The Dream of The Broken Horses

by William Bayer

  When I reminded Mrs. F that the equation she'd just presented had come from her not me, she stated: “You led me straight to it like a horse to water, didn't you?’

  But despite her brief flurry of resistance, Mrs. F quickly showed interest in pursuing this line of interpretation. She offered: “Dad was teaching me to ride fast and free. That was how I always wanted to ride but wasn't allowed to by Mom. All those years studying with G, learning to do that stupid dressage! But riding fast and free is what I do in the dream, once I get going anyway. I break out from the pack. I go so fast I nearly fly. That's what's so wonderful, so liberating, so sexy, I guess – riding my magnificent black horse faster than the wind!"

  At the end of the session Mrs. F said she felt exhilarated. “I think we made real progress today.” She apologized for snapping at me. “I think maybe I did that because what you said just cut too close to the bone.”

  During the next session, resistance showed itself again. “I know what you're thinking – that Dad fondled me too much the way Mom accused him of doing. But I know that isn't true. He was just a loving guy, a real hands-on-type guy. That's how he trained horses – talking to them softly, touching them, fondling them if you will. That's just how he was. There wasn't anything sexual about the way he touched me.”

  However, again her resistance quickly gave way when I explained to her that it wasn’t so much a matter of her father's intentions or what he actually did, but how his touching affected her, especially as

  *12 When I remained silent in accordance with standard therapeutic practice, Mrs. F continued: ”I may not be betraying him now but I have in the past and I can't imagine I won't want to again.”

  From the very start of her analysis, Mrs. F slipped in numerous references such as this regarding her self-described “voracious sexuality.” She seemed to go to great pains and to take special pleasure in making it clear to me just how highly sexed she was. She said of herself “I guess I'm a, you know – a real nympho…” and on many occasion as she referred to herself as “a slut,” “a hussy,” “a real bitch-slut, “a bitch-in-heat,” etc. Such usages made sharp contrast with her otherwise dignified, ladylike, indeed aristocratic self-presentation. There was no question that these references were blatant attempts to be seductive with me. the overheard quarrel about it between her mother and father planted her mother's notion that it was wrongfully sexual in her mind.

  Mrs. F readily accepted this interpretation. “If I'm twisted, it must be Mom who made me this way,” she said. She then launched into a lengthy list of grievances against her mother, all pertaining to her mother's teachings that sex was dirty and wrong and thus should not and could not be enjoyed. “I sure rebelled against that!” she said. “I adore sex.”

  When I pointed out that she used the same word, ‘adore,’ in regard to her feelings toward horses, she quickly put the interpretations together: “I ‘adore’ sex and I ‘adore’ horses. I feel sexy riding horses and I like to ‘ride’ my lovers when I have sex. I like to ride their cocks and I like to ride their faces, too. In the dream I ride a big black horse, which could be Blackjack, and it was Blackjack, Dad, who first put me on a horse and taught me how to ride. I know having sex with Blackjack is wrong, so Blackjack breaks apart beneath me as I ride him. And then I come, just the way I do when I have sex with my lovers. I ride them till they come, till they ‘break.’ Then I come and break too. So there it is, at least the center of it.” At which point she turned her head toward me. “That's what you wanted me to see, isn't it?”

  At the start of the next session, Mrs. F handed me a large manila envelope. When I asked her what it contained, she responded: “It's something we talked about. I thought you'd be interested in seeing it.”

  Opening the envelope, I noticed Mrs. F observing me closely. Inside was the ‘art photograph’ she'd previously mentioned, the one of her in riding clothes, naked above the waist, staring seductively at the lens while bowing a taut riding crop between her hands.*13

  TRANSFERENCE ISSUES ARISING IN THERAPY: One Monday morning Mrs. F arrived, flung off her coat, then, beaming, announced: “Seems on Friday our sons gave each other bloody noses.”*14 To this I promptly responded: "Does this excite you in some way?" “Well, yes, actually it does,” she said. “It seems so… well, you know… intimate.” I suggested we try to analyze why she found a fistfight between our sons to be sexually stimulating. Mrs. F, intelligent and quick-witted as ever, immediately made the connection: “It's the blood, isn't it? The wound. The red jodhpurs. The flaming hood. Our flesh-and-blood bloodied each other, and that's like you and me having sex.”

  The following week she came in with another prepared bombshell: “Guess what, Doctor? I've taken on a new lover. And he has the same first name as you. Now that must mean something, mustn't it?

  Mrs. F, of course, knew perfectly well what it meant and seemed highly amused at my concern. “You think I'm doing a number on you, but it's really just a coincidence. He's so cute, this guy, that I decided I couldn’t deprive myself just because your names happen to be the same.”

  Again we analyzed her statements. She had used the very same expression (‘deprive myself’) when I'd expressed doubts about undertaking her analysis. And I assured her that my concern was not over the coincidence of the names^15 but that by taking on a new lover without having first broken with C,

  *13 At this point I should state that in all my years of practice I never worked with an analysand so intent on my seduction. Though training teaches us how to employ strong transference reactions in furtherance of analytic goals, it cannot fully prepare one for an onslaught of such intensity, especially when the analysand is extraordinarily attractive, experienced, and well tuned to her effect upon men. Furthermore, in the case under discussion, I was well warned by the analysand via her tale of her seduction of Dr. L. But despite my experience and training and the clear warning issued by the analysand herself, I had no adequate preparation for an offering such as the one described above, in which the analysand presented me with a recent photograph of herself half naked in a highly charged and bizarre erotic posture.

  As mentioned, this offering was just one of several such demarches made by Mrs. F, nearly all of which occurred in the context of our probing of the meaning to her ‘sex dream.’ It was as if, the closer we came to a deep interpretation of her dream, the more compulsive became her attempts to seduce me.

  These maneuvers usually took place at or near the beginning of our sessions. Mrs. F would introduce something provocative as if in an attempt to confuse me and throw the analysis off course. These transparent attempts to derail treatment were easily parried by ignoring the provocation or offering a quick and pointed interpretation. It soon became apparent that Mrs. F prepared these incitements in advance. When swiftly dealt with, she would settle down, ready to do the hard and painful work that is a requirement of a successful analysis.

  *14 In fact, authorities at our sons' school had arranged a boxing match to settle a personal quarrel between them. betraying him in effect, she might be unconsciously courting danger.

  She then imparted the following unexpected information: She had first met T at the same school reception where she'd approached me about her desire to undergo analysis. In fact, T was a teacher at our sons' school. After meeting him and hearing how much her sons liked him, she'd hired him to give her sons private coaching and tutoring.

  In our next session, she described in detail how she'd decided that T, employed in this capacity, would make a good lover and how she'd initiated (i.e., seduced him into) an affair:

  “I went out to our tennis court to watch him practice with my boys because they were proud of their progress and wanted me to see it for myself. It was a very hot afternoon. My boys and T, all three in shorts and stripped to the waist, were batting balls back and forth, really working up a sweat. So here's this really good-looking guy with the body of a Greek god! How could I resist? After my boys finished their lesson, they urged the two o
f us to play. ‘Come on, Mom!’ ‘Yeah, Mom, we know you're club champ, but I bet T can kick your butt!’ ‘Yeah, let's see who's better, Mom. Come on! Just one set, okay?’

  “So I went down to the pool house, changed into tennis gear, then stepped onto the court. T's a terrific player. It was fun to play with him. Soon it was clear we were very much in tune. And with the boys there urging us on, cheering for him, clearly wanting him to win, all my competitive juices were aroused. I wanted to win, needed to, so I started playing really hard. And he, responding, quickly raised the level of his game.”

  The tennis match, as she described it, was clearly foreplay for the sex that followed within the hour. Mrs. F was quick to grasp that much of her imagery – ‘in tune,’ ‘aroused,’ ‘juices,’ ‘playing hard,’ ‘raised the level’ – was highly sexual in nature. And with my assistance, she came to understand that the performance of such an extended act of foreplay in the presence of her sons was a provocation in itself.

  "So how do you think all this relates to your dream?" I asked near the end of the session.

  “I'm having sex in front of my sons.”

  "And in the dream?"

  Mrs. F shrugged. “I don't see any connection.”

  I suggested we go back and reexamine the circumstances under which she first met T, at the same occasion, in fact within the same hour, that she first broached the possibility of analytic treatment with me.

  I offered her the following interpretation:

  "There were are, two men, both with the same first name. And the context in which you meet us is almost incestuous – my son and yours attend the same school. Within days you retain me as your analyst and retain T as your sons' coach. Then, while filling our sessions here three mornings a week with provocative sexual statements, setting upon my seduction, even going so far as to present me with an erotic photograph of yourself, you literally seduce this other man, my double so to speak, and in fact do so right in front of your sons. What's more, while this double seduction is going on – my ‘psychic seduction’ and T's literal seduction – one of your sons fights a boxing match with mine in which each boy bloodies the others's nose. And there's something else you mentioned in only the most peripheral way – T not only coached your sons in tennis, he coached them in boxing too. In fact, I learned from my own boy that he served as referee of their match. So in a sense, we could say you hired T to teach your sons to bloody my son's nose. Next session let's try to pull this all together in the context of your dream, because, you see, I think we're getting close now to its underlying meaning, the meaning that terrifies you even as it excites you."

  ANALYSIS (continued): Consistent with past behavior, Mrs. F immediately demonstrated her resistance at the start of the next session by making the following statement:

  *15 In fact, though mine is a fairly common name, I didn't doubt for a moment that this was far more than mere coincidence. However, I decided not to dwell on the matter just then, believing there was something deeper to be uncovered.

  “I'm having such a busy twenty-four hours! Last night I had The Dream again and got all sexy on account of it. Early this morning I went riding, and that, as usual, got me juiced up. Now I'm here to discuss it… and I always find our meetings sexy in a cools sort of way. Then I'm off to meet C for lunch and a hot bout of rough sex. Then after a quick stop home for a shower, I'll meet T at our usual seedy motel for silken loving sex, the kind I've come lately to appreciate more and more. He's so tender with me, so sweet, loving, and eager to please…, etc.^16

  Feeling that this could be a crucial session, I decided to postpone further analysis of her dream till later in the hour. Instead I asked her to describe the difference between the sex she was having with her two lovers, whom, she had just made clear, she was no longer meeting on separate days but was now seeing, provocatively, back to back.

  "Well, Doctor,” she smirked, “to satisfy your prurient interest, C is one hard-ass lover. That, I think, is originally what attracted me. He's dark, hairy, charming, glossy, an old-fashioned ‘lounge lizard’ type. But there isn't a hell of a lot of heart there if you know what I mean. For him sex is rough-and-tumble without much tenderness. When we started our affair, I pretty much let him take over. You know, “do with me what you will.” He told me, ‘You're a classy lady and that makes me want to dirty you up.’ When I asked him what he meant, he said he wanted to make me gasp and scream. ‘No polite little orgasms, thank you, ma'am,’ he said. So I told him, “I love getting carried away, so please, if you think you can send me like that, by all means try.” Oh, he tried all right! I really made him work for it! We'd wrestle and slap and scratch – the whole nine yards. But, see, being dominated doesn't really do it for me. To be satisfied, I need to be in control. So over the course of time, things began to change, with me taking over more and more. The way things are now, we both get ‘dirtied’ up. Now he loses his cool. With me he's no longer the unflappable, slightly malevolent, hail-fellow-well-met nightclub impresario. When I ride him, he turns into just another panting boy screaming for release.”

  I quote Mrs. F's statement in extensor to illustrate how her neurosis, as exemplified in what I had now come to regard as her ‘key’ or ‘master’ dream, was determining her love relationships. Her descriptions of C were so close to her earlier descriptions of her father, Blackjack, as to be transparent to even the most naive observer. Yet it seemed that Mrs. F still resisted making this connection.*17

  Here now is her description of her lovemaking with my namesake and ‘love proxy’ T.:

  “T is a really gorgeous guy, lean, hard, blondish, fair-skinned without much body hair. So physically he and C couldn’t be more different. Different in personality too, because T's a sweetheart. With him there's none of the slapping and scratching I do with C. We make love gently and slowly, excruciatingly slowly sometimes. Yeah, C makes me scream, but with T, I can really lose myself, forget who I am. He doesn't want to ‘dirty’ me up. He only wants to worship me. He adores me for who I am, not what I represent. I find that so refreshing.^18 But if you're wondering why I keep seeing them both, I guess it's because each satisfies a different need. C gives me what I think I crave, while T gives me what I really Want.”

  Mrs. F smiled. “Pretty complicated, huh?”

  *16 In response to my query, "Do you see how you always start our sessions like this, talking abut your sex life and never failing to add me to the mix?" Mrs. F laughed. “Well, isn't sex what psychoanalysis is about? Aren't I being a good patient by building up a strong transference bond with you?”

  *17 Strangely, she'd also seemingly never made the connection between her father's profession or racehorse trainer and C's ownership of a casino. The fact that both men worked in the gambling industry appeared to have entirely escaped her notice.

  *18 I found this idealization of her relationship with T suspect in view of other information she imparted. For instance, she told me how she'd arranged to meet him one day at the Municipal Aquarium in front of a large tank containing sharks. Describing their kiss in front of the lit tank while the sharks swirled behind, she said: “That felt so bold. I think I did it to insert some drama into our affair.” Later, when I described this encounter to a colleague, he pointed out a strong similarity to a scene in the film Lady From Shanghai in which the actors, Orson Welles and Rita Hayworth, kiss in front of an aquarium containing a huge octopus. Unfortunately, I never had the opportunity to ask Mrs. F if she'd seen this film and whether it had inspired her choice of the location of her rendezvous. Still, whether she knew the film or not, the scene suggests she saw herself in a femme fatale role with T.

  As the hour was now nearly over and since she'd redreamt her key dream the night before, I asked her to relate any new particulars she'd found memorable.

  She said that in this latest rendition, the lone pursuing faceless hooded horseman was revealed, when the wind blew back his hood, to be the pursuing horsewoman whose hood was lined with flaming red silk.

>   She I asked her to describe the features and/or expression on this pursuing horsewoman's face, she said the woman appeared cold and grim, “kind of like my mother watching a horse race when she had a lot of money riding on a horse.”

  Considering this a major breakthrough, I urged her to give me her associations to the red-lined hood. Her response was immediate: “It's like the hood of a clitoris.”

  "So," I said, pursuing the interpretation, "the face of the pursuing horseman turns out to be like your mother's, peering at you out of her clitoris."

  Mrs. F, accepting that, urged me to go on.

  "And the horseman you're pursuing – did you see him a little better last night?"

  She said she did get a couple of good glimpses of him before their horses broke.

  And what did she see?

  Not much, she said. Just that he was big, broad-shouldered, and was wearing a black, hooded duster that covered him completely from the rear. Also that his horse was black.

  “Could he be Blackjack?’ she suddenly asked. “Not the horse I'm riding, but the horse and rider ahead?”

  I assured her that indeed he could be Blackjack. As it was now the end of the hour, I added that I felt that her being pursued by her mother while in the act of pursuing her father was a key to opening the meaning of her dream, a key I hoped we would turn together next time.

  “You think it really happened, the dream?” she asked.

  I told her that I felt that the way she reworked the dream material in different ways suggested that she was circling some dreaded and real traumatic event that she'd repressed and that she was now attempting to bring to the surface.

  A NEW APPROACH TO A TRANSFERENCE CRISIS IN PSYCHOANALYSIS: "ENTERING IN": Sexual seduction was Mrs. F's game, her stock-in-trade. It was also the clearest manifestation of her neurosis. By attempting to draw me into her web, she was acting out in accordance with the very compulsions that made her so unhappy. The pitiful Dr. L, whom she'd so quickly seduced in her college days, was but one of a string of seductees used and then discarded as she veered ever more rapidly into a sexual maelstrom that, as it turned out, would lead to her destruction.^19