"Yes, Of Course It Hurts When Buds Are Breaking": Therapist Reactions to an Adolescent Client's Sexual Material in Psychodynamic Psychotherapy

This article focuses on the therapist's emotional reactions to a young female client's revelations about her fear of being raped that came up in the course of an open‐ended psychodynamic psychotherapy. The client suffered from depression and emotional disturbance related to the overwhelming developmental tasks of adolescence, including individuation and psychosexual development. The patient's fears and nightmares not only raised ethical dilemmas in the therapist regarding how to handle the implications of these revelations but also reactivated the therapist's own issues from her adolescent period. The fact that the material of the patient found a “hook” (Gabbard, ) in the therapist enabled a deeper understanding of the patient that helped resolve her inner conflicts and move on in her development.