The Day the Earth Stood Still: Presence of Trauma in Time Experience

The current chapter describes the theoretical and empirical aspects of time experience development and its disruption following trauma. The basic assumption is that acute interferences during the early stages of life result in disruption in time experience. In the psychoanalytic setting, these disruptions may be expressed in the patient’s desire to live in a timeless world, which does not involve any acknowledgement of reality demands. Clinical examples are used to illustrate how traumatic history is manifested in the patient’s time experience and in the psychoanalytic dialogue.