Hope began her treatment with Dr. Marcus by telling him that her training analysis had been very helpful, but had not enabled her to get to the bottom of her difficulties. She made it clear that if this new analytic journey were to be successful, their true selves would have to meet. This is the story, told from both points of view, of how Hope helped her analyst develop the courage to risk responding directly from his unconscious, allowing their true selves to meet, while still maintaining the analytic frame. Intervening in this way the analyst sang to his patient, told her a dream he had about his daughter, and engaged in a spontaneous psychodrama in which they both expressed feelings of love, lust, frustration, anger and sadness. It was this emotional meeting of their true selves which seemed most responsible for the excellent outcome.

Donald M. Marcus, M.D. is a training and supervising analyst at the New Center for Psychoanalysis in Los Angeles and also at the Psychoanalytic Center of California where he was a founding member. He had his premedical studies at NYU and MIT and received his M.D. from Indiana University School of Medicine. Following residencies in Internal Medicine and Psychiatry, he had his psychoanalytic training at what was then the Southern California Psychoanalytic Institute. After becoming a graduate analyst he had a Kleinian analysis and supervision with Wilfred Bion, who had a powerful influence on his thinking. He is now in private practice in Los Angeles.