Freud and post-freudians about current pathologies

Abstract

The current clinical approach is discussed based on Freud’s description of initial stages, which he called the real primitive ego, followed by the purified pleasure ego and by the real definitive ego, establishing a correlation between the subjective constitution and the defenses that interfere with this process. It is commonly known that in psychoneuroses there exists an unconscious conflict, oedipal in nature, which endures repression (Verdrängung), and that these psychoneuroses are guided by the pleasure/unpleasure principle and by the reality principle. In contemporary pathologies, we are faced with clinical pictures that closely resemble Freud’s description of actual neuroses, in which no repressed conflict exists, with predominance of manifestations directly in the soma, due to the lack of symbolization. In these cases, defenses involve negative mechanisms: negation (Verneinung), disavowal (Verleugnung) and foreclosure (Verwerfung). Excessive drives manifest themselves directly in the body, as occurs in psychosomatic and eating disorders and addictions, clinical expressions beyond the pleasure principle, the enjoyment field and the death drive.