A Rare Clinical Case of Failure Expectation Syndrome (Fear of Sexual Failure)

Abstract

A very rare case is presented, when anxious sexual failure expectation syndrome in a male patient was manifested mostly in the form of a fear of libido decrease, the above fear being the real cause for that decrease. The fear appeared after one moment, when the patient noticed libido reduction. Some time later after that decrease he developed thoughts about a possible disturbance of erection, but the latter remained normal though it was not «swelling» like before the libido decrease (preclinical level). The author describes treatment of this patient with help of some psychotherapeutic methods: different cognitive techniques including the author’s method of «comparison by analogy», hypnosuggestive therapy in the variant of programming (using in particular the author’s formula of suggestions for increasing libido), the author’s modification of the «sway» technique that belongs to neurolinguistics programming. Pharmaceutical treatment (Hydazepamum, Trittico) was used too. During the treatment the patient developed a fear of becoming a homosexual, because his desire for women was reduced. It served as the cause for using cognitive manipulations and hypnosuggestive therapy as well as the above pharmacotherapy. The given treatment resulted in recovery. The above clinical observation demonstrates that in extraordinarily rare cases the libido decrease, which has already happened, can later lead to development of a fear of this decrease, this fear causing reduction of libido due to functioning of the semantic mechanism: what the patient is afraid of is realized.