Hysterical Paroxia

I observed in an earlier post that when a woman masturbates its considered a moment of self discovery, and when a man masturbates its an act of loneliness and desperation. I've always wondered why this is and finally this evening I find out.

Apparently as early as the first century AD Doctors had been masturbating women to orgasm to treat them for what we would call sexual frustration, but was then referred to as "hysteria, pelvic hyperemia, or congestion of the genitalia". Symptoms of the disorder seem to have been vague. One web page lists mental or emotional distress, lassitude, irritability, depression, confusion, palpitations of the heart, headaches, forgetfulness, insomnia, muscle spasms, stomach upsets, writing cramps, ticklishness and weepiness. My guess is that today we would call that PMS.

From the original article,

"I'm sure the women felt much better afterwards, slept better, smiled more," said Dr. Maines. Besides, she added, hysteria, as it was traditionally defined, was an incurable, chronic disease. "The patient had to go to the doctor regularly," Dr. Maines said. "She didn't die. She was a cash cow."

The first vibrator was invented in the late 19th century as a tool for doctors who had till then been performing the procedure by hand.

Not exactly an explanation, but it does shed more light on the cultural context. I looked for information on male masturbation but didn't find nearly the quality of content as on female masturbation. If you're interested here's a link. I only started reading, but it looks like good material.