ABSTRACT
This chapter is based on psychoanalytic therapy with psychotic children and with the psychotic residues in neurotic children. It will suggest that the situation described by Dr Bion as a ‘psychological catastrophe’ is associated with a traumatic ‘psychological birth’. In normal development, psychological birth coincides with physical birth, but in psychotic children psychological birth has been experienced as a catastrophe. This causes the cognitive inhibition and dysfunctioning which are outstanding features of psychotic states.
