I’m a 33-year-old gay man emailing you because I have a kink that I enjoy but have always felt ashamed about. My kink is called “wet and messy” (WAM) and it involves getting covered head to toe in messy, gloopy substances.
People who are into this usually have preferred substances. In no specific order, my preferred substances are paint, mud and pies. People enjoy WAM for a variety of reasons; some people like the humiliation aspect, but I just love the feeling of losing myself in the mess. It’s very primal and very freeing. I’ve done this with a couple of men I met through a website that caters to people who are interested in this, and I’ve even told my long-term boyfriend about it. He took it well and even offered to do it with me, but I shot him down.
The problem is I feel ashamed about this on some level. I know it’s harmless, if a little weird, but I can’t shake the feeling of shame that keeps me from enjoying this part of my sexuality. I feel like I’ll be branded a freak forever if my boyfriend sees how much I enjoy this. This feels like as much of a struggle as coming out of the closet was. Any sage words?
— Getting Off On Pies
I’ve talked with a lot of kinky gay men over the years, and more than one has described kink as a second coming out. That said, gay people who wanna come out to lovers and friends about kink have an advantage over straight people who wanna do the same: experience and perspective. Telling lovers you’re kinky is a lot less scary than telling parents you’re gay; lovers that shame can be replaced, parents who shame are forever. But just as coming out as gay has the power to improve lives and relationships, coming out as kinky has the power to improve love lives and romantic relationships.
Don’t deny yourself the pleasure of exploring your kink with someone who cares about you. It doesn’t sound like he offered to indulge you because he doesn’t want you doing this with other guys but that he offered because he’s sincerely invested in your pleasure. And if your boyfriend is one of those guys who gets off on getting people off, letting him get you off will get him off, too. Sometimes kinks are contagious, GOOP, even the weirder ones.
Your kink isn’t really that weird. While WAM, aka “gunging” and “sploshing,” isn’t my thing, it’s not that hard to wrap my head around it. You find the sensation of paint, mud and pies running down your skin arousing. Additionally, you like being covered in gooey substances because it relieves you — temporarily — from the burden of being yourself. Like a drone covered head-to-toe in rubber or a furry in a mascot costume or women in Lycra a superhero, you enjoy erasing and/or transforming yourself. In that, you are far from alone.
If getting covered in slime gives you joy and doesn’t hurt anyone, take your boyfriend’s yes for an answer. If you could learn to let go of the shame of being a cocksucker, you can let go of the shame of being a wet-and-messy player. Get some tarp, bake some pies and invite the boyfriend over to play.
I recently discovered that my on-again/off-again boyfriend of ten years has been using online classifieds to schedule encounters with men. He creates posts when he’s out of town for work, and he’s very specific about what he’s looking for. The acts are punitive in nature (but consensual) and he is always on the receiving end of these punitive activities.
I wish to note that I am not someone who snoops. I am the sort of person who notices patterns of behavior and things suddenly come to me when I’m cooking or on a walk. Based on the secular community my boyfriend grew up in, I suspect that his anonymous activities are the result of some early childhood trauma. Based on the activities involved, I believe he was either abused or witnessed abuse while his brain was still developing and these activities — along with his chronic use of pot (on top painkillers and a couple of drinks each day) — are an unhealthy coping mechanism. I don’t judge him for the acts themselves, nor do I judge him for his sexuality. But I am not okay with his lying and cheating, and I very much resent his haphazard attitude toward my sexual health.
He refuses to talk with me about this, and the silence is further eroding my trust, to say nothing of the plans we made for our future together. Since he won’t discuss it, I have no way of knowing if he’s sought help, as he has in the past with other issues. I’ve spoken with one trusted friend about this, but I have otherwise kept it to myself. I love him and that will never change. But now what?
— Boyfriend Troubling Secrets
Here’s what you know: something about punitive (“inflicting, involving, or aiming at punishment”) theatrics makes your boyfriend’s dick hard, and he’s been seeking out other men who share his kink for consensual encounters. And here’s what you don’t know: why these punitive activities, whatever they are (spanking? flogging? flossing?), make your boyfriend’s dick hard.
Backing up for a second: While you claim to have intuited these facts about your boyfriend — the realization came to you while you were making soup or something — the details you shared are too specific for this to be a mere hunch. It sounds like you suspected something was up and snooped on his computer or his phone. So, while you may not like to think of yourself as the kind of person who snoops, BTS, you are the kind of person who snoops. And snooping is always wrong… except when the person who snooped finds something they had a right to know about, e.g., massive debts, a secret second family, sexual risk taking that puts the snooper at risk, etc.
If your boyfriend is engaging in sex acts that place your health at risk and/or doing things that violate the spirit of your on-again monogamous commitment, you were right to snoop and you have grounds for going off-again. But was he doing anything that put your health at risk? If spanking and/or flogging and/or some other mystery punishment is all he’s been doing with other men — no sexual activities, just punitive ones — he wasn’t putting you at risk, BTS, and your boyfriend may have rationalized his deceit for that reason. He may also have been reluctant to tell you because he thought you wouldn’t understand. And it’s clear from your reaction that you don’t.
You’ve made a huge leap from, “My boyfriend likes being spanked by other men,” to, “My boyfriend must have been sexually abused before his brain was fully formed.” Your boyfriend might have a history of childhood sexual abuse — many men sadly do — but not all kinky men were abused and not all men who were abused are kinky. And while his use of substances is concerning, his substance abuse and his kinks aren’t necessarily linked.
You have a legitimate beef with your boyfriend: He’s been lying to you, BTS, and if his meetups with other men involved more than punitive activities — if spanking and/or flogging was followed up by sucking and/or fucking — he put your health at risk and he owes you an explanation, an apology and some lab work. If you can keep the conversation focused on what he was doing, BTS, and stop making up shit up about why, he’s more likely to open up to you about the what and the why.
I broke up with my ex after four years together, and he didn’t take it very well even though I was as caring about it as possible. It had just become clear to me that we had totally different goals and visions for how we wanted to live our lives. He is coming back to town next week for work — his boss told me —and he’ll be here a week. I want to see him.
Should I ask if he would be willing to meet for coffee or something? I want to know how he is doing and what his plans for the future are. I want to know he’s okay. But he refuses to talk to me. Maybe it’s still too soon? What do you think, Dan? Should I reach out or let him be?
— Wishing Him Well
It doesn’t matter what I think, WHW, and it doesn’t matter what you want. If your ex-boyfriend doesn’t want to see you right now, you don’t get to have coffee with him. And since I’m guessing your ex-boyfriend’s refusal to see you wasn’t unprompted — you reached out to him already, he told you to fuck off already — you already know how he feels about seeing you.
He might be devastated right now, he might be doing okay — either way, your ex-boyfriend is under no obligation to make you feel better about your decision to end this relationship. If he changes his mind and wants to meet up and talk, you’ll hear from him. In the meantime, WHW, you’re gonna have to respect his expressed wants and needs.
P.S. What the fuck was his boss thinking when he told you your ex was coming to town? That’s not information any employer should be sharing with the exes of their employees!
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