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Recently, the illness of the analyst has gotten attention. His/her concomitant anxiety and that of his/her patients have been written about. Little has been written on the analysts' grief over the loss of their loved ones in traumatic, sudden, accidental death of child, spouse or parent.
The suddenness makes for a real intrusion into the analytic space that is hard for the analytic dyad to ignore/deny. Appointments are abruptly canceled, billings are late and public notice in newspaper obituaries reveal one's personal histories. Attendance at funerals, hearing eulogies, and patients' condolence calls are all events one usually cannot and does not prepare for.
Unconscious material seems less guarded and/or characteristic defenses get thrown into visible high relief. This will be illustrated from the vignettes from my own clinical practice during my recent period of bereavement with six ongoing analytic cases.
Counter transference/counter reactions will be surveyed in the sparse literature and discussed also through clinical vignettes. Perhaps only in the pregnancy of the analyst, again a very significant intrusion into the analytic space, can there be such an opportunity for the analyst as well as the patient to be both observing and experiencing.
Thirty years ago when I was a pregnant resident, my continuous case was supervised by my department chief, a general psychiatrist. He was on holiday when my patient began giving me clear signals he was about to bolt treatment. His new complaint was that he was having severe post-orgasmic headaches, and he was becoming convinced his problems were physiological rather than psychological. I asked a senior analyst, my preceptor, for advice.