ABSTRACT
A young, gifted analyst gives a complex interpretation to a woman patient, who ‘responds’ to it by saying that, the night before, she had wanted to have a pizza with some friends, but they had insisted on going to an expensive restaurant, where, on top of everything else, the portions were scarily huge; then she had been bewildered when the time came to pay the bill. At another point in the same session, the analyst first sums up what the patient has said, then describes the prevailing emotion of her communication, and finally gives a transference interpretation. The patient ‘responds’ by saying how an uncle of hers was moved to tears on returning home after a long absence. Later in the session, she says that for her boyfriend she feels she is only really there when he sees her and phones her.
