Talk:Analysis Terminable and Interminable
Analysis Terminable and Interminable
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In response to Rank's proposal of providing shorter cures, Freud, using the example of the Wolf Man, makes the central theme of this article the duration of the treatment and "the part of the transference which had not been resolved" (p. 218). The problem of the slow progress of an analysis "leads us to another, more deeply interesting question: is there such a thing as a natural end to an analysis?" (p. 219). A terminated analysis supposes that two conditions are fulfilled: first, the patient must be relieved of symptoms, inhibitions, and anxieties, and second, enough of the repressed must be made conscious and elucidated, and enough of the resistance conquered, so as to banish the risk of repetition.
Three factors affect the length of a treatment: "the constitutional strength of the drive," "traumas," and the "alteration of the ego" (pp. 220-221). Freud indicated that if the traumatic factor is preponderant, the situation favors progress towards a "definitively terminated" analysis (p. 220). Two factors are responsible for interminable analyses: "the constitutional strength of the drive" and "an unfavorable alteration of the ego acquired in the defensive struggle" (pp. 220-221) that results in a kind of dissociation or restriction of the ego.
To follow dialectical reasoning by opposing a "terminated analysis" to an "interminable" one might not be of use for theoretical research on the end of analysis. Too much stubbornness on this point could reinforce a somewhat ideological position consisting, as Freud wrote in "Remembering, Repeating and Working-Through," "in resolving every one of the patient's repressions" and "in filling all the gaps in his memory" (1914g, p. 220). A failure to achieve this end could result from the constitutional strength of the drive being rooted in biology.
In 1937, the metapsychological model explained most closely the economic and dynamic aspects of clinical experience, aspects that had previously eluded explanations using the notion of opposition of forces. Thus the end of analysis was described by means of a much more complex psychic apparatus involving both the first and second topographies, as well as two classes of drives that place the "psychic conflict" at the center of mental functioning.
When drive is mentioned in this late work, it must be understood in the context of a two-drive model, whether in its relation to the object or to the ego. The pressure of the drives is countered by the ego, which sets up a resistance using various defenses, some of which, as "reaction-formations," constitute the louder aspects of neurosis. Though Freud used the term "transference-love," Eros is not the only component in the dynamics of the transference. Various obstacles face the analysis, with the risk of a negative therapeutic reaction always on the horizon. These negative developments might be moderate during the analysis only to flare up at full intensity after its termination.
On the basis of two examples, Freud implicitly introduced two essential ideas regarding the end of the treatment. The first concerns what would now be called the counter-transference in relation to a young female homosexual. The second idea involves the time of exploration necessary for the numerous returns of negative currents.
This article implicitly links the themes of psychic conflict, failure to achieve completion, the negative, and counter-transference. Resistance to the loss of the object and to the constitution of masculine and feminine identifications is grounded in the dynamics of the binding of the two drives, itself influenced by the transference and the analyst's interpretations.
In this work, Freud did not directly raise the issue of the analysand's desire to become an analyst, although he very probably was referring to Sándor Ferenczi when he mentions the belated disclosure of the negative transference. The remnant of negative transference that is the desire to become an analyst was made the subject of a study by Jean-Paul Valabrega concerning analytic training (1994).
The negative current is one working perspective outlined by Freud in this late text. Several subsequent authors, each in their own way, revisited the question of the negative. As different as their works might be, one common point becomes clear, namely that an analysis, even in the favorable case of a transference neurosis, confronts the protagonists with the play of binding and unbinding of the drives and with inevitable negative phenomena. The length of treatment, which has increased over time, is due, in large part to a wish to analyze the negative currents, particularly in the transference.
RENÉ PÉRAN
See also: Biological bedrock; Cure; Ferenczi, Sándor; "From the History of an Infantile Neurosis" (Wolf Man); Negative therapeutic reaction; Psychoanalytic treatment; Technique with adults, psychoanalytic; Termination of treatment; Therapeutic alliance. Source Citation
* Freud, Sigmund. (1937c). Die endliche und die unendliche Analyse. GW, 16; Analysis terminable and interminable. SE, 23: 209-253.
