Sclerodermic patients: an interdisciplinary approach

We experience our life through the skin: from the first loving contact to the last painful separation. Therefore the skin “reminds” all the conflicts between the individual and the external environment. Nowadays there is a great agreement in identifying these conflicts as responsible for the majority of the psychopathologies. The present work aimed at investigating the psychosomatic features of scleroderma (i.e. the thickening and tightening of the skin) using the Analytic Psychodrama method. This method, through scenes, allows to make conscious different unconscious conflicts, as well as to interpret them. Method. We studied a group of five women (age: 35-70 years old) for one year. We collected the individual experiences reported by the patients, focusing on the ones that are crucial in the formation of psychosomatic symptoms: the specific relationship with the mother and with the father, the possible arrival of one or more younger siblings, the specific affection/dynamics of the primary and following milieu. We measured the relational structures between the participants - closeness vs. distance - before and after the group work. Results and conclusions. Collected data suggest that during the formation of their early personality patients experienced a mother affectively cold, needy or lacking of contact signals. As a result their skin was not trained to soften up, delighting in maternalwarmth and protection. Conversely the skin adapted to defense itself autonomously. The used method, the Analytic Psychodrama, allowed us to investigate different aspects of the psychic life of each participant. We identified important changes in participants’ body perception as well as in physical contact with the others. We observed these changes also in the family context. Resting on these results, we predict further long-term effects of our approach. According to the principles of psychosomatic medicine, it should affect also the specific clinical aspects of scleroderma.