Abstract:In this article the author discusses the problems and dilemmas created by patients who are chronically late for analytic hours or frequently absent from them. The discussion focuses on a single case study, in which this phenomenon was a predominant feature of the analytic process. The author explores some of the issues, dynamic and defensive, underlying such behavior as well as motivational components involving unresolved oedipal issues and powerful unsatisfied narcissistic needs. The temporal difficulties of … Show more
“…However, Meissner () considers that his patient badly needed to keep the area of autonomy expressed by his lateness, and implies that to over‐emphasize its negative interpersonal meaning would have been unhelpful. Going further in his warnings about the technical mistakes that can easily be made, Bird () emphasizes that with narcissistic patients:[I]f coming late is interpreted as a defense against either positive or negative feelings for the analyst, the patient will have no part of it and will feel extremely threatened.…”
Section: Technical Considerationsmentioning
confidence: 99%
“…However, Meissner (2006) considers that his patient badly needed to keep the area of autonomy expressed by his lateness, and implies that to over-emphasize its negative interpersonal meaning would have been unhelpful. Going further in his warnings about the technical mistakes that can easily be made, Bird (1957) emphasizes that with narcissistic patients:…”
Section: Technical Considerationsmentioning
confidence: 99%
“…However, despite the richness of the literature on how our experience and relationship with time can be understood psychoanalytically, and of course the innumerable articles that mention lateness in specific instances during a therapy, there is relatively little in the literature that focuses on chronic and extreme lateness. Notable exceptions are Morris (1983), Meissner (2006) and Piovano (2008). TIME AND REALITY Freud pointed out that: 'There is nothing in the id (the system Ucs.)…”
This paper considers some aspects of the meaning of chronic lateness in psychoanalytic psychotherapy. The central role of time in psychoanalytic work and the significance of enactments around the analytic frame are considered. Using clinical material the writer explores how lateness can be understood as an expression of global difficulties in accepting and adapting to the demands of reality as well as a wide range of complex object-relationship difficulties. Some of the technical and countertransference complexities of dealing with lateness are discussed. Lateness is seen to project intolerable experiences into the therapist, to demonstrate the patient's intense difficulties in imagining and tolerating a productive couple, to re-enact a sadomasochistic dynamic from the patient's past and to re-encounter/re-address the patient's early experiences of rejection and oedipal rivalries. The eventual synchronization of therapist and patient's times is explored as a major achievement in the patient's increasing capacity for relating.
“…However, Meissner () considers that his patient badly needed to keep the area of autonomy expressed by his lateness, and implies that to over‐emphasize its negative interpersonal meaning would have been unhelpful. Going further in his warnings about the technical mistakes that can easily be made, Bird () emphasizes that with narcissistic patients:[I]f coming late is interpreted as a defense against either positive or negative feelings for the analyst, the patient will have no part of it and will feel extremely threatened.…”
Section: Technical Considerationsmentioning
confidence: 99%
“…However, Meissner (2006) considers that his patient badly needed to keep the area of autonomy expressed by his lateness, and implies that to over-emphasize its negative interpersonal meaning would have been unhelpful. Going further in his warnings about the technical mistakes that can easily be made, Bird (1957) emphasizes that with narcissistic patients:…”
Section: Technical Considerationsmentioning
confidence: 99%
“…However, despite the richness of the literature on how our experience and relationship with time can be understood psychoanalytically, and of course the innumerable articles that mention lateness in specific instances during a therapy, there is relatively little in the literature that focuses on chronic and extreme lateness. Notable exceptions are Morris (1983), Meissner (2006) and Piovano (2008). TIME AND REALITY Freud pointed out that: 'There is nothing in the id (the system Ucs.)…”
This paper considers some aspects of the meaning of chronic lateness in psychoanalytic psychotherapy. The central role of time in psychoanalytic work and the significance of enactments around the analytic frame are considered. Using clinical material the writer explores how lateness can be understood as an expression of global difficulties in accepting and adapting to the demands of reality as well as a wide range of complex object-relationship difficulties. Some of the technical and countertransference complexities of dealing with lateness are discussed. Lateness is seen to project intolerable experiences into the therapist, to demonstrate the patient's intense difficulties in imagining and tolerating a productive couple, to re-enact a sadomasochistic dynamic from the patient's past and to re-encounter/re-address the patient's early experiences of rejection and oedipal rivalries. The eventual synchronization of therapist and patient's times is explored as a major achievement in the patient's increasing capacity for relating.
“…We see far less in the literature of a detailed description of the unfolding analytic encounter as transference and countertransference are mutually mobilized in the face of the patient's repeated disregard of agreed-upon aspects of time. Noting the paucity of discourse around the more specific theme of the patient's chronic lateness, Meissner (2006) offers a detailed description of his work with a chronically late patient that explores the relationship between the patient's lateness and his hostility toward his father, rebellion against his mother's control, and issues of dominance, submission, dependency, and conformity. This story, however, is told from a one-person perspective.…”
Section: Lateness As Therapeutic Constructmentioning
This is a detailed examination of a psychoanalytic encounter that focuses on the patient's chronic lateness and other conflicts with time. I offer a moment-tomoment study of the ways in which analyst and patient mutually navigate and survive the patient's chronically late arrivals, with specific focus on the analyst's ongoing involvement and the reenactment of the patient's traumatic past. Through the mutual exploration of these recurring themes, a one-way relationship of complementarity and impasse is transformed into one where analyst and patient mutually recognize each other as similar, yet separate, centers of being. This developmental achievement has reached deeply into the patient's life infusing it with richness, complexity, and gratification.
“…William W. Meissner's recent report in this Journal (Meissner, 2006) regarding the perplexing clinical challenges posed by his conspicuously late patient, Jake, made a great impression on me. This patient was tardy for the vast majority of his sessions across a lengthy 1,000-hr long analysis; only 141 hours commenced on time and 111 hours were missed completely 1 .…”
This communication is a commentary on William W. Meissner 's presentation (2006) of a patient who chronically came late for sessions. The time duration of analytic work-relatively restricted per hour yet potentially limitless in overall duration-represents an existential paradox that is fundamental to the basic representational qualities of mental experience, and inherent in a mute way in the analytic frame. It is to be expected that the latent temporal elements of the patient's conflicts will inevitably challenge this aspect of the frame, subtly coercing patient and analyst to recreate these novel dimensions. If the analyst is too cautious regarding the inevitability of countertransference reactions to such a patient, important developmental opportunities may be missed. I suspect that the chronic lateness and absence that characterized the work with this patient screened an early, nonmentalized trauma that had torn a hole in the foundations of the patient's sense of time, and was inadvertently expressed by Meissner in an entirely atypical manner.
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