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The author relates the case of Catherine (9 years) and her family, whomhe treated for her persistant difficulties in falling asleep. Every evening, she could not go to sleep unless she had settled down in her parents’ room, close up to her mother.This behaviour was assessed as an equivalent of childhood addiction partially brought on by anxious and depressive ideas ans sustaines through the regressive pleasures it procured her.The therapist proposed treatment for Catherine on the one hand and for her parents on the other. Without jolting them, he helped reflect on the symptom’s meaning, and on the pros aud cons of keeping it. The symptom disappeared after a year’s work.