Forgetting, Repeating and Remembering

Abstract

The themes of forgetting, repeating and remembering can be seen running through Freud’s mature work as pronounced motifs: one could even argue that they are among the key principles of Freudian thought. Neurosis itself can be described as a form of repetition that both perpetuates an original traumatic situation or relationship and also tries to ‘forget’ it, in the sense of repressing it. Neurotic symptoms have a paradoxical quality therefore: on the one hand, they are like lumps of amber which contain some ancient creature perfectly preserved. For example, I had a male patient who had had a very seductive mother - she seemed to have been whom he perceived as seductive, and these relationships tended to be very stormy on both sides, with much recrimination, anger, feelings of revenge and so on. It seemed pretty clear that he was repeating some aspects of his relationship with his mother, partly in order finally to conquer the unavailable temptress, partly to be tantalizing to her (for revenge), and for other more obscure reasons - for example, at the deepest level he still felt like a little boy who wanted his mother to comfort him and not seduce him. In a sense, unconsciously he was still trying to solve the conundrum of this traumatic early relationship.