- Hypnosis for a Sexual Problem
I came to see Claire almost by accident. Her husband had consulted me about a stress problem, and during our discussions about the pressures he was facing he mentioned a sexual difficulty. Although the relationship with his wife had previously been a warm and loving one, and both found closeness and fulfilment in their sexual relationship, things had begun to go very wrong in recent months.
Alan wasn't able to give me a name for the problem, but it seemed that intercourse was now impossible because when they tried to make love, Claire's vagina contracted too strongly to allow it. Both were very unhappy about the situation and had consulted a doctor and Claire had been referred to a gynaecologist. She was hospitalised for various observations, but no treatment was attempted, apparently because no organic basis for the problem could be detected.
An interview with Claire convinced me that the problem was a psychological one. By this I don’t mean she had developed some kind of emotional block about her husband. Rather she seemed to have acquired a phobic response to sexual intercourse because of just one very painful experience during lovemaking, as a result of a back injury. The association of the excruciating pain with sexual feelings produced a lasting phobia with regard to sexual intercourse.
Claire's back was o.k by the time I saw her, but the fear that she had experienced on that one painful occasion was so powerful that an avoidance response, powerful contractions of the vaginal muscles, continued every time she and her husband tried to make love.
Because the back problem had sorted itself out, it was a fairly straightforward process for Claire to learn how to eliminate the phobic response. I used hypnosis along with a therapy that is called “desensitization”. Central to this is the use of the imagination. The process requires exposing the person to imaginary experiences that at first are distant from the specific problem situation and for this reason can still be very pleasant. The patient spends some time with each of these experiences paying attention to the good feelings and to the freedom from the phobic response. Awareness of being in control of the good feelings is encouraged. Gradually the patient works through a set of experiences (provided by the patient) that become more and more like the situation where the phobic reaction has occurred, always delaying progression till completely at ease with each step in the process.
The hypnosis element of this involved having Claire become deeply relaxed and then using her imagination to undergo the set of experiences needed. At each step in her imaginary experience Claire was able to go through the experience while still remaining perfectly relaxed, without any abnormal vaginal contractions, even up to the final step where she imagined love making with her husband. The imaginary experiences immediately transferred to the real life situation. This kind of process, desensitisation with imagined experienced during hypnosis (deep relaxation), can be used with a variety of phobias.
More readings will be added to my blog from time to time. Have a quick look now to see the first posting on my blog PSYC1PLUS