Enactment in the psichoanalytic therapeutic relationship with an adult patient

Journal title PSICOTERAPIA PSICOANALITICA
Author/s Elisabetta D’Amico
Publishing Year 2025 Issue 2025/2
Language Italian Pages 10 P. 159-168 File size 121 KB
DOI 10.3280/PSP2025-002010
DOI is like a bar code for intellectual property: to have more infomation click here

Below, you can see the article first page

If you want to buy this article in PDF format, you can do it, following the instructions to buy download credits

Article preview

FrancoAngeli is member of Publishers International Linking Association, Inc (PILA), a not-for-profit association which run the CrossRef service enabling links to and from online scholarly content.

The article analyzes the concept of enactment through the clinical case of an adult patient. Enactment in analysis is understood as the therapist’s unconscious participation in the patient’s profound relational dynamics, whose complex family history is marked by dissociation, identity conflicts, and relationship difficulties. The psychoanalytic treatment presented here addressed identity issues such as bisexuality, the relationship with parents, and the dissociative defenses that generate self-fragmentation and emotional detachment. A crucial moment the author analyzes was the need to reduce weekly sessions, which aroused anxiety about loss and abandonment, resulting in a significant enactment involving the therapeutic couple. This event allowed the analytic relationship to be explored and a transformative process to be initiated. The enactment is highlighted and analyzed in its details by the author in retrospect, serves as a tool for addressing unconscious conflicts and promoting integration and growth.

Keywords: enactment, transference-countertransference, identity, therapist’s role, transformation, transgenerational history.

  1. Bromberg, P. (2009). Destare il sognatore. Milano: Raffaello Cortina.
  2. Craparo, G. (2007). L’enactment nella relazione terapeutica. Milano: Raffaello Cortina.
  3. De Marchi, A. (2000). Atto ed enactment. Rivista di Psicoanalisi, 46: 473-483.
  4. Jacobs, T. (1986). On countertransference enactments. Journal of American Psychoanalytic Association, 34: 289-307. DOI: 10.1177/00030651860340020
  5. Meterangelis, G. (2021). Identità e riconoscimento. Riv. di Psicoanalisi, LXVII (3): 687 e segg.
  6. Minuchin, S., Nichols, M.P., Colapinto, J. (1974). Enactment in Structural Family Therapy. Woodbury, NY, USA.
  7. Mitchell, S.A. (1993). Gli orientamenti relazionali in psicoanalisi. Torino: Bollati Boringhieri.
  8. McDougall, J. (1996). I teatri del corpo. Milano: Raffaello Cortina.
  9. Ponsi, M. (1999). La partecipazione dell’analista. Rivista di Psicoanalisi, 45: 153-167.
  10. Ponsi, M. (2012). Evoluzione del pensiero psicoanalitico. Acting out, agire, enactment. Rivista di Psicoanalisi, LVIII (3): 653-670.

Elisabetta D’Amico, L’enactment nella relazione terapeutica psicoanalitica con una paziente adulta in "PSICOTERAPIA PSICOANALITICA" 2/2025, pp 159-168, DOI: 10.3280/PSP2025-002010