Selected papers on hysteria and other psychoneurosesFreud, Sigmund
Science
Selected papers on hysteria and other psychoneuroses
Freud, Sigmund
Hysteria; Neuroses; Psychoanalysis
The same subsequent discharge of traumas accumulated during nursing is
occasionally encountered where the general impression of the disease
does not ensue, and yet the mechanism of hysteria can be noticed. Thus,
I know a highly gifted but slightly nervous lady whose whole personality
suggests the hysteric though she never became a burden to the doctor and
was never obliged to interrupt the exercise of her duties. This lady had
nursed three or four of her beloved ones until their death, causing her
each time complete physical exhaustion, yet these sad duties never made
her ill. However, shortly after the death of the patient she began the
work of reproduction, bringing again to her view the scenes of the
disease and death. Each day—one might say at her leisure—she went over
again every impression, crying and consoling herself. Such adjustment
she passed through daily in conjunction with her usual duties, without,
however confusing the two activities. Everything passed before her
chronologically. Whether the memory work of one day precisely
corresponded to a day of the past I am unable to say. I presume that it
depended on the leisure which was allowed to her by the current affairs
of the household.
Aside from this “subsequent tear” which attached itself to these deaths
at short intervals, this lady periodically observed annual anniversaries
representing the time of the various catastrophes, and here her vivid
visual reproduction and her affective manifestations followed faithfully
the date. Thus, for example, I found her in tears, and on sympathetic
inquiry as to what occurred that day, she half irritably remarked,
“Nothing on that day except that Professor N. was again here and gave us
to understand that things were hopeless—at that time I had no time to
cry.” She referred to the last illness of her husband who died three
years before. It would have been very interesting to know whether she
always repeated the same scenes on these recurring anniversaries, or
whether as I suppose in the interest of my theory other details
presented themselves each time for ab-reaction. I was however, unable to
find anything definite about that; the wise and courageous woman was
ashamed of the intensity with which those reminiscences acted upon
her.[19]
I again repeat that this woman was not sick, that subsequent
ab-reaction, despite all resemblance, is still not a hysterical process;
one may ask why, after one nursing there results a hysteria and after
another none. It cannot lie in personal predisposition for the lady that
I have in mind showed it very remarkably.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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