Unexpected Entry

Inexplicably driven here. Planned to merely check email. But now that I’m here, I feel a need to send some stuff out into the ether…

So I told my sister that I’m working as a prostitute. Amazingly, I didn’t expect her to react so badly. The people I’ve surrounded myself with are so understanding and accepting of my choices that I forget that some people won’t be. But I told my sister as the start of my second “coming out” to my whole family. I’m writing my masters thesis on sex work, it going to become public knowledge sooner or later, so I might as well give them as much time as possible to get used to is.

My sister was furious. She wanted to know how I could have so little respect for myself, and insisted that nothing I could say would change her opinion. But she also said she’d always love me as her sister, and so we talked and talked and talked. I explained things to her. Things I’ve only just come to realise in a deep part of my mind and that I felt quite weird saying aloud, but I wanted her to understand where I’m coming from.

I used to be so depressed. And sometimes I suffered anxiety, debilitatingly, so it was hard to leave the house. That’s not the case any more. I feel utterly mentally healthy, which is an odd state for me. I’m unmedicated (my brief stint on anti-anxiety medication being one of the most harrowing experiences of my life), not even St John’s Wort. If you delve back into my diary, you’ll see the writings of a conflicted woman. I tried so hard to be good, it was a goal for me. And then I’d fall off the wagon and into slutness and feel bad about myself and try so hard to be good again. But once I let the slut in me out, in a non-destructive way… no picking up men on the street, no waking up with guys whose names I couldn’t remember… it was like I could let go of a breath I didn’t know I was holding.

And all this is true. But I’m changing and I feel so weird. I’m a lesbian, I know this for sure. Having copious amounts of sex with many different men has only cemented for me. I can walk away from a guy and not remember his face, but women touch that soft place in my heart. But what kind of lesbian can I be? It’s so odd to be gay and also a hooker.

I went on a date tonight. I like this girl. She’s so sharply intelligent and articulate and many of her politics match mine. And she’s cute too! But we walked past this notorious strip club, saw a man walking in and she said, “ugh! Guys who go to strip clubs!” like they were a species of such universal derision and disgust that she didn’t even have to question me on it. She simply expected I’d think the same. And immediately I think… What the hell is she gonna say when she learns I’m a sex worker? How the hell would she ever handle me saying, “See ya honey, I’m off to see a client” and know I was going to shag some random guy?

How can I ask that of any woman? How can I be happily a hooker (which I am) and maintain the lesbian relationship I crave?