Termination of Psychoanalysis and September 11

Abstract

In the United States, the last illusion of safety from problems in distant parts of the world was shattered on September 11, 2001. Psychoanalysts are in a unique position to both experience and examine how such a man-made social disaster becomes internalized and affects one’s psychic reality by studying the effects of that day on patients already engaged in a psychoanalytic process.The author hypothesizes that in one such case, that of Mr. N, the termination phase was significantly affected. Furthermore, Mr. N’s reaction to reading the analyst’s clinical write-up further influenced the termination phase.