Lucy, Lisa, Marina, Tess Defense Mechanisms

[Lucy]

Idealization:
Despite what Sally heard about her crush Nick's poor performance in
school and cruel treatment of his little brother, she was madly in
love with him. Sally was convinced he was cute, funny, kind, and
intelligent. She believed him to be everything she wanted in a
boyfriend, and she couldn't identify a single personality flaw of his.

Passive Aggression:
Heather's frenemy Julia, her classmate in AP psych, was out sick with
pneumonia for 2 whole weeks, and was in desperate need of class notes.
After Julia asked Heather for the notes, Heather kept "forgetting" to
make copies, instead of telling Julia she had no intention of helping
her out due to their rocky relationship.

Hypochondriasis:
After watching 5 episodes of "Contagion" in a row one morning, Greta
became convinced that she was ill with the featured disease: the
bubonic plague. She spent the afternoon on webMD identifying the
symptoms, and visited the doctor's office repeatedly, despite the
doctor's assurances that she was perfectly healthy.

Undoing:
After stealing 10 dollars from his little brother's piggy bank to buy
a personal stash of lollipops, Steven felt extremely guilty. The next
day, he offered to take his brother out for ice cream, "his treat,"
although Steven never admitted his wrongdoing.

Intellectualization:
Roger, the cashier at the local Linens N Things, was on duty when two
robbers entered and threatened him with baseball bats; he surrendered
the money, and though unharmed, was deeply disturbed. Instead of
directly confronting the psychological and emotional trauma, he began
researching and putting in place a new, high-tech alarm and camera
system, and could not stop discussing the facts and future
preventative measures that could be taken against armed robbery of the
store.