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Some may wonder why and how group therapists became involved in treating psychoneurotics. We would probably be criticized for it by D.H. Lawrence if he were alive today. Years after the publication of Sons and Lovers, his well-known novel about the Oedipus situation, Lawrence became interested in psychoanalysis and experienced it himself. Later he condemned it as too scientific and remarked that neurotics were better off dead than treated: “I believe that a real neurotic is a half devil, but a cured neurotic is a perfect devil… I would prefer that neurotics died” (Puner, 1947, p. 237).
Since Lawrence's time, we have discovered that some “perfect devils” become cooperative human beings more easily when given the opportunity to work together on their problems. When they secure the love they crave for themselves, they become capable of giving love to others. A therapeutic group experience gives sanction to them to be themselves.
Psychoneurotic syndromes encompass the hysterias, obsessional (compulsion) neurosis, and mixed psychoneurosis. Viewed in historical perspective, their delineation as well as our approach to them as primarily psychological disturbances caused by mental factors, are recent developments. Even more recent is the recognition that they are the manifestations of an ego capable of relating relatively well to people.
Physicians of ancient Greece and Rome gave accurate descriptions