What is erectile dysfunction? All symptoms have a double identity: they are an incoherent utterance in which something unsayable finds a bodily form, and simultaneously the subject’s attempted 'cure' to a structural difficulty. Somatic sexual symptoms make this particularly clear. Erectile dysfunction, for example, may bear witness to an unarticulated fear of being overwhelmed by the Other’s desire, yet it also protects the subject from precisely the encounter that would provoke that anxiety. Viewed in this light, therapeutic attempts to cure the symptom miss its defensive function and are therefore likely to fail. What is required is not the removal of the symptom but the possibility of bringing its logic into speech, so that the subject can assume a different position in relation to their desire and the desire of the Other.