|
DISSERTATIONS - 2002
Female Scenes: A psychosomatic study of women with polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) through sandplay therapy
Margareth Lury Yoshika
Advisor: Denise G. Ramos
Key words: polycystic ovary syndrome, sandplay therapy, femininity, female principle.
Abstract: This study aims at the understanding and analysis of the psychological dynamics of the polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS), one of the organic disorders that most affect women at reproductive age in the modern world, The organic symptom is understood as a pre-verbal level expression of experiencing a complex content whose mental representation has been repressed, therefore not been able to integrate itself to consciousness. This taken as a referential, Sandplay Therapy (ST) was chosen as the .investigative method, for being a non- verbal practice that favors the access and the transformation of internal experiences through symbolic work, enabling the dissolution and assimilation of profound nucleus never before expressed in words. For research purposes, some changes have been made in the original format of the practice. The processes of three women, age 18 to 26, diagnosed with PCOS, were followed and analyzed. The results obtained corroborate and enhance the data found in the literature concerning the psychodynamic of these women: depreciation of the female figure and roles due to difficulties in the process of nurturance, an identification with the mothers negative animus that leads to the development of severe self-criticism and judgment
and an overvaluing of external demands prior to internal ones. In short: Due to the lack of a positive identification with the female role, these women do not establish a co-operative relation with the male figure; without the internal interaction of these figures, creativity does not find its expressive path, therefore remaining immobilized. Through the ST process, these women could understand the signification of the symptom and re-elaborate the female figure, despise the fact that PCOS' symptoms did not show any visible changes. The suggestion is that, perhaps due to, its chronic aspects and for being related to cyclical patterns of female nature, the transduction of PCOS' symptoms from the somatic to the psychic pole require a time structuring from which new experienced behavior and attitude can make possible the organization of new rhythms.
 |
