ABSTRACT
In a letter simply dated January 1916, Mabel Dodge, clearly conversant in contemporary psychoanalytic jargon, wrote to Smith Ely Jelliffe in New York requesting treatment. The relationship between Mabel and Maurice Sterne was characterized by extremes of passion, jealousy, destructiveness, and distance, as well as her intense and violent ambivalence. The "jealousy complex" she referred to in her letter to Jelliffe was often fueled by Sterne's looking at other women or by Mabel's misperceptions of his actions. The "compulsory action" she mentioned often had her searching for clues to his betrayals, but also refers to her own driven sexual behaviors with him that seemed intended to solidify their bond, however temporarily. In his next letter to Mabel, A. A. Brill seems to be warning her against being too financially charitable with Sterne, whom she provided with room and board. Freud himself wrote many letters to individuals currently or formerly in analysis with him, among them Ferenczi, H.D., and Marie Bonaparte.
