Developmental Autobiography from the Psychosexual and Psychosocial Perspectives

Developmental Autobiography from the Psychosexual and Psychosocial Perspectives
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Developmental Autobiography from the Psychosexual and Psychosocial Perspectives
Reflecting on my life so far, I relive memories of late childhood, puberty and adulthood that reflect the various developmental stages in Sigmund Freud’s Psychosexual and Erikson’s Psychosocial Development Theories respectively. I was born 46 years ago in Tbilisi, Georgia, to middle class parents. The second and lastborn child, I enjoyed the full attention and care of my parents during my early years. Not surprisingly, my earliest childhood memories are filled with blissful moments running around the house, going for walks with my dad, and generally enjoying doing all the mischievous things that only children can get away it. Although I was with my mother most of the time, I developed closeness with my dad, which, ordinarily, could be attributed to the fact that he bought me presents regularly. Indeed, I always confronted him at the door whenever he returned from work, sure that there was always a sweet or chocolate bar in his breast pocket.
However, now that I think about it from Freud’s psychosexual point of view, I imagine moments when my mother’s constant presence in the house and her disciplinarian attitude compelled me to develop a likeness to my father because he was gentle to me. As a result, I became dad’s girl, always feeling secure when he was around, and insecure when he was not. It could be partly because I liked mom’s company less because she is the one who instilled discipline in me; but equally, it could also be because Freud is brutally right; I unconsciously regarded mom as a competition for the attention of the only man in the house. I was at my phallic stage, and I had developed the electra complex. While I consider such feelings to have been innocent since I was not mature enough to have sexual desire for my father, I can imagine moments when just sitting on his lap made me cheerfully ecstatic, when his holding my hand as we took a walk aroused in me feelings of happiness that I never experienced with my mother. It was not until I started attending school and socializing with other girls that I realized the anatomical difference between boys and girls, and consequently made me to start identifying with my mother. Moreover, role-playing at school socialized me into the appropriate gender role, and subsequently started viewing my father differently, usually with a sense of reverence and respect. I think this was the process through which I resolved my identity conflict and developed feminine characteristics by associating more with my mother and other girls at school.
From my early schooling days, I was good in math and physics, and I attended school at an institution for the gifted and talented. I was also fluent in the languages, including English, Russian, and the Georgian dialects. I later progressed to Georgian Technical University where I graduated with a master’s degree in electrical engineering, and subsequently worked as a head engineer in the imaging department of a public hospital in Georgia. At the age of 26 I migrated to the U.S., where I settled and married a successful Wall Street broker, with whom I had one child, a daughter named Nicole. Though we are now divorced, I lead a happy life with my daughter in one of New York’s upper class neighborhoods, where she also attends an elite school that teaches music lessons. During my marriage, I played the role of a housewife as my husband took care of the family’s financial needs. My present sense of contentment is, to a large extent, as a result of the happy marriage life I had. In vi...