SEX and anger may become fused in middle-class homes also. The best neighborhoods and the nicest schools have youngsters who use sex as an expression of hostility. The harm is produced not by overstimulation but by specific patterns of parenting.
TIMOTHY
Timothy's mother had always been neat and compliant.
She was a high achiever throughout high school and business
college.
She dressed well and attracted many suitors.
She spent hours each night combing and styling her long
blond hair.
Yet she seldom saw a date more than once and
was described by friends as aloof. She never masturbated nor
allowed heavy petting, until at age twenty-five she made love
with a man she had met at a party that evening. Sex was distinctly
unpleasant.
Yet such unplanned episodes continued
to occur sporadically in the years that followed, always with
a different partner.
When she discovered at age thirty-two
that she was pregnant she didn't consider an abortion. As the
months went by she found herself anticipating the birth with
pleasure.
She decorated the infant's room with taste and all
the latest baby-tending appliances. Her competence as a secretary
extended to her competence in pregnancy and delivery.
She arrived for her prenatal checks on the appointed
hour of the appointed day, and delivered easily after only
four hours of labor.
Although she considered nursing Timothy,
this seemed messy and would be inconvenient when she
returned to work.
Drawing on her savings, she hired a baby
nurse for the hours that she was away. She secured the services
of the most respected and expensive pediatrician in
town.
Timothy was a tractable, engaging infant, entirely devoid
of diaper rashes and of odors other than those of the vaguely
scented commercial baby products. He was rocked, bathed,
titillated, and exhibited in the park.
As Timothy grew, he remained the center of his mother's
attention. He learned his alphabet by age four and could
recite even lengthy poems from Alice in Wonderland.
Ensconced in his mother's lap, he was read every Dr. Seuss
book in print. Timothy rarely left his mother's side when she
was home. Indeed his mother worried that some harm might
befall him if he strayed.
In the fourth grade he was mercilessly
teased by classmates when he walked to school holding
his mother's hand. His mother continued to bathe him
until he was ten.
During his early years, Timothy was exceedingly happy.
His only disappointments were in not being allowed to
explore an abandoned freight car or not having permission to
join a tree-house club of neighborhood children.
Whenever
Timothy seemed upset, mother consoled him by a trip to the
zoo or a museum tour. After he was ridiculed at public school,
mother placed him in a small private academy where he
became a favorite of many teachers.