Psychoanalytic study of an unusual perversion.

The psychoanalysis of a case of an unusual perversion demonstrated the historical determinants of the ritual. Drive and defense, bisexual disposition, and identifications were represented. At the beginning of the analysis the patient appeared to have borderline character traits; but as the analysis unfolded, an oedipal situation was revealed and character development occurred. The factors that determined the particular outcome for this patient, instead of homosexuality, or transsexualism, are discussed. In some cases of perversion, such as the one herein described, only psychoanalytic exploration can determine whether a level of personality structure and object relations had been reached that allows for the analysis of the perversion and a shift to heterosexuality and mature object relations.