Partial trauma

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In classical psychoanalysis, partial trauma is a part of a psychogenic trauma. The term goes back to Sigmund Freud and does not refer to the general definition of trauma as used, for example, in connection with post-traumatic stress disorder .

A partial trauma is a realistically harmless idea that is only traumatic in connection with other ideas. Partial traumas only develop traumatic quality in their summation. Their realistic harmlessness is often characteristic. In addition, partial traumas often only acquire their meaning as a traumatic experience when they coincide with certain situations.

The discovery that trauma can be composed of a number of really harmless ideas was first made by Josef Breuer in the “ Studies on Hysteria ”. (see also idiopathic hysteria ) A trauma can therefore be composed of a complex structure, whereby each individual idea is not traumatic in itself. On the basis of this discovery, Freud later developed the original form of therapeutic psychoanalysis, in which he brought up the partial traumas individually in sessions and was thus able to gradually resolve the trauma.