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One of her patients hoped to leave Roux with a memory that she would not forget. Aside from the anal character and aggressive fantasies involved in this hope, Roux explored the patient's fear of being forgotten, abandoned, and lost, also his incestuous wish to seduce her and and leave her with child. The author discusses the notion of the analyst's memory in light of this patient's wish to leave her with something unforgettable. She speaks of the "collective memory" woven together from all encounters with all one's patients. Other memories are evoked in the passage of a session, mnemic traces which permit empathy with the patient but risk disturbing our capacity to listen. The analyst's memory is also subject to seduction, and the analyst's response might tend toward adroit sadism or aggressive countertransference.
What happens to the analyst's memory of patients and their sessions? Does it have a different function from the "habitual" memory of every human being? The author does not think so. She herself is astonished sometimes at the astonishment of patients about her memory. How can patients forget so readily what they love, what they have invested themselves in psychologically?
Roux suggests that from an analysis we remember those things that have to do with the events and affects that concern us. The particular necessity of remembering what is ours in our practice presupposes that we have been able to allow our own personal memories to develop, a function of one's own analysis, and thus that we can