the sensual capacities described in these women preceded their work with me. But it was only when they realized that they possessed unexplored potentialities and that these could be used to enrichen their sensual lives, to move them closer to the ultimate experience of love, did they dare to take their first tentative steps toward maturity.
As we have observed, partial frigidity includes those degrees of frigidity that lie between total frigidity and normalcy. This includes such a large range of sexual reaction (or the lack of it) that it would not be possible to describe specific measures that would be helpful in all cases.
However, those who find they are closer to total frigidity on this scale than to normalcy often discover that the general techniques just described are helpful. Many of these, if they persevere, will find that they will ultimately achieve orgasm without requiring psychotherapy. Others, after determining the distance they can go on their own, may wish to seek outside help.
For those who lie closer to normal feminine sexual reactions it is usually sufficient to persist in the techniques for self-discovery and self-realization described earlier in this section.
As we saw when we examined psychic frigidity, it seemed to be the exception that proved the rule. Women of this type are able to have orgasms that are apparently normal. But they cannot form a relationship with any man that will endure. They frequently select ineligible men as partners or, if by chance the man happens to become eligible, they will then flee the relationship. If they cannot flee it they become sexually frigid.
We have found that women with this type of frigidity can help themselves by denying themselves the easy gratification to which they are accustomed. Their facile sensuality is a red herring used to disguise their real fears from themselves.
