Children as Collateral in the Fear of Becoming Forgotten: Death Anxiety as the Ultimate Loss

Abstract

People who have an emotional anchor and a sense of self can view others as separate and different; but, those with no sense of personal value, inner stability, or lasting internal identity desperately search for these elements in others. This quest is in part based in a belief that others might serve as collateral to find the antidote to fundamental anxiety and mental distress. Projective identification becomes the singular vehicle in a desperate and aggressive hunt for reassurance of meaning and existence. These psychological experiences are characteristic of the paranoid-schizoid part object world, in which the focus is more on self-survival and extremes of love and hate than the more whole object-related, flexible, depressive state of mind. During psychoanalytic treatment, one way in which these disturbed and disturbing psychic perspectives emerge is in how patients feel and think about parenthood. Case material is used to compare more integrated whole object couples with more disturbed part object couples through their differing internal perspectives of children and parenthood.