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The combination of day-by-day study of vaginal smears and bodily temperature with the material obtained from daily psychoanalytic interviews, gave precise insight into the biological cycle of the woman. Both methods prove to be so reliable that the day of ovulation could be diagnosed.
Seventy-five cycles, twenty-three of them ovulative, were studied. (The study of the premenstrual and menstrual phase will be published later). The extremely interesting and stimulating results are difficult to summarize:
1The estrogenous phase of the cycle is characterized by active heterosexual libido (oestrone hormone). The psychoanalytic material shows desire for heterosexual gratification which may turn in the case of neurotic women to aggressiveness or fearful defense mechanisms: the 'preovulative tension'.
2The corpus luteum phase is characterized by passive and dependent behavior (erotization of the female body, preparation for motherhood).
3The ovulation phase is characterized by the sudden increase of luteum hormone and the sudden decrease of oestrone hormone. The patient shows a further influx of narcissistic erotization.
In the conclusion it is stated:
a.That oestrone activity (folicular hormone) is related to heterosexual desire on a genital level. In neurotic cases it is related to an activation of aggressive and incorporative tendencies (penis envy, castration wish), to masochistic concepts of female sexuality and their defense reactions (fear of being attacked and masculine protest).
b.That progesterone activity (corpus luteum hormone) is related to passive receptive tendency on a genital level—the desire to be loved and the wish for impregnation. These tendencies may be elaborated in neurotic women on regressive level in the form of oral receptive and oral dependent wishes.