Problems of Female Sexuality: The Defensive Function of Certain Phantasies about the Body1

The author discusses certain modalities employed by the female mind when entering into a relationship with the representations of the self and with those of her own anatomy, i.e. with representations of internal and external reality. The hypothesis is that for women in whom representations of a fragile self predominate, the body is not only felt as a mysterious, receptive cavity, but also as an unreliable organism. Here an equation between the precariousness of the self and that of the body seems to be established and the female body is felt as a wounded body, which, through an opening over which there is no control, may lose its inner contents and let in dangerous aggressors. The absence of a penis, which is discovered later, may become the symbolic representation of this precariousness. The vaginal opening may also be seen in a way that triggers persecutory anxieties. The phantasy that defends against these painful perceptions may be that of secretly and guiltily having some qualities of a male body, which are represented by reassuring male sexual attributes. In borderline and psychotic syndromes, the phantasy of having a male body appears to become concrete and almost delusional. In one case of female homosexuality, the unconsciously active phantasy is that of having the attributes of both sexes. These phantasies are defensive manoeuvres connected with early self-loss and non-integration anxieties. They are far removed from the maternal and paternal identifications that should pave the way to mature, psychic bisexuality; that is, to the presence of male and female psychic attributes and to the availability of the cathected object of both sexes.