Growing up in the Midwest, in a conservative hometown surround by farmland was different start than most in my kink journey and exploring what the community had to offer. I knew I was different from an early age, especially when it came to sports. I ran cross country & coached track during the spring and I always caught myself looking at my teammates – but I never understood why until my senior year of high school. Going into college, I knew I could explore these feelings more. But I still remained in the closet, because I was afraid that the industry I had a passion for might reject me.
I always caught myself looking at my teammates.
That industry was agriculture & public policy. Being gay and politically moderate is not a common combination in the industry. I knew a few people who were open about who they were and were accepted, but I still had that fear of what might happen and of getting rejected, especially now of the current political administration.
In college, I took things at a slow pace – there was no much of a gay community locally, so I didn’t have other people to share things with. I spent a lot of time on the Internet, discovered Recon and kept a close lid on who I actually was online and in person. I order some gear and shipped it to college. But hid it from my roommates and all of the toys I owned were locked away and used only when they were all gone for the weekend.
I remember the first dildos I ordered. It was my junior year of high school, I opened a PO box at the post office. Ordered everything via the mail, money order, hand written note with the two toys I wanted, and even wrote out the amount and calculated the tax due. Then I waited and waited, till the day came in the mail. I waited till my parents had gone out for dinner, and I tried to use them. Of course, I was 17, and didn’t know you had to clean out before and didn’t learn that lesson till freshman year of college when I had better access to the Internet. Shoutout to Watts the Safeword!
During college I discovered bondage & fisting porn and it changed my life.
During college I discovered bondage & fisting porn and it changed my life. I had always felt like my butt wanted more and bigger things, and wondered why as a child I always wanted to be the one tied up during games. That led me to the leather community, and eventually to losing my virginity at the bathhouse in the large city near my college to a muscle daddy when I had just turned 19. Still, I was leading a double life with my family and friends.
During sophomore and junior year things expanded; a few more toys, some gear, my first harness. During a summer internship in Washington, D.C., I went to my first bondage club. This then led to my first large event, which turned out to be Mid Atlantic Leather Weekend (2017) during my senior year of college.
Attending a big fetish event opened my eyes to the larger kink community.
I saved up enough money to attend the event, and decided to stay off site just in case I needed a place to decompress. Attending opened my eyes to the larger kink community and the true sense of what community was. I went alone, I didn’t know a single soul. Which for me was normal because up to this point, I had taken this kink journey alone, and thought it would be always like that.
The weekend went great. I observed what was going on and, at the same time, reflected on what this trip meant to me as a young guy coming into this community. As I returned to school, our annual Martin Luther King Jr. Day program was being held later that night. The program’s theme was “Being your true self,” and it reflected on living a true life. This hit me hard, because I wasn’t living my true self.
So I made the decision to tell my two closest girlfriends who I was and what I had done that weekend. I walked over to their apartment to tell them, I thought of how to explain it to them but decided to be simple and straight up about who I was. As I told them, they began to cry with happiness and thankfulness that I was telling them first and that I was being my true self. I talked about not just being gay but kinky as well. I would later tell them about puppy play and how I identified as a puppy, though I hadn’t discovered it yet.
I walked them through my fetishes of bondage and fisting, and I think they were more impressed that I could take dick better than they could. Also, because I was known as the sweet, innocent, kind-hearted kid during college, they were particularly surprised that I was living this life that was 180* different than what everyone else knew. Later that night I told my roommates and showed them my gear and toys, and they gave me the same reaction. These two moments gave me the confidence to tell others and get more involved in the community. The fear of rejection was washed away, and my friends supported me with love, kindness and an eagerness to learn more about me and my kink life. Some of the girls (& guys) even wanted tips and tricks they could use to spice up their lives.
Fast forward to 2018. I expanded my experience to coming out as a puppy to many and attending MAL again, attending 2 Fist Fest’s and competing in a puppy & handler contest. I still hold fears that people may reject me and not understand my lifestyle. But to me, I’m living fully to who I am as a person and a puppy. I take every new experience, good or bad, as an opportunity to learn and expand my knowledge of the kink community.
One doubt I recently had in my journey is whether I could add anything to the community and I found it in an unlikely place. I was competing in a puppy and handler contest, and the feedback I received from the judges was to use my skills of critical thinking & analysis to help others think more critically about headspace and what it truly means to them and their partner.
I would have never made it to this point if I hadn’t decided to live a true life and be who I was on the inside.
As I look back to the start of my kink journey, I think I would have never made it to this point if I hadn’t decided to live a true life and be who I was on the inside. Along the way I have faced many challenges, but I was slowly able to overcome them, I know there will be more to come, but I will face them head on just like I did the ones in the past. My journey will not be done by leaps but by many steps.
