ABSTRACT
Woman's last traumatic experience as a sexual being, the menopause, is under the aegis of an incurable narcissistic wound. At the menopause everything that was granted the feminine being at puberty is taken back. Simultaneously with the processes of genital retrogression the beautifying activity of internal glandular secretions ceases, and the secondary sexual characteristics come under the aegis of the loss of femininity. The factors that govern the choice of neurosis in individual cases must be held responsible for the course taken by the menopause. Two ways lie open to woman to protect her against the disconsolateness of old age: the continuation of psychical motherhood in relation to the outside world or the now biologically revived bisexual constitution that frequently also emerges in the physical appearance of the ageing woman; by means of this, male-oriented relations to life can be maintained after the final disappearance of femininity.
