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Dear Dr. NerdLove:
I am a woman in my mid20’s with a rather specific kink: I really, really like being tickled by other women. I discovered I wasn’t alone in this a couple years ago when I stumbled into online content. I remember how happy and relieved I felt at first, realizing there were people like me, and I joined with my own little profile. But a few months ago I realized I was gay and came out – and suddenly I’ve got a new problem.
Maybe I’m just not looking in the right place but it feels like kink communities online – or at least the ones with people who live anywhere close (cross-country travel is not feasible for me right now because I can’t afford it with my current job) – skew HEAVILY in favor of men looking for women, either to tickle or be tickled by. The few queer women I have even met on here tend to be either wholly submissive in this area themselves (I can switch occasionally but like. Not as often as they need) and/or have a male partner, and no hate but I’m not interested in polyamory.
However, the thought of dating someone the regular way and then letting her in on my kink early on in the relationship and hoping she’ll be down to explore scares me way more than it (possibly) should. To some degree I’m sure everyone feels weirded out by a sexual thing they aren’t into at all but I dunno, I’m also into bondage. But I’ve seen people both people that I know and people online, react to that concept very differently. Like yeah some people will still act grossed out or make fun of BDSM but with tickling I feel like I’ve seen a LOOOT more negative reactions whenever someone else (not me, I’ve never had the nerve to do it with someone I didn’t meet through kink online) up the mere concept – at best there’s obviously-grossed-out amusement and confusion, at worst someone flat out says they think it’s creepy. And I even unfortunately know that some people have had that done to them as a form of abuse with no regard for their consent or pleasure, by a previous partner so I know there are people who wouldn’t just be uninterested but actively find the thing traumatic.
When I’m in a kink space or on my own it doesn’t bother me but outside of it the mere idea of admitting this to a future girlfriend who I haven’t met through that community (and therefore had confirmation they’re into it too) is genuinely terrifying. It brings on such intense shame that it paralyzes me. I know it’s a perfectly harmless thing when practiced consensually like any other kink, I know you’ll say anyone who would judge me for this is a jerk who’s self-selecting themselves out of my dating/sex life pool and I know that intellectually but I honestly don’t know if I could ever bring myself to do it. I’m so much more afraid to ever tell a prospective partner I met the regular way about this than I am to tell her I like bondage. I don’t want a girl I like and have started dating to think I’m weird or gross or even make fun of me – worse, I have this fear that in the age of normalized oversharing via tiktok or twitter that even if she acted normal to my face she’d laugh at me about it later or like. Make some storytime about me and how gross she thinks I am.
So for now I feel like my only viable options are either keep this a part of my sexuality that’s only for me even when I have a partner and never get to actually experience it – or keep trying with the online kink spaces that so far are yielding next to nothing for me. Both options feel increasingly exhausting and lonely. Lately I just wish I could be either just a normal ass lesbian who maybe likes bondage sometimes OR have this kink but be into men as well because bi and straight women do not have ANY problem with attention. (And yes, a lot of it is negative I know, and I don’t envy them that, I’m not trying to be insensitive. But I’ve also seen so many meet partners and just. HAVE AN ACTIVE KINK LIFE at all through the community whereas the lesbian side is almost nonexistent – though I also do get swamped sometimes with gross men who refuse to read and understand what the words MEN DO NOT INTERACT mean 🙂 so it kind of feels like I got the worst of all worlds. This is not just me enviously looking at the few success stories, I promise you, it’s just so much more common for women to be able to meet a partner and fellow kinkster through this than with other women. I know that’s likely because gay dating pools are just smaller in general but this is even more than the ordinary lesbian dating scene.) It feels like I’ll never find a partner who’ll be into this too, or willing to satisfy this desire and it really hurts. Any advice?
Untouchable
Untouchable, you don’t have a kink problem so much as a marketing problem, and that marketing problem has thrown your worst-case-scenario-vision into overdrive. You haven’t so much as started to look for dates or partners and you’ve created apocalyptic scenarios where you either stepped on a landmine that you couldn’t have known about and retraumatized them and blew up the relationship, dated someone who decided to go out with you just to mock you on her social media and now everything is awful.
So the first thing to do is just slow your roll. Seriously, you’re nowhere near a place where it’s time to worry about any of these things. You’ve declared that you’ll never find someone who could satisfy your desire, but it seems that you came to this conclusion because your brain was running around in circles imagining all the horrible things that would happen, rather than actually putting yourself out there on FetLife. And while it’s understandable that having seen some folks’ reactions can throw you for a loop, it’s worth remembering that “a few folks in your social circle and/or online” does not a statistically significant dataset make. That’s more about confirmation bias screwing with you; you notice the negative reactions far more, because it directly correlates to your fears that you’re going to squick people out.
First of all, you might be surprised at how many kinksters are out there – including women who love women who might share your kink. For all the handwringing about kink at Pride, studies have found that LGBTQ people tend to practice kink at higher rates than cis and hetero folks. There’s a good chance that there’s a lesbian, bi or pan top out there who would be very interested in doing tickle scenes with you. The odds are even better if you look for someone to top you in this particular way outside of a committed relationship.
But let’s say that this is something that a) you need as more than an occasional experience and b) within the context of a committed and/or monogamous relationship. You still have good odds of finding a partner who’s willing to give it a shot.
Here’s the thing: there’re two types of kinksters out there. There’re the folks who were functionally born kinky (that is: they discovered their kinks themselves), and then there’re the folks who were introduced to kink by their partners. You’re one of the former. Odds are good – just on pure demographics – that most of the women you’re likely to date are the latter. While you can certainly make a point of connecting with your local kink community (and you absolutely should; more on that in a moment), you shouldn’t look at that as your only option to ever have this need met. This would severely limit your potential dating pool, and do so unnecessarily; queer kinky women already in the scene are almost certainly going to be a fraction of the total queer community in your area. You’re going to have better luck finding dates and potential partners who are currently just into standard-issue sex, but who’re open to some forms of kink.
One of the core components of a strong sexual connection with your partner is recognizing that sometimes you’re both going to do things for (or to) one another that the person performing the act may not get a lot out of, but the person on the receiving end does. Sometimes it may mean a position that really works for them that you could take or leave, or that’s not your favorite. Other times, it may mean indulging in a partner’s kink or fetish or other request within reason. Foot worship, for example, may raise some people’s eyebrows – considering how often it was used as code for “weirdo” and “pervert” – but it’s not a terribly unusual, nor is it a bridge too far for an otherwise vanilla person to indulge for their kinky partner. Similarly, things like handcuffs or blindfolds or role play are areas where I think most people might say “Ok, yeah, it’s not my thing but I could do that for my partner. Intense impact play, electro-stim, suspension and shibari… those start getting into “possibly too much”, while scenes involving breath-control, edgeplay or various bodily fluids would be a hard no for a lot of folks.
I feel fairly safe in saying that tickling, especially being the person doing the tickling, isn’t going to an edge case or a hard no for most people. I think you may find potential partners are more bemused by it, with a “well, if it works for you…” attitude than you’ll experience folks running screaming into the night when you bring it up. In fact, I suspect a lot of the women you may meet aren’t going to even realize that tickling is a kink or a form of domination/submission play. They may be more surprised than shocked, but I think you’re far more likely to find people who’re willing to go with it and give it the ol’ college try because of how much it does for you.
However, you won’t get this response if you roll it out the way you did here. When you’re rolling something out to others, they will often look to you as an indication as to how they should react. If you tell someone about your kink as though you were confessing to some horrible personal flaw or generational curse that forces you to consume live koi fish every seven weeks, then yeah, they’re going to react badly. You primed them to expect the worst, and they’re going to respond accordingly, even if all you’re doing is asking them to tickle your feet with a feather duster or something.
Instead, you want to present it as a value add, not something to be ashamed of and you’re only bringing up out of obligation. This isn’t something shameful or sick or whatever, it’s a quirk that makes you uniquely you, a bit of information about you that means that relationships with you are never going to be boring or typical and isn’t she lucky?
Now, while this is fairly tame as far as kinks go, you may want to give it some time and get to know your dates before letting this one out. Not because your dates need to get used to you before you throw them this curve ball, but because you are trying to feel them out and whether they are someone you can trust. You’re not going to fully eliminate the sex-negative anti-kinksters or the theoretical tiktok influencers who’ll see your story as viral #FYP fodder by waiting, but it’ll give you a better handle on who they are and whether this relationship has legs or not. And if they react badly anyway? Well, you told them one thing about who you are as a person, while they revealed everything about themselves.
With that in mind, it’s still going to be a good idea to make connections with your local kink community too. I’d recommend going to some munches or any open-dungeon parties (if there are any), meet your fellow doms and subs and make friends with them. Having a solid social base who understand your interests and think it’s cool, will do wonders for your sense of self-esteem alone and ease the anxiety weasels ping-ponging all around the inside of your head. While you may or may not find a partner amongst your local kinksters (or even any of the long-distance ones), you may find some women who are willing to top you this way and provide you with the release (er… as it were) of being forcibly tickled. And if you do end up dating someone who is wonderful but not really into the tickling thing, then having someone you can go to in order to get that need met could well be part of what makes that relationship last.
Good luck.
Hi Doc!
I’m a big fan of yours, and an aficionado of advice columns (Agony Aunts and I guess Uncles). Generally speaking, as someone with Avoidant Attachment Disorder, your advice hits me on the theoretical/good reading level rather than being directly applicable to my life. That, one hopes, is about to change.
Before COVID hit and locked everyone down for three years, I’d been suffering from illness for another four years. So, you know that COVID isolation? Imagine doubling it. That’s where I’m at.
Recently took a job dealing with the public just because I’m so tired of talking to my television set all day. It’s going well, and now I’m ready to level up to actually dating (some of) the public. The problem is, I haven’t really dated since high school, and that was last century, so do you have any tips for a straight cis female of A Certain Age (not retired, but also not ovulating anymore)? Apps (which ones)? I’m trying to stay safe so meeting at bars and restaurants is doable provided a) it’s on a patio and b) social distancing. So that’s a problem. I was thinking of starting a “Singles Re-Entering Civilization Post-COVID” group on Facebook or Nextdoor, but need a catchier title: thoughts?
Unfrozen Cavewoman Lawyer
Good news! Despite how it feels, dating really isn’t more complicated than it was back in the 90s. Yes, it can seem like you woke up from suspended animation and discovered you’re in TopsyTurvyVille with a thousand new terms to memorize (like “cuffing” and “breadcrumbing”), a dozen new sexual practices and relationship styles you’re expected to master and deciding which swiping app to declare allegiance to… but honestly, it really is mostly the same shit people used to do back then. The only difference is that we’ve actually started talking and doing things openly that folks used to do on the down-low. Polyamory and ethical non-monogamy? That shit’s been around forever. Casual sex vs. committed relationships, when to commit and how, what’s cheating and isn’t cheating… all of this has happened before, all of this will happen again and the only difference is that now we’re not pretending that everyone’s monogamous, straight and vanilla and sex only happens after the third date or a trip to the Poconos.
Plus, let’s be real: a solid two-thirds of the population went feral during the lockdown and we’re all trying to relearn how to human again, to varying degrees of success. So honestly any quirks or hesitations you have or seeming ignorance of the latest social mores and dance steps aren’t going to stand out. Certainly not when we’re all trying to decide whether pajamas and kigurumi are considered business casual or informal dress.
Now honestly, my standard advice for meeting people applies here. Going out and about and being social, participating in your hobbies and passions in ways that allow you to enjoy them with other people and using dating apps as a supplement for meeting people, not a replacement, will serve you well. Though if you want my opinion, Hinge and Bumble will likely be your best starting point for the apps. While assholes are everywhere, dick-flingers are abundant and time-wasters are platform agnostic, those two apps have the userbase that is most likely to be in line with what you’re looking for. Plus, I think you’ll find them a little less intimidating than Tinder or as overwhelming as OKCupid can be. Make sure you’re up front about your COVID precautionary requirements so as to filter out the anti-vaxxers and folks who don’t have the same safety concerns you do, use your best, most recent pics and put some personality into the prompts, and you’ll be well on your way.
Similarly, if and when you do find some lucky potential beau, don’t be ashamed of how long it’s been since you’ve been on the dating scene or how unused you are to it now. Being open about having been forced into isolation pre-COVID because of an illness will not only answer a number of their questions, but, honestly… it’s a big part of your life experience. It’s something that’s informed who you are today, and it’s going to inform the precautions you’re wanting to take. If they’re going to have a weird or negative reaction to any of that, then all that’s happened is that they’ve revealed themselves to be unworthy of your time or attention and you’re better off not letting them occupy a single mote of your bandwidth any further.
And honestly, starting a Facebook or WhatsApp group for your fellow “Re-Entering Dating” survivors is a good idea. Having a community like that to talk, share memes and suggestions and war stories can be fun, and likely a good way to maintain your sanity and positive outlook while you deal with the usual frustrations that come with dating… regardless of whether you’re an old-hand or coming back after an extended hiatus.
Just not on Nextdoor. That’s mostly for Karens and Chadwicks to snoop on their neighbors and complain that they saw teenage people of color in the neighborhood, while they speculate that it was a gang out to steal their catalytic converters, pirate their cable and rip the copper wiring out of their homes.
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