A Bond of Love, Emotional Risk, and Daring: Commentary on Paper by Stuart A. Pizer

Abstract

This discussion addresses two key points concerning Pizer's thoughtful paper about a long-term, difficult analytic process. First, it responds to Pizer's quest for theoretical and clinical concepts that do not limit the analytic work of mature, experienced analysts to interpretive work, but reconnects them theoretically, clinically, and technically with deeply engaging emotional experiences of life-giving, profound transformation through treatment. The author suggests that the clinical theory of therapeutic regression, which was developed and forged within intense and difficult analytic treatments, brings the critical need for fundamental experiences of the analyst's loving and sustaining provision into the framework of the psychoanalytic process and therapeutic action. The discussion further elaborates on the emotional risking and vulnerability—the venture zone, as the author terms it—that creating psychic change implies for both patient and analyst. This venturing by both of them is illustrated through the clinical example presented by Pizer in his paper.