ABSTRACT
Freud was pessimistic about the psycho-analytic approach to the narcissistic neuroses. He felt that people suffering from these diseases had no capacity for transference, or only insufficient remnants of one. In narcissistic object relations omnipotence plays a prominent part. The object, usually a part-object, the breast, may be omnipotently incorporated, which implies that it is treated as the infant's possession. In narcissistic object relations defences against any recognition of separateness between self and object play a predominant part. Awareness of separation would lead to feelings of dependence on an object and therefore to anxiety. In this chapter the author illustrates some of the problems related to severe narcissism by bringing case material from a patient who showed a marked narcissistic transference without being overtly psychotic. The clinical result of the analysis of a narcissistic patient depends on the degree to which he is gradually able to acknowledge the relationship to the analyst, representing the mother in the feeding situation.
