Rosenberg, Dinah <br/><br/>
Finishing so as never to finish: the art of accommodating residues 

 -  2023.<br/>							 
<br/><br/> 99 
<br/><br/> This article reflects on the act of breaking off an analysis that the patient knew was unfinished. This analysis was grappling with the figure of a dead baby; as soon as it appeared in her associations, the patient missed her sessions; and its shadow served as a screen against the emergence of aggression and sexuality in the transference. Yet violence was at the forefront of her life during separations, and was even at the origin of her request for treatment. It is a question of thinking about the act of breaking off the analysis in the light of what can unfold in the period between the moment the termination is announced and its actual end. As we worked on her intention to break off the analysis, the patient saw that stopping could make sense in the very process of the treatment. The violence of an act that she decided to inflict alone was tinged with the pleasure of keeping a part of her psychic life away from the treatment. This analysis allows us to reflect on how analytic treatment can help us to imagine the possibilities of elaborating this act after the event.