Father and daughter: historical identification, present attachments and the question of passionate involvement

An extended case description is used to illustrate and explore the notion that some children can identify with parental historical experiences as a defense against oedipal passions and mature involvement. Emphasis is placed on the nature and sequelae of a father-daughter relationship, as a function of the father's Holocaust experiences where he passed as a Christian and his post Holocaust experiences with a daughter born to him after the war. The value of adding analytic group therapy to individual analytic work is also discussed in terms of its significance as a potential activator of otherwise latent material that may lay dormant in the dyadic setting.