Thanks, Jessica, for pointing out what needs elucidation in my first report on Laura. I think I had better emphasize that Laura was in treatment for half of her thirty years before she and I met. Thus, I am able to go to the heart of things rather more easily than would be true if she were not already in touch with many of her feelings and facets of her life. You may recall that it was during a previous therapy that she realized the meaning of trace memories of the neighbor's sexual abuse of her when she was a child.
My statement about her living situation was not clear. Before coming to the Midwest to be with Tom, Laura stayed in another state. That is where she was involved with that icon of perfection, her former lover. Laura at the time of the sessions I told about lived with her boyfriend, Tom, and a boarder. Her mother had to come from another suburb to pick her up at work in order to drive Laura to where she lived. Thus the strength of Laura's dependency feelings toward her mother as she wrestled with her attachment to Tom.
The mother is notably self-concerned. When Laura was very young, her mother treated her as a little doll, dressing her in fancy clothes, but not tuning in to Laura's feelings. She cared a great deal about being appreciated for the fine food she prepared, but she did not seem to perceive Laura's involvement with the neighbor. She apparently was much closer to Laura's only sibling, an older brother.
Laura also has a warm relationship with the brother, and in addition is much closer than he is to her father. The mother and father quarrel constantly, Laura feeling herself to be his real favorite.
I am glad it came through my account that Laura is ready to work on a deep level. I think the meaning to her of my questioning her idea of making excuses with the employer was, first, that I thought she could successfully make her request without a need for subterfuge; and, second, that therefore I believed in her right to assert her own interests--especially with a man.
You and I seem to agree that Laura struggles with her longing for and abhorrence of closeness to her mother. She has over the years explored many of the layers of meaning in her bulimia. By this segment of her adventures with psychotherapy, now as my client, I think she is at a pretty basic point.
My way of understanding the metaphor of food goes back to the beginning of crystallizing a sense of self, during the toddler period. The very young mind thinks concretely. Food/mother readily becomes an entity. At the same time, self-recognition is greatly aided by awareness of genital impulses. What it means to be a "Me!" develops around the child's comprehension of a two-gendered world, organizing relationships in terms of these elements.
I think that the compulsion to eat (often reported by bulimics as shameful) is a surrender to merger with mother. Throwing up (often accompanied by feelings of relief or even of triumph) is an act of self-assertion. Self- assertion gains conflictual significance on the metaphoric level. It carries with it self-identity in gendered terms and thus complicated feelings about loyalties to parents and sexual promptings.
In the episode Laura told me about, she ate in the aftermath of nurturing behavior by her mother and disappointment from Tom. When Tom acknowledged he was in the wrong and promised to try harder to please her, Laura felt drawn to him and had to get rid of food/mother. She remained angry, however, still strongly conflicted.
Laura's estrangement from her sad feelings about the threat to her mother's life coincided with her sharp repression of her merger wishes. I believe that becoming conscious of her wish to be close to her mother and get tender care from her in the context of how that seemed opposed to appreciating Tom's love for her helped her to focus on feelings in the here and now. Any conflict that is played out in body language is not available for dealing with directly and is stuck in old, old scripts. I believe that being able to see those scripts in action frees one to live more in the moment of adult powers and possibilities.
These are the feelings I hope Laura will be able to bring into balance. Laura uses almost the same language that you do, Jessica, indeed expressing the wish for healthy relationships.
Don's integrative introduction to our putting our heads together over this latest of the cases we share on BOL smoothens the way for further dialogue. It is fascinating how many roads lead to Rome. I value the Control Mastery emphasis upon how the client sets the agenda, and the other sensitizing emphases other approaches bring to our enterprise.
I thought when I joined BOL that finding our similarities will be the biggest bonus. Maybe it is even better to know that different ways can be interesting, valid, and effective. This is no forum for single-minded stuffiness!