ABSTRACT
As a result of the narcissistic pain, the parents of the disabled child can develop unrealistic expectations of the healthy child, who has to compensate for the disappointment, frustration, guilt and/or feelings of failure in the family. The birth of the disabled sibling might change the communication in and outside of the family. This chapter focuses on the therapy process of an adolescent girl with an autistic sibling and tries to highlight the complexity and difficulties in the transference and countertransference that emerged during therapy. It elaborates mainly on the mental impact of having a disabled sister, although her primary anxieties, as a result of growing up with a depressed mother, and the oedipal anxiety in relation with her emotionally abusing father, clearly should not be underestimated in the expression of her psychopathology. The chapter also focuses on the sibling complexity that emerged from the clinical material, which preceded a more oedipal reflection.
