Page:Collected Papers on Analytical Psychology (1916).djvu/24

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6
ANALYTICAL PSYCHOLOGY

9th, 13th and 15th of October, between twelve and one o’clock. The last three occurred during the menstrual period. The attendant spoke to her several times, showed her the lighted street-lamps, and trees; but she did not react to this conversation. Since then the attacks have altogether ceased. The patient has complained about a number of troubles which she had had all along. She suffered much from headache the morning after the attacks. She said it was unbearable. Five grains of Sacch. lactis promptly alleviated this; then she complained of pains in both forearms, which she described as if it were a teno-synovitis. She regarded the bulging of the muscles in flexion as a swelling, and asked to be massaged. Nothing could be seen objectively, and no attention being paid to it, the trouble disappeared. She complained exceedingly and for a long time about the thickening of a toenail, even after the thickened part had been removed. Sleep was often disturbed. She would not give her consent to be hypnotised for the night-attacks. Finally on account of headache and disturbed sleep she agreed to hypnotic treatment. She proved a good subject, and at the first sitting fell into deep sleep with analgesia and amnesia.

In November she was again asked whether she could now remember the attack on the 19th September which it had been suggested that she would recall. It gave her great trouble to recollect it, and in the end she could only state the chief facts, she had forgotten the details.

It should be added that the patient was not superstitious, and in her healthy days had never particularly interested herself in the supernatural. During the whole course of treatment, which ended on the 14th November, great indifference was evinced both to the illness and the cure. Next spring the patient returned for out-patient treatment of the headache, which had come back during the very hard work of these months. Apart from this symptom her condition left nothing to be desired. It was demonstrated that she had no remembrance of the attacks of the previous autumn, not even of those of the 19th September and earlier. On the