Although this statement is generally accurate, I consider that in the history of psychoanalysis, some analysts discussed the type (2) in van der Hart’s typing. If we go back to Ferenczi’s seminal paper “Confusion of Tangues” we are convinced that he was one of the first among Freud’s disciples who was impressed by the splitting of consciousness. He did not hide his amazement about the way novel psyche is produced as though it is under the influence of some kind of magic.
Sándor Ferenczi (1949).
Confusion of the Tongues Between the Adults and the Child—(The Language of
Tenderness and of Passion) International Journal of
Psycho-Analysis, 30:225-230
We talk a good deal in analysis of
regressions into the infantile, but we do not really believe to what great
extent we are right; we talk a lot about the splitting of the personality, but
do not seem sufficiently to appreciate the depth of these splits. If we keep up
our cool, educational attitude even vis-a-vis an opisthotonic patient, we tear
to shreds the last thread that connects him to us. The patient gone off into
his trance is a child indeed [emphasis added] who no longer reacts to
intellectual explanations, only perhaps to maternal friendliness; without it he
feels lonely and abandoned in his greatest need, i.e. in the same unbearable situation
which at one time led to a splitting of his mind and eventually to his illness;（p.227）
The same anxiety, however, if it reaches a certain
maximum, compels them to subordinate themselves like automata to the will of
the aggressor, to divine each one of his desires and to gratify these;
completely oblivious of themselves they identify themselves with the aggressor.
Through the identification, or let us say, introjection of the aggressor, he
disappears as part of the external reality, and becomes intra- instead of
extra-psychic;（p228）
It is more remarkable that in the identification the
working of a second mechanism can be observed, a mechanism the existence of
which I, for one, have had but little knowledge. I mean the sudden, surprising
rise of new faculties after a trauma, like a miracle that occurs upon the wave
of a magic wand,' or like that of the fakirs who are said to raise from a tiny
seed., before our very eyes, a plant, leaves and flowers. Great need, and more
especially mortal anxiety, seem to possess the power to waken up suddenly and
to put into operation latent dispositions which, un-cathected, waited in
deepest quietude for their development. （229）
Eventually it may arrive at a state which-continuing the
picture of fragmentation-or re would be justified in calling atomization. One
must possess a good deal of optimism not to lose courage when facing such a
state, though I hope even here to be able to find threads that can link up the
various parts. 229
