Some determinants of the male analyst's capacity to identify with female patients.

Abstract

This paper reviews some recent literature on gender issues in the analytic dyad, and then focuses specifically on the male analyst-female patient dyad. In order for male analysts to work effectively with female patients they must be able to identify with feminine concerns and dynamics. The paper discusses the male analyst's attempts to master castration anxieties, provoked by such identifications, in order to permit his female patients' concerns to resonate within him. He uses early maternal identifications in working with the pre-phallic material of his female patients, and he uses less readily neutralized direct identifications with his mother (and other women) to address his female patients' phallic concerns. The importance of resolving conflicts around the organization of a stable and mature masculine identity in his training analysis is emphasized, since the male analyst's freedom to use feminine identifications constructively in his work is dependent on it.