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The oedipal phase child cannot easily reconcile death-wishes toward his or her parents (based on intense rivalry, jealousy, and possessiveness) with concurrent loving and dependent feelings. For that reason children sometimes attempt to form fantasy compromises which afford agreeable "solutions" to their oedipal dilemmas. Little Hans constructed such a fantasy "solution" which Freud (1909) summarized this way:
Things were moving toward a satisfactory conclusion. The little Oedipus had found a happier solution than that prescribed by destiny. Instead of putting his father out of the way, he had granted him the same happiness he desired himself: he made him a grandfather and married him to his own mother too (p. 97).
Adult patients involved in intense oedipal phase transferences often have similar difficulties. A patient of mine in her sixth year of treatment, facing termination issues interwined with those of a positive oedipal competitive transference, arrived at a uniquely modern "solution" to her dilemma. Ms. B's "solution," like Little Hans's, seemed to offer both rivals considerable advantage.
For a number of months following our mutual agreement that we could begin to consider termination, Ms. B had been dealing with two sets of problems: (1) her feelings of dependence upon me; her love for me; her incredulity that we would