decathect

verb

1. (ambitransitive)To detach or withdraw one's emotional energies (libido) from (something or someone).

   ““He will continue manipulating Jonathan. We must get Jonathan to decathect from Michael.””

   “The writer only tried to decathect these obsolete and irrational reactions, especially by strengthening certain other—and just as typically Wolf Indian—vital and effective reactions, which counterbalanced the former, and were rooted in different aspects of Wolf ethics and mores.”

   “The psychiatric consultant in this situation often needs to spend as much time decathecting the anger of the treating physician as in dealing with the patient.”

   “Such objects emphasize the physicality, the materiality of art—qualities which, as adults acculturated into a universe of abstract codes, we learn early on to decathect.”