The author discusses four cases in which the patient's mother's wasting away from cancer seemed to be the precipitating episode in the onset of anorexia nervosa. The actual loss of the maternal object suggests the significant role of maternal identification in the psychodynamics of these cases. A repudiation of pregnancy wishes and a flight from feminine identification with regression to primitive oral mechanisms were apparent in all four cases. The relentless pursuit of thinness is in itself a maternal identification with the anorectic mother. Their denial of weight loss allows the patients to continue the aggressive assault on their bodies in order to lessen their guilt over murderous impulses.