In this paper, we explore how maternal representations, and in particular their contents, are structured during pregnancy. Twenty‐three primiparous women were recruited for participation in a longitudinal study about mothers' thoughts and feelings about their infants. A semistructured interview was conducted with each of the subjects in the third trimester of pregnancy. During the interview, subjects were also given five adjective lists based on the semantic differential model. Results from this sample indicate similarities in the content‐free aspects of representations of self and baby, but differences in the content of these presentations. Implications of these results are discussed with regard to the construction of an internal representation of the child in the third trimester of pregnancy.

This article explores aspects of the clinical development of a male 17 year-old patient who had four weekly sessions of psychoanalysis during an acute psychotic crisis. In the context of arrested adolescent development, a psychotic crisis can present an opportunity to set the process of maturation in motion again. Adolescent psychosis is examined in the light of Bion's theories of catastrophic change - in which the container/contained relationship becomes explosive and overwhelming - as well as of Ferrari's and Matte Blanco's hypotheses on the mind-body relationship. The authors emphasize the role of denial of the body and its changes in the genesis of adolescent psychotic conflict, and show how the analytic relationship can offer crucial reverie conditions for promoting recognition of the body, bodily sensations and affects, as a prerequisite for the activation of an autonomous mental system. This clinical approach entails recognizing the urgent need to make room for the elaboration of intrasubjective relationships and for mind-body dialogue, transference interpretations being postponed. Clinical material and fragments of analytic dialogue illustrate the authors' hypotheses and demonstrate the patient's development towards recognition of his body and an incipient capacity to think associated with the perception of the limits set by time and reality.

Sont abordés dans ce travail quelques aspects de l’évolution clinique d’un adolescent de 17 ans souffrant d’une crise psychotique, traité dans le cadre d’une cure psychanalytique à raison de 4 séances par semaine. Dans le contexte d’un arrêt du développement à l’adolescence, une explosion psychotique peut fournir une opportunité de relancer le processus de maturation. La psychose de l’adolescent est ici abordée à la lumière de la théorie du changement catastrophique de Bion – théorie selon laquelle la relation contenant/contenu prend un aspect explosif –, et de l’hypothèse de la relation corps/esprit avancée par Ferrari et Matte Blanco. Les auteurs soulignent le rôle de la négation du corps et des changements corporels qui jouent un rôle central dans la genèse du conflit psychotique de l’adolescence, et montrent comment la relation analytique peut offrir les conditions de rêverie déterminantes pour promouvoir la reconnaissance du corps, des sensations corporelles et des affects, en tant que pré-conditions de l’activation d’un système mental autonome.