Chapter 12 Filled with Doubt

In the traditional story of Hansel and Gretel, the two children, abandoned by a harsh and cruel mother and a compliant father, wander about the woods, lost and hungry. They come upon a house made of gingerbread that they proceed to eat, and are confronted by an old woman who, although she looks ugly, speaks to them in a kind voice, provides them with nourishing food, and tucks them into two soft little beds with pure white quilts. According to one version of the story, ‘The children lay there and thought they must be in heaven’ (Impey 1992: 82). They discover the next day that the woman is in fact a wicked witch who treats them in a rough cruel way, and is intent on fattening them up in order to eat them.

A patient who suffered from an eating disorder had a dream in which a woman was selling fruit from a stall in the street. At the front there were shiny red apples, and the back was filled with rotten fruit. Although she looked perfectly ordinary, my patient said she knew that it was her mother, and that she was really a witch. She knew with certainty that the shiny red apples were poisoned, and only the rotten fruit at the back contained no poison.

For a while, Hansel and Gretel believe they have been rescued by a benevolent figure who offers them all they could wish, but they soon discover that they have not in fact escaped from the cruel destructive maternal figure. In my patient’s dream, she knew, with certainty that she was dealing with a malign figure, however the woman disguised herself. In the first case, there is a sudden realization that the good object is in fact malign. In the second case, there is the conviction all along that the object is poisonous.

In this chapter I want to describe a different state of mind that may exist in the patient and to explore the way this may, in turn, affect the

analyst’s state of mind. In contrast to the patient who knew, in her dream which fruit was poisoned, the two patients I will refer to have profound doubts about th