| Abstract: | This article is an exploration of the phenomenological experiences of temporality in the psychoanalytic treatment of a patient who suffered severe dissociation. The writer tracked exchanges with an adult analysand who repeatedly suffered childhood attachment losses and sexual and physical traumata. During treatment sessions the patient enacted dissociated alter personality states each with distinct memories. Loewald (1980) contrasted the experience of time as eternity to the fragmented temporality of trauma. Tracking his experience during key sessions, the writer/analyst infers that by repeatedly going back and forth between experiences of sequential time and timelessness, the analyst helped the patient link previously dissociated experiences. This in turn allowed the patient to realize increased coherence and stability of identity and affectivity. The case material is used to consider how multiple temporalities are represented by the patient and the implications of temporality for understanding trauma and deep dissociation. |
