Klismaphilia - Amplification Of The Erothic Enema Deviance
Klismaphilia - Amplification Of The Erothic Enema Deviance
JOANNE D. DENKO, M.D.. | Cleveland, Ohio
ABSTRACT
Use of enemas for sexual stimulation has been observed and named klismaphilia. Some klismaphiliacs indulge their taste for enemas in otherwise normal sexual settings. Others combine it with fetishes, excretory and otherwise, or with masturbation. Still others practice klismaphilia in homosexual or sadomasochistic settings or in group sex.
Among the myriad of extragenital modes whereby persons derive sexual gratification is the enema, either taking or giving or both. A psychiatric patient espousing this preference led me to investigate the condition, to report two case histories, and to name it klismaphilia (1). Two aspects of that report were puzzling--the dissimilarities of the two persons described and the inconclusiveness regarding pathogenesis.
Library searches and perusal of the old classic works on deviant sex by Krafft-Ebing and Havelock Ellis unearthed no comparable case. A detailed history of the enema since antiquity (3) failed to mention explicitly erotic functions of the enema, although such bizarre details were included as their use during court audiences of Louis XIV and even poisoning via the enema route. A short popularization of the Lieberman study in the medicine section of Time (3) referred to Moliere's lampooning the enema health craze of his day.
Searches of the psychiatric literature have unearthed several reports (4-6) of severe sexual psychopathology following traumatic experiences with enemas in childhood. In none of the ten cases reported, however, did klismaphilia characterize the adult problem. One of Bettelheim's (7) children showed her acute regression to autism following a period of traumatic enemas and forced feeding. In therapy, she gave her doll enemas. Freud (😎 published the case history of a severely neurotic man for whom "the world was hidden in a veil.... This veil was torn only at one moment--when, after an enema, the contents of the bowel left the intestinal canal; and he then felt well and normal again." Freud's interpretation was that in receiving the enema the patient identified with his mother, while the man administering the enema represented his father. The enema repeated the act of copulation, and the momentarily well patient emerged from the experience as a newborn "excrement infant." A specific sexual response in the patient was not described.
Kinsey's study on the female (9) mentions the enema as a masturbatory device, but the study on the male does not mention it at all. Medical Aspects of Human Sexuality (10-12) has recently dealt with three questions on the enema. Recent fiction (13) has contained references to the practice. Popular and underground publications have included questions and discussion concerning "enema freaks." How-to books and pornographic enema pictures are sold--at a high price. Commenting on my article, Dietz (14) detailed a number of variations on the klismaphilia theme that he had discovered on a search through "adult book" sources. He drew attention to sociologic interest in the public's reaction to a new form of sexuality. Several paperback books contain case reports. I am told that a recent movie, "The Devil and Miss Jones," has a bathtub enema scene. An "enema bandit" has been apprehended who gives his victims enemas.
My feeling that klismaphilia is probably endemic was confirmed when several letters arrived from other klismaphiliacs who resemname="1">1. Denko, J. Klismaphilia: Enema as a Scxual Preference. Am. J. Psychther., 27: 232, 1973.
2. Lieberman, W. The Enema: Some Historical Notes. Rev. Gastroenterol., 13: 215, 1946.
3. The Clyster Craze. Time, July 1, 1946, p. 48.
4. Siegel, B. L. The Role of the Mouth in the Search for the Female Phallus. J Am. Psychoanal. Ass., 19:310, 1971.
5. Spiegel, N. T. An Infantile Fetish and Its Persistence into Young Womanhood: Maturational Stages of a Fetish. Psychoanal. Study Child, 22:402, 1967.
6. Freytag F. F. Hypnotherapeutic Exploration of Early Enema Experience. J. Ciin. Hypn., 14:24, 1971.
7. Bettelheim, B. The Empty Fortress: Infantile Autism and the Birth of the Self. Free Press, New York;, 1967, pp. 160-161, 205, 221-224.
8. Freud, S. From the History of an Infantile Neurosis (191😎. In Collected Papers of Sigmund Freud, Vol. 3. Basic Books, New York, 1959, pp. 471-605 (55; and 581).
9. Kinsey, A. C. et al. Sexual Behavior in the Human Female. W. B. Saunders, Philadelphia, Pa., 1953, p. 163.
10. Bieber, I. Answers to Questions: Enemas and Sex. Med. Aspects Human Sexual, 4:89, 1970.
11. Feigen, G. M. Answers to Questions: Erotic Potential of Enemas. Med. Aspects Human Sexual., 6: 199, 1972.
12. Shapiro, H. A. Answers to Questions: Enemas as Sexual Stimulants. Med. Aspects Human Sexual., 8: 159, 1974.
13. Metalious, G. Peyton Place, Dell, New York, 1957.
14. Dietz, P. E. Letter to the Editor. i.am. J. Psychother. 28:322, 1974
15. Marwick, M. Is Science a Form of Witchcraft? New Scientist, 63:578, Sep 5, 1974.
16. Robertiello, R C. A More Positive View of Perversions. Psychoanal. Rev., 58:467, 1971.