ABSTRACT
This chapter describes the echoist’s predisposition to use sessions to speak about an external narcissistic person, as avoidance of responsibility for her own self, and as a way of evading contact with the internal omnipotent object, which can cause even more terror than the external version. It explores the usefulness of that concept in recognising and understanding the echoist. The chapter suggests that many echoistic patients have been overlooked and may continue to be so if this phenomenon is not widely acknowledged. The question of mistaken diagnosis occurs, and echoistic patients often feel that something is wrong, but because there is no category for echoism, they misdiagnose themselves. The act of blaming was itself enough to convince the patient that she was demonstrating “borderline behaviour”, and that the critical-voice “must be right”. This powerful session revealed the internal unconscious dynamics that accompanied her external actions and allowed the patient to break the cycle of always accepting the object’s authority.
