Dear Gloria,
I have a rubber fetish and I’ve never been able to find any scientific information about it, like where does it come from? Was I born that way? Or do fetishes start in childhood, because I remember having an interest in rubber boots when I was around 4? My father had these big heavy rubber boots he wore on muddy days at his job-site and I snuck into his closet to play with them. When I got older, I asked if I could clean them for him, and he let me. I would dig all the mud out of the soles and polish them up to shiny new-looking. When he told me he had the shiniest boots at his job I was proud for months. Looking back, it seems really weird now, lol.
It seemed harmless at the time but 40 years later I am jerking off to other men’s rubber boots and own a big collection of rubberwear and rubber gear. Did my father’s boots turn me into a fetishist? I’m not complaining but I wish I understood it better.
Rubber Randy
Dear Randy,
No one thing turns someone into a sex/gender something. There’s no hard evidence that a pivotal event (such as contact with your dad’s boots) can change a person’s sexuality. Otherwise, every little kid whose dad had muddy rubber boots would share your fetish, and every kid who ever saw a spanking would grow up to be turned on by an ass-whipping. In fact, it’s the kids who are either more sexually aware than peers or already disposed to be kinky, who may grasp onto an experience like that.
Note: sexually-traumatic events can be pivotal because their harm can divert development on all fronts.
Consensual, pleasurable sex is not driven by a specific object or event that sets our future in stone. In fact, it’s the opposite: pleasurable events lead us to want to repeat them. You associated positive feelings to your dad’s galoshes. Another person might have looked at them with disgust. Another person may have barely noticed them. A kid who was forced to clean them as punishment might never want to touch a pair again. Etc. So, no, it wasn’t the boots per se.
More likely, you were a sexually curious tyke, with an inclination towards fetishism, and the boots resonated with you. They were cool. They were tactile. They were different. They were exciting in a strange way. As a little kid, your dad was probably your hero. When he rewarded your boot-polishing efforts with praise, maybe his approval made them even more valuable to you on an emotional level. Those moments of innocent and unanalyzed joy left a lasting impression. That’s normal too.
All things related to fetish, kink, sex, and gender speak to a UNIQUE, non-replicable and very personal evolution.
It’s a very common human behavior to invest our memories with powerful meanings. How you processed the memory as you grew up, though, is unique to you: how partners reacted, how strong your self-esteem is, whether you feel good about your body, what you think you’re entitled to in life, all of that shapes you. All things related to fetish, kink, sex, and gender speak to a UNIQUE, non-replicable and very personal evolution.
What makes you you is a breathtaking array of psycho-social and biological factors. Other factors include your raising, your parents, your personality, your mental health status, your hormone levels and overall sexual health, your religion, your culture, the repression you face, the traumas you experienced, your preferences, your positive experiences, the support you received (or the support you lacked), your native intellect, your economic status, and that’s a short list.
Sexual fetishism is normal, first because sex fetishes are common, and second because fetishistic drive manifests in many different ways in human life. My usual example is people who crave, collect and worship material objects, whether action figures or Louboutin shoes. Another example: during mourning periods, a bereaved widow or widower may develop a fetishistic attachment to the clothes of their dead beloved, sleeping with their favorite dress or hugging their suits. It happens. It’s understandable. It relieves stress by reviving the presence of a beloved through the clothes that, fleetingly, seem to bring them back to life.
Even when it’s devoid of overt sexual feelings, a fetish object still bestows an inexplicable sense of inner comfort. This suggests there could, maybe, be a human biomarker for the tendency to attach meaning to inanimate objects — maybe somewhere alongside a biomarker for transactional sex, another common and normal human behavior that our prudish, anti-science culture isolates from its narrow definition of normalcy. I wish it was as simple as having a rubber gene or a high-heel biomarker because then I wouldn’t have had to explain the tangled complexity of fetish to skeptics for the past 30+ years!
Still, humans are more complicated than their biology. Even if we did find a gene or biomarker for fetish, it would not mean that a person is destined to grow up as a fetishist. There are simply too many variables (see above) that influence our choices, attitudes, and identities. Just because you have a seed does not mean you can grow it into a flowering and abundant orchard.
What is a certainty is that fetish is where fetishists go to relieve stress, to have better orgasms, to escape into fantasies that make us feel spiritually nourished and emotionally fulfilled. It is a happy place. People are entitled to their private happy places.
So just keep on keeping on. The weirdest thing about having fetishes is that people who don’t share them can be sickeningly judgmental. Your fetish is a beautiful and intrinsic part of you, a harmless escape mechanism (far safer than alcohol or drugs!) and so interwoven with your life, that it will be a gift that keeps on giving you pleasure into old age.
Below I’m excerpting a nugget from Sex for Grown-Ups. It is my original template of the stages of fetish experience from early childhood to seniority. It’s based on clinical experience, being a fetishist myself, and conversations with thousands of other fetishists over the years. Many people have told me this template mirrors the stages of their own development. It certainly mirrors mine. Let me know if it resonates with you.
Seven Stages of Sexual Development in BDSM/Fetish People
1. In early childhood, they have innocent (non-sexual) but unusual (fascinated or excited) reactions to taboo behaviors (notably bondage and spanking), to body parts (especially feet, rear ends, and body hair), or to objects (shoes, undergarments, clothing made of leather or rubber, etc.).
2. In puberty, as their bodies begin the swift march to reproductive capability, they may notice that things that once merely intrigued them are becoming mysteriously associated with erotic responses and sexy fantasies. If they masturbate during this stage (not all kids do), elements of the things that excited them as little kids will replay in their fantasies, now in a more sexualized, albeit crude adolescent form.
3. In their teens, fetish or kinky themes begin to pervade their sexual fantasies. If they masturbate (as most teens do), they may discover that they climax when fantasizing about a BDSM/fetish scenario. They may also notice that they are sexually different from their peers, who place an emphasis on intercourse and oral sex, acts of less interest to young BDSM/fetish people less than power relationships, fetishes and roleplay.
4. In young adulthood (18 to 26), sexual development yields to social pressures. Young people often make choices they believe will please their elders and earn them a place in mainstream society. Thanks in large part to the proliferation of kink-aware information on the Internet, more people today feel empowered to seek out safe, wholesome consensual kink relationships than when I was growing up. However, shame and negativity remain so pervasive throughout our culture that it’s still common for young BDSM/fetish people to keep their true desires a secret even from their most intimate partners and to stifle their urges for the sake of a “normal” traditional marriage.
5. In the “settling down years” (I’ll liberally say ages 18 to 35), the choice of a partner will shape the course of one’s erotic destiny because partners are half of a romantic equation. BDSM/fetish people who partner with people who are sympathetic and responsive to their needs seldom show up in my office. I have worked with hundreds of people, however, who married partners who rejected their sexual identity.
In my clinical experience, this group tends to be at high risk of self-destructive behaviors. The most common one I’ve observed among kinksters who struggle with shame and inadequacy as a result of rejection is a compulsive stress cycle of binging and purging on their personal kinks or fetishes. Like addicts, they indulge in their kink to excess and then vow never to do anything again, struggling with uncertainty and self-hatred at every turn.
6. By the age of full sexual maturity (usually 25 to 35 in humans), the need for kink or fetish sex is fully defined and occupies an important place in people’s erotic imaginations. Orgasms may occur more easily when BDSM/fetish sex is involved. For some, orgasms may occur only when BDSM/fetish sex is involved. And while some BDSM/fetish people will always have an appetite for intercourse and blow-jobs, the urge to live out their kinky identity generally rivals or exceeds their lust for “straight” sex. In fact, for many BDSM/kinky people, the drive for specific BDSM/fetish experiences is so intense and defined, it may override their usual preferences in sex, gender and body size, allowing them to expand their pool of potential partners.
7. Post-Prime: the older BDSM/fetish people get, the greater their need for kink/fetish sex to achieve complete sexual satisfaction. One of the most common complaints I hear from kinksters over 50 is that they can’t get fully aroused or have orgasms unless some form of BDSM is involved, even if it’s all in their private fantasies. Interestingly, it’s not uncommon for people to be BDSM “late-bloomers” and wait to explore their fantasies until their 40s, 50s, and older. Contrary to public myth, it isn’t because older people are jaded and therefore need more stimulation to get off. It’s usually because, given all the cultural prohibitions against adventurous sex, it takes some people that long to overcome their fears and inhibitions and give themselves permission to explore their authentic sexual identity.
The above is from Sex for Grown-Ups
