In this talk, we will discuss the psychodynamics of the paternal object for a subset of patients with muscle dysmorphia. In the formulation that I present, which I believe applies to many patients who struggle with appearance-related concerns that focus on developing a more muscular physique, there is father-child object relation in which the father maintains his own narcissistic equilibrium by keeping his son small, vulnerable, and weak. Whereas in optimal development the paternal function facilitates the young boy’s separation and individuation, it instead threatens the child with the possibility of remaining forever lost in the archaic mother-child matrix of helplessness and dependency. Faced with this, the child discovers the possibility of idealizing a particular form of masculinity characterized by “bigness” and impermeability that the paternal function comes to represent. The developing boy, his mind’s ability to represent and symbolize the affects evoked by this traumatic theme compromised, takes muscularity as a symbolic equation for masculinity and engages in a frantic drive for muscularity to keep experiences of weakness, vulnerability, and shame, associated with femininity, at bay. These dynamics are illustrated with a clinical case.
Presenter: Tom Wooldridge, PsyD, ABPP, FIPA, CEDS-S is Chair in the Department of Psychology at Golden Gate University as well as a psychoanalyst and board-certified, licensed psychologist. His first book, Understanding Anorexia Nervosa in Males, was published by Routledge in 2016 and has been praised as “groundbreaking” and a “milestone publication in our field.” His second book, Psychoanalytic Treatment of Eating Disorders: When Words Fail and Bodies Speak, an edited volume in the Relational Perspectives Book Series, was published by Routledge in 2018. His third book, Eating Disorders (New Introductions to Contemporary Psychoanalysis), was released in 2022. His fourth book, co-edited with Burke, Michaels, and Muhr, is titled Advancing Psychotherapy for the Next Generation: Rehumanizing Mental Health Policy and Practice. He has also written a novel about the process of psychotherapy, Ghosts of the Unremembered Past, additionally released as an audiobook with Audible. He is a Personal and Supervising Analyst at the Psychoanalytic Institute for Northern California and a Training Analyst at the San Francisco Center for Psychoanalysis. He is on the Scientific Advisory Council of the National Eating Disorders Association, Faculty at the Psychoanalytic Institute of Northern California (PINC), the Northern California Society for Psychoanalytic Psychology (NCSPP), the William Alanson White Institute’s Eating Disorders, Compulsions, and Addictions program, and the San Francisco Center for Psychoanalysis, and has a private practice in Berkeley, CA.
Learning objectives
1) Discuss the role of the father-child relationship in the development of muscle dysmorphia.
2) Describe how disrupted paternal function can lead to the equation of muscularity with masculinity.
3) Identify the psychological motivations behind the intense pursuit of muscularity in individuals with muscle dysmorphia.
