Bodily experience in psychoanalysis as it is encountered developmentally and during treatment is the focal point of this article. The evolution of psychoanalytic thinking on the way that somatic experience contributes to the development of a distinctive psychic self and to the establishment of an intersubjective dialogue between caregiver and infant is traced. Additionally, the relevance of attending to the somatic experience of both analysand and analyst during the course of treatment is underscored, particularly with patients whose primary mode of communicating about their internal experience is through various forms of bodily expression.