Female Homosexuality

Choice Without Volition

Elaine V. Siegel

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• Print ISBN:
  9780881630671
• eBook ISBN:
  9781135827311
• Topic: Psychology
• Subtopic: Applied Psychology
• Index: Psychology

Describing in detail her analytic treatment of eight female homosexuals with common symptoms of incomplete body image and unconscious denial of differences between the sexes, Siegel details the recurring treatment phases that typified their analyses and offers formulations based on both ego-developmental and object-relational perspectives. She candidly describes the countertransferential issues that entered into the treatment of these women and examines basic societal assumptions about sexuality that are imprinted on the analyst.

CHAPTER 1

Introduction

EARLY FEMALE SEXUAL DEVELOPMENT AND THE ISSUE OF HOMOSEXUALITY: CURRENT THEORIES

Much has been written about Freud’s (1905, 1925a, b, 1931, 1933, 1938a, b) phallocentric view of female sexual development. But, as he foresaw, ongoing clinical observation, experience, and expanding knowledge about human development have opened the way for revision and expansion of cherished, often useful, psychoanalytic assumptions. Consensus has not entirely been reached. Some newer formulations provoke as much controversy as did Freud’s (1933) view of woman as castrated and inherently male through the phallic phase. As a matter of fact, approaching the study of female sexuality by way of research into male sexuality has to slant the outcome of such studies in the direction of overvaluing the male genital (Chasseguet-Smirgel, 1976). Many analysts now agree that an acceptable theoretical framework must encompass equally the gender development of both male and female. Interestingly, this assumption is frequently supported by formulations about what female sexual development is not. For instance: (a) Femininity is not achieved via a primary detour through masculinity (Stoller, 1977; Fast, 1984). (b) Although penis envy is as ubiquitous, and clinically demonstrable, as ever, it is not necessarily a developmental step in the way Freud first recognized it (Galenson and Roiphe, 1971; Roiphe and Galenson, 1981). (c) The wish for motherhood does not always constitute a wish for replacement of a lost phallus (Kohut, 1975; Kestenberg, 1982; Glover and Mendell, 1982; Siegel, 1984). (d) Competition as a character trait in women cannot always be traced to penis envy or the wish to castrate (Grossman and Stewart, 1977; Karmé, 1981). (e) The so-called feminine inferiority complex, masochism, and passivity are not at all part and parcel of the character in nonneurotic women (Tyson, 1982, 1984).

Given this preamble as an indication of the views about female sexual development I subscribe to, I will delineate stages and phases as they revealed themselves in the treatment of my patients, along with some formulations indicating findings different from the mainstream of present-day, liberalized psychoanalytic thinking. An ego developmental and object-relational perspective will be adhered to throughout. In addition, conducting the analysis of the women whose histories are presented in this book convinced me of the necessity for including the emanations of the preverbal, perhaps even presymbolic, past in my interpretive work. Infant research, and the work of such analysts as Ferenczi (1924), Searles (1965), Spitz (1965), Kohut (1971), Socarides (1978), McDougall (1979, 1980), Kernberg (1980, 1984), Lichtenberg (1983), and others provided the theoretical base from which I constructed such interventions.

MODERN PSYCHOANALYTIC VIEWS OF FEMALE PSYCHOLOGY

Kleeman (1976), Galenson and Roiphe (1971, 1977, 1979), among others, have reported the existence of vaginal awareness between 14 and 24 months, contributing to gender identity formation and a sense of femaleness in preoedipal times. Stoller (1964) offered the concept of a core gender identity, meaning a sense of femaleness or maleness that predates awareness of the genitals. In 1977 he enlarged this view to postulate a primary femininity from birth. Certainly my patients knew that they were females although they were threatened by certain feminine functions.

As early as 1932, Brierley noted clinical evidence that females have sensations in the vagina at an early age, a finding expanded in 1935. Greenacre’s (1950a, b) pathbreaking findings pointed in the same direction. Kestenberg’s (1956a, 1962, 1968, 1982) research substantiated early vaginal sensations and postulated an innergenital phase at approximately two to four years of age for females. In 1982, she delineated the properties of the prephallic, preoedipal inner-genital phase as follows:

The inner-genital phase begins with a disequilibrium in which pregenital and early genital drives and derivative ego functions vie with one another. The ensuing integration of pregenital and phallic drives and applied ego functions under the aegis of inner genitality is aided by the child’s identification with the mother, who acts as an external organizer, reinforcing and guiding inner genitality, the internal organizer at the time. Externalization of inner genital impulses is the mechanism which underlies their sublimation into maternal behavior and the wish to be a mother. The former dyadic relationship is now replaced by a triangular “girl-baby-mother” relationship [p. 84].

Kestenberg believes that the inner-genital phase deeply influences each developmental phase and is the basis for later maternal behavior and for the vaginal, slow-spreading type of sensual excitation. But since, in essence, the inner-genital phase is one of disequilibrium, the developmental task has to be the integration of tensions, excitations, urges, and impulses then vaguely perceived. But, Kestenberg feels, inner-genital sensations yield no product. Therefore, they need to be externalized and made into a living link with mother. Kestenberg sees such integration as taking place in the externalization of kinesthetic and visual memories in playing. Doll play is seen by her as the principal outlet. In my group of patients, such games were conspicuously absent (Siegel, 1986). They could not recall ever really playing. Instead, there was a lot of running, shrieking, breathholding, and other means of possibly releasing inner tensions. Not being able to let sufficient narcissism flow toward their self-representations, they stayed locked in a sexually undifferentiated mode (Fast, 1984), which also allowed infantile omnipotence to stay intact. Insufficient cathexis of their inner spaces prevented them from finding the shapes, designs, and colors to represent feelings inside their bodies. Glover and Mendell (1982) corroborated Kestenberg’s findings by reporting illustrative reconstructions from the analysis of six adult women.

But it was not only the inability to cathect and to own their complete bodily selves, including their inner genital spaces, that plagued my patients. There was also an omnipotent triumph involved in not acknowledging the difference between the sexes. It allowed them to stay locked into the idea of having all possibilities of both sexes open to them, to imagine being anything and everything, although the female “anything and everything” was for them shrouded in mystery and subject to all sorts of experimentation. Assuming short-lived phallic properties seemed easier than relinquishing omnipotence but invariably led to disappointment and despair. They tried to preserve themselves from the loss reaction implicit in all castration anxiety, which also manifests itself strongly during early castration reactions (Roiphe and Galenson, 1981).

Discovery of the anatomical difference between the sexes does result in penis envy but this is a developmental phenomenon that is reworked during subsequent phases of adequate psychological growth. While little girls indeed have the phase-specific envy reaction, they soon come to know and value what they themselves possess and are thus able to give up envy of what is not theirs.

Clearly, my patients were unable to take this crucial step. But penis envy is a complex issue in the treatment of less severely afflicted women as well. It serves many defensive functions and reflects particular versions of self-and object representations (Karme, 1981).

Penis envy and the castration complex are simply not the turning point toward femininity. They can, of course, constitute the beginning of atypical development. Galenson and Roiphe’s (1979; Roiphe and Galenson, 1981) invaluable contributions are relevant here. They emphasize that Freud’s ideas about penis envy and the feminine castration complex are correct. But their research shows that these developments occur very much earlier than Freud believed. They found that

infants, usually between the 15th and 19th months, acquire a distinct awareness of their genitals. This genital awareness occurs with such regularity and exerts such a pervasive effect on all areas of functioning that we have designated it the early genital phase. One of the most conspicuous manifestations of the early genital phase is the … preoedipal castration anxiety [Roiphe and Galenson, 1981, p. 2].

Preoedipal castration anxiety can have formidable consequences if the little girl is not able to compensate for and integrate this blow to her self-perception. Both self-and object representations are still very unstable at such an early time, so that the child has to withstand not only the preoedipal castration reaction but fear of object loss and self dissolution; that is, three levels of anxiety need to be sustained.

In their 1979 paper on development of sexual identity, Galenson and Roiphe delineated some of the implications when all three levels of anxiety are strong.

Those girls who show unduly severe reactions during the period of early genital discovery appear to be destined for the development of an oedipal attachment of a negative type, in which the ambivalent attachment to the mother remains the primary libidinal tie. Masturbation is inhibited either entirely or to a large degree in these cases, in addition to inhibition in many other areas of development, including the symbolic function [p. 17].

The specific, observable areas of symbolic function affected are those in which words and labels for male/female differentiated things and people were already acquired and then lost during the onset of early castration anxiety. Play activity also became restricted and stereotyped, according to Galenson and Roiphe.

These formulations are entirely consistent with my own clinical findings. My patients reported never playing the usual games of dolls and family, substituting gross motor activities instead. What needs to be underscored in addition is that the early genital phase and attendant castration reaction in my patients was so fraught with danger because the practicing subphase (9–14 months) was still incomplete and insufficiently supported by an often traumatized differentiation subphase (5–9 months). The case histories describe this more fully. The concrete fact of incomplete body image, in particular lacking schematization of the genital region (Socarides, 1979; Siegel 1984) and concomitant lack of stable objectrelations, led to narcissistic injuries and cognitive arrests, as well as unconscious denial of the difference between the sexes. Therefore, only same-sex partners seemed acceptable to these women. Actually, entry into the oedipal phase is a distinctly feminine process. Parens (1976) and his co-workers have suggested that a psychobiological, gender-related force ushers in the oedipal phase.

But prior to the oedipal phase, the growing female child must deal with a host of other issues, such as penis envy and the formation of her superego. Instead of wishing for a penis, the little girl may want a baby. But the wish for a baby can occur prior to the penis envy reaction and is then an identification with the mother, as well as an inborn gender characteristic. Original preoedipal pregnancy wishes gradually mature and change to fantasies about father.

Superego formation is closely linked with these processes. An adequate superego has been found to be regularly present in women, as Schafer (1974), Blum (1976), Applegarth (1976), and others have pointed out. The female superego is similar in structure to that of the male but has a different contents, a fact some classical analysts like Greenacre (1948) were doubtful of.

As stated earlier, during various developmental phases there may be castration anxiety and penis envy. These influence the severity of the superego so that even during adequate development, the gir’s penis envy must be worked through again and again with the context of knowing her own valuable but different genital.

A woman whose body is her own, that is who has successfully integrated her sexual organ and her sexual self within her total inner self representation is able to meet a potential male partner without either resenting him or competing with his maleness. For the women I treated this was at first an insurmountable task because they had to acquire a more complete body image and sense of self. An appearance of exaggerated bisexuality (de Saussure, 1929; Brierley, 1935; Socarides, 1978, 1979) seemed to prevent them from becoming their biologically determined female selves. I am inclined to think, however, of bisexuality as a construct that is neither helpful nor proveable in developmental terms. Rather, I am following Fast’s (1984) alternative conceptualization of a gender differentiation process during which both sexes wish for, and think they possess, the attributes of each other. Infantile omnipotence allows the little girl to assume that she too will grow a penis, while the little boy assumes he can bear babies. Gradually, both boys and girls learn to differentiate and identify feminine and masculine attributes and possibilities. Probably around the second half of the second year, delimitation of possibilities inherent in sexual differences is accepted, along with recognition of anatomical sex differences.

Thus, the notion of bisexuality becomes a question of developmental arrests and infantile assumptions of overinclusiveness retained into adulthood.

CLASSIC PSYCHOANALYTIC ASSUMPTIONS ABOUT FEMALE PSYCHOLOGIC DEVELOPMENT

In the preceding pages, I have focused on developmental issues and conceptualizations that helped me to understand my patients more fully. Contrasting early psychoanalytic views with current thinking in the profession about expectable female psychologic development will further clarify how my patients were different from heterosexual females.

Freud (1905) saw little girls as perceiving themselves as essentially male; then as castrated males (the castration complex); and not until puberty gaining a sense of vaginal awareness. Later, Freud (1923b) spoke of infantile and adult genital organization as virtually identical with regard to the object and asserted that until puberty male and female are synonymous with phallic and castrated. Interestingly, my patients did not “know” their vaginas in that they were not able to include their genitals in their body image but used this incompleteness defensively to ward off any number of cognitive awarenesses and interpersonal happenings. I will focus on this phenomenon in detail later, in the case histories.

In 1924, Freud again wrote of the vagina’s exclusion from the awareness of both boys and girls. He maintained that appropriate genital structure takes place only during puberty. Although the boy’s oedipal conflict dissolves with the castration complex, he is said to have no wish to penetrate his mother’s vagina; he simply is not aware of it. The little girl, on the other hand, does not enter the oedipal phase until her castration complex is brought about by the sight of a penis. This is seen as making her turn to her father in an effort to gain a penis for herself through the desire for a child. But for her the Oedipus complex does not end there. Disappointment makes her turn from her father, and since she is already castrated, she does not fear castration. The important part these processes play in the formation of the superego are well known, with the woman, because of her lack of castration fear, forming a less severe superego.

Freud (1925a) further postulated that in girls the Oedipus complex is a secondary formation. At first the girl desires her mother, then a penis, then a child by her father. But the wish to have a child is merely a coverup for the wish to have a penis. Therefore, loving one’s father is only the consequence of penis envy.

In my patients, retaining mother as a love object could indeed be seen as a developmental arrest because neither the desire for father nor the desire for a child was present at first—although some of the analysands, under societal and familial pressures, had become mothers themselves. Nevertheless, in these women the Oedipus complex remained vestigial at best, with little or no acknowledgment of the desire to “have” father, his penis, or a baby.

Freud also wondered if the discovery of the clitoris were not linked with the loss of the maternal breast in an attempt to substitute one type of pleasure for another. Little boys were accorded masturbatory pleasures without oedipal desire; the Oedipus complex was seen to arise in connection with observation of parental intercourse. But for girls the crucial moment remained the discovery of a genital “superior” to her own that she wished to possess. Her penis envy remained with her, making her resent her mother for not providing the coveted organ and forcing her to give up masturbation because she is disappointed in her clitoris. She would eventually turn to femininity by wanting a child from her father and set up mother as a rival.

By and large, my patients, never having reached the oedipal phase, were disappointed in their parents who were both seen as withholding love. Mother was simultaneously ardently loved and desperately feared; father was a somewhat hazy figure who hardly mattered. When the penis was acknowledged as present in males at all, it was viewed either defensively as insignificant or with disgust. Penis awe was uncovered during treatment, the awe expressing the fear of something foreign and unacceptable.

According to Freud (1905, 1914, 1931) many feminine characteristics are due to “original sexual inferiority,” women’s “genital deficiency,” and the need to overcome these inherent facts or to cover them up. The woman can reach completion only if she gives birth to a son, who will compensate her for her pervasive feeling of inferiority.

My patients, however, compensated for their obviously deep-seated but denied and defended-against feelings of inferiority in a different way. Rather than seeking a real or imagined phallus, or even being envious of a penis, they tried to heal their defective body images by seeking others like themselves, who could at least temporarily put them in possession of what they so ardently but unconsciously sought—their vaginas. (Gillespie, 1956)

Many analysts followed in Freud’s path. Lampl-de Groot (1933), for instance, identified femininity entirely with passivity, and masculinity with activity. Deutsch (1944) linked female genitality to orality, with the mouth seen as the psychological prototype of the vagina. But, again, the vagina was presumed unknown territory until the penis awakened it during coitus. Orgasm was the male’s prerogative. Women, to be truly feminine, used their vaginas for procreation and the clitoris for pleasure (Deutsch, 1944; Bonaparte, 1953). This line of thinking prevailed until Horney (1933) spoke of the denial of the vagina as the result of the little girl’s fear of injury to the inside of her body. Early vaginal impulses were repressed and transferred defensively to the outside, to the clitoris.

In contrast, my clinical findings show t...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Halftitle
• Title
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Acknowledgments
• Contents
• Preface
• Foreword
• 1 Introduction
• 2 Treatment Issues: Dealing with Preoedipal Phenomena
• 3 Transference Manifestations and Regressions
• 4 Clinical Examples: I
• 5 Clinical Examples: II
• 6 Countertransferential Regressions and Empathy
• 7 Parental Profiles as They Emerged in the Daughters’ Analyses
• References
• Index