ON TRAUMA, PERVERSION, AND MULTIPLE PERSONALITY

The role of perverse sexuality as an organizing influence in ''multipl e personality'' is explored in this paper. Following a brief review of psychoanalytic thinking on sexual trauma and perversion, the author d iscusses his own views on dissociation and ''multiple personality.'' A clinical case is then presented in which transsexualism, homosexualit y, and sadomasochistic heterosexual practices were manifested during a ltered ego states. Analysis of the transference revealed the centralit y of sadomasochism in this patient. It is hypothesized that various pe rverse structures may be formed within these seemingly autonomous, amn estic states, in order to contain anxiety and encapsulate the aggressi on which resulted from early psychic trauma. Issues relating to diagno sis, countertransference, reconstruction, and psychoanalytic technique are discussed also.