chapter4/charlene Flashcards
overview: charlene
o Story of Charlene
o Came at age 35 with a complaint of depression following a breakup
o Clearly, underachiever in the game of lie.
o Volunteered for a year, hired by Episcopal church as its director of religious education.
o Six months later fired
o Had no real friends, and many failed relationships
o Described as the “damndest” patient Peck worked with
o Gained nothing from parents but money, father not involved in raising her and her younger sister Edith.
o Her mother was a fanatic Episcopalian who mouthed words of Jesus continually, hated her husband
o Edith lesbian, she considers herself bi
o Always blamed parents
o After being fired from the church she joined a hodgepodge of Hindu, Buddhist, Christian and esoteric theology.
o Peck could not understand what was wrong with Charlene after 4 dozen sessions. Not usual
o Used to do rituals as a kid (Peck was testing for OCD) however around 15 she stopped
o Three dozen more sessions were to go by before Peck started to understand her character
o Charlene cannot give people the same “design” of check so she had to switch banks to pay Peck
o Said it had to do something with “love” energy and she would the pick for the person.
o Peck picks up this is a ritual and found out she does actually have many rituals
o Charlene is a “person of the lie”, withheld information from Peck because she didn’t “trust him” (after 9 months). Kept info just to run the show, she remained enigmatic.
o After this, she began to reveal her desires for Peck
o Believes that Charlene never overcame the “Oedipal dilemma” (in which the child wants to bang their opposite gender parent) which usually is finished at age 5.
o Must go through it now with the therapist, must become the therapist’s child
o Peck began to feel repulsed by Charlene (despite the fact she was attractive)
o Peck really doesn’t want the bang her (what a bitch), says he has “no good sexual feelings toward her”
o Another one of Peck’s patients gets a bad vibe from her, believes she’s evil
o Charlene very upfront about her sexuality, parked outside Peck’s house in the darkness listening to the radio softly
o Peck is afraid of rape, fears her sexual advances
o Reason for her behavior, never received love from her parents
o Tried to get Charlene to take a more childlike approach with him in order to help, failed.
o Without regression, one can not be healed
o Regarded Peck’s advances to nurture her as a trap (cause her parents were screwed up and she regarded him as the same)
o Charlene wants Peck to love her for being her (sick and all) much in the same way a mother loves an infant however, she at the same time wants to be treated as an adult
o Third year of therapy, Peck realized she was autistic
o Mental health is an ongoing process of dedication to reality at all costs
o Autism is narcissism. Charlene had no considerations for Peck’s feelings regarding anything, she assumed that her feelings were his
o Charlene makes her own rules instead of following the employers, this is why she always gets fired
o Charlene does not want to live for God, she wants to live for herself
o Charlene has a dream in which she makes a weapon to win a war with aliens, however, one alien gets in and she knows that he will break the machine but decides to bang him anyways. She believes that the alien represents Peck who is “deceiving her”, making her think things she doesn’t believe, making her think that he cares about her. The machine represents her intelligence which she believes is constantly under attack by Peck, he is trying to undermine her.
o Peck suggests that the machine represents her neurosis (defensive, build to stop people) but Charlene freaks out
o The “inhuman” something in Charlene is what Peck labels as evil, out of reach of ordinary psychodynamic understanding
o Charlene wanted power just for the sake of having it
o To gain authority over evil, must have knowledge and love
o Only cure would’ve been exorcism and deliverance
