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Selbstmorder in der Kalahari
(1992)
Einführung
(1994)
Presents a short biography, within the broader topic of the influence of European immigration on the development of psychiatry and psychoanalysis in the US, of German-born Frieda FROMM-Reichmann (1889-1957). Married to the German/American psychoanalyst Erich FROMM, she followed him to the US in 1935. She worked with schizophrenic and manic-depressive patients as psychotherapist until her death in 1957. Herself a psychiatrist and psychoanalyst, FROMM-Reichmann pursued the cooperation between psychiatry and psychoanalysis which Freud had hoped for, but not achieved, in the German academic psychiatry. The dialog between psychiatry and psychoanalysis was further hindered when the Nazis seized power. FROMM-Reichmann's most important work was Principles of Intensive Psychotherapy.
The paper discusses Frieda Fromm-Reichmann's theoretical contributions on the psychotherapy of psychoses and refers it to other authors' views. Today widely accepted, she stressed transference and countertransference as es-sential issues in the treatment of severely disturbed patients. She disagreed with authors like Federn who interpreted the concept of regression in a way that to treat schizophrenics means to treat children of different ages. Different from Federn, she advocated interpretations also of the positive transference to show the patient where he stands in life. Later on, Fromm-Reichmann opposed John Rosen and his direct analysis interpreting first the contents of the psychotic's speech. She stressed the form of the interaction and of the everyday behaviour where she saw where the patient stands in the world. The discussion shows that Fromm-Reichmann developed her theories and practice in cooperation and discussion with other psychoanalysts working with psychotic patients.