Biomedical subjects
Riccardo Lombardi
Publications and source records attributed to Riccardo Lombardi.
Stanley Kubrick's swan song: eyes wide shut.
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Catalyzing the dialogue between the body and the mind in a psychotic analysand.
The author presents the analysis of a 23-year-old, obese, psychotic man who was dominated by sensations and unable to work through the different levels of psychic elaboration. He could not discriminate between words and concrete objects or between the perceptual functions of sense organs and the oral-cannibalistic level of instinct. Following the working through of these inabilities, it became possible to understand the patient's use of sensation and to make him aware of his emotions and conflicts. The author's discussion of this material emphasizes the role of the body-mind conflict and how this can be confronted in the analytic relationship. Possible links with neuroscience are also indicated.
Knowledge and experience of time in primitive mental states.
The author proposes that time be considered an object of working through during the psychoanalysis of patients whose mental functioning reveals distinct primitive aspects. These so-called 'difficult patients' are particularly intolerant of the temporal limits of analytic sessions and often attempt to undermine the analytic setting. He presents some hypotheses about time and the mind's depth levels. A series of clinical vignettes taken from the analysis of adolescent, borderline and psychotic patients shows several ways in which the analysand's perception of and relation to time surfaces and is worked through in the course of analysis. Analyzing the relationship with time and the conflict between denial and acceptance of temporality proved a significant catalyst in the development of cases that had tenaciously impeded progress. It thus became possible to bring about important changes in the ways such patients experienced affect in the analytic relationship and in object relations, not by acting directly upon these relationships but by working instead on the formal parameters that organize the mind-and primarily on its spatio-temporal organization.
Mental models and language registers in the psychoanalysis of psychosis: an overview of a thirteen-year analysis.
The author suggests that the use of mental models and language registers may help an analysis to proceed, especially in psychosis, when the patient has not yet developed a mental space that will allow him/her the functions of knowledge and containment of emotions. Models, according to Bion, are a primitive approach to abstraction and a manifestation of the analyst's reverie that enables him/her to transform sense data into alpha-elements. Ferrari, in a further development of Bion's theories, hypothesises a relationship between the transference and the internal level of body-mind communication, and proposes the use of language registers to sustain the psychoanalytic process. The author presents several clinical examples from a thirteen-year, four-session-a-week analysis of a psychotic analysand who was initially confused, paranoid and altogether unable to bring self-reflective thought to bear on her overwhelming emotions and had, by the end of the analysis, completely recovered from her psychotic symptoms. The clinical material shows how the technical tools of mental models and language registers helped in the construction of a mental space and spatio-temporal parameters, permitting the patient to tolerate overwhelming concrete emotions and finally to recognise and work through the emotions of an intense transference.
Primitive mental states and the body: a personal view of Armando B. Ferrari's concrete original object.
The author explores some psychoanalytic hypotheses about primitive mental states and their implications for a direct focus on body experience in clinical work. Some aspects of current clinical research about the patient's difficulty in achieving awareness of his emotional life as it emerges from object relations are presented, and this problem is viewed in connection with the relation of the analysand to his own body and to his capacity to pass through the different levels of mental elaboration, from motor discharge to abstraction. Ferrari's theories on the body-mind relationship are discussed and compared with the work of other authors. Ferrari calls the body the Concrete Original Object to indicate that it is the first source, differing from person to person, from which mental phenomena are generated and against which they are constantly measured. A clinical case serves as an illustration of the importance of the perception of the body for the birth of genuine, non-imitative mental activity.
PRIMITIVE MENTAL STATES AND THE BODY: A PERSONAL VIEW OF ARMANDO B. FERRARI'S CONCRETE ORIGINAL OBJECT.
The author explores some psychoanalytic hypotheses about primitive mental states and their implications for a direct focus on body experience in clinical work. Some aspects of current clinical research about the patient's difficulty in achieving awareness of his emotional life as it emerges from object relations are presented, and this problem is viewed in connection with the relation of the analysand to his own body and to his capacity to pass through the different levels of mental elaboration, from motor discharge to abstraction. Ferrari's theories on the body-mind relationship are discussed and compared with the work of other authors. Ferrari calls the body the Concrete Original Object to indicate that it is the first source, differing from person to person, from which mental phenomena are generated and against which they are constantly measured. A clinical case serves as an illustration of the importance of the perception of the body for the birth of genuine, non-imitative mental activity.