The author discusses the role of an occupation in the psychic economy of
women in midlife and the diagnostic and therapeutic function of attention
to work-related issues. Clinical examples are grouped according to commonly
encountered patterns as these result from prevous developmental choices and
as they show some of the possible repercussions during the middle years. In
psychotherapy with midlife women it is important to address work-related
issues in terms of the interplay among previous development, age-specific
factors, and social realities and changes as well as neurotic factors.Abstract Teaser