Psychology Case Study
Case Study
Elissa is developing mental problems and is facing a severely compromised reality testing. The condition, therefore, is proof that she is in the in the psychotic level of personality organization. She is in fear, and believes that there are beings that want to ‘get her.' The compromised reality testing is proof to the level of level of organization, and also eliminates the possibility of any other level. Elissa’s reality testing is evidently compromised, which proves that she is not at the neurotic level, where reality testing is intact. She is also not at the borderline level since she is experiencing a severely fragmented sense of self. The condition is evident on a full-time basis, eliminating the borderline level, where the condition is random and fragmented (Lacan & Miller, 2013).
Projective Identification
A classic example of projective identification at the psychotic level is that involving a psychotic boy and his therapist. The 14-year-old school boy is constantly experiencing a fantasy of putting his ‘sick brain' in the mind of the therapist so that she can go through the endless troubles and torments that he goes through each day. The boy fantasizes about putting his "sick brain' into the head of her therapist. He wishes that if only the therapist could visualize the number of license plates that he saw and how he was always accused of stealing when he touched anything in school. The young boy fantasizes about tormenting his therapist from within so that she could feel how he felt from the inside. The patient, in this case, does not only rid himself of something but also inhibits another being and controlling them from within. The defense is adaptive to the relational patterns of the schoolboy, because, through it, he can quit worrying and hating himself for a while. However, it causes major harm, and thus it is maladaptive to him as it increases his mental instability and makes the schoolboy develop relationship problems, resulting to low self-esteem.
Question
Tatiana purges after every meal and doesn't feel this is an unusual practice for controlling her weight. To her, it is quite normal. Her purging behavior is Ego syntonic.
References
Lacan, J., & Miller, J. A. (2013). The Ethics of Psychoanalysis 1959-1960: The Seminar of Jacques Lacan. …