ABSTRACT
Here the author discusses how the unconscious ideational content of the instinctual drives and the concomitant affect response constitute an integrated whole. However, in the case of psychic trauma, this experiential entity may break down. If the capacity for psychic representation fails, the solid affect experience tends to disperse into bodily excitation and disconnected id-impulses, possibly enacted with destructive consequences. Instead of emerging as an object-directed wish, the instinctual drive then seeks discharge as direct action, whereas the concomitant affect response becomes re-somatised. Using two case histories, the author examines the opportunities a psychoanalytic setting offers to solving the problem of broken affect states, where the disruptive experiences of the past may be worked through without overwhelming shame and guilt.
