Seite - 236 - in Psychoanalytic Perspectives on Puberty and Adolescence - The Inner Worlds of Teenagers and their Parents

236 Lost by the wayside – overstepping limits until he drew blood and threatening to kill him, whereupon the younger brother locked himself in the bathroom and called their mother on his mobile phone. Initial interviews During the initial interviews the mother was already in tears, reproaching herself that Vinzenz would have become another person with another mother. He was at the center of her narrative: her second son, who had been diagnosed as a schizo- phrenic, had continually threatened suicide, and imparted to her the feeling she had failed. The mother’s family history was as follows: she was the second of three sisters – one two years older, the other 14 months younger. She never felt understood by her parents; her grandmother and great -grandmother lived with them; she felt nurtured by the grandmother. Three months after her birth, the mother went back to work in the legal profession. She decided to have psychotherapy with two sessions per week. Escalation In the third session, she brought a dream that took place in a foreign country where everyone was killed by an old -fashioned gun. To my interpretation that she was full of murderous hate towards Vinzenz, she added: “and towards my mother. She is always saying she was able to bring up her three daughters well, why can’t I do that with my three sons?” Discussion The old -fashioned guns indicate early feelings from her childhood: the murder- ous rage in her that she herself calls dangerous. She is both victim of parental violence – it is still unclear in what form – and perpetrator (presumably in fan- tasy). The patient projects her neediness onto Vinzenz, but actually shows that she would have needed and still needs a mother. She called me before her seventh session quite upset, because Vinzenz had just been brought to the psychiatric ward in an ambulance by the police. Since he gam- bles and drinks, he demanded more money from her; she refused him, whereupon he blocked her way and pushed her aside. The father hurried to help, but Vinzenz caught him in a stranglehold, causing the mother to call the police. When they arrived, Vinzenz let himself be committed. The plan was to have Vinzenz do an intensive six - to eight -week therapy after spending one week in the hospital. His mother was worried about him. Indeed, he broke off this intensive therapy after two days and came home. When I addressed her rage and aggression towards him, she could say that she sometimes thought: “then just kill yourself, then I’ll finally have peace from you.” When I interpreted that her great fear of her own aggression and destruction impeded her from embarking on a four -session -per -week analysis, she became thoughtful.