very resistant to couple therapy. Winnicott's concepts of ‘undifferentiation’ between self and other and his notion of ‘fear of breakdown’ are used to investigate the couple dynamics in those circumstances. Clinical examples show the slow process of disentangling and reclaiming projected aspects of the self from the ‘shared unconscious phantasy’ the two partners had created.