Freud - Complete Works (352 page)

   ‘I have noticed for the
last two days that Hans has been defying me in the most decided
manner, not impudently, but in the highest spirits. Is it because
he is no longer afraid of me - the horse?

   ‘April 6th. Went out with
Hans in front of the house in the afternoon. At every horse that
passed I asked him if he saw the "black on its mouth"; he
said "no" every time. I asked him what the black really
looked like; he said it was black iron. My first idea, that he
meant the thick leather straps that are part of the harness of
dray-horses, is therefore unconfirmed. I asked him if the
"black" reminded him of a moustache, and he said:
"Only by its colour." So I do not yet know what it really
is.

   ‘The fear has diminished;
this time he ventured as far as the next-door house, but turned
round quickly when he heard the sound of horses’ hooves in
the distance. When a cart drew up at our door and came to a stop,
he became frightened and ran into the house, because the horse
began pawing with its foot. I asked him why he was afraid, and
whether perhaps he was nervous because the horse had done like this
(and I stamped with my foot). He said: "Don’t make such
a row with your feet!" Compare his remark about the fallen
bus-horse.

   ‘He was particularly
terrified by a furniture-van passing by. At that he ran right
inside the house. "Doesn’t a furniture-van like
that," I asked him unconcernedly, "really look like a
bus?" He said nothing. I repeated the question, and he then
said: "Why, of course! Otherwise I shouldn’t be so
afraid of a furniture-van."

Analysis Of A Phobia In A Five-Year-Old Boy

2042

   ‘April 7th. I asked again
to-day what the "black on the horses’ mouths"
looked like. Hans said: "Like a muzzle." The curious
thing is that for the last three days not a single horse has passed
on which he could point out this "muzzle". I myself have
seen no such horse on any of my walks, although Hans asseverates
that such horses do exist. I suspect that some sort of
horses’ bridle - the thick piece of harness round their
mouths, perhaps - really reminded him of a moustache, and that
after I alluded to this this fear disappeared as well.

   ‘Hans’s improvement
is constant. The radius of his circle of activity with the
street-door as its centre grows ever wider. He has even
accomplished the feat, which has hitherto been impossible for him,
of running across to the pavement opposite. All the fear that
remains is connected with the bus scene, the meaning of which is
not yet clear to me.

   ‘April 9th. This morning
Hans came in to me while I was washing and bare to the waist.

   ‘
Hans
: "Daddy,
you
are
lovely! You’re so white."

   ‘
I
: "Yes. Like
a white horse."

   ‘
Hans
: "The
only black thing’s your moustache." (Continuing)
"Or perhaps it’s a black muzzle?"

   ‘I told him then that I had
been to see the Professor the evening before, and said:
"There’s one thing he wants to know." "I
am
curious," remarked Hans.

   ‘I told him I knew on what
occasions it was that he made a row with his feet. "Oh,
yes!" he interrupted me, "when I’m cross, or when I
have to do ‘lumf’ and would rather play." (He has
a habit, it is true, of making a row with his feet, i.e. of
stamping, when he is angry. - "Doing lumf" means doing
number two. When Hans was small he said one day when he got off the
chamber: "Look at the lumf [German:
‘
Lumpf
’]." He meant "stocking"
[German: "
Strumpf
"], because of its shape and
colour. This designation has been preserved to this day. - In very
early days, when he had to be put on the chamber, and refused to
leave off playing, he used to stamp his feet in a rage, and kick
about, and sometimes throw himself on the ground.)

   ‘"And you kick about
with your feet as well, when you have to widdle and don’t
want to go, because you’d rather go on playing."

   ‘
He
: "Oh, I
must widdle." And he went out of the room by way of
confirmation, no doubt.’

   In the course of his visit his
father had asked me what Hans could have been reminded of by the
fallen horse kicking about with its feet. I had suggested that that
may have been his own reaction when he retained his urine. Hans now
confirmed this by means of the re-emergence during the conversation
of a desire to micturate; and he added some other meanings of the
making a row with the feet.

   ‘We then went out in front
of the street-door. When a coal-cart came along, he said to me:
"Daddy, I’m very much afraid of coal-carts,
too."

   ‘
I
: "Perhaps
that’s because they’re as big as buses, too."

   ‘
Hans
: "Yes;
and because they’re so heavily loaded, and the horses have so
much to drag and might easily fall down. If a cart’s empty,
I’m not afraid." It is a fact, as I have already
remarked, that only heavy vehicles throw him into a state of
anxiety.’

   Nevertheless, the situation was
decidedly obscure. The analysis was making little progress; and I
am afraid the reader will soon begin to find this description of it
tedious. Every analysis, however, has dark periods of this kind.
But Hans was now on the point of leading us into an unexpected
region.

Analysis Of A Phobia In A Five-Year-Old Boy

2043

   ‘I came home and was
speaking to my wife, who had made various purchases which she was
showing me. Among them was a pair of yellow ladies’ drawers.
Hans exclaimed "Ugh!" two or three times, threw himself
on the ground, and spat. My wife said he had done this two or three
times already when he had seen the drawers.

   ‘"Why do you say
‘Ugh’?" I asked.

   ‘
Hans
: "Because
of the drawers."

   ‘
I
: "Why?
Because of their colour? Because they’re yellow?’, and
remind you of lumf or widdle?"

   ‘
Hans
: "Lumf
isn’t yellow. It’s white or black." - Immediately
afterwards: "I say, is it easy to do lumf if you eat
cheese?" (I had once told him so, when he asked me why I ate
cheese.)

   ‘
I
:
"Yes."

   ‘
Hans
:
"That’s why you go straight off every morning and do
lumf? I should so much like to eat cheese with my
bread-and-butter."

   ‘He had already asked me
yesterday as he was jumping about in the street: "I say,
it’s true, isn’t it, if you jump about a lot you can do
lumf easily?" - There has been trouble with his stools from
the very first; and aperients and enemas have frequently been
necessary. At one time his habitual constipation was so great that
my wife called in Dr. L. He was of opinion that Hans was overfed,
which was in fact the case, and recommended a more moderate diet -
and the condition was at once brought to an end. Recently the
constipation has again made its appearance more frequently.

Analysis Of A Phobia In A Five-Year-Old Boy

2044

   ‘After luncheon I said to
him: "We’ll write to the Professor again," and he
dictated to me: "When I saw the yellow drawers I said
‘Ugh! that makes me spit!’ and threw myself down and
shut my eyes and didn’t look."

   ‘
I
:
"Why?"

   ‘
Hans
: "Because
I saw the yellow drawers; and I did the same sort of thing with the
black drawers too.¹ The black ones are the same sort of
drawers, only they were black." (Interrupting himself) "I
say, I
am
glad. I’m always so glad when I can write to
the Professor."

   ‘
I
: "Why did
you say ‘Ugh’? Were you disgusted?"

   ‘
Hans
: "Yes,
because I saw that. I thought I should have to do lumf."

   ‘
I
:
"Why?"

   ‘
Hans
: "I
don’t know."

   ‘
I
: "When did
you see the black drawers?"

   ‘
Hans
: "Once,
when Anna (our maid) had been here a long time - with Mummy - she
brought them home just after she’d bought them." (This
statement was confirmed by my wife.)

   ‘
I
: "Were you
disgusted then, too?"

   ‘
Hans
:
"Yes."

   ‘
I
: "Have you
seen Mummy in drawers like that?"

   ‘
Hans
:
"No."

   ‘
I
: "When she
was dressing?"

   ‘
Hans
: "When
she bought the yellow ones I’d seen them once before
already." (This is contradicted. He saw the yellow ones for
the first time when his mother bought them.) "She’s got
the black ones on to-day too" (correct), "because I saw
her take them off in the morning."

  
¹
‘For the last few weeks my wife has
possessed a pair of black bloomers for wearing on cycling
tours.’

Analysis Of A Phobia In A Five-Year-Old Boy

2045

   ‘
I
: "What? She
took off the black drawers in the morning?"

   ‘
Hans
: "In the
morning when she went out she took off the black drawers, and when
she came back she put the black ones on again."

   ‘I asked my wife about
this, as it seemed to me absurd. She said it was entirely untrue.
Of course she had not changed her drawers when she went out.

   ‘I at once asked Hans about
it: "You told me that Mummy had put on some black drawers, and
that when she went out she took them off, and that when she came
back she put them on again. But Mummy says it’s not
true."

   ‘
Hans
: "I think
perhaps I may have forgotten she didn’t take them off."
(Impatiently) "Oh, do let me alone."'

   I have a few comments to make at
this point on the business of the drawers. It was obviously mere
hypocrisy on Hans’s part to pretend to be so glad of the
opportunity of giving an account of the affair. In the end he threw
the mask aside and was rude to his father. It was a question of
things which had once afforded him
a great deal of pleasure
,
but of which, now that repression had set in, he was very much
ashamed, and at which he professed to be disgusted. He told some
downright lies so as to disguise the circumstances in which he had
seen his mother change her drawers. In reality, the putting on and
taking off of her drawers belonged to the ‘lumf’
context. His father was perfectly aware of what it was all about
and of what Hans was trying to conceal.

   ‘I asked my wife whether
Hans was often with her when she went to the W.C. "Yes,"
she said, "often. He goes on pestering me till I let him.
Children are all like that."'

   Nevertheless, it is worth bearing
carefully in mind the desire, which Hans had already repressed, for
seeing his mother doing lumf.

Analysis Of A Phobia In A Five-Year-Old Boy

2046

   ‘We went out in front of
the house. He was in very good spirits and was prancing about all
the time like a horse. So I said: "Now, who is it that’s
the bus-horse? Me, you or Mummy?"

   ‘
Hans
(promptly):
"I am; I’m a young horse."

   ‘During the period when his
anxiety was at its height, and he was frightened at seeing horses
frisking, he asked me why they did it; and to reassure him I said:
"Those are young horses, you see, and they frisk about like
little boys. You frisk about too, and you’re a little
boy." Since then, whenever he has seen horses frisking, he has
said: "That’s right; those are young horses!"

   ‘As we were going upstairs
I asked him almost without thinking: "Used you to play at
horses with the children at Gmunden?"

   ‘
He
:
"Yes." (Thoughtfully) "I think that was how I got
the nonsense."

   ‘
I
: "Who was
the horse?"

   ‘
He
: "I was;
and Berta was the coachman."

   ‘
I
: "Did you
fall down by any chance, when you were a horse?"

   ‘
Hans
: "No.
When Berta said ‘Gee-up’, I ran ever so quick; I just
raced along."¹

   ‘
I
: "You never
played at buses?"

   ‘
Hans
: "No. At
ordinary carts, and horses without carts. When a horse has a cart,
it can go without a cart just as well, and the cart can stay at
home."

   ‘
I
: "Used you
often to play at horses?"

   ‘
Hans
: "Very
often. Fritzl² was the horse once, too, and Franzl the
coachman; and Fritzl ran ever so fast and all at once he hit his
foot on a stone and bled."

   ‘
I
: "Perhaps he
fell down?"

  
¹
‘Hans had a set of toy harness with
bells.’

  
²
Another of the landlord’s children,
as we already know.

Analysis Of A Phobia In A Five-Year-Old Boy

2047

   ‘
Hans
: "No. He
put his foot in some water and then wrapped it up."¹

   ‘
I
: "Were you
often the horse?"

   ‘
Hans
: "Oh,
yes."

   ‘
I
: "And that
was how you got the nonsense?"

   ‘
Hans
: "Because
they kept on saying ‘ 'cos of the horse, ‘ 'cos
of the horse’ " (he put a stress on the
‘'cos’); "so perhaps I got the nonsense
because they talked like that; ‘'cos of the
horse.’"'²

   For a while Hans’s father
pursued his enquiry fruitlessly along other paths.

   ‘
I
: "Did they
tell you anything about horses?"