1. See Mahler, M.; Pine, F.; and Bergman, A.,The Psychological Birth of the Human Infant. New York, Basic Books, 1975.
2. Among the exceptions we cite Becker, E.,The Denial of Death. New York, The Free Press, 1973; Burton, A., ?Fear of Death as Countertransference.? InModern Humanistic Psychotherapy. San Francisco, Jossey-Bass, 1970, pp. 106?124; McCarthy, J.B.,Death Anxiety: The Loss of the Self. New York, Gardner Press, 1980; Moss, D.M.; McGaghie, W.C.; and Rubinstein, L.I., ?Medical Resistance, Crisis Ministry, and Terminal Illness,?J. Religion and Health, 1978,17, 99?116; Searles, H. S., ?Schizophrenia and the Inevitability of Death.? InCollected Papers on Schizophrenia and Related Subjects. New York, International Universities Press, 1965, pp. 487?520; Wahl, C. W., ?The Fear of Death,?Bulletin of the Menninger Clinic, 1958,22, 214?223; Yalom, I.,Existential Psychotherapy. New York, Basic Books, 1980; and Zilboorg, G., ?Fear of Death,?Psychoanalytic Quarterly 1943,12, 465?475.
3. Rosenberg, H., ?The Fear of Death as an Indispensable Factor in Psychotherapy,?Amer. J. Psychotherapy, 1963,17, 619?630, 620. We believe not one session goes by in which death is not alluded to. Its ever-present reality, however, is often expressed metaphorically, i.e., through patients' symptoms or complaints. We can detect the fear of death, for example, in agoraphobia, panic attacks, fears of abandonment and individuation, even depressions. See also Becker,op. cit. The Denial of Death. New York, The Free Press 1973; McCarthy,op. cit. Death Anxiety: The Loss of the Self. New York, Gardner Press, 1980; and Yalom,op. cit. Existential Psychotherapy. New York, Basic Books, 1980.
4. This stand is in harmony with other clinicians and psychologically-minded theoreticians. Among others, we cite Abraham Maslow and Karl Menninger. Both address the defensive purposes to diagnosing patients. Irvin Yalom concludes: ?The standard diagnostic formulation tells the therapist nothing about the unique person he or she is encountering; andthere is substantial evidence that diagnostic labels impede or distort listening,? op. cit., p. 410 [emphasis ours]. See also Maslow, H.,Toward a Psychology of Being Princeton, N.J., D. Van Nostrand Reinhold, 1968, esp. ch. 9, ?Resistance to Being Rubricized,? pp. 126?134; and Menninger, K.; Mayman, M.; and Pruyser, P.,The Vital Balance. New York, The Viking Press, 1963, esp. ch. 2, ?The Urge to Classify,? pp. 9?34.
5. May, R., ?Contributions of Existential Psychotherapy.? In May, R.; Angel, E.; and Ellenberger, H. F., eds.,Existence, New York, Basic Books, 1958, p. 50.