Nomadic life, fleeing from self-knowledge to find the world: A case study in existentialism

Abstract

The case study described here explores the clinical understanding developed in an internship in a clinic-school, between August 2021 and December 2022, when the university still maintained social distancing. Through online consultations, adapted from the existentialist approach, the case of a woman with complaints of anxiety, depression and a history of suicide attempts, living a nomadic life, living in a van with her husband, both musicians, who performed in several cities as a form of survival, is discussed. The condition of online consultations, which began in the Covid-19 pandemic, made it possible for the patient to undergo psychotherapy, however, the conditions were precarious, due to lack of private space for sessions and difficulties in accessing the internet, requiring strengthening the therapeutic alliance and clinical management to overcome challenges. Among the initial complaints, the patient identified herself as "the daughter of a narcissistic mother," a conclusion she reached after reading a self-help book and which provided her with an explanation for behaviors she could not understand in herself. Existentialism rejects any determinism, understanding that the subject is a constant totalization in progress and never encloses itself in a tendency, pathology or a priori vocation. The case illustrates the complexity of family relationships and how identification with labels can both help and limit the psychotherapeutic process. The existentialist approach provided a mediation to question these fixed identities and opening a resignification of their history and new existential possibilities, taking into account their choices and project of being.