Shared Trauma, the Renegotiation of the Frame, and the Preservation of What Is Essential: Transformations in Psychoanalytic Treatment in the Time of the Pandemic

Abstract

In this paper, the author describes a process, renegotiation of the frame, that emerged as he contemplated with his patients the continuation of work together in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic. Such a renegotiation lends itself to the formation of bastions, as described by Baranger and Baranger (1969); attention to these bastions demonstrates that the psychoanalytic process continues and can deepen. An extended clinical vignette is presented to illustrate. If a more broadly defined functional frame is considered, not only may the frame be used as a clinical tool in a more nuanced way, but in addition, aspects of the traditional narrowly defined frame may be seen to contribute to the formation of bastions that, unaddressed, could impede the analytic process.