The Overstimulation of Everyday Life: I. New Aspects of Male Homosexuality

Abstract

Western heterosexual culture surrounds the homosexually inclined boy in a climate of erotic overstimulation that powerfully affects his development and adult sexual adaptation. This assertion is illustrated through a case presentation of a homosexual man who shared a bed with his brother from childhood into adolescence. Analysis of the patient's transference enactment--repeatedly falling asleep on the couch--gradually revealed the psychic impact of this everyday overstimulation: the creation of a tantalized inner world of longing. The regular occurrence and developmental understanding of adolescent homosexual boys' unrequited love affairs with adolescent heterosexual boys are described and explored. Finally, the overstimulation of everyday life is proposed as a new model for understanding certain behavioral aspects of male homosexuality, such as the avoidance of rough-and-tumble play in childhood and homosexual cruising.

Complications in Gay Men's Intimacy

“…Therefore, adolescence offers boys who grow up to be gay the developmentally brief opening for a reworking of earlier relationships, with the opportunity for a healing outcome. Phillips, for example, writes about the ubiquitous narrative, among gay men he has treated, about having fallen in love during adolescence with a straight peer (Phillips, 2001). In virtually every story about these unrequited love affairs, he writes, the adult gay man described an intensely close bond between the closeted protogay boy and his straight peer, with the bond (typically unconsummated) ending when the straight boy falls in love with a girl and pulls away.…”

Homosexuality: Coming out of the confusion

“…He calls this third form the plicate or 'folded' Oedipus complex 'because in it a single gure, the father, plays two diametrically opposed and simultaneous roles-the exciter and the prohibitor of erotic arousal' (p. 347). I have termed this special feature commonly observed in male homosexual development 'the overstimulation of everyday life' (Phillips, 2001), by which term I refer to the frequent experiences of homosexually inclined children and adolescents who are placed again and again in the company of same-gender parents, siblings and peers in various degrees of undress or nakedness and the subjective states generated by those experiences. Might it be that the 'phallic tie' to the mother is not a general occurrence?…”

“…This version of homosexual adolescent longing, then, is a re ection of or failure to accept oedipal disappointment (for a more detailed elaboration of this point of view, see Phillips, 2001). In heterosexual oedipal disappointment and anxiety, the father declares this particular woman taboo, while wittingly or unwittingly approving the boy's generic desire for a woman.…”

“…I have reported elsewhere (Phillips, 2001) on the analysis of a 32-year-old gay man who presented for treatment for dif culty in initiating and sustaining romantic, sexual relationships with other men. Diagnostically, Mr Davis had an obsessional character disorder with depressive-masochistic traits.…”

“…Lewes's (1998) clinical observation that the father is the source of both erotic excitement and prohibition in some homosexual men is consistent with a clinical discovery of mine concerning the childhood and adolescent development of some gay men. I have termed this special feature commonly observed in male homosexual development 'the overstimulation of everyday life' (Phillips, 2001), by which term I refer to the frequent experiences of homosexually inclined children and adolescents who are placed again and again in the company of same-gender parents, siblings and peers in various degrees of undress or nakedness and the subjective states generated by those experiences. The homosexually inclined child or adolescent may be repeatedly overstimulated by gender pairings that paradoxically were meant to protect against just such a risk.…”