Talamini, Milvia
THE BODY UNVEILS WHAT THE MIND HOLDS: THE CASE OF DIANA

Journal of Sandplay Therapy, Volume 19, Number 2, 2010

KEY WORDS: shame, lies, family secrets, narcissistic links between generations, Sandplay therapy, clinical example, girl, child, female, enuresis, encompresis, stealing, transgenerational pathological family pattern, family shadow, dystonic behavior.

ABSTRACT: The author describes the analysis based on sandplay therapy of a nine-year-old girl with symptoms of enuresis, encopresis, stealing and lying at school. The therapist outlines a transgenerational pathological family pattern involving a family secret that affected the family’s dynamics. The unsolved and never analyzed secret had been relegated to the family shadow and led to the explosion of the child’s psychotic nucleus. The sandplay process removed both the symptoms and the dystonic behavior, while bringing to light the secrets hidden in the soul of the young patient and understanding retroactively the secret in the context of the family history.