SEXUAL PROBLEMS IN WOMEN

The extent of sexual problems in women as revealed by the survey we quoted earlier in the chapter suggests that all the clinics and therapists dealing with them are doing no more than scratching at the surface. When one bears in mind that women are biologically endowed with an enormously greater sexual capacity than are men, the extent of the present situation is impressive and a cause for concern. There are many ways of tackling the problem. The best course, in our view, is prevention, by bringing up children differently. Better sex education for girls is becoming an urgent necessity in an age when men are being increasingly encouraged to perform to their partner’s satisfaction and when women have increasing sexual expectations. The discrepancy between what women are capable of and what they can achieve may in itself account for the marked difference between the sexes in the prevalence of emotional illness.

Women would probably perform better if they were able to communicate more to their partners and if men were educated to understand them better.

To say that men suppress women is provably wrong. Their mothers probably suppressed them far more as girls — and much more than they did their brothers. Men often complain that their women undervalue themselves and so underachieve. In fact they tend to see more potential in their women than the women do themselves.

These influences and many others, exert negative influences on female sexuality generally. It could be that human females are designed to be sexually dissatisfied, at least to some degree, so that they have an incentive to have further sexual activity. Human females are, in effect, permanently ‘on heat’ or ‘in season’ because humans are capable of rearing their young in any season of the year in which they are born.

Most women seem to be in touch with a deep inner sexuality which they fear because of the consequences which could result if they were really to let go. In fact many sex problems in women are the result of what is called ‘reaction-formation’ against their own powerful sexuality. They have learned that it is bad to be sexual and then have realised how sexual they are. Thereafter their interests, attitudes, behaviour and pleasures all have to be presented, even to themselves, as the opposite, or a modification of what they really are.

Re-education can rapidly and dramatically alter this situation, especially if the woman’s partner is encouraging. Many women are afraid to be themselves for fear of earning condemnation and this is one reason why bold, self-confident and sexually dominant men, who expect a woman to be very sexual, appeal to so many women. Underconfident, shy and embarrassed partners simply make many women feel inhibited as well.

If men were better educated to know about and to accept female sexuality there would be fewer sex problems in women.

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