Tags
autism, clients, consent, disability, personal stories, Sex Work, virgin
A woman had called me during the week. Her son had autism, was about to turn 30 and was a virgin. She wanted to make a booking for him to see me on Saturday as it was his birthday, and to loose his virginity is what he wanted for a present.
Oh God, the pressure. As i got ready for this booking i was becoming increasingly nervous. This poor guy was a virgin, and I’m being entrusted with giving him his first sexual experience… and a birthday present no less!!?? Welcoming him into his ‘dirty thirties’. He had probably spent the last 15 years imagining how this might go. i had a lot to live up to. Intense.
And his mum had organised it! She planned to bring him over in a taxi, what was she going to do for the 45 mins while him and i were in the bedroom? i hope she didn’t want to wait in the lounge for him! How embarrassing.
He arrived with his mum, all three of us extremely nervous, although i just went into automatic pilot. Fake it till you make it! I’m being payed to put their nerves at ease, so i cant be acting like its my first time too! The mum smiled and giggled nervously as she assured me she didn’t want to wait inside and would be fine going for a walk and will see us in 45 mins. I led Daniel into the room, explaining to get undressed, lay on his tummy on the bed, and i will return to give him a massage.
After the massage i turned him over, he laid very still, smiling widely as i touched him and spoke softly to him, checking out that he was still enjoying it. His erection went up and down, and i had to take his hand and show him that he was allowed to touch me. He had never touched boobs before… let alone anything else. The booking was difficult, and he could not keep an erection long enough to achieve an orgasm. He liked it when i took his hand and showed him how to touch me, he liked it when i gave him a lil show with my toys, but he didn’t like oral sex and the other penetrative sex wasnt going to work very well. We were both nervous, but I kept checking with him softly asking him which bits he likes and which bits he didn’t. In the end I tried giving him a hand job, but that didn’t work either. Time ran out and we both knew it wasn’t going to happen this time.
I felt a little disappointed as i said goodbye to him and his mum at the door. I couldn’t make him cum but he was grinning ear to ear! i spent a few minutes imagining what he was telling his mum about the booking…. Then I jumped in the shower, took my money and went out dancing on a Saturday night.
*later edit to address concerns about consent* I take consent very seriously and take various actions throughout the booking to check the consent of my client with everything i do. This is something i attend regular and ongoing training on. Daniel and his mother were referred to me from their sexuality counsellor after looking at options for Daniel to have sexual interactions, as was his ongoing and stated wish. This was his 30th birthday present, had been planned and discussed and requested by Daniel for months.
That poor man. What you did was agree to sexually abuse an autistic person whose mother forced this “sex”on him.
He laid still, like women and children do when they are being forced into unwanted sex.
He kept losing his erection, and you didn’t take that as a sign to stop.
He gave no signs that he was okay with you touching him sexually, gave plenty of signs he wasn’t all right with it that you continueed to ignore when you started to give him a handjob, and he reacted with obvious relief when you stopped forcing yourself on him and relented to touching and playing with yourself.
That poor, poor man.
Hi Lia,
I am trained at providing ethical and professional sexual services to people with disabilities which includes checking informed consent. I take it seriously. I dont presume someone wants to have sex or have sex with me, or that they even like girls. I check it all out. It is not unusual for me to decide to just provide a sensual massage rather than anything sexual if the person is inexperienced. i have a lot of experience with people with disabilities both in sex work, in other jobs i have had and in my personal life. Autism does not mean you cannot consent. As i stated i checked before hand and (continuously) throughout the booking that what i was doing is what he wanted. He was definitely consenting, i can assure you. I would not hesitate to have stopped the booking if there were any issues or doubts about that on his or my part. As i stated, he had no issues telling me which parts of the service he enjoyed and which parts he didnt, and i listened. My god, you must think i am a monster.
Also loss of erection, or the gaining of an erection is not a sign of consent or lack off. Erections are physical and not in necessarily in the control of the person. There are men and boys who have been raped who HAD an erection, that does not mean they consented. I have fully able men who have problems getting or maintaining an erection for many reasons that include medication, nerves, or other physical issues. That doesn’t mean that they are not consenting to a sexual service. Or are you suggesting that someone with Autism cannot meaningfully consent to sex?
Speaking from my own experience, other possibilities for lying stiil are:
1) As at a massage parlor, I just like to relax, soak it in, enjoy silently and not feel compelled to orchestrate the process, but just let the masseuse goes through her routine.
2) As I was 20 years ago, I was much too shy and inexperienced to initiate sexual contact; I lied flat and unresponsive the one time a girl did take the initiative; and would probably have embarrassedly refused if somebody had offered to hire a sex worker for me (I was, of course, far too shy to engage one myself). But I would have been ecstatic had somebody persisted and hired a sex worker for me anyways. And I still have very affectionate memories of that girl for trying (although an experienced sex worker would probably have had more success). The sex was deeply wanted, even though I was unable to act on and give consent to my desires.
If his mother had to hire you I assume he was not capable of hiring you himself. I do believe someone incapable of booking a prostitute is incapable of giving meaningful consent to what someone else arranged due to the obvious severity of his disability.
If you had had sex with the mother I wouldn’t have an issue, but this autistic man was not capable of hiring a prostitute and therefore reasonably not capable of giving meaningful consent.
I don’t think you’re a monster. I feel sorry for you and believe that woman’s irresponsible actions as a caretaker are criminal.
“all three of us extremely nervous, although i just went into automatic pilot. Fake it till you make it!”
Those aren’t the words of a trained professional carefully regarding each step along the way, they are the words of someone disassociating herself emotionally from an uncomfortable situation and letting habit lead when conscious awareness becomes too difficult.
First of all, the preferred term is sex worker not prostitute, please when commenting in future i’d prefer you use sex work.
Second of all I disagree with you about people with disabilities not being able to give informed consent. However i do agree that there are extra considerations regarding issues of consent when working with someone from a more vulnerable background than me. Especially with someone who had a profound disability. And that is part of the training i do annually. I agree a carer or family member giving consent is not the same as the person themselves giving consent, and do always take care to ensure that i check consent and enjoyment with my clients. But even so, i never spoke about the extent of Daniel’s disability, but i have mentioned many times that i checked out his consent and enjoyment regularly.
If you are interested in knowing more about people with disabilities and their access to sex workers i point you to touching base for more info.
Last of all, many people get nervous, doesnt mean they are not trained professionals and are still able to do a competent and professional job. I know of surgeons who feel incredibly nervous before every single operation. What about actors, what about just about any person.
Lia, please feel free to continue to comment and challenge me, but please do not associate YOUR meaning to MY experiences. I am perfectly aware of who i am, and how i feel at any given moment. If you dont agree with me, please say so, but if you dont believe me, please move along to the next blog. Thanks.
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Thanks for sharing BecauseImAWhore. Are there many people effected with physical or mental conditions that request your services? I always wonder about some of those sweet old guys you see in a small community – how much lovin of a sexual type they’ve had in their life… Everyone needs some release & physical comfort
You may be trained in how to work with ppl with physical/mental disadvantages but not everyone is – do you think there are many ppl in Oz’s communities who are/may be taken advantage of by sex workers who aren’t trained as you are – one would hope their community/family would look after them as much as possible but…?
Hi emz,
Yes I see a lot of people with a disability but that is because I HAVE done the training and so I get reccomended (along with the handful of other workers who are on the trained list).
Older guys and those in nursing homes etc tend to use the services of older sex workers. I know a woman in her 60′s who specialises n seeing pensoners.
Mostly people organise their own services and are able to verbalise their own desires and consent is fairly straight forward. There are times when it is less straight forward. But that is not the norm.
To be honest the bigger problem is making sure the client is going to get a decent service. I have heard so many times about people with diasabilities being ripped off because an agency sent them a young worker who was not comfortable seeing someone with a disability and so the worker spends the hour chatting and not providing any sexual/sensual service.
As much as I would like to tell you that noone has never been taken advantage of by a sex worker, obviously that would be silly. All I can say is that I do not believe and have no reason to suspect that sex workers raping clients with disabilities is a common occurance, in Australia or anywhere else.
I might be trained, and that training is useful, but as mentioned many times throughout this blog, sex workers are kinda pretty good at negotiating every single thing they do. Its part of the gig when you take payment from someone, you want to be sure you’re both on the same page so that noone gets upset for any reason.
go check out http://www.touchingbase.org
Well thanks for sharing – was something i hadnt really thought about much before… Glad to see there are trained & caring proffessionals out there looking out for all the ppl in our community
Wow, thank you for sharing your stories …. I’m impressed by your level cool headed response to Lia. When I read it I was a little angry on your behalf, lol. The judgements are completely typical of some people. A little enlightenment won’t go astray.
Thank you for providing that service to people who also have a right to be sexually satisfied if that is their wish (as it clearly was from your post). Nowhere did you say that Daniel was incapable of making the booking. Maybe his mother was helping him out because he was nervous, or just because she’s his mum. I do that for my best friend … he is a 57yo highly intelligent dentist, but likes me to book his flights … I assure you he is completely capable of doing it himself !!!
Keep up the good work
Great story. I’m glad you were there for him and his mother was open-minded enough to listen to what he wanted.
Would love to know how he processed the experience later but I guess that ain’t gonna happen
Love ya work!! I am a woman with physical disability, I am also non verbal, so people automatically assume my ‘deformed’ body and muteness means ‘no one’s home upstairs..’ I am however an advocate of peoples sexual rights, and for the past 2 years have been researching societal attitudes and barriers to sexual freedom for people with disability. I am currently at uni studying Psychology and business, purely for the credibility to speak to this ‘sensitive’ issue.
).
I have been sexually active and proudly express my love of sex and intimacy, I am also a single mum, the other night I was discussing the debate around consent with an ex lover (my sons father, actually) and I asked him if he ever saw this as an issue, I thought his response was profoundly simple, and we tend to over analyse this a lot for the ‘percieved’ vulnerable in society. but he said, well body language speaks for its self, if someone is uncomfortable or doesn’t like something, the body will speak this.
sex workers are professionals, and are not about to risk their reputation by forcing sexual encounters onto someone who does not want it. And in my experience, someone with autism will let you know loud n clear through their body language and reflexes that they want out of here….
I applaud this mother, i applaud you, and i hail all professional sex workers who treat everyone as equal (unless you’re of course being paid not to
In response to Lia – do you recall your first time – how nerv wracking, with tingling excitement, and did YOU orgasm the first time – i mean really mind blowingly orgasm? its very rare for anyone to ever orgasm on their first encounter into exploring ones sexuality, unless really ready. the fact he responded by even getting hard at times, engaging in touch, and leaving with a huge beaming grin tells me he’s probably had a personal sense of achievement fulfilled.
to me it seems as a JOB WELL DONE!!!