ObLiviOn

The unconscious is the part of the mind you don’t have easy access to — it’s kind of like a locked storage room. It’s believed that painful or difficult memories are often stored in your unconscious so that these remembrances can’t get out to disturb or upset you. Freud believed that infantile desires, needs, and impulses are also housed in this part of the mind.

By storing early memories in the unconscious, you don’t have to be aware of them, or fully acknowledge them, or even work through them. By hosting them in your unconscious mind, you also protect yourself from interfering with your present image of yourself.

Freud, however, argued that the clutter we never fully addressed in our unconscious, is a series of "conflicts" we never resolved as we went through the five stages of psychosexual development: the Oral Period, the Anal Period, the Phallic Period, the Oedipal Period, and the Genital Period. He further believed that these conflicts cannot only be traced back to specific stages of psychosexual development, but also can lead to specific personality traits in adults. Freud believed most adults still experience substantial problems due to their unresolved unconscious conflicts. He also felt that most people could benefit from Freudian analysis to uncover exactly what their conflicts are.

Freud’s theories are based on the idea that all adult neuroses originate in some kind of unresolved sexual conflict, normally tied to an earlier point in life. To emphasize his point, he delineated the conflicts that must be resolved in each in order for us to develop fully into healthy, normal adults.

This process, Freud believed, was normal and unavoidable. He didn’t think it possible for anyone to make it through these very difficult periods of childhood and psychosexual development unscathed. Rather, he saw development as a journey that would likely result in numerous problems later on. He also believed that in most situations parents could only partially mitigate a child’s trauma. Only in very unusual situations could they alleviate it altogether. As a result, Freud would say that most — if not all — adults struggle with some kind of conflict that dates back to what happened during their childhood sexual development.

Through your test responses, Tickle determined that your greatest conflict originated in what is called the Anal Period of sexual development. This stage occurs at about the same ages for all people. Note that some stages overlap and exactly how each stage plays out differs slightly from person to person. Yet for the most part, there is a standard progression across individuals and across years. Freud would say that your strongest conflict stems from events that happened when you were a toddler. The section below does three things: It details the strength of your conflicts during each of your developmental stages, examines exactly what the stages are, and looks at issues that may persist in your adult life as a result.

This chart shows how conflicted you are in each of the periods when compared with others:

	Phallic Period Anal Period Oral Period Oedipal Period Genital Period

Phallic Period (4 to 7 years)
Compared with others, you’re more conflicted about this stage than 99% of people.

The Phallic Period starts when you’re about four years old and goes on until approximately age seven. Freud’s theories about this stage focus more heavily on the penis than on the clitoris. He stated that the Phallic Period is the time of life when both boys and girls learn the importance of the penis. Freud believed that from girls’ anatomy, boys learn it is possible for them to lose their penises — to be castrated. Girls learn from boys’ anatomy that they have already lost their penises and are deficient. Freud postulated such realizations cause boys to feel fearful of losing their penises and girls to feel inferior because they do not have one.

In addition, Freud focused on the fact that children between three and seven typically realize that they can receive pleasure by stimulating the penis or clitoris. Masturbation is a natural human behavior, but because of social taboos, parents often shame children caught doing it. For example, according to Freud, some boys are told that if they masturbate their penises will fall of or will get cut off. Furthermore, Freud felt that even boys not explicitly given this message might have internalized it because of the way they processed other parental instructions. For instance, if a boy played with something he wasn’t supposed to and it was taken away, that same child may feel that if he plays with his penis when he wasn’t supposed to, that could be taken away as well.

Depending on how your parents treated masturbation and feelings of inferiority or superiority during this period, you may have come out feeling more or less conflicted. Girls with a phallic fixation will tend to behave submissively and passively in romantic relationships. Boys with this fixation often grow up needing to show the power of their penises by dominating others either sexually or throughout life; Freud said this hides their fears of castration. Freud also believed that phallic fixation can cause boys and girls to resent their mothers — for the girls because the mother represents inferiority and for the boys because she represents a threat. In addition, Freud said phallically fixated girls wish to be like their fathers so that they can have penises too.

If you were punished as a child for masturbating or were made to believe that you were wrong to touch yourself, chances are you have some residual unconscious feelings about touching yourself now. Another possible repercussion of feeling intense guilt is if you masturbate compulsively, needing to masturbate any time life gets intense. Because your fixation on this period appears to be very strong , you’re likely to experience these problems to a slight degree.

The stage that follows the Phallic Period is latency, lasting from age seven to puberty. During this time Freud hypothesized that children repress their sexuality. He also believed that the seeds of the Oedipus complex are planted during the Phallic Period and latency as children experience conflicts regarding their love for their same and opposite-sex parents.

Anal Period (18 months to 3 years)
Compared with others, you’re more conflicted about this period than 97% of people.

The Anal Period is the second stage of development. Even if you had difficulties during the Oral Period, you still moved beyond them and onto this second stage — though it’s possible you had two sets of conflicts to contend with.

Freud’s theory states that during the Anal Period you learn the pleasure you can experience by having control over your body, and, more specifically, by withholding or releasing your excrement. This stage marks the first time you can control something in your environment through your own will. Freud remarked that if your parents interfered with this process by trying to control when you defecated, a battle of wills may have ensued.

During the Anal Period, you began to learn the power of your own choices. What exactly you learned was dependent on your parents’ behavior. For example, if your parents forced you to go to the bathroom on a predetermined schedule as dictated by some expert, a doctor, or just for their convenience, you probably learned that your bodily functions weren’t as important as the convenience and needs of others.

On the other hand, if you were allowed to go to the bathroom more or less when you wanted to and weren’t potty trained prematurely, it’s likely that you moved through this stage with little strife. However, having a highly permissive parent could result in problems of a different kind.

There are two main ways that the Anal Period manifests itself in adulthood. You can be either "anal retentive" due to parental over-control or "anal expulsive" due to parental under-control. Of the two, you appear to be more retentive.

People who are anal retentive are likely to be highly compulsive. For highly, anal-retentive types, everything needs to be in its proper place, and their surroundings need to be cleaned and organized. In addition, they may have trivial compulsions like having to cross the road just to pick up a piece of newspaper littering the sidewalk.

Interestingly enough, even though anal retentives typically avoid mess, Freud believes that unconsciously they crave it — and therein lies their conflict. Freud felt that this internal unrest also manifested through stubborn behavior. He suggested that anal-retentive individuals learned that controlling others and standing their ground was the key to being able to satisfy and have control over their own bodily functions and needs.

Freud also believed that in adulthood being anal retentive could take on yet another form, translating into withholding or saving money more than most people. Of course not all people who save money are anally fixated, but when paired with compulsive cleanliness and control issues, it’s strongly suggested.

At the opposite end of the spectrum are people who are highly anal expulsive. Rather than withholding pleasure from themselves, anal expulsive types are more likely to overindulge. Often this trait is associated with being sloppy and wasteful, as well as with not being able to keep a good hold of things. Much like anal retentives, those who are very anal expulsive tend to be defiant of authority and are often obstinate.

The Anal Period (18 months to 3 years) is also the time of life when you grew stronger and got sharper teeth. During this time you may have learned that you could hurt others by biting, hitting, and so forth. You likely also learned what it’s like to experience aggression and be able to act on it. Because this period couples the knowledge of how to inflict pain on others with the discovery of anal pleasure, Freud concluded that being fixated in this stage could, in extreme cases, lead to sadomasochistic behaviors, pairing pain with sex. Because your fixation on this period seems to be very strong, you’re likely to experience these kinds of issues to a great degree.

Oral Period (birth to 18 months)
Compared with others, you’re more conflicted about this period than 76% of people.

The Oral Period is the first stage that everyone goes through. It begins when you’re born and continues through your first year and a half. For some individuals, it may not last quite that long and for some it may last slightly longer. However, overall this stage lasts about 18 months. Freud said that during the Oral Period, you experience pleasure through your mouth, by sucking on a mother’s breast, a pacifier, a bottle, or even your thumb. This is the first pleasure you feel and it is one that you’re able to give to yourself. In other words, Freud interpreted this to mean that the first pleasurable feeling a person has is autoerotic.

It has been argued by some that children should suckle at their mother’s breast through the age of six or seven. The rationale is that when the children aren’t allowed to do so, they need a surrogate for the mother’s nipple. Thus, when a child moves to a pacifier, thumb, or blanket, these things are used as a substitute for the nipple.

According to Freud, there are two types of parental behavior that can negatively affect children during this stage. Parents can wean a baby off of the mother’s breast, pacifier, or other object too early, or they can do so too late.

Freud taught that in order to move past the Oral Period, you have to have been able to graduate out of your need and dependence on the nipple. If your parents insisted that you stop your sucking behaviors before you were ready, you may have developed an oral fixation. Moreover, if you were shamed or chastised for your behavior on top of being forced to quit, your oral fixation could be even stronger. If you can’t remember ever sucking your thumb, blanket, pacifier, or some other soothing object, or were weaned from your mother’s breast too early, chances are you repressed that need, and now it can resurface as an adult through other problems.

On the flip side, if your parents didn’t put any pressure on you to stop sucking, or weaned you off your mother’s breast much too late, you may also have developed an oral fixation. This kind of fixation plays out differently in terms of certain personality traits.

Of these two types of fixation, you display more of the personality traits consistent with having an overindulgent parental figure. People with extreme fixation in the Oral Period are likely to: 

• Develop serious eating disorders
• Eat when they are stressed or lonely
• Be orally aggressive (In childhood this aggression may mean literally biting, in adulthood, it can mean being verbally ‘biting’ by using sarcastic language)

When it comes to other aspects of personality, those who were weaned too late by an overindulgent parent are more likely to be domineering and manipulative; those who were weaned too early by an underindulgent parent are more likely to be passive and dependent. Because your fixation on this period appears to be moderate, you’re likely to experience these problems to a moderate degree.

Oedipus complex (puberty)
Compared with others, you’re more conflicted regarding this period than 10% of people.

The Oedipus complex occurs during puberty. The issues behind the Oedipus complex center on guilt about wishing you could marry your opposite-sex parent. Obviously most people don’t identify with this wish consciously — most likely in part because of the social taboo that keeps these desires repressed. However, at some point in your life you may have wished that you could have your opposite-sex parent all to yourself and then felt guilty about wishing your other parent would disappear. Understand that there is a big difference between what you wished would happen and what you truly wanted. However, on an unconscious level having the thought and performing the act are identical. Therefore, the guilt for actually doing something is no less than just thinking it.

According to Freud’s theory, at some point everyone wishes for their same-sex parent to disappear and is left with the guilt of having that wish. If the same-sex parent dies or leaves for some other reason, this guilt can become dramatically compounded. So too, if incest occurs, children can experience tremendous guilt and shame because they unconsciously believe that they caused the abuse to happen by wanting the opposite-sex parent all to themselves. Such feelings cause enormous conflicts.

If you’re stuck in the Oedipal Period and unresolved about it, you may feel guilty when kissing a lover in front of a parent, as though you’re doing something wrong or betraying them. You may also feel either guilt or fear around same-sex people who are about your parent’s age. Freud said that these feelings surface because of a fear that the same-sex parent will punish you for being a rival.

Many factors can complicate the Oedipal Period, and most people have difficulty with it. For instance, if your opposite-sex parent communicated in some way or another that you were more attractive, desirable, or otherwise a more preferable partner than your same-sex parent, your own experiences with the Oedipus complex may be harder to deal with. On the one hand you may consciously or unconsciously want victory over the same-sex parent. At the same time, you don’t really want that victory. So if you attain it, the result can be a lot of guilt and confusion. Your fixation on this period seems to be mild, so you’re likely to experience Oedipal problems to a slight degree.

Genital Period (Adolescence onward)
Compared with others, you’re more highly advanced in this period than 1% of people.

The Genital Period is different from the rest. In order to arrive here successfully, you have to have resolved most conflicts from the other periods. This is no small feat. This is the stage when adult sexuality begins to flourish because the difficulties of childhood sexual development have basically been maneuvered successfully.

While in theory you can’t reach this stage if you are stuck in earlier ones, in practice you’re likely to display some healthy behaviors typical of adult sexual relationships while still having some unresolved unconscious conflicts from childhood. Thus your score on this dimension indicates the extent to which you engage in healthy sexual behaviors. If it is your highest score, it means you have resolved more conflicts than you have left to resolve. It also indicates that to a great extent, you’re able to engage in positive adult sexual relationships. However, a positive score doesn’t mean that you have no issues to resolve; you simply have fewer of them than most people do.

One way you can tell that a person has reached the Genital Period is by looking at how they handle the impulses of the id. The id is the aspect of self that is responsible for raw desire. It has no consciousness or rational thought. It simply wants — whether the want is food, sex, or some other primal desire. People in the Genital Period are able to take this raw energy and express it in the form of productive, creative work. People who have not reached this period may feel compelled to relentlessly pursue satiation of those needs.

According to Freud, another way you can tell if someone is in this stage is if they seek a mate who resembles their opposite-sex parent but aren’t guilty about having sex with this person. Freud believed that this indicated several things: First, that an individual has abandoned their incest feelings for their opposite-sex parent and has therefore let go of any rivalry with their same-sex parent. Secondly, that they’ve let go of the phallic problems around gender identification and are able to lovingly accept and appreciate the differences between the sexes. Lastly, that they can now identify with the same-sex parent and be on good terms with them.

Obviously this all assumes that the person’s parents are normal to some extent, so that wanting someone just like your parent would be a rational thing to feel. However, not everyone has reasonable parents. So just because someone doesn’t get along with their mother it doesn’t necessarily mean that they haven’t resolved their Oedipal complex yet. It may simply mean that their mother is a tough person to deal with.

While this appears to be an obvious truth, it’s not necessarily a perspective Freud would share. Therefore we give you the result here according to what Freud would have thought, given the assumptions of the theory stated above. Based on Freud’s assumptions, it appears that your connection to this period is a not very strong one. As a result, Freud would say that you’re likely to experience this situation to a slight degree.

So if you didn’t know before, you definitely know now: Sexuality is a primary component of Freud’s theories. This being true, it only makes sense that among the many ways Freudian analysis might impact your life is by improving your sex life. Tickle’s Ph.D.s have examined particular aspects of Freud’s work to help you look more deeply at your sex life from a Freudian perspective.

According to Freud, your sexuality in adulthood is intimately tied to how your psychosexual development unfolded during childhood. Freud felt that the more unresolved sexual conflicts you experience as a child, the more difficult it becomes to experience satisfying sexual relationships as an adult. To help you get past these old conflicts, Tickle’s team gathered information about typical ways Freud’s stages of development can play out in your sex life. They also provided exercises to help examine and alleviate the conflicts associated with each period.

Phallic Period
When fixated in the phallic stage of psychosexual development, you may be conflicted about gender roles in society or may have an unclear or ambivalent gender identity yourself. This conflict can influence the roles you take on during sex. Typically, sex for phallically fixated people focuses on power and domination.

The pairing of domination and sexual excitement is more common in males. Freud would say that this is because during the Phallic Period there is a strong focus on male domination. While some females also take on more dominant roles — if they identified with the father more than the mother during this period of childhood, for example — in general they are more likely to take submissive roles. Whatever the gender, being fixated in this period can often lead to a compulsion to engage in power games during sex. If you and your sexual partner enjoy this, then you can have enjoyable sex together. However if your partner doesn’t enjoy this kind of power play, or you feel guilty about it afterwards, you may not want to focus your sexual encounters in this way.

The other and perhaps more frequent consequence of phallic fixation is being addicted to masturbation or preferring it over sex with others. Obviously this preference can interfere with sexual intimacy. If masturbation is the height of your sexual experience, other encounters may seem dull or not good enough by comparison.

		Most of the problems from this period stem from guilt around masturbation. This is something that you can work on, on your own, when masturbating. For one, try to stay away from indulging in fantasies about bondage or power games if you have compulsions around those areas and are trying to reduce your compulsions. Secondly, you can work on your feelings after you masturbate, or while you are masturbating, if you are wracked with guilt, shame, anger, or some other intense emotion. By labeling that emotion you give it less power, and you can start to use self-talk to change your emotional reaction to it. For example, if you feel guilt when masturbating, you can talk to yourself about how normal it is to have sexual desires and to masturbate. You can assure yourself that it is a completely natural human behavior that is healthy to do. Give yourself permission to feel the guilt, but simultaneously soothe and encourage yourself. By consciously thinking more positively about your actions, you can gradually move out of the emotional trap that may be associated with masturbating.

Anal Period
When fixated in the anal stage of psychosexual development, you may be drawn to sadomasochistic sexual fantasies or encounters that pair pain and pleasure. Again, if you have a sexual partner with similar desires, such a focus becomes less of a problem than when only one partner is oriented this way. In fact, you and your mate may be able to indulge one another’s greatest fantasies. However, potential problems arise from the danger involved in this kind of sexual activity. Sadomasochistic acts require a great deal of trust. They also require that each partner take careful precautions so that neither person is physically injured during the encounters. If you feel compelled to engage in this kind of sexual behavior or are in an unbalanced relationship where your sexual partner doesn’t have an interest in it, you might want to consider seeking some method to change these desires for yourself. However, whether or not you should change is a judgment only you can make.

Some theorists believe that this kind of sexual behavior is linked more to the oral stage of development. Disturbance from either stage may make you more liable to be dealing with these compulsions.

		When sex and pain are paired, it can be difficult to untangle them. Most people have some fantasies that border on sadomasochistic. One way to lessen the entanglement of pain and sexual pleasure is to use visualization techniques to try to pair your sexual excitement with highly erotic but not painful images of sex. So for example, masturbating to non-painful sex, making it as erotic as you can, even if it is not as enjoyable as what you could be thinking, can help you move closer to what you are trying to achieve: arousal by non-painful sex. Creating choices for yourself about the kinds of sex you want to have can be very liberating. By teaching yourself to become aroused by non-painful sex, you give yourself the option to be aroused by whatever kind of sex you wish to engage in.

Oral Period
When a person is completely fixated in this stage, they far prefer oral sex to other kinds of sex. If both partners in a romantic relationship prefer oral sex to other kinds of sex, there will be less conflict around sexual acts. However, in most cases, this preference will cause an imbalance and result in disruption of the sexual relationship. When extreme problems occur surrounding this issue, sexual expression can come to feel like a routine without variation. This can make sex feel less intimate and meaningful.

Freud would encourage that to have more "normal" desires around oral sex, you should make conscious those unconscious conflicts at the root of the problem. By understanding what underlies your desires, Freud believed you could change how you approach sex. Therefore, if you really want to dig deep, you should work to expose any underlying shame or guilt around oral pleasure. If you were weaned from the breast very early or were discouraged from sucking your thumb or blanket at an early age, Freud would say that oral fixation may be something to examine.

		Get some privacy. Suck your thumb and notice how it feels. Does it feel like you are doing something wrong? Talk to yourself with reassurances that it is totally normal to need to do this, that there is no shame in having that oral need. While you may feel very silly doing this, the idea is to speak to the child within you who was weaned off sucking a thumb, pacifier, or blanket too soon. Or, if you were weaned late or sucked your thumb or pacifier longer than most other kids, ask yourself how this experiment feels in terms of meeting your needs. Is it really something that is satisfying, or are you indulging a need that was created from sucking too long in the first place?

Oedipus complex
According to Freud, it is difficult to maneuver this stage of sexual development so that upon your exit all conflicts are resolved. Therefore, for most people this particular stage has special relevance.

As for how the Oedipus complex interferes in sex, there are two primary ways. The first way is experiencing guilt about having sex. This is especially true in heterosexual relationships, because being stuck in this stage of development indicates a conflict around the incest taboo: threatening your relationship with the same sex parent because of your attractiveness to or desire for the opposite sex parent.

The second way the Oedipus complex can interfere with sex is when you become unable to pair desire and love together in the same relationship. If whenever you are sexual with someone, you consider it to be wrong, taboo, or dirty you can severely limit sexual intimacy. These thoughts make is so the person you’re being sexual with is degraded in your mind. It can be difficult to love and trust a sexual partner when you feel there is something wrong with them just because they are having sex with you. If you feel that this dynamic represents a strong conflict for you, you may want to work on changing your perceptions so you can be freer to engage in positive adult sexual relationships.

		You may not have ever had conscious thoughts about wanting to marry your opposite-sex parent and wishing your same-sex parent out of the picture. But it may still be useful to look back into your childhood, scan through your mind with no judgment, and see whether you ever harbored a thought like that. If you find one, assure yourself that it’s totally normal and that you can’t hurt a parent simply by wishing that they were out of the picture. If you don’t remember ever having this thought, imagine someone you really care about, having this conflict. Imagine what you would say to them and how you would reassure them that there is nothing wrong with their thoughts and feelings. Imagine telling them that it is all very normal and healthy to have these ideas.

So now you know some actions you can take to explore how unresolved conflicts might be affecting your sexuality. But what about looking more deeply at the other aspects of your life? For that kind of an in-depth examination, you may want to consider consulting with a professional psychoanalyst. As mentioned before, you appear to have more of the conflicts psychoanalysis is designed to resolve than do 76% of people who have taken The Freud Test. Tickle’s research team compiled some facts to help you decide if psychoanalysis is the right thing for you.

Of course, only you can answer this question. However, having the facts to make an informed decision is a good place to start. The following section will help you understand exactly what psychoanalysis is, what it’s usually helpful for, and where you can expect to find it.

What is psychoanalysis?

First of all, not all therapy is psychoanalysis. Psychoanalysis refers specifically to Freud’s method of therapy. Primarily, psychoanalysis involves two people talking. As a patient, you’re typically instructed to think aloud and to say whatever comes to your mind. The idea is that the less interference you have from your therapist when talking, the faster you’ll get to what’s important. Psychoanalysis also often involves the process of "free association," in which you’re given a topic and asked to quickly say whatever comes into your head. Oftentimes this method will be used to help you understand the deeper meanings beyond your dreams. Dreams are given great importance as part of the psychoanalytic process, especially in the beginning years of psychoanalysis.

Free association can also be used to help determine where your psychological conflicts may lie. For instance, a psychoanalyst might say a word and ask you to state the first word that comes to mind. Delayed responses, repeat responses, and unusual content can all indicate that there’s something in your unconscious trying to come to the surface. So this free association technique helps your psychoanalyst identify areas that may need to be worked on.

You may have heard of the term transference before. Transference occurs when a patient unconsciously redirects feelings about a person or situation onto their therapist. This is another aspect of psychoanalysis that therapists can use as a tool. To do so, your therapist would note the way you acted toward them in a therapy session and use that information as clues to what may be bothering you on an unconscious level. So for example, if you got repeatedly got angry with your therapist, they might conclude that really you’re mad at one of your parents. You’re simply taking that anger out — transferring it — on to your therapist. By working with transference, Freud felt that deep issues could come forth and can be addressed.

In addition to these therapeutic methods, psychoanalysts sometimes also use hypnosis. It’s looked at as a way to get past your conscious mind to the latent, compulsive tendencies of your unconscious; however, Freud had doubts of the effectiveness of hypnosis and preferred to work with most patients without it, especially in the later years of his career. You may want to note this fact when deciding on an psychoanalyst.

As for where to find an analyst, there may be more psychoanalysts per capita in New York than anywhere else in the country. Regardless of where you live, your best bet will be to consult your local mental health (sometimes called behavioral health) association, a medical association, or your insurance carrier. Note that because psychoanalysis can be a lengthy process, your insurance carrier will likely cover only a portion of such services, if any at all. It will be best to examine the details of your plan in advance.

Do you need it?

As for whether you need psychoanalysis, it depends both on the severity of your problems and on the value you would place on this kind of experience. Generally, the more extreme your unresolved conflicts, the more problems you’re likely to experience in your day-to-day life. However, you may have unresolved conflicts and still lead a perfectly happy life. In this case it may be less important to seek psychoanalysis. However, some psychoanalysts would argue that everyone could use psychoanalysis; it’s simply a tool to help you to understand yourself better.

Woody Allen movies epitomize the result of years of psychoanalysis — a highly sophisticated understanding of psychological processes and of your own problems. However, there are critics of Freud’s theories — even from one of his most famous followers, Carl Jung. Jung, who went on to contribute substantially to the field of psychoanalysis with his own ideas, felt that you could bring unconscious conflicts into consciousness, but it didn’t necessarily mean you’d be healed. Jung and Freud, however, both did agree that if any healing was to occur, bringing unconscious wounds to the surface was the first step.

Other opponents of Freud’s theories would argue that no one could really benefit from psychoanalysis. In fact, some people feel that psychoanalysis can do more harm than good. Mostly opponents conclude that psychoanalysis is a time-consuming, expensive process that, for some, produces very little benefit.

For women, psychoanalysis’s usefulness is even more questionable; there are many feminist theorists who argue that Freud’s views were gender-biased and provide far less insight into the depths of female sexuality than they do into the depths of male sexuality. Even many modern followers of Freud find this critique quite convincing. For example, the Oedipus complex appears to be consistent with studies done on the folklore and mythology of other cultures — at least as far as boys are concerned. However, for girls the situation played out in the Oedipus complex is not part of the mythology and folklore. On the contrary, it is the father who desires the love relationship with their daughter, not the other way around. Although folk tales are not proof for or against Freud’s theories, this example does shed light on the way Freud’s theories may or may not pertain to females.

Other forms of therapy

If psychoanalysis doesn’t sound like it’s right for you, there are many other forms of counseling. One of the many possible examples is cognitive-behavioral therapy. Cognitive-behavioral therapists focus mostly on actions and thought patterns that are negatively affecting you, as well as helping you to change those patterns. These therapists don’t normally try to dig up conflicts from your unconscious or your distant past. They’re more concerned with the present: What are you doing in your life? What positive feedback are you getting for acting this way? What is the negative feedback? After determining these things, they can then work with you to enhance your good behaviors and thoughts and root out bad ones.

Again, if you feel that you may need therapy, try contacting your local mental health center, your insurance carrier, or your physician for a referral. You may also want to rely on friends and family to help you out. If you are in acute distress, check the yellow pages for a crisis hotline and get immediate help. Hotlines can usually give you referrals and may also be able to tell you what kind of treatment you need.

Note that The Freud Test is not a diagnostic tool and cannot determine whether you meet criteria for an official psychological diagnosis. This test was simply meant to give you a snapshot of Freud’s most central theories and how they may apply to your life. If you want to determine whether you have a disorder of some kind, you’ll need to talk to a licensed mental health professional, preferably one who is accredited in your area. For further information, you may want to contact the American Psychological Association.

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