ABSTRACT
This chapter explains that vignette is indicative of the attitude of many patients when they first come to see an analyst. They have a desperate clearly expressed hope that “somebody out there” will “fix” their lives for them. Their expectations, whether direct or implied, are of clear solutions to clear problems that have clear endings. Sigmund Freud discusses the fate of his famous patient, the Wolf Man, whose first analysis ended, principally, because Freud set a date for its termination. This analysis did not prevent the recurrence of some of the patient’s distressing symptoms. As a result of the Russian Revolution of 1917 the Wolf Man lost his vast estates in Russia and became penniless. Freud makes a distinction between “primal repression” and a second stage of repression, “repression proper”. Freud describes repression as a process that holds sway between the pleasure and unpleasure impulses.
