Deadness: psychoanalytic reflections

Abstract

This paper elucidates the subjective experience of 'deadness.' Categorizing it into melancholic (due to pervasive ego inhibitions secondary to guilt) and schizoid (due to the internalization of profound early neglect) types, the paper describes the manifestations of deadness in the realms of self-experience, interpersonal relations, and attitudes towards life and death. It also outlines therapeutic strategies to ameliorate 'deadness.' These include (i) maintaining awareness of the patient's 'alive' parts, (ii) holding and containing the patient's 'dead' parts, (iii) staying responsive to non-human transferences, (iv) drawing conjectures and interpretations from countertransference, and (v) translating 'nothingness' into 'no-thingness.'

Keywords: alive parts; deadness; emptiness; psychological death.