In this book, we describe the evolution of ideas in psychoanalytic psychosomatics regarding the relationship between mind and body, and how disorders in mental functioning can lead to the manifestation of physical illnesses. The psyche is shaped alongside the body. The body has something of the soul and the soul has something of the body. “Body from heaven, soul from earth.”

The creation of the Psychosomatic Human, that is, the unity of the body-soul entity, is ensured by the love, care, and boundaries set by the parents for their child, and subsequently the individual's relationships with significant people in their life. Early traumas in life cause deficits in the structure of the psyche that will determine how one thinks, feels, and behaves.

To avoid seeing their wounds, the individual distances themselves from their true self. They conform to commands and adopt the obligations of others, considering them as their own desires. They ignore that their body is vulnerable and, in some later disastrous condition, will become ill.

Paradoxically, the sick body serves as the ultimate refuge for the individual against psychosomatic disorganization and death. As will be shown through examples, illness becomes a reason for the individual to seek their history and find the gaps in their psyche that interrupted their ability to dream, desire, and live.