The couch of paranoia – the shadow of the ancestors and a haunting ego ideal

Based on her experience of working within two cultures, the author examines and explores how, in a Taiwanese context, one is encouraged to take on a different development route that emphasises maintaining identification with one's pre-Oedipal and Oedipal objects throughout one's life, in which separation and independence are discouraged and a familial-self is facilitated. This gives rise to a strong ego ideal that acquires a persecuting quality, and one could easily become prey to it. Clinical material is presented to illustrate this psychic situation, the plight it creates for the individual and how it manifests itself in the consultation room, turning the couch of understanding into a couch of paranoia.