NOVEMBER 2002, VOLUME 30, NUMBER 2, Abstract 4
When the Unconscious Has Been Left in the Wrong Hands
Annette Allman, Clinical Psychologist
This case illustrates the treatment of recurring postnatal depression in a mother of three young children utilising psychotherapy and pharmacotherapies. It reveals how hypnosis provided the necessary breakthrough to resolve the issues causing the recurrence of the severe, chronic postnatal depression and how this led to the client’s symptom relief and cure. The case highlights the extreme destructiveness and ensuing pathology that can take place when others deliberately impose their views on an unconscious patient. We follow the unconscious journey of Mary, a 17-year-old girl who has had a termination, to the older 34-year-old mother who cannot love her three children because she feels she deserves to suffer. Why? How did this come about? The case addresses several spiritual issues such as our relationship to life and death, as well as life after death and our need to have a respectful relationship to the world of the unconscious, the spirit, and the soul.