The Importance Of Self Psychological Theory

Vicki, whose name has been changed for confidentiality purposes, is a 34-year-old, African-American female. She has two children, ages 4 and 14. She does not know the father of her eldest son, and her daughter’s father was recently sent to prison. Vicki has stated that as long as she can remember, she has had a difficult time staying focused. She was diagnosed as having ADD at a young age and was prescribed medication but stopped taking it once she entered high school. Vicki did not graduate from high school and has never lived on her own. She started to rebel when she quit school and she began staying out late, dating many different men in the hopes of finding her soul mate. Vicki’s father is a minister, and her mother has always been a stay

There may be a missing component of the three fundamentals that this method finds crucial for developing a primary self-structure (Cooper & Lessler, 2015). According to Dr. Tom Young (2016), three critical self-object relationships to achieve a healthy ego include: mirroring, idealizing, and twinship. Vicki entered the homeless program because she was asked to leave her home and had nowhere else to stay. Due to her car accident, Vicki fears that she has destroyed her relationship with her whole family. This failure is heightened because of her previous experience of self-object failure in her role as a daughter when Vicki dropped out of school when she was only sixteen years old. She felt that her parents never accepted her and gravitated more toward her brother and sister, which generated the damaging effects on Vicki’s self-esteem and identity as a daughter (Cooper & Lessler, 2015). Now, Vicki feels inadequate in her

She feels that finding a relationship will make her feel loved and possibly make her parents more accepting of her. Vicki refers herself as the black sheep of the family. These feelings could stem from Vicki’s feelings of inadequacy when being compared to her siblings. Her mother and father are very close to Vicki’s brother and sister and were disappointed when she dropped out of high school. Vicki’s insecurities and low self-esteem issues could stem from the side effects of her diagnosis of ADD. Vicki’s siblings have moved on to be successful in their lives, whereas Vicki never finished high school. Vicki fears that she may never find a partner because they may want to be with someone who is more educated and career oriented. Vicki never felt a genuine connection with her family of origin, who are all very religious. She has felt judged and criticized for having two children by two different men out of wedlock. Not having the emotional connection she desperately needed, Vicki began to rebel against her mother and father. Vicki tends to fall in love with every man she meets and gives all of her attention to the new men in her life, leaving her children in the care of her parents. Because of her parents’ disappointments in the decisions she has made, Vicki is feeling bad about herself and disconnected. Vicki’s continuous search for love is a source of reinvigoration to her (Singer, 2016). Vicki needs to