Citation

Evzonas N. Br. J. Psychother. 2021; 37(2): 263-279.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2021, John Wiley and Sons)

DOI

10.1111/bjp.12623

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

This article discusses the connection between the compulsive use of toxic substances and the shortcomings of the family environment. It provides a detailed account of the author's experience with an adult patient in a psychoanalytically oriented mental health care institution in France and argues that drug abuse can be conceived as a self-calming strategy and an effort to be without the other. The coexistence of neurotic and psychotic mechanisms in the patient's mental function is highlighted and discussed in the light of structural psychopathology. Finally, French institutional psychotherapy, as a dynamic and tolerant form of psychiatry that emphasizes multi-transference in response to the split-off elements of the psychotic ego, highlights the pertinence of treating psychotic drug addiction in a pluralistic framework. © 2021 BPF and John Wiley & Sons Ltd

Language: en

Keywords

human; law; bipolar disorder; psychotherapy; psychiatry; schizophrenia; France; anxiety; psychosis; suicide attempt; personality; addiction; drug abuse; vomiting; mental disease; politics; psychoanalysis; mental health care; vertigo; neurosis; religion; melancholia; drug dependence; mother child relation; delirium; anamnesis; transference; Glasgow coma scale; psychedelic agent; intellectual impairment; Article; postnatal depression; sexual violence; ADDICTION; DEAD MOTHER COMPLEX; FRENCH INSTITUTIONAL PSYCHOTHERAPY; MELANCHOLY; PRIMARY MIRROR; PSYCHOSIS; receptive field; TRANSITIONAL OBJECT