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The Infantile Erotic Countertransference and the Work of Renunciation

  • Michigan Psychoanalytic Society 32841 Middlebelt Road Farmington Hills, MI, 48334 United States (map)

Course Description:

It is a highly problematic but known fact that every psychoanalytic institute has had instances of analysts who have sexually transgressed against patients. Sexual boundary violations are an unremitting problem: they injure our patients and traumatize our analytic communities draping many of us in shame, silence and fear. This paper joins the significant scholarship in this area to propose that we do not, as a field, pay enough attention to the force and intensity with which erotic countertransferences can seize the analyst, neither do we consider the infantile sexual roots of these clinical phenomena which are endemic to our clinical work and extraordinarily helpful when well analyzed. This makes open conversations about erotic feelings extraordinarily difficult and it is that which may open the door to sexual violations. This paper explores some of the obstacles in having these critical conversations and offers concrete suggestions as to how analytic communities can help create space for them.

Course Link: http://www.mpi-mps.org

CE Value (credits): 2
CE Type: Standard

Sponsor Name:
Michigan Psychoanalytic Society

Contact Information:
Monica Evans
248-851-3380
monicasimmons@ix.netcom.com