Page - 78 - in Psychoanalytic Perspectives on Puberty and Adolescence - The Inner Worlds of Teenagers and their Parents

78 Psychosexual development in puberty When I question him, James says he was not thinking of anything in particular when he chose the photos and combined them for his collage. I don’t let him off the hook and ask who is holding the chainsaw. Could it be an instrument of lib- eration? Or is one of the dwarves using it? James says no to all my suggestions. When the class is completely still, since they are all waiting for the answer, he says laughingly: “It’s just sticking in his neck!” It seems to me the boys in the class are laughing at this, too. “What does the stamp mean? Is it a stamp for the man?” I ask. “I found it, and since I couldn’t think of anything else, I pasted it on,” says James. “Is it supposed to do something to the person?” I insist. James reflects, hanging his head to the side. “No, I couldn’t think of anything.” I do not wish to attribute too much importance to James’ work, and thus enter an A into my book and turn the class’ attention to another work. Discussion The students cope with the unconscious content of violence and threat by laugh- ing. With their laughing, they defend themselves from the threatening aggres- sion and destruction that they sometimes also experience themselves. We can also speculate what James is expressing with the phallic aggression of soldiers shooting and fighting, which interests all male adolescents to a lesser or greater extent. For the first time in school, James can answer his teacher’s questions – before, he would just shrug his shoulders mutely and avoid eye contact. Rather naively, H. expected him to be able to articulate the unconsciously arranged top- ics of deportation and annihilation. But he immediately is seized by inhibitions: when James says the images have no meaning, this means these feelings are blocked on the conscious level. Yet he says the chainsaw is sticking in the man’s neck. We can recall that James tried to choke a fellow student and afterwards was committed to a psychiatric hospital. By saying “I couldn’t think of any- thing”, he is trying to distance himself from this meaning, which is nevertheless clearly visible in the work and thus serves as an outlet for these painful feelings. All in all, we can understand this form of handling unconscious conflicts as an important aid for James to creatively depict (and also talk about) aspects of his dark side. His fellow students deal with him empathetically, although the girls are neutral. In child analysis, symptoms and difficulties in school or within the family often disappear quickly, which still does not mean that the adolescent’s inner world is now ordered and stable. Therapy is still necessary to open space for the child where she can express her conflicts through play. In small episodes, James managed to talk of his dark threatening memories and thoughts with H. With a social worker, James visited a special education facility, and H. talks with him about it: “How did it look?” I asked. “There are rooms with two beds, they look new.” “Did you also see the classes?” I ask. “Yes, a little bit. They look