Dora Hysteria

A Fragment of an Analysis of a Case of Hysteria (1905), simply known as “Dora”, was a case study written by Austrian neurologist and the founding father of psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud. Dora chronicles the condition and treatment of an 18-year- old female exhibiting symptoms of hysteria. Freud highlights this case study as a scientific approach. He likens himself to a gynecologist, engaging in conversations with his patient purely for scientific purposes rather than any excitement or gratification. However, the lines between his scientific interest and personal involvement become blurred, having a direct negative outcome on the patient’s treatment. As a result, his interpretations and suggestions for treatment are biased and fails to meet the standards of scientific analysis.
No longer recognized as a mental illness, hysteria, especially female hysteria, was a common medical diagnosis for emotional distress; the diagnoses stemmed from a wide range of symptoms. Freud believed that hysteria stemmed from traumatic sexual experiences in the patient’s past, or from problems in the patient’s sexual life. In the case of Dora, Freud described her case as “merely a case of “petite

At the age of 14, Dora alleges that she was inappropriately sexually advanced by Herr K, her father’s friend, while she was visiting him. Freud notes that “Dora had at that moment a violent feeling of disgust, tore herself free from the man, and hurried past him to the staircase and from there to the street door” (580). However, her father informs Freud that Dora only imagined that Herr K tried to seduce her and stresses that Herr K is an honorable man. Not surprising, the men take sides against her and transforms her into the perpetrator rather than the victim. We later learn that the Dora’s father is having an affair with Herr K’s wife and it seems plausible that her father was treating her as object for barter between the two