‘Pink at the heart of it’: The containment of vulnerability by a man and a boy in therapy for sexual abuse

Through detailed exploration of countertransference experience and its use in practice, this article uses a single case study to illustrate the centrality of the acknowledgement and containment of vulnerability in the recovery process for abused children. Working chronologically through the course of therapy, I analyse the child's employment of chaotic behaviour as a defensive strategy, the tie to the bad object, working with ambivalence to therapy, responses to the manifestation of controlling and dominant behaviour and the metabolising function of the therapeutic relationship. Highlighting the significance of supervision in creating an essential space for thinking, my examination of working through the countertransference includes both the capacity and the failure to tolerate the re-evocation of feelings of vulnerability and powerlessness in the therapist, and the unexpected re-emergence of the therapist's personal experience of childhood victimisation. This case study concludes with an exploration of how the integration of vulnerability may present particular challenges for abused boys and advocates for the distinct potential of the male therapist in their recovery process.