Ignacio Melo : Notes on the Hallucinatory

The outcome of psychotic disorders during puberty depends on how the adolescent and his therapeutic environment make use of the adolescent’s hallucinatory world. When used and worked on within the analytical relationship, the narcissistic part of primary identifications is preserved, and it is no longer necessary to disinvest the Unconscious, as Freud postulates in the case of President Schreber and in schizophrenia. The hallucinatory then becomes a precious tool for saving and expressing desires; putting it into words will help to lighten the economy of the adolescent’s psychological functioning. This is illustrated using two clinical cases.