Transference-Countertransference Issues with Adolescents: Personal Reflections

The theoretical concept of transference-countertransference in the psychotherapeutic work with adolescents is approached from a more global, inclusive interactive view developed by tracing various modifications of Freud’s original theory by Jung, Fromm-Reichmann, Klein and Sullivan, among others. The two case vignettes highlight the author’s position that the transference-countertransference phenomenon is the result of all and everything in the therapist and patient as part of the therapeutic relationship induced by external stimuli by the patient or from the therapist (and vice versa) as well as internal stimuli from the patient or by the therapist (and vice versa).