The Relationship Takes Form: Reflections on Transference Images Appearing During a Psychoanalytic Treatment Utilizing Sandplay Therapy

By Rosa Napoliello Balfour, Rosalba Cagna, Ezia Palma, and Chiara A. Ripamonti

With this article the authors participate, as Jungian psychoanalysts and psychotherapists who also use sandplay therapy, in the ongoing debate amongst the proponents of the various schools of psychoanalytical thought on the concept of transfererence. The appearance of certain transference images during sandplay therapy may result in a transformation – and at times even a radical change in the therapeutic process – changes that are derived from a transformation within the relationship therapist-patient. The authors present a series of transference images from the therapies of several patients and reflect on such images within their group and also analyze the various experiences of countertransference therein – before, during, and after the appearance of the transference images. The authors offer three final reflections.