Distortions of time in the transference: some clinical and theoretical implications

The author considers that patients' distortions of time can frequently and readily be observed in clinical psychoanalysis, reflecting both their psychopathology and their reactions to the temporal aspects of the psychoanalytic setting. These phenomena are considered in order to examine the assumptions that can implicitly be made about the nature of space and time in object-relations theory. Two case histories are given to exemplify these clinical phenomena-the first being an example of a fixation and the second one of a psychic retreat. These cases are compared to demonstrate the unconscious processes underlying the particular time distortions being considered, their impact on the patient's lives and their manifestation in the clinical setting. On the basis of these studies, it is suggested that the asymmetry of the 'arrow of time' cannot be assumed in the structure of psychic reality. The clinical evidence suggests that psychic reality has to be seen as discontinuous and that the structure of the discontinuities is revealed by the impact that the temporal aspects of the psychoanalytic setting have on the patient.