Client, patient or... Which do you prefer?
"The Patient" by Ernst Ludwig Kirchner
Oftentimes psychoanalysts speak of their 'patients'. This one I like and dislike at the same time. On the one hand, this word comes from the Greek 'pathos', it denotes someone who's suffering, which adds the human, subjective dimension missing in 'client'. A patient suffers and so they turn to a therapist for help. Fantastic. But then the medical associations come in and spoil it all: a patient is someone who's ill, they have a disease, they are not 'normal' and thus must be 'cured' by a doctor who knows all about health and illness.
Seen from this perspective, 'patient' may sound pathologising. While 'client' objectified the therapist and therapy itself as something that can be bought, 'patient' objectifies the person seeking help, reducing them to the passive object of medical manipulation. Complementary, it makes the psychoanalyst look like an all-knowing doctor, which they aren't and should never be.
But do we have any other options? In psychoanalysis there's a neologism that apparently eliminates the problems discussed above: 'analysand', or 'analysant(e)' in French. If compared to 'the analysed' / 'l'analysé', it stresses a more active position, that of someone who analyses themselves, thus being the subject, not the object of the process. That would be a great solution indeed, were it not for the fact that the word 'analysand' sounds a bit weird and artificial. It doesn't really exist outside of professional jargon.
So, at the end of the day, one has to choose out of three imperfect words whichever they please and face the music. Now I wonder, if you were going to a psychoanalyst, which of the three would you prefer to be called? Or maybe you can even think of some other options? I'll be happy to hear from you in the comment section below.