ISPPM - Journal Volume 8 (1996) english

Abstract: The aim of this paper is reflected in the title. Some essential components of the Marcovich-Method of neonatal intensive care have been identified and are described. They are less tangible than many parameters of conventional neonatal intensive care. Short-term outcome of Dr. Marcovich's work has been outstanding, meriting international recognition. Research into long-term outcome - especially of the emotional development of Marcovich babies - should be implemented forthwith.

Title: Shamanic Midwifery Every Mother a Midwife

Author(s): Jeannine Parvati Baker

Source: ISPPM-Journal Vol. 8 (1996) No. 1, 15-20

Language of article: English

Abstract: The author's thesis is that for a sustainable future, babies need

to be born gently at home, with every mother being a midwife herself and optimally attended only by her lover, the baby's father. This paper demonstrates how to enhance the inner knowing of the mother to give spontaneous birth. The author, as shamanic midwife, journeys to the source of intuition and midwifes the mother to heal herself. Pre- and perinatal psychology is revisioned to place imagination and soul-making central to our work - and assist the reclamation of birth out of the hands of the experts, back to the family. The paper concludes with an invitation for perinatal professionals to contribute to a world wherein every baby is greeted earthside by the original lovers and is a living demonstration of the possible family.

Title: "A Time to Be Reborn" - A Case Report

Author(s): Anna Galati

Source: ISPPM-Journal Vol. 8 (1996) No. 1, 21-26

Language of article: English

Abstract: Case M, a divorced woman with two children, started Autopsychognosia, a therapeutic approach that uses psychedelic drugs, at the age of twenty. The presenting problem then was depersonalization. The first two years she had had Autopsychognosia sessions approximately once a month. After that she had on average two sessions every two years to further her self knowledge. Case M describes the revivals and realizations she had during therapy. She also relates the emotional, psychosomatic, behavioural patterns and defence mechanisms she had in marriage, during separation and after separation to the ones she had had as an embryo in the womb, during birth and after birth. She realized that marriage was a womb substitute and married life symbolized the womb life. Separation symbolized the expulsion-birth and adjustment to life after separation symbolized adjustment to life after birth. The knowledge acquired through Autopsychognosia has helped Case M to understand and change the rigid, repetitive and pain-inflicting patterns she had developed since her fetal life and after birth to more flexible and healthier ones. In this way she feels she has has been reborn to a new life she deserves to live more happily. The subjective revivals and realizations of Case M raise some important theoretical and therapeutic issues and questions that need to be further investigated and explored.

Title: Social Regression and the Global Prevalence of Abortion

Author(s): John C. Sonne

Source: ISPPM-Journal Vol. 8 (1996) No. 1, 27-46

Language of article: English

Abstract: This paper advances the thesis that the high but little commented on global prevalence of abortion which amounts to 25% of the unborn being aborted world-wide, is mobilizing an almost universally denied and repressed dread of being aborted which is present to varying degrees in the unconscious of most humans, and that this dread and the defenses against facing it are transferentially acted out in the form of quiet or conspicuous

individual and social regression. Evidence for social denial of this dread is seen in the under-reporting of the prevalence of abortion, in contrast to the strong focus on the prevalence of other forms of social regression. Although statistics are presented in this paper on the prevalence of both social regression and abortion, the import of both of these phenomena is best understood if they are looked at dynamically as intensive properties of society rather than as extensive properties measured in terms of numeric body count. The "too many people in the world" argument for abortion is examined in terms of abortion dynamics, and the relation of abortion to trust in human relations is emphasized.

Title: "If it Weren't for These Pictures ..." - Joseph Beuys. The Pre- and Perinatal Aspects and Their Transformation in "Lebenslauf/Werklauf" - An Approach

Author(s): Dieter Arnold

Source: ISPPM-Journal Vol. 8 (1996) No. 1, 47-56

Language of article: English

Abstract: Nearly ten years after Joseph Beuys died there are increasing efforts in reception of his work, He seems to evoke essential themes of our existence. Plastic self-description is the central motive, He tries to connect himself to the biography of world and evolution. This opens access to his work, Autobiographic selection and conclusion like "Lebenslauf/Werklauf" 1921-1986, "a secret block for a secret person in Ireland" 1945-1976 and "4 books of project Westmensch" 1958 show that especially in his early-work, the artist is trying to find new visions for present and future in going back to very early stages of evolution. In a concretistic manner he is engaged in placenta-and umbilical-symbolics, in their nutritive and circulatory phenomena, including birth and feminity, These pictures changed in later years in using his typical materials, kind of performances and social transformation. The significance of pre/perinatal symbolism in Beuys-reception of today is nearly undeveloped.

Title: "Riß in der Beziehung" - Gedanken über die Therapie eines Sechsjährigen, der zu früh geboren wurde

Author(s): Barbara Friedrich

Source: ISPPM-Journal Vol. 8 (1996) No. 1, 65-71

Language of article: German

English Title: "Fracture of the Relations" - Throught About the Psychotherapy of a Six-year-old Boy, Who Was Prematururely Born.

Abstract: The author, an analytic psychotherapist of children and adolescents, has treated some prematurely born children. None of these children was in need of psychotherapy only because its premature birth. All cases showed clearly that the premature birth can't be seen as an isolated event but have to be understood as one event in the continuum of the parents' history. This paper presents the summarizing report of a six-year-old boy's therapy; it shows how the scenario of being born prematurely reveals and develops according to its inherent scheme until it escalates. The inner chaos of the child and the "early fracture of the relations" can begin to heal by the therapeutic process.

Title: Die Wiederbelebung prä- und perinataler Traumatisierungen in der analytischen Arbeit mit Kindern und Jugendlichen. Frühgeburt und psychische Wiederannabelung

Author(s): Carola Leyh

Source: ISPPM-Journal Vol. 8 (1996) No. 1, 73-83

Language of article: German

English Title: The Reenactment of Pre- and Perinatal Traumatizations in Psychoanalytic Therapy with Children.

Abstract: "Premature birth and re-navelling" in the sense of trying to connect early disconnected relationships due to premature birth within psychoanalytic treatment, is the attempt from a scientific point of view - to show that there is a connection between foetal and postnatal life. Disturbances of the foetus during pregnancy are significant for later structural psychic development and behavioural disturbance. Two adolescent patients - a 15-year-old female patient and a 20-year-old male patient - were born after 7 months of pregnancy. Their disorders became significant during puberty but were based on much earlier experiences - premature birth. Thus, the author tries to show that there is a significance between adolescent disorders and premature birth.

Title: Brutkastenerfahrung - Verletzung des Selbst: Klaus M. Die Nichterfahrung der mütterlichen Nähe führt zum Nichterlernenkönnen menschlicher Beziehungen. Eine psychotherapeutische Behandlung eines zu früh Geborenen

Author(s): Barbara Hungar

Source: ISPPM-Journal Vol. 8 (1996) No. 1, 85-88

Language of article: German

English Title: Klaus M. - The Experience of an Incubator as Trauma for the Self

Abstract: The author describes that feelings of lonelyness and death anxieties in the incubator disturb the development of visual perception of the mother and consequently of other persons and objects of the environment. The child lacks the bond.

Title: "Wenn ich diese Bilder nicht hätte ..." - Joseph Beuys. Prä- und perinatale Bezüge und ihre Um-Formung im "Lebenslauf/Werklauf" - Eine Annäherung

Author(s): Dieter Arnold

Source: ISPPM-Journal Vol. 8 (1996) No. 1, 89-110

Language of article: German

English Title: "If it Weren't for These Pictures..." - Joseph Beuys The Pre- and Perinatal Aspects and Their Transformation in "Lebenslauf/Werklauf" - An Approach.

Abstract: Nearly ten years after Joseph Beuys died there are increasing efforts in reception of his work. He seems to evoke essential themes of our existence. Plastic self-description is the central motive. He tries to connect himself to the biography of world and evolution. This opens access to his work. Autobiographic selection and conclusion like "Lebenslauf / Werklauf" 1921-1986, "a secret block for a secret person in Ireland" 1945-1976 and "4 books of project Westmensch" 1958 show that especially in his early-work, the artist is trying to find new visions for present and future in going back to very early stages of evolution. In a concretistic manner he is engaged in placenta-and umbilical-symbolics, in their nutritive and circulatoryphenomena, including birth and feminity. These pictures changed in later years in using his typical materials, kind of performances and social transformation. The significance of pre/perinatal symbolism in Beuys-reception of today is nearly undeveloped.

Title: Ultrasound Research on Prenatal Life: Transcripts of a Clinical Experience

Author(s): D.A. Nesci, T.A. Poliseno, S. Averna, A.K. Mancuso, L. Ancona, and S. Mancuso

Source: ISPPM-Journal Vol. 8 (1996) No. 2, 139-143

Language of article: English

Abstract: The authors have been following 13 high-risk pregnancies in the obstetrical pathology ward of a universitary clinic. The interdisciplinary team (liaison psychiatrists and gynecologists) has been working with a methodology based on the idea that primordial human groups were "primarily reproductive in function" and "maternal". From this perspective human pregnancy is seen as a psychosomatic and psychosocial fenomenon, at the same time. That is why the authors structured a group setting for the ultrasonographic study of prenatal life, and constructed a group of observers around the mother and her unborn child. From the transcripts of one of such clinical experiences it is possible to discover and explore some unconscious dynamics of human pregnancy.

Title: Being a Son - Becoming a Father: A Mourning Process

Author(s): Madeleine Sednaoui-Mirza and Irène Krymko-Bleton

Source: ISPPM-Journal Vol. 8 (1996) No. 2, 145-156

Language of article: English

Abstract: Becoming a father starts before the birth of a child. It is a process that involves giving up being a son (Legendre 1985, 1989). This intergenerational switch is attempted through the reenactment of early oedipal relationship with significant others. Deutsher (1981) describes the task of fatherhood during pregnancy as the man's attunement and alliance to the woman bearing his child, an alliance based upon a certain degree of maturity and empathy whose origins are related to maternal as well as paternal identifications. Herzog (1982) in his study on fatherhood, has observed that male children who have been deprived of their fathers develop a "father's hunger" which in adulthood affects their availability to attune to their female companion and to participate intrapsychically and interpersonally in the progression towards parenthood.

An exploratory study (Sednaoui-Mirza, Bleton and Lortie 1991) with men whose female companion have a high risk pregnancy for idiopathic reasons has revealed a common theme: during their early childhood, the families of these men have experienced severe losses (divorce, separation, deaths) that have lead at times to the "dead mother syndrome" (Green 1986) described as the sudden psychic unavailability of the mother towards her child. During adulthood these men's wish to conceive a child is avoided or mainly triggered by unresolved oedipal rivalry. These finding are illustrated by 4 different examples of psychic configuration or ways of dealing with these early issues reenacted during their companion's pregnancy.

Contrary to Herzog's conclusions, the outcome of this study stresses the importance of both parents for the process of mourning that will enable a man to give up being a son and prepare him to become a father.

Title: Birth Memories, Psychotherapy, and Philosophy

Author(s): Paula M.S. Ingalls

Source: ISPPM-Journal Vol. 8 (1996) No. 2, 157-170

Language of article: English

Abstract: Traumatic pre- and perinatal experiences pose difficulties for psychotherapy, e.g., repression, lack of linguistic representation in the unconscious and conscious mind, and later resistance toward truthfulness. Unconscious conflicts have a philosophical dimension which underlies the physical, emotional, and psychological symptoms.

In America, obstetrics, neonatology, and developmental psychology are based on materialistic notions and practices. Pre/neonates are measured by the insufficiency of neural constructs. In contrast, the neonate is fiercely individualistic. Hence, the pre/neonate is in collision with two philosophies: individualism and the brutal materialistic mind set of `might is right'.

Notwithstanding the absence of language and reason at birth, a primal philosophy develops alongside the neonate's experiences. Traumatic birth experiences lead to unconscious notions, which will contradict the formulated philosophy in adulthood. Before a necessary meta psychological, i.e., philosophical resolution can be reached, traumatic memories must be recovered, encoded into language, scrutinized, and conceptualized. Truthfulness is resisted due to the premise: where there is an accusation, there is a confession to be made. In the name of survival, the neonate abdicated its autonomy and individualism by means of repression and internalization - acts only the self can commit. Emotionally, the conflict lies between repressed unearned guilt and rightful anger.

Title: Restaging Early Traumas in War and Social Violence

Author(s): Lloyd deMause

Source: ISPPM-Journal Vol. 8 (1996) No. 2, 171-211

Language of article: English

Abstract: Analysis of shared national fantasies prior to wars reveals recurring fears of a poisonous, blood-sucking maternal monster. Aggressors regularly claim they were forced to go to war because they felt strangled, unable to breathe, needing "Lebensraum" - suggesting that war is a rebirth fantasy of enormous power shared by nations restaging fetal traumas on the historical stage. A review of recent research into fetal emotional life leads to the conclusion that the fetus experiences recurring developmental stresses, including receiving toxic blood from its placenta - which is likely the emotional matrix for later fears and poisonous blood. The restaging of early traumas is thus a homeostatic mechanism of the brain, achieved in the social sphere by nations through wars and social violence, during which we recapture our helplessness and inflict our traumas upon scapegoats.

Title: Neue Wege im Umgang mit vorzeitigen Wehen in der geburtshilflichen Praxis

Author(s): Christine Schulz-Züllich

Source: ISPPM-Journal Vol. 8 (1996) No. 2, 219-226

Language of article: German

English Title: A New Approach in Treating Premature Labour in a Gynaecological Practice.

Abstract: The therapeutic approach described here regards the mother-to-be and her gynaecologist as partners. Increasingly pregnant women find themselves between their aspirations to be a good mother and the demands and pressures of their career. This collision of interests often results in premature labour and premature babies. The treatment consists of detailed informations on the various symptoms linked to premature contractions, confronting the pregnant woman in an open and frank discussion with her own stress and actively encouraging her to find help. Thanks to this ego-boosting element the rate of compliance of the whole treatment is very high. The medication which elsewhere often proves to be ineffective turns out to be nearly unnecessary. Thus over the past ten years the rate of premature babies could be reduced to a minumum.

Title: Psychosomatische Aspekte der drohenden Frühgeburt

Author(s): Rupert Linder

Source: ISPPM-Journal Vol. 8 (1996) No. 2, 227-231

Language of article: German

English Title: Psychosomatic Aspects of an Imminent Premature Birth.

Abstract: For seven years, the rate of premature births has remained at about one per cent in the practice of this gynaecologist and psychotherapist. Only two out of seven hundred births occurred before completion of 36 weeks of pregnancy. Assuming an essential influence of psychosomatic factors, the risk of premature birth seems to be enhanced by down-ward pressures on the foetus. Given the understanding and co-operation of pregnant mothers, supportive interventions aimed at resolving conflicts may result in conflict resolution and bring about a reduction of tension. Consequently there may be a marked improvement in gynaecologic findings and genereal health among pregnant mothers. Complementary medical intervention includes phytotherapeutic and homoeopathic medication, use of Arabin cerclage pessaries and surprisingly rare hospitalisation.

Title: Nachstationäre Betreuung von Familien frühgeborener Säuglinge

Author(s): Eva Vonderlin und Otwin Linderkamp

Source: ISPPM-Journal Vol. 8 (1996) No. 2, 233-242

Language of article: German

English Title: Care and Support of Families with Premature Babies After Discharge from Hospital.

Abstract: The premature birth of a child results in a number of problems for the parents concerned. Even after the baby has been discharged from hospital, particular measures are often necessary to care for the child. Furthermore, in comparison with families with babies born at term, the risk of problems occurring in the interaction within the family - both for the children and for the parents - is increased. Longitudinal studies have shown that small babies born prematurely before week 32 of pregnancy are particularly likely to develop abnormal behaviour. These studies also show how important social and psychological factors are in the development of children at risk. On the basis of this, programmes of specific care and support for premature babies and their families are called for. Intervention studies carried out in the USA have proved that such programmes are effective.

Title: Tod als Geburt. Das altägyptische Jenseits, das Unbewußte und der Flammensee

Author(s): Edmund Hermsen

Source: ISPPM-Journal Vol. 8 (1996) No. 2, 243-258

Language of article: German

English Title: Death as Birth. The Ancient Egyptian Beyond, the Unconscious, and the Lake of Flame.

Abstract: In ancient Egyptian cosmology all areas of life and the world are interconnected. The transition from one world to another is regarded as the equivalent of birth. In the cosmogonic myth of Hermopolis, the origin of the world itself is understood as the birth of the sun-god. This prelude to birth, which is repeated every morning at sunrise, is threatened by forces of non-existence. At the same time the potential for non-existence guarantees the necessary regeneration of life, in the beyond as well. Non-existence penetrates the world, so that in dream the sleeper can visit the "other world" of the unconscious. The beyond and non-existance are periodically identified with the unconscious. Indeed the modern concept of the unconscious extends considerably further. Death through violent annihilation leads, as in the Osiris myth, to a new life in the beyond. This initiation ritual into the world of the beyond is used to express a symbolism of birth. Only through death does the deceased assume the childhood of the sky-goddess. As the Horus myth for instance demonstrates, the experiences of birth are accompanied by crises. In the Lake of Flame in the map of the beyond contained in the Book of Two Ways the symbolism cited above is bound together. The life-destroying and life-sustaining aspects of the world, and of non-existence, are symbolized by fire and flames, a symbolism which may perhaps be direved, according to a psycho-historical model of interpretation, from the real experiences of birth. In the ancient Egyptian beyond, therefore, one can recognize the life-experiences of the ancient Egyptians as an engrammatic repository of the unconscious.

Title: Isolation, Rejection and Communion in the Womb

Author(s): Thomas R. Verny

Source: ISPPM-Journal Vol. 8 (1996) No. 3, 287-294

Language of article: English

Abstract: Most people whether they be lay people, scientists or academics cling to a whole slew of erroneous beliefs about prenatal life. Two of the most prevalent ones are: first, that the uterus is a place of perfect peace, harmony and joy and second, that our mental faculties start to develop only after birth i.e. that babies prior to birth are mindless creatures. Why this stubborn resistance when evidence to the contrary is so overwhelming? I think it is due to the presence of a collective unconscious defense against the threat of re-stimulating and reawakening deeply repressed feelings of intrauterine rejection, isolation and separation. Even a person who as a prenate had miraculously escaped exposure to any toxic maternal or paternal feelings would find re-experiencing this state of prenatal bliss, compared to his present existence, painful. In other words, no matter whether you had a good or a bad pre-natal life, you don't want to be reminded of it. On the other hand, those attending this Congress have, in various ways, done their work, faced and overcome their fears and now, are willing to look at the facts. One of these facts is that unborn children respond to and are affected by maternal emotions. This paper will attempt to examine those maternal feelings and attitudes that promote the formation of a strong ego and a healthy mind-body continuum and those that create feelings of dejection and despair in the unborn. We will examine the effect of parental messages on the unborn and newborn and not the mechanisms of parental fetal communication, a subject I have dealt with previously (Verny and Weintraub 1991; Verny and Kelly 1981). Our focus will be on negative parental fetal communication though the effect of positive prenatal parenting will also be briefly studied.

Title: Dreams and the Reconstruction of Infant Trauma

Author(s): Lynda Share

Source: ISPPM-Journal Vol. 8 (1996) No. 3, 295-316

Language of article: English

Abstract: Based on the psychoanalytic discoveries of Bernard Bail, M.D., this paper demonstrates that the earliest experiences of life, particularly the earliest traumatic experiences, can be retained in the unconscious mind of the infant and then lived out throughout the course of life in the form of behavior, symptoms, and characterological manifestations. The paper brings to bear research in child psychiatry, developmental psychology, neurobiology, and psychoanalytic infant observation. Three detailed clinical vignettes are presented using Bail's method of dream analysis to illustrate how even pre- and neonatal experiences can be accessed in the psychotherapeutic setting. The work illustrates the enduring effects of earliest trauma and represents a contribution to the study of primitive states of mind.

Title: Interpreting the Dread of Being Aborted in Therapy

Author(s): John C. Sonne

Source: ISPPM-Journal Vol. 8 (1996) No. 3, 317-339

Language of article: English

Abstract: This paper will illustrate how the sequelae of prenatal trauma can be transferentially expressed in a variety of pathological symptoms in postnatal life. An in-depth examination, based on a receptive posture in the therapist, often reveals that the traumatized unborn in the patient has developed a congenital diathesis which has predisposed him to have repeated postnatal reenactments symbolic of the original pre-natal trauma. This diathesis cannot automatically be assumed to be an expression of genetic endowment. The ambient psychological family is an important determinant in both the causation of prenatal trauma, and its healing or reinforcement in postnatal life. The meaning of the messages communicated by the traumatized unborn are "known but unthought" by the patient until the associative links are interpreted in therapy. Such interpretations require the therapist to think in terms of prenatal mentation and communication, and to consider the dread of being aborted as a possible component in the transference, and also in common syndromes that have been traditionally viewed and interpreted as primarily having a postnatal origin. Failure to do this may result in an interminable or unsatisfactory therapy. Ten clinical case examples will be presented.

Title: Psychosomatic Aspects of Impending Premature Delivery

Author(s): Rupert Linder

Source: ISPPM-Journal Vol. 8 (1996) No. 3, 341-345

Language of article: English

Title: Der intrauterine Mutterrepräsentant

Author(s): Jenö Raffai

Source: ISPPM-Journal Vol. 8 (1996) No. 3, 357-365

Language of article: German

English Title: The Intrauterine Mother Representative.

Abstract: In neuropsychological terms, communication between mother and fetus is of a visceral-vegetative nature and is expressed in the form of sensations. Analysis of the way in which schizophrenic patients sense their own bodies takes us back to the intrauterine period of life. A differentiation process can be initiated to make up for the process that failed to take place in the course of ontogenetic development. We can therefore conclude that differentiation of the physical boundaries of mother and fetus usually takes place during the intrauterine period of life. In schizophrenic subjects, however, this is not the case, as a sense of the physical boundaries of the fetus has not been developed. Thus patients experience the mother's body as their own. A decisive stage in the therapeutic development is the appearance of the intrauterine mother representative, which contains the unconscious, destructive, narcissistic fantasies of self-reproduction in the way the patient's experiences his or her own body. The intrauterine mother representative forms the basis for all subsequent (extrauterine) object relations.

Title: "Das unwillkommene Kind und sein Todestrieb"

Author(s): Ludwig Janus

Source: ISPPM-Journal Vol. 8 (1996) No. 3, 367-377

Language of article: German

English Title: The Unwanted Child and His Death Instinct.

Abstract: An example from psychoanalytic/psychotherapeutic practice is used to describe the difficulties involved in treating patients who were primarily unwanted. The psychotherapeutic setting can easily be jeopardised by re-enactments of the experience of being unwanted and rejected. Destructive complications and negative reactions to therapy may ensue. Results of experience with LSD and of regression therapy show the fundamental signficance of being unwanted in the aetiology of neuroses, psychosomatic illnesses and dissocial tendencies, and empirical observations and studies support the results that have been obtained in practice. The hypothesis is adopted that in the early years the subject of being unwanted was concealed by psychodynamic constructions. Greater knowledge and a heightened sensitivity towards children of pre-speech age make it easier to assess the significance of being unwanted in an individual's psychological and emotional development. Psychohistorically speaking, being unwanted was probably a more widespread collective fact than it is today. This is correlated with the pessimism found in historical views of the world. These correlations emphasise the preventive significance of parent/child relationships in consolidating democracy and improving the ability to deal with conflicts in our society.

Title: Weniger Geburtstraumen durch Doula-Begleitung. Eine alte Tradition neu entdeckt

Author(s): Christina Hurst Prager

Source: ISPPM-Journal Vol. 8 (1996) No. 3, 379-386

Language of article: German

English Title: With Doulas Fewer Birth Traumas. An Old Tradition Rediscovered.

Abstract: Intrigued and fascinated by the positive outcome on birth when a woman is continuously supported by another woman, Drs. Kennel and Klaus and Mrs. Phyllis Klaus have initiated several studies. They call such a birth companion, who stays with the woman throughout labour and birth and supports her physically as well as emotionally a "Doula", the word stemming from the Greek, meaning female servant of a woman. The far reaching positive consequences not only on the physical side for mother and baby but on the emotional and psychological level as well, including the relationship of the couple and the family, seems to predestine a Doula for every woman in labour and birth. However, a number of obstacles are still in the way.

Title: Riten des Übergangs in einigen östlichen Kulturen

Author(s): Helga Blazy

Source: ISPPM-Journal Vol. 8 (1996) No. 3, 387-402

Language of article: German

English Title: Rites of Transition in some Eastern Cultures.

Abstract: The paper deals with some non-priviledged societies of the Third World, however, seen from the First World they seem likewise especially priviledged in the realm which we feel to be little developped in our societies. Western imagination often notices ideal conditions for pregnancy and birth in the societies of the Third World which we try to imitate as, f.i., the cangaroo-method. Certainly, sometimes there exist nearly optimal conditions for the early lifetime, but they consist in the inner space of three partners and are not to be reproduced by suggestion, manipulation or music-cassettes, as we would like. But there is no paradise `somewhere over the ocean'. I present some ideas and images concerning womanhood, birth and death, the intrauterine space and the inner talking in rites and metaphors in Indian cultures, in two West Malaysian cultures, Chewong and Temiar, in the Javanese and some Eastern Indonesian cultures, and in two Micronesian cultures.

Title: Wilhelm Reich: Studies of Earliest Childhood

Author(s): Morton Herskowitz

Source: ISPPM-Journal Vol. 8 (1996) No. 4, 415-426

Language of article: English

Abstract: A consequence of Wilhelm Reich's emphasis of character structure in treating psychiatric patients was the discovery of armoring, the physical representation of emotional repression. The energy-binding function of armoring led inevitably to an awareness of the bioenergetic basis of human dis-ease. The process can begin in utero and exerts its strongest effects in the earliest years. He instituted the Orgonomic Infant Research Center to investigate the onset of energetic malfunction at life's beginning. This paper reports on some of his findings, and on his priority in many areas of neonatal investigation.

Title: Intra-Uterine Security: The Cause of the Oedipus and Electra Complexes in Two Cases Treated with LSD25

Author(s): Athanassios Kafkalides

Source: ISPPM-Journal Vol. 8 (1996) No. 4, 427-432

Language of article: English

Abstract: The article represents reports of the experiences of one male and one female patient during LSD sessions, showing that their fixation could be traced back to the mother and to their desire to return in the womb. For both patients, sexuality was a way of coming as close as possible to the realisation of this desire. Kafkalides views these results as providing a clinical explanation for the basic aspects of the Oedipus and the Electra complex.

Title: "Derepression and Reprocessing": Food for Thought from a Patient

Author(s): Paula M.S. Ingalls

Source: ISPPM-Journal Vol. 8 (1996) No. 4, 433-450

Language of article: English

Abstract: Derepression and Reprocessing (D&R) is a developmentally transforming therapeutical process with the specific aim to resolve physical, emotional, psychological, and philosophical conflicts stemming from pre- and perinatal trauma(s). A new life undergoing pre- and perinatal traumas due to materialistic birthing practices often suffers from stagnation on various levels. Mental and emotional stagnation are carried forward into adulthood possibly resulting in intellectual and ideological fundamentalism and fanaticism or a black and white infantile mentality underscored by the materialistic philosophy of "might is right". The internally driven process of D&R moves in layers from the least to the most painful and from the before, after, and during (core) aspects of a particular trauma. During derepression, the evidence of the body, senses, emotions, infantile behaviors, and thoughts brings recognition which leads to verbalization and knowledge of previously repressed pre- and perinatal memories. During reprocessing the splintered self is gradually reintegrated into a whole human being without conflicts between body and mind, feelings and actions, canceling out all psychosomatic manifestations. Questions are raised about the effects of pre- and perinatal trauma(s) upon the neural, chemical, and electrical systems of the brain, about organic memory, and such phenomenon as impulsivity.

Title: Prenatal Themes in Rock Music

Author(s): John C. Sonne

Source: ISPPM-Journal Vol. 8 (1996) No. 4, 451-463

Language of article: English

Abstract: Rock music, although disparaged by many adults, is a definite and vibrant part of the youth culture. If we consider that the artist is sensitive to the culture of his time and express thoughts and feelings that others only dimly perceive or have difficulty articulating, the fact that prenatal themes are prominent in much of this music deserves serious attention. Rock music's appeal to such a large audience of young people throughout the world suggests that it strikes a highly receptive chord having to do with universal primitive concerns about physical and spiritual survival. The songs can be seen as messages from the womb that express despair, wishes to regress, wishes to arrest development at a prenatal level, a dread of being aborted, suicidal and homicidal wishes, and grief at the loss of prenatal life. The careful listener will hear in these songs, scarcely discernable in the midst of the incessant rocking beat, such words as "Before you were born someone kicked in the door. There's no place for you here, stay back where you belong," or "If you could keep me floating just for a while, 'til I get to the end of this tunnel, Mommy," or "There's a place for the baby that died," or "I can feel the fight for life is always real. I can't believe it's no big deal. It's a legal kill."

Title: Am Ursprung der seelischen Welt Initiationsmuster und therapeutischer Prozeß

Author(s): Ralf Bolle

Source: ISPPM-Journal Vol. 8 (1996) No. 4, 479-502

Language of article: German

English Title: At the Origin of the Psychic World -- Patterns of Initiation and the Therapeutic Process

Abstract: Psychotherapeutic processes are seen in the context of early experiences of transition, and their reproduction in the experiences of an adult woman is investigated. In this context, the idea of an archetypal pattern of initiation has proved to be very useful in therapy, as diametrically opposed psychological contents of personal and transpersonal experience can thus be related to one another in a meaningful way. The psychoanalytic treatment of a crisis in an adolescent is discussed from this point of view and is illustrated using images from therapy.

Title: Energetische Qualitäten, körperliche Manifestation und emotionaler Ausdruck bei frühkindlichen Störungen

Author(s): Dorothea Fuckert

Source: ISPPM-Journal Vol. 8 (1996) No. 4, 503-518

Language of article: German

English Title: Energetic Qualities, Bodily Manifestations, and Emotional Expression in Early Child Disorders

Abstract: Disorders of earliest childhood can be viewed as posttraumatic stress-disorders. Each psychich trauma manifests itself physically and energetically at the same time. Traumata in earliest childhood disturb the field and the flow of body-energy in a specific way. There are changes of musculature, connective tissues and movement of bones. The emotional expression is repressed and fixed, e.g. to be seen in a dissociated look and in a disturbed eye-contact. The specific and most serious pathophysiologic result is a sensoric-perceptive split with following developmental disturbance of self-identity, emotionality, personal interactions and reception of the world -- the typical pathologic condition in all psychoses, borderline-structures and dissociative disorders. The treatment consists in dissolving the split between perception and sensation, and between brain and body. A rebuilding of unified sensations, integration and further development are necessary. With Wilhelm Reich's systematic, body-oriented and energetic psychotherapy -- sometimes combined with craniosacral therapy and somatoemotional release techniques of J. Upledger -- early traumata of the pre-, peri- and postnatal periods are reexperienced, if time, patient and therapist are ready for it. On the basis of mother-child-attunement, through touch, body-language, mimic interaction and spontaneous emotional release, these traumata can be worked through and dissolved. A deep and lasting restructuring follows.

Title: Erlebnisgedächtnis, Wiedererleben und posttraumatische Störungen

Author(s): Siegfried Petry

Source: ISPPM-Journal Vol. 8 (1996) No. 4, 519-532

Language of article: German

English Title: Experience Memory, Re-enactment and Post-traumatic Disorders

Abstract: To begin with, the phenomenon of re-enactment, a phenomenon that can be observed in various settings, is presented and its many components described. On the basis of very varied observations, re-enactment is characterised as a repeated perception of sense impressions from a previously experienced situation and reproduction of the state of the organism at that time. This leads to the assumption that there is an "experience memory" which can be clearly distinguished from the cognitive memory, which functions independently of the latter and which, in terms of evolution, is apparently a very old, non-cognitive form of memory that can also be shown to exist in animals. On the basis of this hypothesis, re-enactment is the holistic, non-cognitive counterpart of cognitive remembering. The hypothesis provides an explanation for various phenomena that we have known about for quite some time, including eidetic visualisation, exceptional memory performance, perfect pitch, acoustic perception while under anaesthetic, classical and operant conditioning, and generalisations in conditioning, panic disorders and phobias. It explains how post-traumatic stress disorders, phobias and compulsions, certain forms of depression and other types of psychological and psychosomatic disorders can arise by situation-induced re-enactment of earlier traumatic experiences, the content of which has been stored in the experience memory. "Psychotherapeutically Supported Systematic Re-enactment", a technique developed by the author, can be used to resolve such disorders. The technique has also been successfully used in the treatment of infants and babies.

Title: Einbeziehung der Eltern Frühgeborener in Pflege und Entscheidungen

Author(s): Friedrich Porz

Source: ISPPM-Journal Vol. 8 (1996) No. 4, 533-539

Language of article: German

English Title: Involvement of Parents of Preterm Infants in Nursing and Decision Making

Abstract: The impact of psychologic and social support on the well being of preterm infants and their parents has become an issue of major interest. Optimal psychosocial care includes unrestricted visits of parents, brothers and sisters, close skin-to-skin contact of parents and infants (including Kangaroo care), participation of parents in nursing care, elimination of unnecessary distressing procedures and environmental disturbance, encouragement of breastfeeding, and involvement of parents in therapeutic and ethical decisions. Honesty of the personnel and trust of the parents are important prerequisites for successful medical and psychosocial care of preterm infants and their families. Caring of the parents of an infant who dies is an important part of neonatal care. Parents self-help groups are extremely helpful for encouragement and support of parents with a newly born premature infant.

Back to homepage

ISPPM-Secretary,

A. & J. Bischoff

Friedhofweg 8, D - 69118 Heidelberg, Germany

Phone: +49 6221 892729 Fax: +49 6221 892730

E-mail: <secretary@isppm.de>

Last updated on: 18. Jan. 1997 by A.Bischoff