Sex work is a trap.

After back and forth I eventually decided to quit sex work, it was lockdown and I had moved back to my parents, due to restrictions in my country it was impossible to do escorting, I switched to Only Fans as an option as the thought of no money coming in used to keep me up at night. But deep down I knew I had to make a choice, unfortunately I had mixed drinking with working and eventually found it impossible to work without having some kind of substance. I was depressed.

We are bombarded with stories in the media of how girls and young women have ‘transformed their life’ after becoming a sex worker, bills paid, luxury cars and being able to buy a first home , any millennials dream. We celebrate the good stories but forget the real side. With all these good stories, I’m worried it can portray a glamourize version of what it’s really like.  I suppose this is because we are celebrating an ultra-sexed up generation, sex work has literally been put on steroids and is not so taboo as it once was. It is now celebrated as a feminist movement, an empowerment of women. I tend to disagree coming out the other side. And while at some points I did feel empowered …meaning I felt empowered by being in control which was something I had struggled a lot with in my teens, I was left feeling bleak eventually.

The excitement and freedom became different, it didn’t feel as it once did, perhaps because I got older and just got sick of it, maybe I grew out of it as they say or maybe, eventually like most cases it started to take its toll.  Having to act happy and not show anybody how you’re really feeling was hard. Some days the money was low and those days were depressing, you start questioning things and you start to question yourself. I never felt good enough as it was. The stress of not knowing if I would make any money that week or if I had fucked myself up with drink and drugs but then, of course you have a brilliant days where everything goes well, the money is piling in and the customers are extra nice. I struggled with the ups and downs, the constant good and bad days. The bad days then would last weeks and id be lucky to get any good days in the mental state I was in.

I viewed men differently after, it took me a couple years to get out of my head that all men were cheaters and not so bad, I guess in my job I let men act on their darkest fantasies , in the end I consumed a lot of energy from others while I running out on mine. It took a while for me not to be so bitter towards the male race. I’m eventually out of that now and don’t have so much hate towards men in fact I have none. I didn’t want sex work to make me hateful or have limitations on my opinions based on my sole experiences, I didn’t want it to affect future relationships. I still had hope of happiness. I would say I’m more aware now, although I have slightly more trust issues but I’m working on that.

I felt trapped in sex work, I was worried I might be doing that job until I was 50, which would have been a lot of energy exchange and a hell of a lot of blowjobs. Minimum wage and the cost of living crisis I can totally understand why sex work has now become an option for many, I would just like to vent, sex work is not work forever, even if you think it will be, there will be a point in time where things will need to change. It becomes draining on the soul, if you like it or not. I got angry that I wasn’t enjoying myself anymore like I once did, I wasn’t ready for my wake up call. I’m very stubborn.

The transition from sex work to I guess you would say ‘a normal life’ is difficult if you are unsure of what to do, I started sex work at 18 so didn’t have a clue, 18-24 a whole lot of ups and downs. I was lucky enough to come out at an age where I was still young ‘old in sex work numbers’ but young in a considered normal society (yay). This didn’t make the transition easy but I guess easier in terms I still had time to figure things out. Of course I got badly depressed and didn’t have motivation to do anything. To start my whole life again while depressed. No thank you.

Here’s a little bit of advice …find what really makes you happy… it’s a tough one, and won’t be easy, some will know and some won’t for example me, in and out of shitty jobs after and not knowing any of my passions, I frankly lost myself and had to re find myself .I felt I kept going back and forth with what I wanted, the past was comfortable, I wasn’t exactly happy in my present but the future gave me anxiety. Eventually I found my love of writing a couple years later. Three years to be precise, better late than never as they say. I remember writing fiction stories when I was younger and loved reading and writing, by no means is this a fiction story this is my real life, but it was a memory that popped up, a happy buried memory. Of course I never remembered any of this until I started healing, before it was a blank memory.

Sex work should be treated as a side hustle, if you are thinking about entering sex work don’t treat it as something you will be doing for the rest of your life, it comes with disappointments and a lot of reality checks. I don’t believe sex work is a form of empowerment bit I guess this can depend on who you are. I’m an emotional sponge and found it difficult to deal with the bad side. I came out of it with a negative view of the world and people that walk upon it. Through therapy and a lot of self-healing I’m now doing ok. Now it did have some pros, the freedom, the money and the control. Unfortunately for me it brought up a lot of shit, sex work mixed with unhealed trauma can be a deadly mix. It can take you down a slippery slope with no hope of doing anything else in life. I struggled to see outside of sex work, I still struggle now and temptation to go back always looms at the back of my mind. The money is a huge temptation (of course) but I know I will not get sucked back into the trap. It’s easy to think like that when times get tough .It took me a while to realise that wasn’t all I am. Sex work didn’t define me anymore.