At the age of 18
she married. She loved her husband, but she had no sexual
feelings in coitus, and she continued to masturbate, sometimes
several times a day, without evil consequences. At 24 she had to
go into a hospital for floating kidney, and was so obliged to
stop masturbating. She here accidentally learnt of the evil
results attributed to the habit. She resolved not to do it again,
and she kept her resolution. But while still in hospital she fell
wildly in love with a man. To escape from the constant thought of
this man, she sought relations with her husband, and at times
masturbated, but now it no longer gave her pleasure. She wished
to give up sexual things altogether. But that was easier said
than done. She became subject to nervous crises, often brought on
by the sight of a man, and accompanied by sexual excitement. They
disappeared under treatment, and she thereupon became entirely
frigid sexually. But, far from being happy, she has lost all
energy and interest in life, and it is her sole desire to attain
the sexual feelings she has lost. Adler considers that even when
masturbation in women becomes an overmastering passion, so far as
organic effects are concerned it is usually harmless, its effects
being primarily psychic, and he attaches especial significance to
it as a cause of sexual anaesthesia in normal coitus, being,
perhaps, the most frequent cause of such anaesthesia.
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