In this conversation with Luca Mazzucchelli we talk about the disenchantment in the couple, a topic that, like all psychotherapists, I often find myself facing, but also about the enchantment that sometimes (not always) gives life to the couple. I have focused my attention only relatively recently on this magical phase that we hardly see in therapy. And, as strange as it may seem to you, it was precisely psychopathology and the differences that can be found in this regard between different disorders that sparked my interest in this topic. Suffice it to say, that falling in love can cause symptomatic onset in phobic organizations. On the contrary, people with depressions, that can be placed in the semantics of belonging, as cyclical depressions and bipolar II disorders, generally recover if they fall in love, at least as long as the spell remains. Much of the interview is dedicated to the innovations introduced by the theory of semantic polarities that I have developed in the understanding of couple dynamics and to the profound differences in the love registers that we find in people with different semantics.
I also introduce many clinical examples and Luca Mazzucchelli prompts me with several intriguing questions. An example? Do couples that belong to the same semantic get along better than those with little semantic cohesion? And what about intercultural couples?