WARNING: Mature themes are discussed here such as sex, r*pe, and psychological issues.
Naturally, for my 69th post, I wanted to write something a bit more in the realm of NSFW. However, this post isn’t going to talk about how much I like sex. At least… not until the end. In reality, this is a story of my journey into accepting myself, my sexuality, and my fetishes. It’s a tough one, and it took so long. But, in the end, it was worth it. I wanted to write something like this so that others who may have dealt with similar issues, or are right now, can see they are not alone.
My relationship with sex hasn’t been a good one. I’m not asexual, though I thought I was due to my fear of sex. Those who are asexual are entirely valid, and go through horrible people invalidating them as well. Not all are sex-repulsed, either, or even refrain from having sex. However, that sexuality wasn’t the case for me, for I did have attraction sexually to people & pleasured myself like many people do during my teenage years.
The thing is, though, I had intense, horrible guilt every single time I pleasured myself. I hated the idea of sex and loathed the fact that I felt these things. I wasn’t brought up in a household that was super religious or anti-sex. Far from it, actually. There were relations going on in other rooms I could hear. Which makes me wonder if something happened, but I’ll get into that in a moment.
Years and years of therapy were needed to finally get me okay with sex. We did rapid-thought therapy (I’m not sure the proper term) where I said immediately what came to my mind out loud. I had a ‘dream’ that I was raped that I think is an actual memory. I don’t remember his face, though, I just know I was really young and can’t really remember. To be honest, there’s a ton I can’t remember from my childhood. I see it in fragments. My memory is horrible and I feel guilty for even having these issues given I can’t remember my own trauma. But I know it’s there. I can’t really read on-page rape without needing a quick 5-minute mental break following it (though it’s not truly distressing given I can calm myself down easily after it) and an actual rape scene on television will unfortunately cause massive distress. I hate admitting this, because I like putting up the guise that ‘I’m tough as rocks, nothing bothers me’, but that’s simply not true.
Also, this doesn’t mean I can’t handle any of that or the themes. Far from it. I love reading stories where a trauma survivor gets revenge and butchers their rapist/abuser. I wrote a lot of that graphically in my early works, and it’s present in my current works, too. Thing is, if the evil person gets away in the story, I’m left feeling super horrible. Yes, it’s reality. I get that. Does it mean I want to read it, though? No, I want to see their blood splattered all over the wall and their flesh scattered everywhere (sorry, gore writer here, you’ll see me saying language like that a lot).
Anyway, one of my early fetishes was being raped. Yes, you heard me right, it’s horrible. I felt deep self-hatred for having such a fetish, because obviously I wouldn’t ever truly want that. But yes, I self-pleasured to the idea of that, though things began to shift from non-con to dub-con (dubious consent is not as bad but using body language as a sole indicator of things isn’t a good idea in real life in non-established relationships, in my personal opinion.) Keep in mind, I was doing this as a young teenager, and for years. I learned in therapy that this was because I wanted to replay the scene and take control, where I would actually be enjoying it. Makes sense. I’ve worked hard on drilling this stuff out of my head, successfully. My other fetishes are less problematic, though still masochistic in nature. I’ll talk about that (without detail) later, though.
As a little girl, I disgustingly looked down upon sex workers. Looking back… I’m so horrified at my attitude. I was like “Why would they do that?! That’s disgusting, vile…they are horrible people”. I hate how I thought that way. Again, I wasn’t brought up as religious, so I don’t even know where this came from other than the fact that I was terrified of anything to do with sex. Hell, I was offended anytime sex was even mentioned in a song. “DISGUSTING! DISGUSTING!” Ugh…
I also overvalued ‘virginity’ and was super proud of being a ‘virgin’. I saw myself as more ‘pure’ than everyone else. Why the hell would I think that way? Well, nowadays, I did a COMPLETE 180 on that, as seen in this article I wrote here about The Problem with “Virgins” & “Purity” in myth/stories.
My psychologist told me it was a bad idea to dwell on the past or go out of my way to try and figure it out. He told me that it’s best to look toward my future, so I did. It took me years of therapy, as I said, to get over this. I mean, when my first relationship had me bawling my eyes out at the mere touch to my breast, you know something’s wrong (again, given I’m not asexual and do have a sex drive). When I am mentally ripping myself to shreds every single time I masturbated… you know something’s wrong. But you know what? With the help of my doctor & my current lover (who I love so so much, he’s amazing and I’m almost in tears thinking of just how much I’m honored he helped me get through it) I was able to move on and accept myself.
The journey wasn’t easy, and I needed to step out of my comfort zone so much. Today, I am very sex positive and love writing graphic scenes in my books. Sex workers are a marvel, super strong, really wonderful people I wish the best for. They work hard and bringing pleasure to other people is an art. I’m not afraid to say that, and I aggressively shred any argument otherwise. I was cleaned of that toxicity toward other people…and toward myself.
This is a good transition to the other part of my sexuality. I am a submissive woman, which is unfortunate, given the world sees submissives as weak. Through my current lover, I learned that’s the opposite. Submissives draw the line in a BDSM relationship and define what will & will not occur. A good dominant will listen to them, talk with them, and respect them. If not, it’s abuse. The submissive runs the show, and they NEED to have the power in a relationship to say ‘stop’, or point out what makes them uncomfortable. Society’s view on the submissive is horrible, really. We are not weak. We are extremely strong. Besides… I’m a brat submissive. Which means I’m far more aggressive than most and sadistic just like my lover. The feeling of submitting in the end though… it’s a certain high that feels so great. Top that off with masochism, and you have a very fun combination.
Also, a proper dominant is not an abuser, and it’s tiresome to see society not accept that either. Submissives give permission to fulfill sexual fantasies (SAFELY, always need to educate and be safe!) like bruising, scarring, biting, what have you. This can admittedly make it hard to see an unwilling versus willing situation, but sometimes contracts come into play, and sometimes you really need to look at the nuance of the situation. BDSM relationships are the line of ‘unsure’ society sees, but a good one will mean that the submissive loves every second of the consented-to pain. That’s just it–consent. BDSM is all about it, otherwise it’s a toxic relationship. We need better representation in our books.
I’m not going to deep-dive into my specific fetishes in this article, though. I think I revealed enough, and I can merely assure that the echoes of my past have silenced, leading into fetishes far less frowned-upon (though still a bit violent 😉 ). I did want to touch upon my sexuality in here, because I recently discovered that I’m a bi woman, which I didn’t understand up until very recently.
First, I figured because I wasn’t attracted to breasts, I couldn’t be bisexual. Wrong. Next, I thought because I was in a relationship with a straight man, I couldn’t be bisexual. Wrong. Finally, I thought that because I was more attracted to men, I couldn’t be bisexual. Wrong. Here’s the deal.
I’ve been in a total of two relationships my entire life, the only one that’s ever been sexual with my current lover. My past friendships with women have not yielded good results. Much of the time, they were manipulative and terrible toward me. That, paired with my fear of sex & the stigma against bisexual folks led me to entirely shut down the prospect. My psychologist actually suggested I was bi at one point, and I reacted with.. fear? Why? To this day, I still don’t understand why I was so afraid of that very correct idea.
Well. I kept seeing women, more and more over the years, that I thought looked attractive. But could I imagine them taking me to bed? Well… yes. But I felt guilty, given my relationship. Not that I would do that, more like: “Yeah, if I wasn’t in a relationship, I would definitely try it and probably enjoy it.” I started to get confused. “I’m a straight woman. Why do I find other women attractive? Surely it’s because I want to look like them…” Well, I kept seeing women in suits, women with beautiful tone muscle, gothic women with sharp nails that would look really pretty around my throat… ahem anyway, you get the point.
The problem is… I’m so damn picky. But that’s the case with men too, isn’t it? Gothic/punkish men aren’t that common, after all, and that’s my taste (I mean.. look at my OCs.) Turns out, I’m even more picky with women. So while I’m about 65% attracted to masculine-presenting goths/punks, there’s 35% there which also applies to women (my bi-awakening was Maria Brink). When I finally accepted that yes, even though I am in a relationship with a man, I’m bisexual, I started allowing myself to actually enjoy dirtier thoughts beyond just with a guy.
I was very worried what my lover would think, actually. Would he be mad at me? Nope. I love him with all my heart. He knew I was bisexual a few months into our relationship, years before I did! He wanted me to discover it on my own. He loves me for who I am, and is happy to be here for me. I am a monogamous woman, however, so I doubt I’ll be interested in talking about exploring. However, it is very freeing to just…accept who I am.
So, there you have it. That’s my relationship with sex. I admire sex workers, though I myself couldn’t do it, and I no longer harbor self-hatred for who I am nor what I enjoy. I love writing graphic scenes where they fit, and am dipping into erotica (of my specific taste, of course).
That said, if you are interested in a paranormal erotica (vampire) novella, you can check it out here. I’m also working on an erotica anthology to put out soon.
Hopefully this article was enlightening to some. You might feel guilty whether due to religious upbringing or…something else you can’t identify. Any and all of it is valid. It might take years to work through, like it did for me. But it’s so freeing to work hard on getting through it and succeeding.
Des M. Astor 