Sexual abuse like the kind Willa experienced robs a person of innocence. Instead of discovering erotic life in a natural way with a peer, sexuality was forced upon her. Any pleasure she might have found in the awakening of her sensuality was contaminated from the beginning with confusion and shame.

We hypothesize that Ingrid turns separation into abandonment and then seeks connection through sadness. Mitch takes it personally when she does this and then gets angry and feels unappreciated. I want Mitch not to take it personally but to be clear with Ingrid that although she cannot fix Ingrid’s sadness, she can bring her joy nonetheless.

Rachel’s boyfriend could not believe that he was enough for her, that she actually was satisfied by him and with him. He needed her reassurance and he needed her to faithfully pick up the phone when he called. In my formulation, he was endeavoring to stave off debilitating feelings of inferiority that surfaced immediately when she was unavailable, feeding the need to cling to her all the more tightly. Right away, as if regressed to a childhood place, he imagined her with another lover. Rachel’s spontaneous cry, “What are you, twelve years old?” was off, in my view, by six or seven years.

Loyalty to her mother has made Rebecca distance herself from her need for her father. Her sadness has become a secret even to herself.

Shirley is striving to be “indifferent,” in her words, to her exhusband’s complaints, but I know there is an alternative to indifference that is closer to equanimity with a dose of compassion. Of course her ex is enraged and of course she feels unfairly attacked but, from an emotional

perspective, he has a point. Just as a mother has to bear the hatred intrinsic to being a mother, Shirley will have to accept the consequences of her decision to divorce. Craving understanding from the person she has left is not going to get her anywhere.