The Internalization of a Representation of the Therapist as an Element in Psychotherapeutic Gain.

Abstract

This paper illustrates the beneficial effect of a positive benevolent transference in the development of an internalized representation of the therapist/analyst in a variety of patients in psychodynamic treatments ranging from consultation to psychoanalysis itself. This is described in patient presentations. In those who have had substantial early nurturant life experience and now find themselves in a dysphoric state due to crisis, the effect lies in the transference reactivation of these positive object relations that relieve their distress. In those who have been deprived of such early experience, the positive transference may emerge during the intensive work of psychoanalysis and may lead to the internalization of a new positive object representation of the analyst generated in the transference that persists after termination of treatment. In both of these situations, the patient discovers a sense of greater harmony with self and the world. The special conditions that permit and facilitate this process are described since this does not occur in all psychodynamic interventions.