Meetings of the New York Psychoanalytic Society

June 10, 1952. ON THE ROLE OF ANIMALS. Marcel Heiman, M.D.

Commenting on the fact that psychoanalytic literature contains very little clinical case material on the role which domesticated animals play in the life of man (aside from the phobias and perversions), Dr. Heiman presents a case which demonstrates that animals may be used as depositees of id material and how we can make use of the man-animal relationship in our psychoanalytic practice.

A thirty-five-year-old woman started analysis because of intolerable anxiety in anticipation of her forthcoming marriage—her second. She had had three years of treatment with two other analysts prior to this analysis. She could have only four interviews prior to the marriage, shortly after which she became pregnant and terminated her treatment just prior to delivery.

Two weeks after she returned from her honeymoon, she first spoke of her dog which had been in the bedroom on an occasion when she and her husband were having intercourse. This recalled primal scene memories. Her identification with the dog became quite clear, particularly in a series of incidents relating to bowel movements (her own and the dog's). She talked of how bad her dog was, that he was a nuisance to everyone, that he was noisy, and filthy in his soiling. The patient indicated that she derived vicarious satisfaction from the dog's uninhibited behavior. After the patient became pregnant she identified the unborn child with the dog. Hostile impulses toward the child were projected as hostile impulses to the dog. On another occasion, following an outburst of rage against her mother, she beat the dog. As the treatment progressed there was a striking improvement in the dog's behavior which preceded that in the patient. One time the dog was taken by the patient's mother. In the dog's absence the patient soiled, and in the analysis recalled childhood experiences of soiling in the presence of her father. As the patient came to accept her femininity mo