5. The Oral Stage

Marie : A case of obsessional neurosis

« I'm always afraid that my son will get a cold »

Through these sessions, we gradually understand the meaning of the symptom and its purpose in the subjective economy of the subject. Marie over protects her son but this over protection of which we perceive the excessive and obsessive nature, masks in reality a very strong aggressiveness towards her brother whose image is being projected onto her son. We can imagine that, in the unconscious, a substitution took place: the son was put in the place of the brother and the unconscious feelings related to the representation of the brother moved onto the son. Marie cannot accept her aggressive feelings (of which she is not aware), so she has unwittingly put in place a behaviour of over protection that is the opposite of aggressive behaviour in order to fight against and continue to ignore the hatred she unconsciously feels. Hostile feelings vary in intensity according to external circumstances. When her son is sick or when he has bad grades, he becomes much less her brother. The over protection is then sufficient to prevent the aggressiveness from surfacing. On the other hand, when he succeeds or when he is in good health, he becomes more and more the image of the brother: the handsome and strong boy whom she hates unconsciously because this image is associated with the rejection that he expressed towards her. In this case, the over protection gives way to criticism and to aggressive behaviour noticed by her entourage. On the other hand, Marie has probably never accepted that her brother has one, (a phallus – this expresses her penis envy), she clearly expresses her position with respect to castration in the session where she talks about cats and trees. The sick or failed son also symbolizes for Marie a form of physical and mental castration; if her son no longer benefits from his phallus, he no longer resembles her brother and she won't feel the envy and jealousy towards his sexual identity. In which case, she can again, be motherly and protective of him. The repressed aggressiveness and hatred towards the brother manifests itself through dreams of disappearance and of war. In the waking state, the feelings of aggressiveness are maintained in the unconscious by the moral censorship of the superego. On the other hand, in the preconscious state of awakening, the forbidden feelings can appear at least in the images of the dream. The dream of the witch is quite explicit because it reveals Marie's secret desire though she is yet able to establish the link between her son and her brother where the two distinct representations along with their affects remain isolated from each other. Marie's transference on me marks an important step because it is from this session and through those that will follow, that she will be able to express and recognize the hatred she bears towards her brother. Gradually, Marie will be able to accept her feelings towards him, making the isolation between the representation of the brother and the son less strong until finally she can consciously recognize the link that has been established between her brother and her son. From that moment on, Marie will understand the meaning of her symptom and will be able to free herself from her obsession. On the other hand, her son, accustomed to responding to his mother's anxieties from an early age, will probably have to seek psychological help in order to be reassured and to give up the symptom that his mother unconsciously needed him to have so that she could love him