Many times love and sexuality are not integral parts of life's pleasures, but become suffering, pain, embarrassment, emptiness.
trust one therapist specializing in couple therapy and systemic sex therapy it can be the modality to re-elaborate one's own life history, try new modalities of relationships, dissolve knots and regain autonomy and the right to be loved.
In the course of several years as a systemic psychotherapist, it happened on several occasions that I had patients who came for psychotherapy with problems related to sex. And almost always these people tended at first to circumscribe the issue by the sexual dimension, not taking into account the dimension of the relationship with the partner, much less the relational meaning of such an aspect.
It is very interesting, during the therapeutic process, to explore these aspects and see how they are deeply intertwined with the physical problem that accompanies the symptom, leading the same patient to see the relational dimension underlying his problem, of which he is more the cause than the symptom. consequence being inserted inside a circular process that, once activated, feeds on itself.
In the German book Dr. Ulrich Clement – Systemic Sex Therapy, translated into Italian by Dr. Teresa Arcelloni, the concept is resumed that sex within the couple dimension often represents a repeated ritual and having the function of confirming and maintaining the homeostasis of the relationship.
Sexual dissatisfaction is often a clue to the state of health of the couple's relationship. Sometimes the symptom can appear in only one of the partners, but it is apparent evidence and therefore the therapist must expand the context.
There may be communication difficulties, unresolved conflicts, unmet expectations, insecurity; or it may have increased stressors, work, marriage, pregnancy, growing children, economic pressures, passing years, and the negative consequences are concentrated in the double bedroom, extinguishing the passion.
In the course of couple therapy, with patients who present symptoms of a sexual nature, it is very important to deepen the relational aspects linked to these and to connect with the person's history, the affective and sexual history, the family history, focusing on the relational consequences of the symptom .
For Clement, sexual desire is born of difference. It is possible to value the difference and not standardize the different desires of sexuality through a “lowest common denominator”.
Often, in fact, within a couple, diversity is not given a voice, while many people are afraid to express their desires to their partner for fear of losing them.
Clement guides couples therapists to enter the terrain of desire and sex, using the compass of the disparity of desire and not its identity, seen as uniformity.
According to this author, therefore, the focus of therapeutic intervention is the development of different sexual profiles and the relationship dynamics that derive from them.
But systemic sex therapy can also be individual. The person can go to the psychotherapist with questions about their own sexuality, without being in a stable relationship. The issues can be expanded to the scope of the relational dynamics of the patient's family of origin.
During systemic sexual therapy, it is important to help the patient to also develop a systemic view and thus be able to see himself at the center of a network of relationships, which, in a more or less significant way, influences him in his sexual problems, in his emotions and in his behavior. your lifestyle.
Having a systemic idea of the symptom, however, disconnects the patient from the interpretive linearity that is often based on psychopathology or on the individual's physiological and genetic bases. This significantly increases the possibility of therapeutic success.
Text organized by: Jaqueline Cássia de Oliveira Systemic Psychotherapist - Belo Horizonte, MG
INTERNATIONAL COURSE in 33 video lessons COUPLE THERAPY & SYSTEMIC SEXUAL THERAPY
With the trainers: Dott.ssa TERESA ARCELLONI and Dott.ssa GLORIA FERRERO
