On the State of “Speechlessness”: When Analysts are Mis-Recognized by Their Patients

Abstract

Relational psychoanalysts have been seeing ghosts, belonging to both patients and analysts, which can haunt the analytic dyad, especially if left unprocessed by any of the parties. Drawing on two clinical examples, I explore a state of “speechlessness” that followed comments by patients that alluded to assumptions about my ethnic and religious background. I make a case that in these encounters mis-recognition by the patient led to a confusion of self-states, leading to “speechlessness” and fragmentation in me. I further explore how certain ghosts of my past were called into the room in these encounters and how they possibly haunted me.