ABSTRACT
After the development of the child’s libido up to the sexual trauma of the Oedipus complex and recognized in it the decisive point for the formation of neuroses, a question is raised as to how far each neurotic symptom, as it becomes intelligible in the analytic process of healing, conforming to the birth trauma. The fundamental significance of the birth trauma as a means of expressing every neurotic anxiety is proved by the fact that it forms the starting-point of the most diverse neurotic symptoms which in other cases can arise without the operation of a shock. All forms of the neurotic development of anxiety, including phobias, conform to the same process, according to the mechanism revealed through analysis. The same may be said of the so-called actual form of anxiety neurosis can be traced to direct disturbances of the sexual function, since the coitus-interruptus causing it corresponds to the anxiety roused by the mother’s genitals.
