December 19th, 2005 -- by Bacchus
Sex Surrogate
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Shorter URL for sharing: http://www.erosblog.com/?p=1018
Shorter URL for sharing: http://www.erosblog.com/?p=1018
Its a very good, very human story. The way it ended (the adendum from 1990) made me cry a bit. I hope he finds some happiness. Lifes too short to judge and torment and stomp on other peoples joy
Mark O’Brien, the story’s author, died six years ago.
His life was the subject of the documentary Breathing Lessons. If you dig the story, you’ll probably enjoy the movie too.
My wife and I sometimes toy with getting a surrogate for her brother, who’s 34 and whose total experience with women involves a couple of kisses in high school, but we’ve never been sure if bringing up the subject would piss him off royally.
“So…your 35th birthday is coming up. Want us to get you a surrogate so you can lose your virginity?”
Or should we just get him a ticket to one of those (legal) whorehouses in Nevada?
As to the Nevada idea, a man who isn’t creeped out by the idea of commercial sex is unlikely to be a virgin at the age of 35. Commercial sex is widely available and very cheap; guys who’ve never bought any (like, say, me) usually have pretty firm reasons they don’t want to.
Wow… that was an awesome read. This is part of the reason why I have toyed with the idea of being a surrogate. “For now,” I’m a service provider (or whatever you really want to call it: escort, prostitute etc…) and I was saddened by this part:
“Hiring a prostitute implies that I cannot be loved, body and soul, just body or soul. I would be treated as a body in need of some impersonal, professional service — which is what I’ve always gotten, though in a different form, from nurses and attendants. Sex for the sake of sex alone has little appeal to me because it seems like a ceremony whose meaning has been forgotten.”
:( Unfortunately, this is the common (albeit mostly well-deserved *sigh*) view. I see where he is coming from (and many others), and ideally, yes, it’d be very nice to have loving intimacy with a special someone. But when it’s not available, there are plenty of caring and willing-to-be-intimate (no pun intended…) service providers out there; those of us who still see sex as something fun and special (and dirty when it’s aprropriate *grin*) and just have the honour of making it a career.
Just saw a documentary this past weekend on how Holland (I’m pretty sure… darn it) has a program for helping pay for prostitutes for physically and mentally-disabled people, realizing that for “whole-person” well-being, sexuality needs to be included. These prostitutes are given extra training and are only accepted into the program once they agree to have the sessions NOT be only about the actual sex act – that closeness, touching and conversation is included. Therapists are included in the decision to have their patient see a worker.
Diff’rent strokes… ;)
An incredible story, with a fascinating look into someone you’d never think of as a sexual being. He’s right, the world offers pity, but none of us expect him to have the same desires…
This statement that he starts off
with intrigues me to no end…..
In my imagination, they seemed to have an uncanny ability to know what I was thinking, and were eager to punish me for any malfeasance…. He says it is in his imagination but it has basis in reality. somewhere the parents have instilled in him this union
of minds that has a psychic component and they use it against him as a weapon. I have had the same personal experience with my own parents and have had a rough time resolving this. It is an enigma wrappped in a riddle and when it becomes a knot it paralyzes your psyche.If none of this sounds familiar then be very gratefull for the love and sex you
have been able to experience.
Thought you guys might want to know that Mark O’Brien passed away in 1999:
http://www.paci....html
I’m a woman with a physical disability. I walk funny and I use a wheelchair. That’s it, even though, in the dating world that’s a lot. Much of what he wrote takes me back to my late teens, when I thought I might never have a relationship. Since then, I’ve been in and out of relationships with able-bodied men, and was once engaged. Now that I’m a single girl again, it’s so easy to think those self-hating, “who would ever love me?” thoughts. Just wanted to tell you guys from the point of view of a woman with a disability who lives a totally normal life–like all of you– that much of what he says rings very true, regardless of the severity of disability. So, what’s a disabled chick to do? Get out there, see and be seen, date a bit, and be thankful everytime you meet an enlightened one. Isn’t that what all of you do (or did) in your dating lives? It’s funny, we may seem worlds away from all of you, but the feelings, desires, triumphs and disappointments are all the same.