Our school of psychoanalytic thought deals with preoedipal, or narcissistic
disorders, thought untreatable by Freud.  What follows is a brief
description of how we see the problem of pathological narcissism and its
treatment.  It is free of jargon.  Although not a direct response to the
challenge, it is a contribution in the same spirit.  We use the jargon to
teach the concepts, and then we get rid of it as quickly as possible, so
that we can talk about human beings as human beings.  Discussions in our
classrooms would make sense to anyone interested, even if they were not
familiar with any psychoanalytic terminology.

Deborah Bershatsky, PhD
Co-Director, Mid-Manhattan Institute for Psychoanalysis


 Narcissism and the Narcissistic Defense
We use the term "narcissism" to describe an inability to love caused by two
things.

The first is an infant's failure to develop past the point when it first
begins to perceive its mother as separate from itself. Unlike Narcissus of
the myth, our narcissist loathes himself. His rage has nowhere to go. It has
no outlet because he and his frustrating mother are one. His internal
reality and the world around him are one and the same.

The second is that to the extent he has differentiated from his mother, he
fears that his omnipotent rage will destroy her, and himself. In an effort
to protect his own life, he turns his fury on himself, thus preserving his
mother, who keeps him alive, from destruction. This is called "the
narcissistic defense."

Dr. Hyman Spotnitz stresses the part of the Narcissus myth which shows that
Narcissus's preoccupation with himself destroys him, even though it is
described more as self-love than self-hatred. The Narcissus myth, though,
presumes a more evolved patient than the one we treat. To our thinking,
Narcissus is not curable through enlightenment. He is not a fool; he is a
victim.

We cure him by insinuating ourselves into his objectless world and becoming
a part of him, thus sharing with him the burden of his hatred. We then begin
to facilitate the process of differentiation, helping him to be angry at us
for our failure-as surrogates for the inadequate mother. At the same time we
prove to him that we are not destroyed by his hatred, nor do we seek
retribution. Now he realizes that he is safe in hating us. Merely tolerating
the patient's hatred is an act of love of which the original mother was
incapable. Through being loved in this way the patient develops self-esteem,
and also learns to love.