Never Twice Without Thrice' an Outline for the Understanding of Traumatic Neurosis

Following the review of Freud's work on trauma (1916‐17, 1920, 1926, 1933, 1939), this article proposes to view the traumatic scene as a screen which acts as an active process in the case of many victims who, like Mrs D, break down a few days after being assaulted. After a first attempt at denial, the ego is submerged with repressed content. Repetition is seen as a means of abreacting the trauma by seeking to bind the enormous quantity of excitations that cannot find discharge. Repetition, because of its compulsive quality, fails. The victim remains in a state of helplessness against which she resorts to denial, splitting and projection (Freud, 1920, 1926). This strategy is seen, however, as maintaining the victim in a state of helplessness. Thus, I suggest that, overwhelmed, the ego finally resorts to a multi‐levelled system of defence. On a first level, fixation to the trauma, like in screen‐memories, gives way to a first displacement. On a second level, the adoption of an identity built upon being a victim contributes to the strength of this displacement. On a third level, identification with the aggressor consolidates this defensive strategy by giving meaning to the hostility awakened by the sexual assault

Aesthetics · Denial · Hostility · Id, ego and super-ego · Identity (music · Learned helplessness · Meaning (existential · Projective identification · Psychoanalysis · Psychoanalytic theory · Psychotherapist · Repetition (rhetorical device · American Jewish Fiction Analysis · Philosophy · Psychology · Psychotherapy Techniques and Applications · Social Psychology · Violence, Religion, and Philosophy