ABSTRACT
Psychosis is characterized by the foreclosure of the Name-of-the-Father and the lack of inscription of the logical operation of separation. This chapter explains the dialectic between alienation and separation in the structure of the subject in order to demonstrate its particularity in psychosis. Jacques Lacan introduces the formula of the paternal metaphor in his “On a question preliminary to any possible treatment of psychosis”. According to Lacan, in psychosis the child takes the place of the object in the maternal fantasy. His psychosis was triggered at the age of three in the typical style of “very early dementia”. From a perspective linking psychoanalysis with paediatrics, Ginette Raimbault discusses parents who desire the death of their children, and the role this plays in the latters’ illnesses. Lacan’s perspective is set in opposition to all psychological theories of anorexia. Instead of presenting it as an independent clinical picture, he addresses it as a symptom articulated within a particular structure.
