Emergency Responses In Sexual Anxiety

Do remember that the chronic ERs are simplified descriptions and that you or your partner may exhibit more than one of them. Even if you recognize yourself in one or more of them (if you are very nervous you may seem to recognize yourself in all of them!), it is best to think of them not as absolutes but as tendencies. They are also, of course, necessities in real emergencies: if we had no basic ER we would not survive long.

Becoming conscious of one's sexual behavior carries the danger of becoming so self-conscious that you can hardly move, like the proverbial centipede counting its feet. So do not extend couples work into the sexual arena. The explorations in couples work have already been described. Here I am suggesting guidelines for further thought and discussion.

Fright-Paralysis

By definition this is a suspension of pulsation and at its most extreme it blocks all levels of pulsation in the sexual act. People in whom severe fright-paralysis is evoked by sex are either abstinent or go through the motions with a partner. If they feel affection for the partner they may get pleasure from generalized skin contact and feelings of mothering or being mothered, this, of course, means the paralysis is not total.

The fright-paralysis may only be evoked with genital contact or penetration, while foreplay is enjoyable. Clearly, if the fright-paralysis only occurs late in the sex act, it is not likely to be a deep part of the person's character structure; it may be linked to trauma or a history of sexual or emotional violation. As soon as intercourse reaches the sensitive point, the person tunes out. If the associated fear can be shared, the fright-paralysis may work itself through. A trusted partner can be the best person with whom to share such fears.

The guide can help by avoiding any anxiety-producing statements or gestures. The explorer needs reassurance that, despite their fear, you love and want them. Eye contact is important: the explorer can be encouraged to look at the guide's eyes, body and genitals, to stay with present reality. This may counter a habit of absorption in fantasy as part of the contact block. Couples work can also encourage extension and stretching of the body which open it to excitation by widening the range of the breathing.

Fright-paralysis leads to some depersonalization; this means that the explorer may be out of touch with specific areas of the body, even while enjoying a generalized sensation of being held. It may be useful to search these areas out with them. One woman who worked with me in therapy had read scores of books on sex with her partner but never really "discovered" her clitoris. In fright paralysis even a person who is otherwise very competent may have some blind spots which seem incredibly naive: the fear behind this naivete and shyness must be acknowledged and respected.

At bottom, many people with fright-paralysis have deep feelings of abandonment: after all, in whatever original situation provoked the fright-paralysis they have been left unprotected. They had nobody to run to (and in a sense, in their shock, no body). Their genital-ism can only develop in a context of great love and security, and their needs for cuddling and generalized contact have to be met. Their eventual opening to deeper feelings may be with wonderful intensity since they lack rigidity and armor.

Fright-Rigidity

There is as much anger as fear contained in this locked musculature and, by extension, a fear of the anger. The person is not paralyzed into inertia, but lacks spontaneous movement. Movement is forced and mechanical, in a harsher way than that of fright-paralysis. Sexual release may be a compulsive necessity but it is not accompanied by emotion or tenderness. This absence of involvement (so as to avoid rage which in turn covers a deeper longing) means a flattening in sexual contact: one form of release is much the same as another. Other forms of mechanical discharge (compulsive jogging, swimming, or other exercise) can replace sex and increase the emotional isolation.

Sometimes movement during intercourse will be relatively flexible only to freeze into board-like rigidity at climax. Where armoring is severe and the fright rigidity chronic, the person will be stiff and board-like throughout intercourse and climax will be almost hidden, with no external signs of pleasure.

All ERs are a matter of degree. This is most important to remember with fright-rigidity which can occur in any person who is well muscled and somewhat rigid. Because of the strong element of rage in the fear the best work on this condition is done on the mat. The explorer may need to bang and shout and thump out their rage before the anxiety and then the deeper longing will come through. Because the rage has been suppressed, it may have developed sadistic or vengeful elements and the desire to use the pelvis and legs aggressively.

The fear of the inner unknown, the sense of inner violence best kept under control, very often leads to sexual passivity. Sex is only safe when it is dutiful, eager to please and be pleased, a polite transaction. In fright-rigidity there is usually a too-obedient "good boy" or "good girl." This emotional attitude accompanies the rigid immobility and is part of the "I'll do it myself" syndrome of isolation. Sex then becomes the meeting point of two solitudes not unlike the "parallel play" characteristic of children at the same stage: they cannot join in a mutual activity, but play with different toys, side by side.

In sex, the partner can help by encouraging the fright-rigid person to take the initiative in pleasing him or herself and by accepting some degree of aggression. The fright-rigid person has to learn that they are not so vicious and frightening as they secretly believe, that they are not suppressing some inner monster. If harshness or physically expressed anger such as pounding the pelvis or vicious grasping do occur, the partner (unless operating with a stuck ER which dovetails with this) should draw the line and stop the abuse. The fright-rigid person's rage and fear can be worked on outside the marriage bed.

If, when caressing a person with tendencies to fright-rigidity you notice signs of anxiety, you should stop and gently try to find out what they want to do. Often they will have felt and then repressed an impulse to touch or embrace you in a particular way about which they feel shy. An understanding partner will find ways of getting the fright-rigid person moving. Tenderness and spontaneity may arise if you are in good contact.

The first thing to emerge from contact with a fright-rigid person may be shyness. It is unlikely you are more frightened of them than they are of themselves.

Flight-Away

This character structure usually allows sufficient mobility for sexual excitation: the flight-away is not into abstinence (although periods of abstinence may be tolerated more easily than by more integrated people). The flight is mainly away from commitment and contact; from a full surrender to orgasm and acceptance of sensations. The person is "all over the place," impulsive, sometimes dangerous in the way that a person in full flight from a battlefield might be—looting and raping and ransacking and moving on. In extreme flight-away, sex is just one of many indiscriminate acts. It can be with anybody, any perversion can be explored, and intercourse often occurs when being stoned on dope or drunk. The person is not very armored and the body is flexible enough for various pulsatory movements to occur, but these do not flow into a meaningful, total pulsation. Underneath all the movement is sometimes a basic autonomic deadness which prevents surrender and desensitizes climax. But these "runners" are very unpredictable and some may be quite sensitive.

In therapy the task with flight-away is not simple, though it is simply stated: to stop the running and then work with the result. The same is true in couples work and in a sexual relationship with such a person. If flight-away is a dominant condition, this person is incapable of relationships and unlikely to be reading a book like this. If you are in a relationship with such a person it will no doubt be chaotic and difficult, at least if you have any expectations of them. If you are a person with some flight-away tendencies you will know what I mean by the acute anxiety which occurs when you stop running.

To stop the running, many escape routes must be eliminated: the need for alcohol or drugs before sex or compulsive experimentation with new positions (as Reich said, it is possible to be "compulsively impulsive"). Of course the elimination risks losing the person—they may run away. But then what are you already paying to have them stay? Even if your general relationship is secure and based on mutual need, at the sexual level a miniature version of running away may be played every time. What is the cost to the stable partner in this situation? Are his or her needs being met?

Since the flight-away person is often unarmored and open to contact, one way they can sometimes be reached is by being told of their stable partner's needs. Paradoxically, the flight-away person is often terrified underneath that the stable partner will eventually leave; to learn that the stable partner needs them may help to stop the running; it emphasizes the reality of the situation. The partner should not go along with the person's fantasies and unwittingly assist them in a constant escape—and cannot do so without a heavy emotional price.

In couples work the emphasis must be, as in therapy, on identifying the running then stopping it. At the sexual level anxieties may emerge which are quite surprising in a person who seems so free and wild, so ready for any experiment. Often the person is not so experienced in sex as they seem. Frank talks may get the history clear but they increase vulnerability—they very thing that is being fled.

In therapy, remarkable progress can occur once the running stops. Usually the reason for running lies in very early childhood. The lack of armoring means that once the flight stops, potential is huge. Energy and mobility are high. Combined with concentration and endurance, the result is great intensity in love and work.