AN ACCIDENT WITH THE DEATH DRIVE AND ITS WORKING THROUGH IN THE ANALYST’S COUNTERTRANSFERENCE

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

Working through the different faces and vicissitudes of the death drive in the countertransference, and especially through projective identification, is a very challenging process. A thorough and versatile process of containment and working through of the manifold threatening expressions and influ-ences of the death drive is required, experienced most specifi-cally and deeply in the arena of projective identification. This paper demonstrates how each aspect that unfolds in the ana-lyst’s countertransference sheds light on a particular layer of anxiety and internal object relations related to it. The creation of a new meaning to the differing expressions of the death drive gradually lessens the compulsion to repeat and enables a better integration between the life and death drives. This process will be illustrated by a prolonged clinical case that in-volved intense internal working through of the death drive in the analyst’s countertransference.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)79-108
Number of pages30
JournalPsychoanalytic Review
Volume110
Issue number1
DOIs
StatePublished - Mar 2023

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© 2023 N.P.A.P.

Keywords

  • Melanie Klein
  • countertransference
  • death drive
  • projective identification
  • transference

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • General Medicine

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