Authors: Gillian R.M. Steggles
A 28 year old schizoaffective woman receiving Kleinian psychoanalytic psychotherapy made a small study of her mind which resulted in producing her representational world (an unconscious concept of some of her life’s environmental features that were important to her) in a pentapointed shape. This shape in itself manifested some of the features of her mind. A researcher made a Case Study of this woman, and adapted her geometric shape to illustrate her progressive mental states in therapy. These shapes, forming the Psychodynamic Pentapointed Cognitive Construct (PPCC) model were compared with Dr Michael Robbins’s successful results in treating a series of paranoid schizophrenic patients with psychoanalytic psychotherapy. The researcher derived shapes that illustrated: the young woman’s psychotic and non-psychotic parts of her mind; the internalization (inclusion) of her Analyst in her mind; Melanie Klein’s paranoid-schizoid and depressive positions; her adjustment to her life’s experiences in a non-threatening and non-alarming way; and her evolution into an integrated, autonomous and independent individual. These shapes of her experience as a patient also perfectly complemented Dr Robbins’ therapeutic view of his schizophrenic patients’ progress as occurring in 7 main therapeutic Stages. The progress of the young schizoaffective woman’s evolution into a healthy, independent individual through her psychoanalytic psychotherapy was also experienced by half of Dr Robbins’ schizophrenic patients, who reached “a positive outcome” of their therapy, ie. of marriage, achieving a university degree or coming off medication. Their recovery may be conceptualized visually by the progressive geometric shapes of the PPCC model.
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