Psychodynamic Practice

Individuals, Groups and Organisations

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The lost boy who feared growing up

Chanelle Thornton

To cite this article: Chanelle Thornton (2023) The lost boy who feared growing up,
Psychodynamic Practice, 29:3, 271-287, DOI: 10.1080/14753634.2023.2182868
To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/14753634.2023.2182868

Published online: 25 Feb 2023.

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Psychodynamic Practice, 2023
Vol. 29, No. 3, 271–287, https://doi.org/10.1080/14753634.2023.2182868

The lost boy who feared growing up

Chanelle Thornton

Department of Psyhcosocial Studies, Birkbeck College, London, England

“All children, except one, grow up” (Barrie, 1911). An experience of deprivation in
the maternal transference

“Absence makes the heart grow fonder . . . or forgetful” (Barrie, 1911). The feeling
of being unseen and the mysterious disappearance.

“Every child is affected thus the first time he is treated unfairly” (Barrie, 1911).
The threat of rivals.

“Goodbye means going away and going away means forgetting” (Barrie, 1911).
Out of sight, out of mind?
It is the nightly custom of every good mother after her children are asleep to
rummage in their minds and put things straight. (Barrie, 1911)

In this paper, I will present the case of Tyrone, a 9-year-old boy who attended
therapy once a week, within a Southeast London school, for the period of 20
weeks. My time as Tyrone’s therapist (in training) offers an insight into the
development of a therapeutic relationship wherein the child may be experiencing
feelings of persecution and a sense of maternal deprivation. I will elaborate on
how this was experienced in the countertransference and how treatment
progressed.
I enjoyed developing a therapeutic relationship with Tyrone, despite the
sense of sadness I felt during many of our interactions. In his referral, much
was made of his consistent use of infantile speech, his premature birth and
rivalry with a younger brother who bore the family nickname of “baby”. My
initial sense of Tyrone was a of a boy reluctant to grow up. This paper will
reflect on this using the metaphor of Peter Pan; a child who did not grow up and
yet, despite his bravado, appeared to have unmet infantile needs and anger
towards a mother figure (Barrie, 1911).
Tyrone is the second youngest of a large family of mixed-race heritage
(White-British and the Caribbean). He has two older brothers, one in prison
and one under probation. He also has a 15-year-old sister who, when we met,
had just given birth to her own baby. These siblings came and went from the

Corresponding author. Chanelle Thornton E-mail: Chanellerogers11@yahoo.co.uk

Birkbeck College, 44 Wharncliffe Gardens, London SE25 6DQ
© 2023 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group
272 C. Thornton
family home and there was a good deal of conflict as a result. Tyrone lived in
local authority housing with his parents and two other siblings, brothers aged 11
and 7, respectively. Tyrone’s premature birth had meant that he had received
a good deal of additional medical care and developmental support within his first
2 years of life. Tyrone’s mother reported that his younger brother was born with
“more needs” and Tyrone had felt very “jealous”. Mother also reported that she
worried about her older children and her youngest son but had “no worries”
about Tyrone.
Tyrone appeared to struggle in school. He had been assigned a dedicated
teaching assistant and had attended out-of-class inclusion support sessions since
reception. His teacher shared that this was due to consistently not meeting the
national curriculum age related expectations. He also had a long history of
becoming violent in school, mostly towards other pupils but more recently
towards teachers. He was restrained, to prevent him leaving school, several
times and had physically fought against this, injuring adults at school. Just
before his referral he had punched another child in the face during
a disagreement about a birthday party invitation. He had very few friends and
was quick to show anger.
Additionally, Tyrone spoke with the intonation and vocabulary of a much
younger child, at times sounding like a toddler. Teachers and school staff
reported that he would oscillate between non-verbal, an infant like whine, and
“baby talk”. This was punctuated with violent outbursts of shouting, profane
language, and physical violence.
Tyrone had been referred for a variety of assessments prior to therapy; this
included initial screening for dyslexia by the school’s special educational needs
coordinator (SENCO) and a referral to the local borough Child and Adolescent
Mental Health Service (CAMHS) Neurodevelopmental service. This was speci­
fically to assess for autism spectrum disorder (ASD), attention deficit, and
hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). The assessments had been inconclusive, and
no diagnosis confirmed. Tyrone attended a speech and language therapy assess­
ment, with an occupational therapist in school, to learn whether his communica­
tion style was the result of a speech delay. He had also attended group sessions
with a school-based occupational therapist. When he began one-on-one therapy,
he had not yet received a diagnosis of any kind, and notes from speech therapy
indicated that his speech delay could potentially, in part, be selective. Teachers
reported that Tyrone’s challenging behaviour in school appeared to have been
exacerbated by the COVID-19 lockdown and had not integrated back into school
life as well. Specifically, he appeared reluctant to leave his home, mother had
reported that leaving home in the morning made him very angry. The transition
from mother’s care into school grounds was a common time for Tyrone to
become aggressive and resistant; he would often shout, scream, and express
that he did not want to come to school, that he wished to return home. Tyrone
had made very little contact with other children during lockdown, and his
attendance at online classes had been sporadic. Mother reported that Tyrone’s
 Psychodynamic Practice 273
younger brother had taken up a lot of her attention during lockdown as his
developmental needs had made online classes impossible for him to attend
alone. There was some feeling on behalf of teachers that Tyrone was not
supported at home to attend online classes or participate in any school set
projects. Tyrone had told a teacher that he spent a lot of lockdown online gaming
with older children, whom he did not know. On returning to school, he had very
few friendships, school staff noted that he struggled to talk or play with his peers
and most contact was aggressive; he would often accuse other children of
making fun of him or stealing his property.
Three key themes presented themselves during our sessions; deprivation in
the context of maternal transference; Tyrone’s preoccupation with rivals; and
a sense of being unseen or forgotten. To elucidate on these themes, I have
reflected on three key theories: Klein’s theory of Introjection (Klein, 1937/
1975), Klein’s theory of the Depressive Position (Klein, 1937/1975) and
Bion’s theory of Container-Contained (Bion, 1962). Throughout, I will also
refer to the concepts of transference and countertransference. I will conclude
using Anna Freud’s concept of Developmental Lines to reflect on Tyrone’s
development and state of mind in the context of our therapeutic sessions
(Freud, 1965).

“All children, except one, grow up” (Barrie, 1911). An experience of

deprivation in the maternal transference
At our first meeting, I noted that Tyrone looked older than 9, tall and broad. He
was not wearing school uniform, instead an expensive branded tracksuit and
trainers often worn by older teenagers. In contrast, he displayed the shyness of
a young and vulnerable child. When he did look up at me his eyes were wide,
and I sensed a pleading expression. His face was round, light brown skin and
rosy cheeked, almost toddler like. This evoked in me a sense of sadness and yet,
to my surprise, I felt no draw to offer maternal care.
It had been explained to Tyrone that I would collect him from his class at
11.40. However, at 11.38 I opened the door to find him waiting. I invited him to
explore the room whilst I sat and introduced our mutual contract for therapy.
This felt protective, giving me time to retreat and recover from the surprise.
I had the sense of an imbalance of power, but I was not clear to whom this
favoured.

Tyrone is standing in a corner, hands in pockets, speaking in a toddler-like

mumble. I feel overwhelmed with my inability to understand his speech, I move
to the table to sit, and I feel better not towering over him. I smile and say, “Tyrone
I’m really interested in what you have to say”. He says, “Not nothin’ in da room”.
I lean forward and say, “It doesn’t seem like there is anything for you in this
room?”. Tyrone looks at me and replies “what den?”. He comes closer and I say,
“Maybe you’d like me to show you what is in the room”. He nods. I stand and
walk over to the art cupboard, he comes to stand beside me, he mimics my stance.
Tyrone picks up some gold glitter and says, “I eat this?” I reference the contract
274 C. Thornton
and keeping each other safe, so no he cannot eat it. Tyrone breaks eye contact and
throws back the glitter with force. (Session 1, December 2021)

Tyrone bringing himself to the room and his early adolescent appearance struck
me as a stark contrast to his infantile speech. I did not know where he was
developmentally; I had a strong image of a lost boy, knocking at the nursery
window, yet being too old to receive the baby’s nourishment. I was able to
reflect on the possibility, in supervision, that my surprise and feelings of power
imbalance may have been Tyrone’s projection of his own anxiety, perhaps in
a state of not knowing what I was made of (Klein, 1937/1975). In bringing
himself to the room, perhaps Tyrone is communicating, through transference,
that he is not assured that adults will be reliable or available. Furthermore, he
sees nothing for him in the room; perhaps, he has the expectation of being
deprived by maternal object, and this may be akin to his experiences of depriva­
tion during covid lockdown.
Not only was Tyrone’s speech infantilised, so were some behaviours, such as
phantasies of ingestion through his mouth. When he asked what was in the room
I had a sense of a greedy baby, which repelled me. Perhaps maternal transference
was at play, and in my countertransference, I was drawn into enacting
a withholding mother (Alvarez, 1983). I reflected on this in supervision, linking
to Tyrone’s history of rival babies, assessments, and additional support in an
ambitious school; perhaps he does not feel good enough to receive maternal
nourishment. The infantilised speech may indicate a defence; projecting out the
desires of a greedy baby that a mother, internalised and external, finds unappeal­
ing or too much (Klein, 1937/1975).
When Tyrone asked if he could eat the glitter I panicked. Perhaps, as
a consequence, I set a boundary where potentially he needed to elaborate.
Earlier, I had told him I was interested in him, and he joined me at the art
cupboard, perhaps about to create something together. The glitter may have been
a request to share his emotional experience of feeling need and I responded by
depriving him. With my supervisor, I explored what may have happened if I had
encouraged elaboration; what was it about the glitter that looked good to eat?
When I shut down the exploration with a firm “no”, Tyrone rejected it, as he had
been rejected (Alvarez, 1983).
Klein proposed that a child’s complex transference situations in therapy have
roots in early experiences, and her ideas on introjected internal objects may have
some relevance to Tyrone (Joseph, 1998). Klein proposed introjection as key in
child’s mental activity; in phantasy, he takes inside his experience of the outside
world, and the mouth often features in these phantasies (Bronstein, 2007).
Introjection occurs cyclically with projection, a thrusting out of the death instinct
onto bad objects common to the Paranoid Schizoid state (Klein, 1937/1975). By
the latency period, on resolution of the Oedipal situation, a child often relates to
whole objects and has internalised parents by way of introjection, this contri­
butes to the structure of the ego (Waddell, 2011). Internalised parents do not
correspond directly to the actual parents, rather part of the internal world, for
 Psychodynamic Practice 275
example, an encouraging ego and a protective super-ego (Waddell, 2011).
Tyrone may be demonstrating that the parental figures he has internalised are
depriving, contributing to an envious or punitive superego. His experience of
being a premature baby replaced by an even more dependent and enduring baby
in his family structure may have led him to feel excluded. Perhaps, he has
internalised a parental figure who will not have time for any part of him that
matures. It may be that this has led to an anxiety to “grow up” and of the threat
of rival babies (Klein, 1937/1975).
Winnicott’s theories may support an alternative hypothesis for Tyrone’s
rejection of the glitter. Winnicott argued that Kleinian theory did not fully
consider the state of total dependence in which the “infant exists only because
of the maternal care with which it forms a unit” and specifically how this
contributes to the infant coming into being (D. Winnicott, 1960). There are
three key stages within this process; in the initial stage of “Absolute
Dependence” the infant experiences a sense of fusion with mother, which
facilitates a perception of omnipotence via maternal preoccupation. The subse­
quent stage of “Relative Dependence” is characterised by a disillusionment of
the omnipotence, and a separation from the fused state, which must be sensi­
tively managed by mother, introducing frustration at an appropriate rate and
time, to foster a sense of independence. The third stage of “Towards
Independence” sees a child developing a healthy false self, which can be used
to interact with the external world (D. W. Winnicott, 1963/1965b). Perhaps, in
this session, Tyrone is experiencing an infantile self, potentially a sense of
absolute dependence; indicated by his infantile speech, which emphasised the
requirement of me to be somewhat intuitive of his needs and my countertrans­
ference of feeling drained by a greedy baby. In the transference, Tyrone may be
communicating a need for a facilitating environment, specifically for maternal
care that intuitively responds to his infantile instinctual drives (Ogden, 2018).
This may have been evident in my sense of a lost boy wanting entry and my
negative countertransference reaction towards his demands for me to provide
something fulfilling that seemed distinctly different from the physical materials
in the room. For example, when Tyrone requests to eat, to be filled up, I deny
this need, referring instead to the concrete contract, indicating I do not intui­
tively understand his instinctual need.
Across these developmental stages, Winnicott proposes a change in the
nature of the object for the individual (D. W. Winnicott, 1963/1965b).
Specifically, the object is initially experienced as a subjective and as the child
moves towards relative dependence and beyond the object becomes objectively
perceived or rather “not-me”. As maternal preoccupation changes, the environ­
ment stops adapting as readily and consequently perception of fusion with the
good object, and sense of omnipotence, diminishes. This is vital because if no
frustration was ever experienced, then there would be no change in the percep­
tion of the object and no consequent realisation of the not-me world (Ogden,
2018). Crucially, Winnicott states that the relationship with subjective objects is
276 C. Thornton
creative in nature; paradoxically, that a good object must be created by the infant
and yet to be created it must also be found within the environment
(D. W. Winnicott, 1963/1965b). Hypothetically Tyrone may be endeavouring,
subconsciously, to create a good object after discovering a potential one within
our therapeutic relationship that, in the transference, seemed potentially capable
of maternal preoccupation (Winnicott, 1956). For example, when Tyrone refused
to acknowledge what was in the room and demanded of me “what den?” I had
a sense that I had failed somehow that I should have known what he needed and
provided it. However, in withholding the glitter I was an “other” who introduced
frustration. This is important to note as Winnicott stated that instinct gratification
for the infant, whilst “providing a personal experience, does not contribute to the
development of object relating, or rather the change in the perception of the
object from subjective and under omnipotent control to objectively perceived
and “other” (D. W. Winnicott, 1963/1965b). Whilst the mother initially needs to
intuitively respond to her infants’ instinctual desires the state of fusion between
the pair requires frustration to be introduced, at the right time, in order that the
infant can become aware of the not-me world, integrate the reality principle and
move towards independence with an internalised good object (D. W. Winnicott,
1963/1965b). It is possible that I represent a good object in Tyrone’s transfer­
ence, potentially maternal, evident in his request that I feed him. This may
provide fertile ground for Tyrone to have a good-enough experience and develop
his experience of object relating as his sessions continue. However, it may be the
case in this session that the frustration I introduced in denying the glitter was too
much to bear, or as Winnicott argues not at the right time. Perhaps, his rejection
of the glitter communicates a desire to be in fusion with a maternal object.
Winnicott suggests that there is an additional element to creating a good
object, prior to a sense of fusion. Winnicott writes;

There is an intermediate stage in healthy development in which the patient’s most

important experience in relation to the good or potentially satisfying object is the
refusal of it. The refusal of it is part of the process of creating it. (D. W. Winnicott,
1963/1965a, p. 182).

If indeed Tyrone is creating a good object, then an act of refusal may also be
vital and evidenced in the rejection of the glitter as he throws it away. I, as
a potential good object, and my associated glitter food have potentially been
rejected as the vital stage prior to the creation of a good object in the therapy
room and from which Tyrone could experience the development towards inde­
pendence in the transference. This theory alters the idea that I have introduced
frustration in denying eating of the glitter; rather Tyrone in the act of refusal
begins the creation of an object that is potentially subjective and, in illusion,
omnipotently controlled.
Rosenbluth proposes that children bring their expectations to the therapeutic
relationship, transferred from previous experiences. Tyrone’s unconscious inter­
nalised parental images, created from experience, emotions, and phantasy may
 Psychodynamic Practice 277
be re-experienced in the transference (Rosenbluth, 1970). I should expect this to
fluctuate, but at this first meeting, it may be that Tyrone is communicating that
his internalised parents withhold care and attention. His reaction to me with­
holding glittery nourishment may indicate what he has come to expect from
interactions with adults (Rosenbluth, 1970).

“Absence makes the heart grow fonder . . . or forgetful” (Barrie, 1911). The
feeling of being unseen and the mysterious disappearance
In the intervening sessions, Tyrone waited to be collected and often hid seashells
in sand for me to find. He began each session with the infantile voice, but over
time, I noticed that he phased it out, speaking clearly by the end. After this
pattern repeated several times, we arrived at a week where I had to collect
Tyrone from PE. However, he told me he did not want to leave, PE was fun.
I asked him to speak to me privately before deciding what to do. I was
encouraged that he could communicate with me but also noticed that he reverted
to an infantile whine when he perhaps suspected that I was going to deprive him
of PE and force him to come with me. I made it clear I would be in the room for
our full 50 min but then the session would close, and I would be there next
week. He told me he would come next week and offered to shake my hand on
the matter.
When I collected him for the following week’s session, he was receiving
maths support and his teacher asked him; “when are we going to do this maths
then?”. I felt a pull to appease teacher but broke an uncomfortable brief silence
by saying; Tyrone’s session starts at 11.40 and ends at 12.30, holding the
boundary.

I sit at the table and say, “I wanted to talk about last week; I stayed in the room and
kept this space for you because it’s always your hour”. Tyrone remains standing
and looks down with hands in pockets; “I wanted to do PE”. I nod and say, “I
understand, I think it was important that you could tell me”. A silence follows and
Tyrone initiates a game of hiding shells under cups, making me guess where they
are. He makes it hard for me at first then offers to help. As he is moving cups he
says, “Who comes here when I don’t?”. I reply, “There are other children who use
this room, but this time is always yours”. Tyrone throws his hands in the air and
shouts “But what about the other days, where are you?” I take a pause and then say,
“I wonder if you’re worried this room might not always be here for you?”. He then
moves away and says he wants help to build a paper aeroplane. (. . .) we fly the
plane across the room. I wonder where the plane is going, and Tyrone tells me the
aeroplane “crashed” and the passengers “aren’t dead but disappeared”. I say, “That
must feel worrying”. Tyrone looks out of the window and says, “what do you do
when you aren’t here?”. I nod and reply “I can hear that you want to know what
I do when I disappear every week, maybe if I’ll come back”. Tyrone turns from me
(. . .) he squeezes paint messily onto paper. (Session 7, February 2022)

The opening of our session was planned in supervision, with the hypothesis that
Tyrone may be anxious about not attending the previous week. Furthermore,
278 C. Thornton
teaching staff and counsellors are very separate at placement, all communication
regarding pupils is via the Team Manager and I have sensed distrust between
professionals; I feel a pull to justify my role to teachers. As a consequence,
Tyrone may feel himself to be in a loyalty conflict; potentially this could lead
him to be quite angry with, or fearful of, the adults and their reactions to his
choices.
When I told Tyrone that I felt it was “important” he could communicate his
needs I felt a sense of relief, possibly his projection (Klein, 1937/1975).
Potentially the subsequent cup game was Tyrone’s exploration of his emotional
experience of becoming seen by the therapist. In supervision, I reflected on other
possibilities for the metaphor, an anxiety that he was unseen by me for 2 weeks
or how it feels for me to come and go and experience separation.
Tyrone was able to ask difficult questions, potentially revealing his anxieties:
who are my rivals for your attention? Perhaps, his transference is that I am
mother object whose attention will be stolen by other babies. Initially, I can see
that I replied in the concrete, I felt defensive and somewhat invaded. My
countertransference may indicate that I am in the position of the depriving
mother of Tyrone’s internal world (Alvarez, 1983). I took a pause to think,
and as the defensive feelings subsided, I was able to reflect a possibility that his
preoccupation with rivals may be connected to an anxiety about loss and
deprivation (Rosenbluth, 1970).
It is possible that Tyrone found my interpretation regarding rivals intolerable
as he moved suddenly to the paper aeroplane. I presented this to my case
discussion group to reflect on the many unknowns. As the game progresses,
I felt a surge of panic at the passenger’s disappearance and unknown fate.
Perhaps, Tyrone was sharing his experience of panic when he does not know
where I go or if I will come back. I attempted to give him an experience of being
understood, making a link to my disappearing, he responded by squeezing out
paint, which evoked further panic in me. The group also helped me think about
why I accepted the sudden change without comment. As Joseph details, I may
have felt a desire to avoid Tyrone’s anger and for him to see me as a good object,
perhaps a better mother than the one he indicates in his transference (Joseph,
1998).
It is possible that during this session Tyrone’s state of mind was in
a Depressive Position (Klein, 1937/1975). Whilst this key stage of mental
development is associated with the first year of life, it can be re-experienced,
and refined, throughout childhood. Characteristic to this stage is the onset of
whole object relating and revelations that attacks on the bad object have been
directed to the loved, yet flawed whole object, specifically mother (Bott Spillius
et al., 2011). Tyrone may be indicating that he is experiencing depressive guilt
for attacks on internal and external objects, and this may be evidenced in the
maternal transference. Klein proposes that depressive anxiety is a particular fear
for the damaged object and fear of retaliation. Tyrone may demonstrate this in
his anxiety about what will occur after choosing PE over the therapist, evident in
 Psychodynamic Practice 279
the potential projected panic (Bott Spillius et al., 2011). Klein proposed that the
depressive position and anxiety feels like a loss which the child links to the
greedy attacks of the Paranoid Schizoid phase. For example, when I mentioned
the previous week, Tyrone knew that this was about PE. Potentially, he demon­
strates that he has the capacity to feel guilty for attacks on mother-object in
transference. Klein proposed that defences against these feelings of loss can
include manic defence, characterised by triumph over and contempt for the
object, or reverting to paranoid schizoid defences such as splitting or denial.
Potentially Tyrone engages in these defences during the cup game and in the
metaphor of the aeroplane; the passengers suffered attack and are now lost.
When I linked it to my “disappearance” he may have been telling me that he
mourned losing a good object (Bott Spillius et al., 2011).
Tyrone seemed to present a much younger self within the therapeutic inter­
action, associated with some confusion about what I did or where I went when
I was not with him. This caused me to reflect on his hypothetical developmental
stage and what this may be communicating. I reflected on this within the context
of Anna Freud’s theory of developmental lines, which regards childhood devel­
opment as both cumulative and environmentally impacted and outline a child’s
readiness for key events such as school (Edgcumbe, 2000). This provides an
interesting counterpoint to the Kleinian theory presented in this paper.
Specifically, Anna Freud argued that the superego is established between the
ages of 3 and 5, and illustrated the developmental contributions to this. This
contrasts with Klein’s view that the superego is in place in the second half of the
baby’s first year (Holder, 2005). Key events had occurred for Tyrone during the
age of 2–3 years such as the birth of his brother, and rivalry for his mother’s
attention as brother’s additional needs became increasingly pronounced. I have
questioned whether these events had felt disruptive to Tyrone and if he commu­
nicated potential associated anxieties in the sessions.
Anna Freud proposed a number of lines of development, line 1 is the
development from dependency to emotional self-reliance. A key stage in this
line is the perception of object constancy (Freud, 1963). This is characterised by
the onset of the ability in the baby to perceive the mother as separate and
maintain an attachment to her regardless of her presence. In fact, the child is
able to have an internalised concept of the loved object which maintains the
bond and ensures the mother is not forgotten as well as facilitating relationships
with others (Edgcumbe, 2000). Freud argued that without object constancy the
individual would struggle to form relationships that were reciprocal or survive
frustrations. If disruption, changes or losses had been experienced in early
childhood then object constancy, and a consequent internal model of relation­
ships, could be derailed (Edgcumbe, 2000). This has a significant impact upon
the ability to trust others and relationships within the school environment. It
seemed to me that Tyrone was expressing some anxiety about rivals for my
attention when he asked who comes to the room when he does not. My offer of
keeping his time with me consistent was not enough and engendered an
280 C. Thornton
exasperated response that made me sense he wanted to know more about how
I exist when I am out of his sight. This may be connected to some anxiety that
I will not return. Hypothetically, the image of the plane crashing and the
passengers disappearing but not dying communicates some confusion and anxi­
ety about where good objects go when they are out of sight.

“Every child is affected thus the first time he is treated unfairly” (Barrie,
1911). The threat of rivals
In the intervening sessions Tyrone had become playful in a way that seemed to
correlate with his age. He often set up drawing competitions between us and
messy painting was a common activity. He seemed happy and I had a sense of
growing confidence to be seen and relaxed in the therapy room, he even told me
that his mother was taking him to a cricket club outside of school hours and that
he was very good at cricket. However, there came a point where he ceased to
mention mum or cricket. The week after this revelation, Tyrone was internally
excluded from year 4 for hitting a classmate. I had to collect him from a year 6
classroom where he was sitting alone at a table in a corner, facing the wall. On
entering the therapy room began to kick furniture, appearing to show me how
furious he was.

Tyrone kicks the cupboard containing other children’s boxes repeatedly, it shakes.
I stand on the opposite side of the room and say, “I wonder how you are feeling
right now”. He mumbles, I say, “I want to hear you” there is silence, which he
breaks by saying “Grownups are supposed to know” and gives the cupboard a huge
kick. I nod and say, “Perhaps you are angry with me”. Tyrone looks up at me with
rage in his face and raises his voice; “you always come at the wrong time”. I feel
a surge of panic and anger, I want to take him back to class. I keep my gaze on him
and in a firm tone say, “I understand it feels like I’m here at the wrong time and
maybe it feels like you didn’t get what you wanted”. Tyrone starts making a high-
pitched infantile whine. I pause, breathe, and then softly say his name; He makes
eye contact, there are tears in his eyes. I return his gaze, soften my expression and
nod. We keep the silence and after a pause Tyrone moves towards the toolbox
selecting toy bolts so that we can “fix together” pieces of paper. As we play, he
looks up and says, “I know the others are in the cupboard, I could pick the lock”.
I put down my bolt and say, “the others are in the cupboard, but its locked”. Tyrone
smiles and nods. I say “It might seem like there are parts of this room, and maybe
me, that you can’t get into or that you share with others? But that cupboard needs
to stay locked”. Tyrone shouts “no!” and jumps up. (Session 11, March 2022)

Tyrone began kicking the cupboard and evoked emotion within me that felt like
anger, but I then realised was fear. It was suffocating and I struggled to think. As
I wondered aloud how he was feeling I realised that I may already know via his
projection; what looked like aggression may well be Tyrone’s fear (Klein, 1937/
1975). My assurance that I wanted to understand enraged him as grown-ups
should know what it is like for him. This may indicate an anxiety that adults are
not keeping him in mind (Bion, 1962). Tyrone continued to kick the cupboard of
 Psychodynamic Practice 281
rivals, perhaps in his internal world I was preoccupied with the children in the
cupboard and therefore could not know how he was feeling. I paused to think
and then offered an indication that I had thought about his state of mind. I felt
tempted not to address the potential negative transference, perhaps due to a fear
of increasing Tyrone’s anger towards me; it felt risky (Rosenbluth, 1970).
However, Rosenbluth proposes that acknowledging negative transference can
strengthen the therapeutic alliance as the child has an experience of his emotions
being understood (Rosenbluth, 1970). Tyrone was able to tell me that I had not
provided the way he needed me to.
I felt anger and fear so powerfully that I examined this experience in super­
vision. I reflected on the possibility that I had enacted in countertransference as
rejecting mother; using “wanted” as opposed “needed”, my choice of word
seemed significant. I was feeling compelled to quash Tyrone’s aggression,
make it unseen, like a punitive mother or teacher. However, I think Tyrone
needed me to understand his fear, to share the experience. His response to the
word “want” was to make an infant-like whine, as if he were calling out for
breast. I paused and gave myself time to think and then try to make a connection
by calling his name and making eye contact. Possibly, Tyrone then feels safe
enough to cry and that his aggression sadness.
Tyrone’s assertion that grownups are supposed to “know” may relate to
Bion’s theory of container contained (Bion, 1962). In infancy, if mother is
capable of what Bion termed “maternal reverie”, she can actively feel and
understand baby’s projective communication (Bion, 1962). I recalled that
Tyrone’s mother reports she is “not worried” about him. Despite showing care
in supporting him to therapy perhaps she had no capacity to keep him in her
mind within the context of her demanding family. Potentially, Tyrone is making
a projective communication of his fear and anger, of not being understood or
regarding rivals and abandonment (Klein, 1937/1975). I had an opportunity to
provide an emotional experience of being understood that Tyrone may introject
(Bion, 1962). Bion proposed that the therapist can serve as a container for the
child’s difficult emotional experiences, facilitating containment by putting them
into words (Bott Spillius et al., 2011).
Bion develops the theory of Container-Contained, proposing that the infant
learns to tolerate the unbearable with the emergence of thinking; an emotional
experience reliant on the ability to have insight into mother’s mind
(O’shaughnessy, 1981). Bion’s theory of thinking is “to know” and he clarified
this with symbols; K is knowing, via X; the state of getting to know you and
Y the experience of becoming known (O’shaughnessy, 1981). This is only
possible in the presence of what Bion terms the Thinking Breast; the mother
who makes sense of her infant’s experience and hands back a digested version. If
this is absent, experiences may have no meaning and give rise to nameless dread
(Bott Spillius et al., 2011). It is possible that due to the pressures mother is under
to care for her complex family, Tyrone may have had an absence of the thinking
breast and lacks the experience of becoming known, bringing together his
282 C. Thornton
fractured self. It is possible that in the session Tyrone experiences a sense of his
emotions being understood which, as previously outlined in the Container-
Contained relationship, can be introjected back as a manageable experience
(Bion, 1962). The process of projection and introjection contributes to the
development of a reality-ego, with the ability to think, as opposed to the more
primitive pleasure-seeking ego (O’shaughnessy, 1981). To be unseen may indeed
have made Tyrone feel like a” lost boy” (Barrie, 2021). Bion argues that
projective identification and containing are vital to the therapeutic process
(Bion, 1959). Specifically, that a containing understanding, gained via the
transference, will be the core psychoanalytic intervention in the therapy and
will modify projective identifications into something less terrifying
(Hinshelwood, 2018).
Bion outlined K as the thought process; the dance between two people, in
this case therapist and client, who, with linking, endeavour to form an idea
together; K+ the curiosity to know (Bion, 1962). Linking is more than the
transfer of information between people; Bion saw linking as an extension of
Klein’s ideas of projection and introjection, of being on one another’s minds
(Hinshelwood, 2018). However, during this session, I had a sense that Tyrone
both desired to have some understanding, or indeed be understood, and that yet
this was somehow hard to tolerate. Bion argued that an attack may come when
the knowing feels too much to bear, and the thinking is destroyed (−K denial),
and potentially this is evident in the session material (Bion, 1962). Potentially
my attempts to think felt dangerous to Tyrone in this session. For example,
Tyrone expressed curiosity to know where I am outside of our sessions. When
I reflect that he may be worried that the therapeutic experience, or indeed I, may
not always be available I may have suggested thinking about the loss of a good
object. This may be too much for Tyrone to bear at this point, but when I offer
a link on how this may be worrying for him, his response is potentially an attack;
moving to an airplane that crashes and all inside are lost or making an explosion
of paint that, in my countertransference, felt aggressive.
An alternative argument can be made that Tyrone’s kicking of the cupboard,
his possible anger, and my response could align with Winnicott’s theory of
holding. It is well documented that confusion can arise in the difference between
Bion’s concept of containment and Winnicott’s of holding (Aguayo & Lundgren,
2018). To be clear, whilst containment describes the infant’s projection of
emotions into mother, and her adaptation of these feelings for reintegration
holding is characterised by the infant being unconscious that they need an
“other” and that they are in complete fusion with mother (Aguayo &
Lundgren, 2018). Winnicott writes that in the holding state “when things go
well the infant has no means of knowing what is being properly provided and
what is being prevented” (D. Winnicott, 1960, p. 52). Ultimately the holding
environment provides the appropriate conditions for “good enough” parenting;
the mother is adapted to her infant’s needs and the child’s anxieties of annihila­
tion are managed (Finlay, 2016). However, as more frustration is sensitively
 Psychodynamic Practice 283
allowed the child is given the experience of expressing emotion and an oppor­
tunity to develop an understanding that they can survive. Winnicott suggested
that the holding environment provides a sense of continuation of self, or going
on being, and a lack of the holding environment may give a sense of disintegra­
tion and a threat of annihilation (Aguayo & Lundgren, 2018).
When Tyrone claims that “adults are supposed to know” perhaps what he is
seeking is the environment that the state of holding provides, a fusion with
a maternal object where his instinctual needs are understood and met without
him having to be conscious of the process or suffer frustration that he possibly
feels unable to tolerate at this time (Finlay, 2016). When Tyrone attacks the
cupboard containing his rivals (other children’s boxes) and retreats to an infan­
tile whine of pain perhaps he is indicating that he does not have the recourse of
protection and regulation endowed by a sense of a continuation of self in the face
of threats and rivals (Finlay, 2016). When he claims I come at “the wrong time”
perhaps he expresses a fear that he needs are not understood. To this end,
perhaps he is regressing to a state where he needs to experience the holding
environment within the therapeutic relationship, which may ultimately provide
a sense of “going on being” (D. Winnicott, 1960). Winnicott proposed that the
stage of life compatible with holding could be relived in the transference and in
that case the therapist could find herself experiences similar changes to the
mother in the state of maternal preoccupation and sensing a pull for fusion (D.
Winnicott, 1960). Perhaps, this was experienced in my distress at Tyrone’s
aggression and my ability to see this as something like sadness relatively
quickly. I survived the aggressive attack and rejection, which Winnicott notes
comes before the stage of fusion, and potentially this paved the way for
a holding environment where I could resist the urge to take him back to class
but instead provide the understanding for his emotional state he required. When
he begins to make an infantile whine and I responded with eye contact and
softness, the moment had the feeling of a physical holding where frustration was
temporarily removed and Tyrone’s response was to propose we use tools to “fix
together”. However, it may be that I misjudged when the right time to bring
frustration in occurred, as I confessed to Tyrone’s having to share me with
others, rivals, ad this prompted a renewed aggression and potential intolerance
at this time.

“Goodbye means going away and going away means forgetting” (Barrie,
1911). Out of sight, out of mind?
Since the last session Tyrone had begun to occasionally mention his mother, but
no other family members. Prior to the following session he reveals to me that
mother had stopped taking him to cricket, he tells me she found it “boring” and
now father takes him instead. This is the last session before a two-week holiday;
discussion of breaks had previously been concretely ignored by Tyrone but I had
noticed his behaviour would often change prior to a school break or missed
284 C. Thornton
session for a school trip. Notably, play would become extremely messy and
chaotic, often involving tying dolls to furniture with balls of wool or squirting
paint on the floor. Tyrone would also revert to infantile speech and often tell me
that I was “never there”. Prior to this break I had made a calendar of the term
and invited him to tick of weeks leading up to the holiday at the start of each
session, he ignored this and in supervision I reflected on the possibility that he
found this rejecting. Therefore, I had stopped referencing the break until the
previous week, where at the end of the session I reminded him a break was
coming up. He did respond this time but claimed I was mistaken. My intention
with this session was to raise the topic of the break towards the end of the
session but leave enough time for him to respond.

Tyrone moves around the room with toy tools, identifying what needs repair
because “It’s been ruined”. I say in a soft tone “Maybe it feels like I will let the
room get ruined when not here”. Tyrone says, “I don’t know but there’s nothing
here”. There is silence and when we make eye contact, I give a small smile. He
then says, “I do know, but I don’t want to tell you”. I nod and say “Yes, it can be
really hard”. He drops the tools and gathers paint and paper saying, “my dad got
a puppy, my mum looks after it, it’s worse than a baby”. I raise my eyebrows and
say “Maybe that feels difficult that mum has another baby to look after” there is
a brief silence and I say “Maybe it feels like no one is looking after you? Like this
room”. Tyrone looks down at his painting, which is entirely black. (. . .) Tyrone
tells me he has painted a tornado and I observe that I can see two figures inside. He
says they are “a boy kid and a grown-up girl”. I pause, I feel dread and then say
“Like us. I wonder how they are feeling?”. He smiles and says they are scared. His
smile fades and he quickly paint over them, he whispers “now you can’t see it”.
I say I cannot see but I will keep thinking of them. Tyrone then folds up the paper
and tells me to “forget”. (Session 13, April 2022)

I noticed that Tyrone did not revert to the infantile speech often used when
difficult emotions arise. When he observed the room to be ruined with nothing
for him, I wondered if he was understanding and communicating sense of feeling
deprived as a break approach. He reveals that he knows but he does not want to
tell me. When I recognise that expressing emotion can be hard it is possible that
he uses metaphor to communicate the emotional experience of being deprived of
mother’s attention and in the context of a rival (the puppy baby). I felt sadness
and felt this reflected in Tyrone’s body language. Supervision helped me to draw
links between Tyrone’s mother rejecting his interest as boring and depriving him
of her company at cricket. Perhaps, Tyrone is communicating that he does not
know if he is interesting enough for the maternal object and that, in his
transference, a break in therapy may bring changes; maybe he will be rejected
in favour of more interesting rivals.
The darkness of Tyrone’s black painting felt foreboding and Tyrone’s smile
incongruous, as though he were trying to cope with quite a destructive act. It
could be that the painting communicated a murderous drive to kill of his internal
bad object and the associated feelings he experiences which is reminiscent of
Klein’s theories on introjected objects (Rosenbluth, 1970). The therapist is also
 Psychodynamic Practice 285
killed off in the black tornado, perhaps also a bad object who in transference has
come to represent deprivation and hiding. Tyrone’s potential murderous impulse
could be a way of working though his anxiety about separation and loss of the
maternal object brought to the fore by the prospect of a break (Rosenbluth,
1970).
I had a sense that Tyrone was struggling with the experience of being seen;
I felt a sense of shame when he told me to forget as if the knowledge that
someone else understood his mind was unbearable. As previously hypothesised
maybe Tyrone is in a mourning process; experiencing the loss of the object in the
depressive position (Klein, 1937/1975) Bion proposed that the ability to bear the
experience of loss could be supported by reverie and containment in the ther­
apeutic session; the ability of the therapist to make sense of the child’s state of
mind (Bott Spillius et al., 2011). However, Tyrone seems to come to a point
where he rejects this experience. Bion’s theory of K proposes that during the
container-contained process good objects and experiences can be introjected and
relied on for future thinking about emotional experiences. However, If Tyrone
has introjected depriving objects who do not “know” his emotional experience
then he may have come to see his internal bad object, and external, as dangerous
(Bion, 1967). To defend against this dread Tyrone may be rejecting the process
of a meaningful connection between a thinking object. He may be finding it
intolerable to remain in his experience, yet only remaining in the presence of
a “thinking breast” will reduce the terror and facilitate understanding. Perhaps he
is limiting the relationships between objects, specifically termed by Bion as
“attack on linking” (Bott Spillius et al., 2011).

Conclusion
By the end of our sessions together I felt there was a consistent sense of a fear of
deprivation within Tyrone. Tyrone consistently demonstrated how he could
communicate more like a 9-year-old child when potentially he felt interesting
or seen. However, he was also capable of reverting to violence and an infantile
state when he potentially felt threated by deprivation. This often put me in mind
of his initial referral; punching a child who deprived him of a birthday party
invitation, struggling so significantly with the deprivation that came with
COVID-19 lockdown, and possibly a continuing hurt of a younger sibling taking
maternal attention; communicated by clinging to infantile speech. This was
particularly prevalent in the change in behaviour with the arrival of a new
baby, the puppy, and mother’s cessation of interest in his cricket. I wondered
if this played out in the therapy room as a fear that I too would deprive him of
therapy or turn my attention to his rivals.
Tyrone may have come to find it more tolerable to think about, and com­
municate, his emotions but this is potentially still painful and fear of loss and
being unseen may endure. This put me in mind of Anna Freud’s developmental
lines (Freud, 1965). Within the line of dependency to emotional self-reliance he
286 C. Thornton
could reasonably be expected, during latency, to be at stage 6, demonstrating the
transference of libido away from parents and to peers and other adults
(Edgcumbe, 2000). However, this is not the case in his school life and perhaps
he communicates this therapeutically within his preoccupations. I reflected on
a potential disruption to stage 3; the ability to conceive of object permanency;
Tyrone may not have established an internal representation of mother and her
permanence, which he can rely on in event of an actual absence, leaving him
with an overwhelming anxiety of being abandoned (Freud, 1965).

Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes on contributors
I have spent the last two years working in placement within school based counselling
services in London, with children aged 6 to 17 years old. Prior to this I worked in NHS
psychiatric crisis services and a variety of youth services including youth offending
services. I have also spent the last 15 years as an advocate for mental health provision
for young people diagnosed with cancer and I have worked as a mentor for newly
diagnosed young people.
I hold a PG cert in Psychology of Child Development from the Institute of Education,
an MSC in the Psychology and Neuroscience of Mental Health form Kings College
London and I will complete an MSC in Child and Adolescent Psychodynamic
Counselling and Psychotherapy at Birkbeck college in the summer of 2023.

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