Dead Father Syndrome (Effect)

Coined by André Green, what is Dead Father Syndrome?

Dead Father and Dead Mother complexes were introduced to me by a Psychologist on Youtube called Sam Vaknin, whose videos included Object Relational Theory, Freud and the Psychodynamic/Psychoanalysis end of Psychology, although he also discusses other topics such as behaviourism.

Vaknin discusses the "Dead Mother"and "Dead Father", described by the French Psychoanalyst André Green.

Green theorised a Dead Mother Complex (La mère morte, 1980) - not a literal dead mother - but one who is engaging and loving and then a life event (for example depression) leads to emotional coldness and withdrawing her emotional investment in the child. This leads to problems including emotional coldness, internal emptiness or meaningless, and searching for surrogate mothers. Some of these resemble the descriptions of Borderline Personality Disorder.

Green then expanded this concept to fathers, in The Construction of the Lost Father (2009). The father can be physically present, but devoid of warmth and love, absent or limited in the time spent with the child. It's been called the Father Wound, Dead Father Complex or just having a "Dead Father".

Its effects include

• Internalizing the conflict - aggression as a defense mechanism.
• Identity & Self-Esteem issues
• Relationship difficulties. For example seeking unavailable partners.
• A longing for the paternal figure

It has a particularly strong effect on daughters, but can equally affect sons.

A few references:

• Green, A. (1983). La mère morte. In Narcissisme de vie, narcissisme de mort. Paris: Éditions de Minuit.
• Green, A. (2009). The Construction of the Lost Father. In L. J. Kalinich & S. W. Taylor (Eds.), The Dead Father: A Psychoanalytic Inquiry (pp. 23–46). London: Routledge.
• The dead father effect on the psyche of a daughter
• The Father Wound by the Adult Attachment project
• The Absent Father Effect on Daughters book. A Jungian psychoanalyst and clinical psychologist.