ABSTRACT
This chapter describes how the dramatization of experience by children in the consulting room, can be effectively used by the clinician to facilitate the unfolding of material and lead to change. It describes Annette Watillon’s suggestion that “the ‘speed and spectacular nature of the therapeutic effect’ in work with under several results from the ‘dramatization’ of experience in the therapeutic setting”. The chapter summarizes the several-session intervention with the family to illustrate the unfolding process. A defensive pattern develops, and the young child splits off and projects feelings of helplessness and anxiety about “not-knowing” into his parents and teachers, who feel increasingly deskilled. The therapist may suggest extending the exploratory work with parents on their own before introducing the children to the clinic. Parents of small children often complain of feeling immobilized in the face of their children’s intense emotional outbursts or demands, expressing bewilderment at having lost a firm grip of their own parental capacities.
