Pain in psychoanalysis – Physical or psychic?

Abstract

Pain has become an important theme for psychoanalysis. One of the reasons for this interest is the phenomenon of fibromyalgia, a syndrome described by medicalprofessionals as characterized by chronic pain in the absence of lesions or signs of abnormality in the biological machinery. An impasse is brought up here — how to treat physical pain psychoanalytically? Interpretations are suggested, such as associations of pain with the melancholic state, with psychic inhibition or with hypochondria. Pain in these cases is taken as expression of a non-symbolized traumatic experience.