Letters in Response to Jody Messler Davies's “Between the Disclosure and Foreclosure of Erotic Transference—Countertransference: Can Psychoanalysis Find a Place for Adult Sexuality”

I found the article by Davies (PD 8/6), as well as the commentaries by Cooper and by Gabbard and Hoffman, and Davies's reply, all thoughtful and stimulating (as far as I can tell, only on an intellectual level). However, I was surprised by what seems to me a glaring omission in all the proceedings. I do recognize, with Cooper, that “the patient and analyst whose work is being described know each other far more intimately than the reader to whom the analysis is being described” (p. 767). At the same time, I believe there are unconscious feelings and thoughts that ensure that even the most intimate of relationships will always contain elements of the unknown and mysterious for both parties.

It is because of my respect for the abiding power of the unconscious that I was troubled by Davies's apparent assumption that she knew what dyadic fantasy constellation was sexually stimulating her patient David at the point when she disclosed her flirtatiousness to him. We are not told what David's associations had been before his comment, “Forgive me if I'm wrong, but I think you're flirting with me.” Nor are we told just what the analyst had been saying or doing that constituted “flirting.” What we are told is that Davies immediately recognizes the validity of David's observation. We are further told that Davies doesn't seem to have any hesitation in assuming she knows who she is to her patient at this moment. She is the mother. And, by acknowledging