Sexual Issues Affecting A Couple Sexual issues have become a sizeable topic in couples counseling, due to the fact the public has made recognition and awareness of treatment options (BOOK). One sexual issue that has become of sexual topic in couples counseling is erectile disorder. This paper will discuss the cause of erectile disorder and how it affects a couple’s relationship. The paper will conclude with a discussion on the life cycle of sexual relationships and where erectile disorder mitigates into the sexual relationship. Erectile Disorder Erectile Disorder is the inability for a male to maintain an erection (BOOK). It is believed the cause of erectile disorder is a male’s anxiety level (BOOK). Increased anxiety will disrupt a male’s erectile response, leading to no erection or the inability to …show more content…
There are two sides being impacted when examining how erectile disorder affects the relationship, which are the male experience the erectile disorder and their partner. The partner with the erectile disorder can feel “less of a man”, leading him to feel insecure about the relationship (ARTicle). Loosing that sense of security can put stress on the relationship. The partner with the erectile disorder can often become scared of being intimate with partner (ARTCILE). Not having sexual contact in the relationship will build up and can withdraw the partner from the relationship. The partner, who does not have erectile disorder, can often feel guilty, hopeless, and rejected (ARTicle). In this case, the partner may become depressed and overwhelmed with terrible feelings of not being able to satisfy their partner. Although both partners are experiencing the erectile disorder together, there are different feelings brewing in each other. As a counselor, it is important to recognize both partner’s feelings and thoughts of the erectile
First, it is important to distinguish the difference between sexuality and sensuality. When some people think of sexuality, the brain automatically thinks orgasms and penetration. But, when we think about sensuality, all of the senses become engaged. Touch, taste, smell, and feel can all become a form of foreplay. When you take foreplay or sensuality out of the equation, “couples have no way of intimately connecting unless they have sex” (Markman et al., 2010, p.272). This can introduce pressure to the sexual relationship which will also allow room for anxiety. “Numerous studies suggest that anxiety is the key inhibiting factor to arousal” (Markman et al., 2010, p. 277). There are two types of anxiety - performance anxiety and conflict. When a person is focusing soley on his or her performance, Markman et al., (2010) suggests that it puts “emotional distance between you and your partner. This kind of detachment can lead to the most common sexual problems that people experience” (p. 277). A few of these problems are difficulty having an orgasm, lack of erection or arousal, and pre-ejaculation. Conflict is the other source for anxiety. When a couple is arguing all the time and having trouble getting along, the desire for intimacy is lost. “It is important that you agree to keep problems and disagreements off-limits when you are being sensual or making love” (Markman et al., 2010, p. 278). If your partner has a complete lack of interest in sex, it can be a side effect of a hidden issue. It can be a stressful time at work, he or she could be depressed, drinking, or suffering from another type of illness that affect one’s sex drive. Try to figure out if it is health related, and if it is not, then look more at the
Sexual dysfunction can be defined as the inability to partake in or enjoy sexual relationship with one's partner as a result of underlying physical and/or psychological factors (Hoel, 1998). Physical attributions play a large part in both males and females and their ability to perform and enjoy sex. Males encounter several normal changes as they become older. A decrease in the hormone testosterone is very common amongst males with increasing age. Testosterone is beneficial because it gives a decrease in body fat, an increase in energy, including sexual energy, and an increase in lean muscle. These factors are important for physical attraction one has for another, definitely improving the outcome of sexual arousal. The size and firmness of the testicles may be reduced because of this decrease as well. The sexual response phase also changes with age. During the beginning of sex, an older man may experience a delay in his erection and when erect, the penis may not be as firm as when younger. ...
reason why sex between males proposes an issue is because the masculinity of a man is
If working with a client like Walter I would likely also have them keep a journal. I’m not sure yet if I would ask that they bring the journal back to session, or if I just ask them to describe any insights that may have come from their journaling. We would likely discuss any thinking distortions and work to replace them with healthier thinking patterns. We would also utilize relapse–prevention training where we would work to identify high-risk situations and learn alternative ways of coping with them. When working with clients with this disorder I would like to pay special attention to whether the techniques are helpful or whether we need to look at other methods of treatment such as aversion therapy, masturbatory satiation, orgasmic reorientation, or antiandrogen drugs.
Yet medical writers voiced more than a certain anxiety as to how to regulate marital pleasure, especially for the female partner. The conjugal "genital act" may have been the best medicine in preventing hysteria and maintaining general health, but only when dispensed in exactly the right dosage. Too much or too little could also unleash fatal female instincts, making marriage not the cure to a woman 's debauchery, past or future, but rather the gateway. Thus, while for men marriage itself seemed to offer enough of a cure for unregulated passion, for women another layer of surveillance was needed: enter the husband, dispenser and moderator of pleasure and passion. '” (Mesch
Alan Soble counters the large dilemmas presented by Immanuel Kant in his article “Sexual Use and What to Do about It”. Soble makes very strong points when he is both agreeing and disagreeing with Kant in his article. The “sex problem” that is discussed by philosophers is a battle of what makes sex immoral and harmful to humanity. The root of the objectification of the body, and luring someone under false pretenses, into sexual activity is viewed as harmful to both the person doing the objectifying and the person being objectified. Soble outlines “Kant’s sex problem” and Kant’s solution, Soble also gives his own solutions, and in learning both I feel the solution is in externalism.
Through case study, the psychodynamic approach was developed by Sigmund Freud. Freud visited Charcot’s, a laboratory in Paris investigating people suffering from hysteria. There, Freud began patient case studies (Crain, p. 254). Freud developed 5 stages of human development known as the Oral, Anal, Phallic, Latency and Genital stages. The Oral stage is from the ages of birth to 18 months. This stage engages in oral activities such as sucking. Next the Anal stage begins around age 18 months to 3 years of age. Freud suggests that during the Anal stage a child focuses on the pleasure of purging from the rectal area. The Phallic stages, none as the masturbation stage, when a child get’s pleasure from focusing on his genital areas usually happens during ages 3 years to 6 years of age. After the Phallic stage come the Latency stages. Latency is when children at the ages of 6 to 12 years old work to develop cognitive and interpersonal skills suppressing sexual interests but those 12 years and older fall into the Genital stages. During the Genital stage those suppressed sexual interests re-occur and the need to find gratification dependent on finding a partner (Craig & Dunn, p 12)
It is not a new thought that today’s young Americans are facing issues, problems and difficult decisions that past generations never had to question. In a world of technology, media, and a rough economy, many young adults in America are influenced by a tidal wave of opinions and life choices without much relevant advice from older generations. The Generation Y, or Millennial, group are coming of age in a confusing and mixed-message society. One of these messages that bombard young Americans is the choice of premarital cohabitation. Premarital cohabitation, or living together without being married (Jose, O’Leary & Moyer, 2010), has increased significantly in the past couple of decades and is now a “natural” life choice before taking the plunge into marriage. Kennedy and Bumpass (2008) state that, “The increase in cohabitation is well documented,such that nearly two thirds of newlyweds have cohabited prior to their first marriage”(as cited in Harvey, 2011, p. 10), this is a striking contrast compared with statistics of our grandparents, or even parents, generations. It is such an increasing social behavior that people in society consider cohabitation “necessary” before entering into marriage. Even more, young Americans who choose not to cohabitate, for many different reasons, are looked upon as being “old-fashioned”, “naive”, or “unintelligent”. This pressure for young people to cohabitate before marriage is a serious “modern-day” challenge; especially when given research that states, “... most empirical studies find that couples who cohabited prior to marriage experience significantly higher odds of marital dissolution than their counterparts who did not cohabit before marriage”, stated by Jose (2010) and colleagues (as c...
New York, NY: Guilford Press. Gurman, A., (Ed.). Clinical Handbook of Couple Therapy (4th ed.). New York, NY: Guilford Press.
...ed clinical trials: part 1-the efficacy of psychosocial interventions for male sexual dysfunction. The Journal of Sexual Medicine, 9(12), 3089-3107. doi:10.1111/j.1743-6109.2012.02970.x
Among those individuals that do not progress in the proper way into the genital phase, can still be playing out the psychodrama in various displaced, abnormal, or exaggerated ways. Primal desires of course can be quickly repressed but even among the mentally sane they could always rise again in dreams and in literature. The most critical conflict that the child must successfully resolve. healthy personality and sexual development and this all occurs during... ...
McCabe, M.P. (2005). The role of performance anxiety in the development and maintenance of sexual dysfunction in men and women. International Journal of Stress Management, 12(4), 379-388.
Freud (1962) believed that the erogenous zones involved in development are the mouth, the anus, and the genital region. Conflicts and behaviors in each of the psychosexual stages are closely associated with these erogenous areas. As Freud’s developmental theory is linear, a child is unable to progress to the next stage – i.e. unable to focus on the sexual energy associated with the primary erogenous zine of the next stage (Freud, 1962). The conflict central to the psychosexual stage must be resolved in order for an individual to move on to the following stage. According to Freud (1962), successful resolution of each of these stages involves expenditure of sexual energy.
...uch a key impact, it is important that when an issue does arise to take action. All of the sexual dysfunctions can be treated by going through sex therapy. This is where they can talk out their issues that could be causing the sexual dysfunctions and also it can give them ideas and tips to use to enhance the sexual relationship. (Nevid & Ruthus, 2005).
When a man fails to keep and erection strong enough for a sexual intercourse can be considered to be erectile dysfunction. It can be a sign of any health or mental disorder that can be treatable with prop...