TPC-Journal-V2-Issue3

The Professional Counselor \Volume 2, Issue 3 204 cling to his parents’ approval. Her clinging and compensatory over-functioning reminds him of his perceived engulfing mother. A man cannot make love to his mother; thus, he develops impotence. Except that instead of focusing in his own issues with impotence, he turns his attention to his female partner, his wife in most instances, and blames her for it, paralleling the way he might have blamed his mother for his father’s absence. Whereas the impotent king tends to be passive-dependent, he unconsciously pairs up with a woman who may be aggressive-dependent and have motherly overtones (Jacobs, 1977). He selects a woman with these characteristics because she reminds him of his mother, and at the same time, he resents her for the same reason (Jacobs, 1977). No doubt, the impotent king may be aware of his female partner’s sexual needs. Thus, his impotence “may serve as an oblique outlet for the husband’s covert hostility triggered by the wife’s dominance” (Jacobs, 1977, p. 101). Riveting with metaphors, the bedroom becomes a torture chamber: his unconscious payoff is to diffuse responsibility for erectile dysfunction with his sexual partner and thus, blame her for his inability to perform. He punishes her for his own unresolved and unacknowledged dependency issues with his family-of-origin. Covered with rage, the impotent king syndrome depicts a man who covertly blames his mother for keeping his father away, and then overtly blames his female partner for reminding him of his mother: “These men perceive women as invasive and insatiable” (p. 99). The impotent king views women as insatiable because that is how he most likely experiences his own need for nurturing. The explicit rage against his female partner is actually a cover-up for the hidden rage he feels toward himself. He despises himself for his own human vulnerability. Viorst (1986) suggests this vulnerability to rage is “relentless” (p. 61). Feelings of Rage Jacobs (1977) suggests that “secondary impotence occurs within the context of the husband’s narcissistic rage elicited by their wives’ unwillingness to pay continued tribute to them” (p. 100). In his studies, Goss (2006) uncovered that feelings of rage are a welcome relief to the feelings of inner emptiness these men experience. Goss suggests this is most likely the result of the detachment from the authentic self (differentiated self). This rage may be either clearly expressed or superficially withheld while manifested through acts of passive-aggression, such as seducing a woman and then having an unconscious desire to frustrate her sexually and blame her for his impotence (Goss, 2006). Drawing from a similar paradigm as Jacobs’ (1977), Karpman (1933) referred to the phenomenon of psychic impotence as “sexual neuroses” (p. 275) and argued that sexual neuroses are manifestations of the emotional disturbance of the personality through the sexual organ, but these manifestations have very little to do with sex or sexual organs per se and more to do with interpersonal relationships. Karpman posited that psychic impotence not only refers to the inability to attain or maintain an erection, but also to the inability to derive any physical or psychological satisfaction after reaching orgasm. Mostly detached from conscious awareness, the inability to perform in the bedroom may bring these men to counseling seeking relief for their sexual impotence. Jacobs (1977) cites scholars who report a high failure rate in counseling these men with sex therapy, and suggests that “a refinement in the treatment techniques may reduce the failure rate in the future” (p. 97). In agreement with Jacobs, and based on their recent study Kealy and Rasmussen (2012) recommend applying the psychodynamic counseling approach to treat “narcissistic vulnerability” (p. 358). Kealy and Rasmussen assert this approach “would add to the understanding of narcissistic phenomena” (p. 357). Psychodynamic Counseling Kealy and Rasmussen (2012) emphasize that clients suffering from narcissistic vulnerabilities are a challenge to clinicians because of their strong resistance to mourning their losses. With that in mind, Herzog (2009) proposes that helping these men calls for careful consideration of the counselor’s gender to facilitate identification. Ideally, a reenactment needs to take place in the therapeutic session with the male client projecting the feelings toward his (living or deceased) father onto a male counselor. A male counselor oriented in psychodynamic counseling would be most helpful in triggering the client’s transference and tapping into his resistance (Herzog, 2009). In contrast with other counseling approaches, in psychodynamic counseling both transference and resistance are not only expected, but embraced. Transference requires a well-trained practitioner who would not give up in the face of a challenge and would continue to