This paper reports on ten cases in which treatment began with conventional sex therapy and was later modified by incorporating techniques of psychodynamic couple therapy. While the modifications initially led to symptom reversal, the reversal of symptoms activated a recycling sequence of relapses and renewed symptom reversals, ultimately terminating in treatment failure. While the ten couples were heterogeneous in many respects, they did form a distinct clinical group. In common, they demonstrated a set of characteristics laced with hate, love and dependency, which interacted to create what the authors have called “therapeutic gridlock” and “interminable” sex