Chapter 3, Frau Anna G., Section 1 Summary

Freud writes a case study of a 29-year-old woman he calls "Frau Anna G.," whom he treated in 1919. Anna has been suffering from severe pains in her left breast and ovary, eats very little, and suffers breathing problems. While Freud treats her, he discovers she also suffers from intense hallucinations.

Freud gives a brief overview of Anna's history for his readers. Her father was a Russian Jewish man and her mother was a Polish Catholic woman, and their marriage estranged them from their families, with the exception of her mother's twin sister and her husband. Anna had one brother, five years older, to whom she was not close. They lived in Odessa, Ukraine, where her father, an energetic but workaholic man, owned a grain-exporting business. While her mother was always sweet and indulging, her father...