Arctic Spring: Potential for Growth in Adults with Psychosis and Autism

261 Pages·2005·0.68 MB·English

by  Laura Tremelloni

ARCTIC SPRING

ARCTIC SPRING
Potential for Growth
in Adults with Psychosis and Autism
Laura Tremelloni
Edited by
Judith Edwards
KARNAC

To my parents
With love and regret for all that was left unsaid

CONTENTS
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ix
A NOTE ON THE SUBJECT OF CONFIDENTIALITY xiii
PREFACE xv
Introduction 1
PART I
Theoretical aspects
1 Autistic capsules in adults 17
2 Vicissitudes of the transference in work
with autistic adults and children 33
3 Countertransference: an overview 51
4 Use of countertransference in patients
with autistic capsules 60
vii
viii CONTENTS
5 Working with adult patients with autistic capsules:
obstacles to treatment 77
6 Therapeutic factors in the treatment of patients
with autistic cores 95
PART II
Case studies
7 Elisa 119
8 Irene 143
9 Ambra 168
10 Renzo 190
Concluding remarks 207
GLOSSARY 223
REFERENCES 229
INDEX 243
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
First of all, I would like to thank all my patients for the precious
contribution they gave in shaping the hypotheses put forward in
this work and for the trust they placed in me even during periods
when there was no analytic improvement. By sharing their psychic
torment, I was able to enhance my personal and professional knowl-
edge. I would like especially to thank the patients who gave me per-
mission to publish the work we did together. They were aware of the
fact that it might be useful towards an understanding of others in
helping them to realize their full potential.
I would like to thank all the authors mentioned in this book, since I
obtained support and clarifications from their works.
I would like to express my gratitude to my colleagues and super-
visors, who, during different periods of my training, helped me
through individual analysis, seminars, or supervisions and patiently
accompanied me during the long process of personal and professional
individuation. Their original contribution and passionate interest in
research were important elements of support and stimuli for my daily
analytic work.
I would like to thank my supervisors who helped me during the
early stages of my career. Due to the initiative and courage of
Pierfrancesco Galli, in the mid-1950s a psychotherapy study group was
set up in Milan, where Gaetano Benedetti (Switzerland) and the late
ix