Psychosex.

April 16, 2000

By LISA JENNIFER SELZMAN

THE IMPOSSIBILITY OF SEX Stories of the Intimate Relationship Between Therapist and Patient. By Susie Orbach. Scribner, $24.

ver wonder what your therapist is really thinking? In ''The Impossibility of Sex,'' the London psychotherapist Susie Orbach describes the impressions that go through her mind during treatment sessions; she gives a human face to the stereotyped portrait of the distant, passive analyst by showing that, on the contrary, she is deeply affected by her patients. She details the therapeutic process through seven composite patients drawn from her 20 years of practice, among them a seductive male chef, a self-mutilating businesswoman and a lesbian couple. She dissects these clinical ''stories'' to let the reader in on her thoughts at significant points along the way, admitting with impressive candor to feelings of sexual attraction, arrogance, favoritism and even failure. Orbach believes that patterns of interaction between therapist and client often recapitulate aspects of the client's early painful experiences and are thus the key to healing. Her physical and emotional responses to those who come to her for help supply information that propels the clinical process forward. Orbach, the author of ''Fat Is a Feminist Issue,'' has a knack for making psychological material accessible and engrossing. The fact that the patients and their circumstances are fictionalized -- albeit for reasons of confidentiality -- dilutes somewhat the power of these ''case studies,'' and the titillating and misleading title cheapens Orbach's intent. The prevailing theme of this artful book is not the impossibility of sex, but rather the possibility of transcending violation and loneliness.