The term '[[helplessness]]' ([[French]]: ''[[détresse]]''; [[German]]: ''[[Hilflosigkeit]]'') is used in [[psychoanalysis]] to denote the state of the newborn [[infant]] who is incapable of carrying out the specific [[action]]s required to [[satisfy]] its own [[need]]s, and so is completely dependent on other people (especially the [[mother]]).
The state of [[helplessness]] is linked to the [[infant]]'s initial [[power]]lessness in the face of its [[need]]s.
This causes [[distress]], as the protective shield is overwhelmed; only the intervention of another person can relieve this [[suffering]].
The neurophysiological model of [[Sigmund Freud]]'s "Project for a Scientific Psychology" (1950c [1895]) posits the [[baby]]'s original [[helplessness]] as the prototype of all [[trauma]]tic situations.
[[Helplessness]] and [[satisfaction]] [[structure]] the two modes of mental functioning.
In the primary mode, the [[desire]]d [[object]] and [[desire]]d [[satisfaction]] are hallucinated immediately through re[[cathexis]] of the [[memory]] traces left by the real experience.
In the secondary mode, a lasting discharge forms the basis for the relationship to the real object, lost and rediscovered thanks to "indications of reality," and invested with the meaning "mutual understanding."
[[Helplessness]] and the theory of [[anxiety]] are closely linked.
The [[helpless]] baby, powerless to fulfill its needs and without any adequate means of discharging internal excitation, experiences "automatic anxiety."
Anticipation of [[helplessness]] triggers "signal anxiety," the ego's appeal to the ego (1926d [1925]).
In a state of [[helplessness]] owing to its [[prematurity]], the preverbal [[human]] [[infant]] cries, experiences and recognizes its [[power]]lessness, and urgently alerts the succoring object.
The ability to apprehend its helplessness depends on the protective shield against stimuli, whose action is thus the basis of relationships, the precondition of effective [[communication]].
For [[Melanie Klein]] (1952/1975), the distress associated with the [[death instinct]], a source of tremendous persecution, precipitates [[projection]].
This is the foundation of what she calls the schizoid-paranoid position.
When a human being is reduced to a state of [[helplessness]], subjected to a primal kind of passivity by the impositions of others, he or she may seek to regain mastery through repetition of the experience.
For Kreisler et al. (1966), too much [[distress]] of this kind may cause psychosomatic disorders; for Tustin (1972), the result may be recourse to autistic defenses.
The term '[[helplessness]]' ([[French]]: ''[[détresse]]''; [[German]]: ''[[Hilflosigkeit]]'') is used in [[psychoanalysis]] to denote the state of the newborn [[infant]] who is incapable of carrying out the specific [[action]]s required to [[satisfy]] its own [[need]]s, and so is completely dependent on other people (especially the [[mother]]).--
The [[helplessness]] of the [[human]] [[infant]] is grounded in its 'prematurity' of birth, a fact which was pointed out by [[Freud]] and which [[Lacan]] takes up in his early writings.
This means that it is more dependent than other animals, and for a longer time, on its parents.
--
[[Lacan]] follows [[Freud]] in highlighting the importance of the initial dependence of the [[human]] [[infant]] on the [[mother]].
(The recognition of this contrast engenders a depressive effect in the [[child]].<ref>{{S4}} p.186</ref>)
--- [[Lacan]] also uses the concept of [[helplessness]] to illustrate the sense of [[abandonment]] and [[subjective destitution]] that the [[analysand]] feels at the [[end of analysis]].
<blockquote>"At the end of a [[training]] [[analysis]] the [[subject]] should reach and know the domain and level of the experience of absolute disarray."<ref>{{S7}} p.304</ref></blockquote>
If this seems to present a particularly ascetic view of [[psychoanalytic treatment]], this is exactly how [[Lacan]] wishes it to be seen; [[psychoanalysis]] is, in [[Lacan]]'s words, a "long subjective acesis."<ref>{{E}} p.105</ref>
[[Category:Imaginary]]
[[Category:Jacques Lacan]]
[[Category:Development]]
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[[Category:Psychoanalysis]]
==See Also==
[[Category:Terms]]
[[Category:Concepts]]
[[Category:Jacques Lacan]][[Category:Development]][[Category:Dictionary]]
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[[Category:Enotes]]
[[Category:Imaginary]]
