The Cotophobia Is the fear of sex or sexual intercourse. It is capable of paralyzing the person and making him capable of completely rejecting any sexual behavior. It is closely linked to other sexual phobias such as phylophobia or erotophobia.
If you land on sexual intercourse, you will most likely suffer from anxiety disorder Which is characterized by an irrational and excessive fear of sex. Obviously, this alteration causes a significant impact on the sexual life of the person who suffers.
Likewise, the fear of sex can have a very negative impact on the quality of life of the subject and put in question their personal and sentimental relationships, sometimes being sometimes labeled as homophobic or xenophobic because they confuse the fear they suffer Gender or race.
The causes of this pathology may be very diverse, such as having experienced traumatic sexual experiences, having altered sexual functioning or having received a poor sex education.
Whatever the cause, the best news of coitophobia is that it can be treated and even surpassed if the appropriate interventions are performed.
Characteristics of coitophobia
Cotophobia, also known as genephobia, makes an anxiety disorder characterized by an irrational, excessive and disadaptive fear of sex or sexual intercourse.
This means that the person has a phobia of the sexual relationship itself, or any activity involving sexual behavior.
As we can see, it is a type of situational phobia comparable to others such as Phobia to drive wave Phobia to fly .
However, in this case can have much more impact on the day to day of the person, since it completely prevents any kind of sexual relationship. For this reason, it is very important to be able to correctly detect the presence of the phobia and perform the appropriate interventions to treat it properly.
In general terms it is maintained that avoidance of phobic stimulus is the main factor. In this way, rejection of sexual relations would be the main factor that holds the fear of sex.
How can I find out if I have co-opophobia?
Concerns about sex are a fairly common phenomenon that all people can present at some point.
Experience sensations of nervousness The anxiety While we have sexual relations or before maintaining them also happens with normality. However, these factors do not in themselves explain the presence of the disorder.
In fact, coitophobia is not a simple preoccupation with sexual intercourse or a slight fear of sex or certain sexual situations.
In order to determine if a particular type of fear of sex makes the presence of coitophobia or not, a number of assessments must be taken into account.
These are mainly:
- The type of fear
- Physical symptoms experienced when having sex
- The types of thoughts you have about sexual intercourse
- The resulting behavior of the individual.
Types of Fear of Sex
Fear of sex per se does not represent the presence of a psychological illness or, therefore, the presence of coitophobia.
So, as we have commented, fears or fears for not being good enough during the sexual practice, not meeting the expectations of the couple or not enjoying the sexual act usually appear with some frequency.
This type of fear is also the one that defines the coitophobia, but to be able to dictate its presence the fear must own a series of determined characteristics.
Thus, not all fears of sex are relevant to phobia. To be able to detect it must be:
1- Disproportionate
The fear experienced in coitophobia must be highly disproportionate to the demands of the situation.
This means that the person suffering from this type of alteration presents an exaggeratedly intense and elevated fear.
Sexual practice does not in itself represent a threatening situation, so experimenting with intense fears produces a highly disproportionate response.
This aspect of the fear of coitophobia allows us to differentiate it from slight fears or doubts that may appear normal before having a sexual relationship.
2- Irrational
Another important characteristic is that the fear experienced is totally irrational. This does not mean that fear seems strange and unreasonable on the part of others, but it is the subject who suffers it who interprets it as irrational.
Thus, the person with co-opophobia is fully capable of interpreting that there is no explanation for being so afraid of sex.
3- Uncontrollable
The person knows that his fear is irrational and that there is no reason to experience such terror in harmless situations as sexual intercourse.
However, this thought is not enough to control your fear of sex, so it appears completely automatically.
The individual can strive to try to manage their feelings of fear, but these are so intense that they take over completely when they appear.
4- It leads to avoidance of the dreaded situation.
Non-pathological fears to sex do not usually involve avoidance of sexual practice.
So, even if we get nervous before we maintain a relationship or look at the possibility of practicing sex, this fact does not prevent us from having sexual intercourse if we really want it.
However, this does not happen in coitophobia, where the fear experienced is so intense that it automatically leads to avoidance of the relationship.
The individual with fear will always try to avoid any sexual practices with the aim of avoiding the appearance of excessive anxiety and fear that appear when practicing or is about to practice sex.
5- Persistent
Fears are emotional responses that can appear and disappear throughout life. In this way, a person may experience fear of sex during a determined stage for different reasons.
However, the fear of sex belonging to coitophobia is persistent over time and does not correspond to a particular stage or stage.
This means that if left untreated, the person will experience fear of sex all his life.
6- Is maladaptive
Finally, the fear of coitophobia is clearly disadaptive to the person who suffers it.
This means that the fear of sex does not play any role and negatively affects the life of the person.
Physical symptoms of coitophobia
When the person with the disorder tries to perform a sexual act, they will immediately experience a series of anxiety symptoms.
These symptoms can take the form of a panic attack And capture all the attention of the individual.
Also, it must be taken into account that it is not always necessary to perform a sexual activity so that the person responds with his panic attack.
Discussions about sex or the very fact of imagining oneself having sex may be enough factors to uncover the anxiety response.
The physical symptoms experienced are characterized by an increase in the activity of the Central Nervous System .
Thus, typical symptoms of elevated anxiety such as increased heart rate, rapid pulse, rapid breathing or excessive sweating are presented.
Other symptoms such as dry mouth, stomach ache And head, or muscle tension may also appear.
Coithobic thoughts
The person with coitophobia makes up a series of thoughts about sex that motivate and encourage the onset of excessive fear.
These thoughts can take thousands of forms, but all of them are characterized by attributing negative elements both the sexual practice and the personal capacity to maintain relationships.
Thoughts such as"I will never be able to maintain a sexual relationship","sex is a disgusting activity"or"sexual intercourse is an excessively dangerous activity"may be some examples.
These thoughts are fed back with the physical symptoms described above and become much more intense when proceeding to maintain some kind of intimate relationship.
Resultant Behavior
The end result of the disease is that the individual will completely avoid any possibility of having a sexual relationship.
The fear and anxiety experienced are so high that the person chooses to avoid sexual intercourse completely, It is more usual to end up resorting to Asexuality .
In this way, the disorder ends up seriously affecting the person's behavior and may have negative consequences.
Causes
The most common is that a number of causes are developed and that the mixing of several causes causes the disorder. In some cases we can find clearly identifiable causes but in others these may be somewhat more difficult to determine.
Among the main causes of coitophobia are:
1- Traumatic experiences
It is postulated that direct conditioning is the mechanism that explains a greater number of specific phobias.
In this sense, a factor that can easily lead to coitophobia is the fact of having suffered traumatic experiences related to sex.
Background of Sexual assaults , Violations Or abuses can motivate a response of fear that ends up leading to coitophobia.
In general terms, it is argued that when the introduction to sexual behavior is violent or manipulative rather than pleasant and progressive, future attempts at intercourse may be compromised, owing to the fear of being unpleasant.
Sexual dysfunctions
In some cases, suffering from sexual disorders such as impotence wave Dyspareunia Can motivate the association of negative elements with sexual practice.
The association of the disease with the sexual relation can give rise to feelings and feelings of fear that can lead to coitofobia.
3- Fear of disease
People who are overly fearful of the likelihood of contracting illness may also develop the disorder.
Diseases such as hypochondria , Nosophobia or Misophobia Can make the fear of getting sick too high and can eventually move to sexually transmitted diseases and thus into sexual practice.
4- Bad sex education
Finally, having been subjected to very hard and dictatorial educational styles in which the child's sexual development is completely restricted, can also contribute to the development of co-opophobia.
Other types of vicarious experiences such as the visualization of sexual material on television or other media during childhood have also been postulated as a possible cause.
Treatment
Often it can be thought that the coitofobia is a minor mental alteration that does not affect in excess the person. However this is not so, since this pathology can have devastating consequences.
In fact, it is quite common for them to resort to asexuality or to develop a depression .
In this way, it is important to avoid reaching these limits and to start treatments as soon as the co-ophobia affects the life of the individual.
To treat it is highly advisable to perform psychotherapy , Through psychologists specialized in this type of disorders.
The technique that has been most effective in treating coitophobia is the Cognitive behavioral treatment .
In this type of therapies the subject is trained so that he is able to expose himself to his dreaded situation little by little.
Exposure to sexual situations will allow the individual to become accustomed to them and learn to control the feelings of anxiety that they experience at that time.
In addition, Relaxation techniques That allow to reduce the levels of anxiety of the person and to get that one approaches with more predisposition to the sexual practice.
Performing this treatment can be highly beneficial and can help the person overcome their phobia and can carry out their sex life normally.
References
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