ABSTRACT
Intimacy has memorably been called “that most fragile and cherished edifice of the private sphere” (Gurstein 1996: 217). The phrase speaks volumes about the cultural and social heritage that shapes our emotions, and the idealized images of intimacy that haunt our daily lives. As psychoanalysts approaching the discussion from backgrounds in sociology (Silver) and literature (Kupersmidt), we come together in our recognition that, in clinical work, intimacy is a close-up experience with hidden referents. Because we are perhaps inadvertent guardians of the right to a private, intimate space, we hesitate to think of intimacy as a consciously sought-after construct. Our aim is rather the development of a depth of emotional experience, with and in the presence of another and with recognition of its therapeutic value. This commitment to intimately known selves in relation to others leads us to negotiate fragile territory in our work, deliberately or accidentally approaching or distancing our patients by signs and gestures that will be interpreted according to an encoding of intimacy that has been acquired, inherited and created, and for each of us that encoding will be both like and unlike our own.
