Antidepressants Blog

As they are making love, he says to her, in exactly these words:

“Yes, I am a prince and I’m making love to you.” And she says:

“Yes, I am a princess and I’m making love to you.” And he says:

“I must be great if I’m making love to a princess.” And she says:

“I must be great if I’m making love to a prince.”

They should repeat these and similar phrases during the course of the lovemaking. It will serve to emphasize their narcissistic feelings about one another while pointing to the lack of more genuine feelings. Naturally, this part of the game is rather less fun and more confrontational. Couples may well want to resist saying these things, viewing them as spoiling the fun or interfering with the flow of the story. But it is important to work through any resistance and express themselves. They can do so by discussing feelings of resistance as they come up. After the lovemaking they should talk about what other thoughts or feelings or memories they had while playing the game—and particularly while saying their designated lines as they were making love. A number of surprising feelings and memories will emerge that had formerly lain in the unconscious.

The game can also be reversed, with the husband playing Cinderfella, and the wife playing a princess looking for her mate.

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“Where are you taking me?”

“Where I should have taken you long ago!”

“Put me down [let go of my arm] this instant!”

“No.”

“I said put me down.” “No!”

If the husband and wife are playing this game together (cooperatively), they may make up their own lines at this point. If the husband is the activist, he should proceed with caution: If his wife is smiling with surprise or delight at this sudden and somewhat fanciful act of assertion, he should continue. If, however, she is adamant about not wanting to be swept away, he should not press on. Instead, he should try, in as authoritative a manner as possible, to persuade her to go with him. “Why don’t you just do as I say and see what happens? You might just be pleasurably surprised. Come with me. Is our life so great that we couldn’t use a little mystery, a little surprise? Just this once let me take command. I promise you I won’t do anything to hurt you, and you may just find yourself enjoying it.” If all else fails, he should abandon the attempt to be the sole activist, reveal the game to her, and encourage their mutual participation in it from this point on.

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This game should result, for the first time, in honest communication about what is going on between them. It should also lead to a revival of sexual interest and passion.

Variation: A variation of “Psycho Surprise” has the “psycho” spouse slide into bed some night wearing a monster face or witch mask—and nothing else. The “psycho” laughs maniacally and grabs and kisses the spouse (with the mask still in place). When the passive asks, “What are you doing?” the psycho spouse does not reply, but simply continues embracing and kissing the passive (thus giving the passive a dose of his or her own medicine). Again, this may provoke an angry response, discussion, or wild love-making.

Caution: “Psycho Surprise” should not be played by older couples, or by anyone with a history of heart trouble, strokes, or the like. And it should only be used in connection with ongoing couples therapy, under the supervision of a psychotherapist. In some cases, for caution’s sake, the “psycho” spouse may warn the passive spouse that a shower surprise might be in the offing at some point in the future—just to play it safe.

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The wife also removes an article of clothing and says, “Yes, this is really boring, but I’ll go along with it.”

They proceed to remove all their clothing, repeating the same or similar phrases. Then the husband reaches over and caresses the wife’s breasts. “How does that feel?” he asks.

“It doesn’t matter,” she replies. She may even yawn.

“Do you want me to continue?” he asks.

“I don’t care.”

“Do you want me to stop?”

“I don’t care.”

As he continues, she fondles his genitals. “How does that feel?”

“It doesn’t matter.”

“Do you want me to continue?”

“I don’t care.”

“Do you want me to stop?”

“I don’t care.”

They continue the foreplay, trying new things. As they give vent to their feelings of boredom while engaging in this kind of sex play, they will begin to feel less and less bored. Then, in the second phase of the game, as their passion begins to rekindle, they should follow each statement of boredom with the very next thought that enters their mind.

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How important is human physical contact? It is so important that at critical periods people will die without it. Rene Spitz conducted a study of ninety-one infants in a foundling home who had been separated from their mothers. These infants were fed by a succession of nurses and given only perfunctory physical contact. Thirty-four of them died by the second year, while others went on to develop numerous symptoms. All of the infants showed manifestations of severe separation anxiety; then angry crying and clinging (trying to control or destroy the frustrating environment); then anaclitic depression (aggression turned against the self); then motor retardation; then marasmus (withdrawal into apathy); and finally—all too often—death. Others have replicated this study.

Similar drastic responses to the frustration of Eros can be observed in adults, as when a husband or wife suddenly dies and the spouse dies a short time later, without there having been any normal precipitating illness; or as when a scorned lover goes on a destructive spree of gambling, drug abuse, or promiscuous sex or kills his mate or himself.

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