ABSTRACT
In the course of psychoanalysis, some children who are initially diagnosed as suffering from Autistic Spectrum Disorder (ASD) turn out to move back and forth along an autisto-psychotic spectrum. This subgroup, or spectrum, is characterized by a mixture of paranoid-schizoid anxieties and less differentiated autistic anxieties-of-being. Thus, these children could be described as borderline autistic. The interpretation of unconscious anxiety proves to be a crucial factor in the analyses of these children. They are characterized by an overwhelming influx of intermingled anxieties. Thus, it is the analyst's difficult task to try and trace the dominant, urgent anxiety and interpret it in its own "language." It is helpful to interpret and show the child how autistic withdrawal serves against further fragmentation, and the way fragmentation prevents an influx of paralysing anxieties-of-being. Furthermore, different anxiety states require different technical considerations and means. This is especially so when the type of anxiety is related to disintegrated or unintegrated states of the body. Clinical material taken from a five-sessions-per-week analysis of a boy, initially diagnosed as ASD and later on as suffering from childhood schizophrenia, will attempt to demonstrate the internal dynamics and the technical challenges involved when working with the autisto-psychotic spectrum.
ABSTRACT
This paper describes three early developmental modes of handling the individual's psycho-genetic heritage. The first one, which characterizes normal development, is called living with the shadow of one's heritage. The shadow (of history, of life and death) is a natural counterpart of the self. The second mode, which accounts for more disturbed patients, is called living under the shadows of heritage. This type is characterized by an unconscious phantasy of the person being haunted by persecutory and vindictive ghosts instead of benign ancestors. The third mode, which might be encountered in severely disturbed patients, is being the shadow. This mode, called Chimerism, describes a confused organism which may turn against itself as parts of it are experienced as alien. On the unconscious level this signifies a heritage which cannot be experienced or mentalized as such. Rather, it is a complete chaos with moments where the hardly existent self is experienced as a bizarre object made up of non-combining, welded parts. These three modes will be examined with the help of material drawn from two analyses: of an autistic boy and of an adult patient who was persecuted by an unspeakable, horrific ancestral past.
