Freud

            Freud's psychosexual stages of development .
             Freud really did make some major contributions to the field of psychology. He was the first one to suggest that psychological problems might have their roots in how children were treated. Freud believed that most of our personality is formed by early childhood, much of it so early that we don't even have conscious memories. For example, people who were toilet-trained strictly and at an early age grow up to be intolerant of mess, disorder and anything that doesn't go by the rules of how things are supposed to be. In the summer of 1929, one of Freud's patients, Herman Kleirman, wrote a letter to him in order to be able to understand a dream he had. The symbolism and depiction of this dream represents the different stages of Freud's theory of development. The first thing the patient remembers is that he was in a very dark and uncomfortable space. Soon after, he fell down a tunnel and ended up in a lake. This is the suggestion of the moment of birth, when the baby is still inside the mother (the dark spot). The tunnel he talks about is the birth canal through which he will come out and see the light for the first time. Up to that moment, the baby has been in water for nine months. So, once he is outside (in the lake), he starts to take oxygen. This is why he felt that "the lake was filled with more than water", which is air. Next, the patient grasped onto something to save himself in the dream. This is the representation of the beginning of the oral stage for the baby. Now, the mouth is his only connection with the world. Grabbing and sucking are two of the only things that the baby can do at this point. As Freud indicates in his theory, little kids have the desire to Freud's psychosexual stages of development 3 suck all the time. They grab the mother's nipple for milk, as the man grabbed and ate that thing in the dream to save his life. He tasted something bitter and acidic.