I need weight on my body, otherwise I have the feeling it’s going to burst.”: a sex worker describes her life in a time lacking touch. 

We’re living through a time in which touch and bodily contact is a little like gold dust. Rare and valuable.

Touch has always been important to me. Touch, Closeness, Intimacy, and Healing are so existential for me that I abandoned my law studies and a career behind a desk for them. Most people love sex, but it’s enough for them to practice it as a hobby, often even with just one other person. That’s totally okay. As for me, I wanted to spend more time on Touch, Closeness, and all the emotions connected to them, to delve into the topic, know more about it, practice and professionalize it. Since I, too, need to make a living, it was clear that time needs to be paid. And voilà: that’s how I became a sex worker.

Giving intimacy in a world lacking touch already deserved credit long before Corona. The fact that I make a very good living is only one of the ways I can tell people value it. Some of my clients’ letters of thanks are deeply touching. Many colleagues describe one of the most wonderful aspects of our profession as being the gratitude we receive from people who have experienced contact, desire, and sex which has made them happy.

The Privilege of Touch

Now we’re all at home, and we’re told to keep two meters distance from each other. The privilege of touch is reserved for monogamous couples. Those in relationships can consider themselves fortunate. Not a good time for all those for whom family is not a safe space, for singles, or for loose subjects (like myself). I follow all the rules, talk on the phone until my ears hurt, go jogging, meditate and do yoga, put my mother’s groceries in front of her door and only touch, if at all, my cat, my self, and from time to time, my loved one.

Now and then, I roll around on the carpet, to assure my body it still has boundaries. My own body weight isn’t enough to transmit that meaningfully. I touch myself and also masturbate, but even before, I only did that with a moderate amount of passion. As a sex educator, I’m familiar with all the theories that the prerequisite for good sex is the ability to have fabulous solo sex. I agree with that pedagogically, and regularly maintain it towards all my clients, in order to be professional. I hereby for the first time admit publicly that it was never really the case for me.

I desire to pounce on somebody or be grabbed. I love fingers other than mine on my body, on and in my pussy. And I considerably prefer hands, cocks, and tongues to any fucking sex toy, no matter what fancy outer space material it’s made of, how utopically large its price tag was, and how streamlined the way is that it cuddles up to my g-spot.

My body doesn’t understand the withdrawal of adrenalin, serotonin, and oxytocin. It misses the deep relaxation that comes from lying in close contact with someone with whom you’ve just dared to go on a wild ride through ecstasy. My chocolate consumption is increasing in proportion to the published numbers of infections.

At my Desk in a Latex Dress?

On the radio, I hear advice for the “home office”. Most important: maintain your usual everyday work routine. What does that mean for me? Sit at my desk in a latex dress and boots and answer customers’ emails who aren’t booking appointments? Tie myself up and suspend myself in my living room? Sitting on stuffed animals faces? Talk dirty to my cat? My work routine has been disturbed.