Impaired spatial structures

Our knowledge of the very early processes of human development, such as how the body becomes experienced as a three-dimensional spatial structure containing different functional cavities that communicate with the outer world via bodily orifices which are regulated by appropriate sphincter control, is far from being complete. Analysing spatial aspects of psychodynamic phenomena can bring us closer to understanding the nature of internal and external spaces and their role in harmonious and disturbed psychic development. In the paper attention is called to special symbolic connexions between open and strictly closed spaces, malfunctioning boundaries in the outside world and insufficient-containing functions and respective disorders in the development of the ego and ego boundaries. Specific defensive manoeuvres, aimed at annihilating inner spaces and bringing the organism to a 'thing-like', two-dimensional way of existence, are demonstrated in the material of patients with severe psychosomatic diseases and identity problems.