further clarification in the “Relationship” area:- Sexual Relationship

As the interviews proceed, either with the partners separately or together, certain specific questions will inevitably come up and need further clarification, and the first group of these to be dealt with are those in the inter-personal or “relationship” area. The most important aspects of the marital relationship which may come under discussion are the sexual, the personal, the parental and the social relationships, and they will be discussed in that order, after which some attention will be given to the question of what goal is being aimed at.

The sexual relationship is a very common area of marital conflict, as we have already seen in the discussion of contributory factors in marital disorders. In many cases the sexual difficulty is not immediately disclosed, but is hidden behind a “fac,ade” of personal touchiness and “unreasonableness” on the part of the wife, or apparent indifference or infidelity on the part of the husband. As the rapport becomes better the sexual frustrations or conflicts are often expressed, or the counselor may be provided with an appropriate opening for a question about either partner’s feelings about the sexual relationship. As already suggested in discussion of contributory factors it is generally impossible to consider the sexual relationship apart from the personal relationship or from the inner personality structure and “conditioning” of the partners.

Whatever the counselor’s ideas may be about the meaning and significance of sexual intercourse between human beings, it is necessary for him to listen to the feelings and attitudes of the partners about this important part of their relationship. The aim of counseling is to help them to a mutually satisfying total relationship, rather than to “educate” them “up” to any concept of it, no matter how good, that the counselor may have. For example, if the husband is constantly demanding, much will depend on whether the wife can willingly accept his demands, and if she is happy to do so there seems no justification for the counselor to suggest any other attitude unless asked to do so.

In most cases in which this subject comes up for serious discussion in counseling, however, there is enough painful conflict for a definite review of attitudes to be necessary, and this can only be done on a basis of some workable concept of the meaning and significance of sexual union. Many people have the vaguest ideas of this at the time of marriage and with the normal differences between male and female attitudes to sex they find themselves increasingly at cross purposes after marriage.

If we accept the democratic concept of the dignity of human personality and the autonomy and freedom that go with it, then it seems clear that sexual intercourse cannot properly be the subject of demand on the one hand, but that it is implicit in the marital undertaking that each partner makes a genuine effort to meet the reasonable needs of the other sexually and in all other respects. But this attempt is surely a matter for the individual conscience of each and not for decision by the other partner. In a sense it is more an obligation to the marital partnership than to the other partner, and the marriage will better be promoted and sustained when each makes a genuine effort, with any help that may be found advisable, to live up to the obligation.

Having made these observations it is perhaps necessary to go a little deeper, and to examine some of the inner feelings associated with sexual intercourse in many men and women. The feelings of men are more direct and even demanding than those of most women. Sex, to men, is often felt as a strong “appetite” which seeks gratification and “conquest.” Women have a sexual “appetite” that is less direct, and which generally needs to be “awakened,” especially at the beginning. Sexual intercourse to a woman involves considerable self-giving, the urge to which needs to be “won” by love rather than demanded by coercion or taken for granted.

Many men fail to understand that their demands for sex intercourse without setting out to win the self-giving cooperation of their wives constitute a recurring affront to their wives’ personalities, and that there are limits to the acceptance of such affronts to human dignity. Many wives in counseling make the rather sad observation, “The only time he’s ever at all affectionate to me is when he wants sex.” The use of any other person as a means to an end (in this case the gratification of an appetite) would seem to be a denial of the very ideas of human dignity and value for which mankind has been fighting over the centuries, and to which we so easily give “lip service.”

This kind of approach on the part of husbands may best be exposed for attention in counseling by “creative questioning” at the appropriate time. For example when it is brought out that a husband is regarding sex intercourse as a matter of demand, irrespective of his wife’s feelings about it, the counselor might put the question, “Then you feel that your wife should be ready to meet your needs at any time you want her to, regardless of her feelings about it?” In this way, the differing role perceptions can be brought out, and either reconciled by the partners or counseled more deeply by the counselor to elucidate the underlying elements in such attitudes, the habitual attitudes and responses, the uncritical assumptions, emotional needs, and the background “conditioning.” This may demand great patience and tact on the part of the counselor, because he is dealing with very deep and highly charged emotions and attitudes which do not lend themselves easily to change.

On the other side the wife who consistently rejects her husband’s appeals, or accepts them with hostile compliance may need help in finding out the deeper causative factors in her attitudes. Some of this feeling may arise from inept or crude methods of wooing on the part of the husband, but in many cases there are much deeper factors involved, which may well be related with the early “conditioning,” such as an unconscious hatred of men as a result of early experience with a coarse, drunken, cruelly demanding father, or with a tense repressed hostile mother.

When it appears that such conflicting attitudes between the partners extend as deeply as this and do not seem to respond to the general counseling approach it may be advisable for the counselor to consider referral of the partners for deeper psychotherapy, leaving it to the psychiatrist to decide how much therapy he should offer each of them.

While the counseling or psychotherapy is progressing and in cases where it appears that no further counseling or psychotherapy is justified or desired, some help can still be given through examination of the underlying aims of the partners in this area of their lives. Are they, for example, looking for perfect sexual union, something which seems to be beyond the reach of the majority of married couples? Do they on the other hand regard inefficiency in the performance of sexual intercourse as a reflection on their masculinity or femininity? To help the partners to “come to earth” and learn to accept, at least for the time, the best that can be obtained, even if it is not at all comparable with what they had hoped for and expected, may bring about enough release of tension to open the door to a steady improvement in the sexual relationship. This is often found in the case of recently married young people, and if they can even accept the pleasure of being together when the successful conduct of sexual intercourse is beyond their power, the situation may be kept from deteriorating while the necessary counseling and the time for adjustment can be obtained.

Tags: Counseling