I used to be an escort, and a former client wants to be friends. What should I do?
One client I was particularly fond of was a man a few years older than me. He is on the autism spectrum, which makes him somewhat socially awkward, but he is intelligent, creative and empathetic – and passably handsome. I always felt he would make a wonderful partner for a woman who could see past his quirks.
Last week, I ran into him at the library. The first thing he said was he'd understand if I didn't want to talk – but I was actually glad to see him. We spent about 15 minutes chatting pleasantly, and when we parted he asked if I'd consider meeting up as friends. I took his number and said I'd think about it.
I'm pretty sure he's hoping for more than just friendship, but if my sense of him is accurate, he'd accept a 'no' gracefully and respect my privacy. The problem is I'm unsure what to do. Had we met under different circumstances, I might well have considered dating him, and I would definitely like him as a friend. I'm aware of the stigma directed at men who see escorts, but he doesn't fit any negative stereotype.
Even so, the fact he's tied to a chapter of my life I've moved on from leaves me conflicted. I don't know if reconnecting would add something positive to my life – or blur boundaries I've worked hard to establish and maintain.
I think the fact you're writing to me shows you do want to consider it, but are aware there may be some pitfalls. In some ways you're front-loading the issues you would have – because you already know something of each other's past – more than if you met someone the more conventional way.
I consulted clinical psychologist and psychoanalyst Dr Stephen Blumenthal, who has worked with people who visit sex workers. He wonders if this might be less a case of 'wanting a relationship, but rather exploring your boundaries in relation to your previous work and the life you have now'.
You said in another message that you had hitherto kept your past work private. Perhaps you now feel ready to merge your past and your present/future, and by allowing this man from your past to possibly be a friend, you can see if this will work for you.
Dr Blumenthal explains that he's known 'situations where men have formed relationships with sex workers. Some have succeeded and some have ended in disaster. It's impossible to know how things will turn out, there's no predetermined outcome. And yes, most people assume the relationship between sex worker and client is just about sex, but I've heard many a time it's less about sex and often primarily an emotional relationship that has sex as part of it. It's not always like that, of course, but it can be.'
I think you have to be honest (as with all potential relationships) about what you want from this man, and if that's possible. You've been very good at boundaries before, this will need a different set of boundaries and they may need renegotiating, both at the beginning and at various other times as things change – if either a friendship or a relationship blossoms.
'The important thing,' says Dr Blumenthal, 'is to be fully cognisant of where the original relationship came from. A lot of sex work is about an illusion – that the client is the only one, that maybe they're loved by the sex worker. Here, exposing the relationship to the outside world may be problematic if you deny where it's stemmed from.'
All relationships, whether platonic or romantic, start with a bit of illusion and projection, and what makes them succeed is communication, with the other person but also with oneself. That communication may allow the relationship to grow, or founder. You seem grounded and have established boundaries. If you feel safe with this man then it may not be a bad idea to meet him again in a public place and see if you can develop a new way of being together.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
The Sun
2 days ago
- The Sun
I was virgin before university but ended up sleeping with five different guys since… I feel disgusted
DEAR DEIDRE: WHEN I arrived at university less than a year ago I was a virgin, but now I've already slept with five different guys. I used to have a boyfriend when I was living at home, but my parents are very strict and religious and frown on sex before marriage. They rarely let me and my boyfriend out of their sight. I'm an 18-year-old girl. When I applied for university my parents insisted I had to live in halls as they thought it would be safer than a house but they don't know the halls I'm in are mixed. On my first night I went to the student bar and ended up drinking far too much and going back to one guy's room and having sex with him. I felt guilty but managed to get over it. I had sex with him a few more times but he stressed it was just for fun. Although I really liked him, I acted as if I was happy with that. He would come to my room late at night and let himself in, then return to his room afterwards. I don't see him now as he has changed course. I started seeing another student but he was controlling. He reminded me of my parents so I dumped him. There was another one after him but we weren't compatible. Then I've had a couple of one-night stands that haven't gone anywhere. At the weekend I bumped into the first guy in a bar. Dear Deidre on relationships, jealousy and envy I told myself I wasn't going to have sex with him but we ended up in my bed. I feel disgusted with my behaviour. I have gone from having no sex to doing it just for fun. I'm so confused. DEIDRE SAYS: Casual sex risks both your emotional and sexual health but don't beat yourself up. You grew up without being given a chance to develop a sense of responsibility to decide on healthy boundaries for your sexual behaviour. You're giving off vibes that you're up for a casual fling, rather than spelling out what you really want. No-strings sex is unlikely to lead to a relationship. The good news is you can do something about this. Set your boundaries firmly. Only have sex with men who are as open as you are to the possibility of it leading to a relationship. Drinking too much alcohol is seriously affecting your judgment so keep your boozing in check. I'M FED UP OF MOVING HOME AS HE BUILDS HIS CAREER DEAR DEIDRE: I AM sick of following my husband and his job around the country. Is it time for me to break free and move to another area? My husband works in construction and he likes to be near his work. He's currently involved in building a huge estate a few miles from where we live as part of the Government's new housing plan. It's been going on for three years, with shops and schools all in the mix, and my husband is part of different phases. We are both 52 and I've had enough. The area we live in isn't great. Nobody goes out at night because it's not safe. My husband loves his job and simply says it is paying the bills so I need to get on with it. I would love to develop my own career but because we move so often I can only offer cleaning or waitressing. DEIDRE SAYS: If you don't have to work then it is easier to stay where one of you is working but is there no room for compromise? Find a moment to talk to your husband about moving further away from his work to somewhere still accessible but a nicer environment to live in. Could he use public transport or even car-share to the site to take some of the strain off a longer commute? If you can't agree, then see (020 7380 1975) who will be able to help you find a compromise through couple's counselling. DEAR DEIDRE: MY mother's house is absolutely filthy and I've come to realise that she doesn't keep herself clean either. While my wife and I were renovating our really old property, we spent six weeks living with her, along with our two children. My brothers and I have all lived with her at some stage, and the house is always messy. We've had discussions and jokes about having to clean up when we go. This time it was worse. The house was piled up with old newspapers and things she had bought but never used. Mum smells musty too and there are rooms you can't even enter because of everything that's piled up. My dad died 15 years ago. I'm 31 and I have realised that things started to get bad when she was grieving him. DEIDRE SAYS: When people start to let their personal hygiene slip, it is often a sign of depression. You must talk to her. If she's feeling overwhelmed with the property, arrange a clean-up with your brothers. Ask if she has spoken to her doctor about this or whether she would consider bereavement counselling. Check out Cruse Bereavement Care ( 0808 808 1677). You can find more advice through which helps anyone affected by a hoarder or hoards themselves. SHE THINKS ONCE A WEEK IS PLENTY DEAR DEIDRE: IF I didn't initiate sex, my wife and I would be living like housemates. I'm fed up with always being the one to suggest it and feeling like a sexual predator. I've no interest in cheating on her. I love her and she is my world, aside from my three kids who are pretty special, too. We have busy lives with the children's activities, cooking and cleaning, but we both work at it. My wife is 41 and I'm 45. We both have good jobs and sometimes work from home. With our companies both relaxing the rules on being in the office, I thought it would be our opportunity to get physically intimate during the day sometimes when the kids were at school. My wife sees it differently. She thinks sex once a week is enough, so if we've done it one evening, then I worry about asking her again. She's always got the excuse that she is tired or the kids will hear if we do it at bed time. I think we have lots of time when we are alone so why not take advantage and have sex three or four times a week? My wife doesn't agree. DEIDRE SAYS: A good sex life is more about quality than quantity and a good relationship is making sure that you both compromise if there's something you don't agree on. Rather than letting this fester, find a moment when you're not going to bed and ask if you can talk to her. Explain that you feel unhappy with the way things are right now and ask what you can do so she commits to sometimes initiating sex. Having a date night once a week, when there are no distractions like phones, can help. She might feel like sex afterwards. 'Diarising' intimacy often helps couples to make time to ensure that connection. My support pack Different Sex Drives will also help.
The Independent
2 days ago
- The Independent
In temples and churches, sensory rooms remove barriers for neurodivergent worshipers
From organ blasts and incense to forced hugs and hand shakes, for folks who struggle to process sensory input, houses of worship can quickly feel anything but holy. That was the case for Lark Losardo's son Percy, who in 2017 began attending Catholic Mass with his family at age 7. Percy, who is autistic, was often overwhelmed by the Brooklyn church's open space, noise and crowds. At first, when he needed to move around or stim (engage in repetitive actions to self-regulate), he'd leave the service with a parent. Eventually, in part because of the barriers to attending as a family, they stopped coming altogether. Then, in 2020, the Losardos moved to Maplewood, New Jersey. After watching online services at a nearby Catholic parish called St. Joseph's during the pandemic, Lark Losardo learned in 2024 that the parish was opening a sensory room equipped with regulation tools, including a weighted blanket, touch pillow, ear defenders and sound machine. Thanks to that room, today Percy is back in the pews, using the room to regroup whenever needed. "It speaks volumes,' Lark Losardo told Religion News Service. 'Not everyone needs this space, but just having it there sends a very clear message.' ___ This content is written and produced by Religion News Service and distributed by The Associated Press. RNS and AP partner on some religion news content. RNS is solely responsible for this story. ___ Across the U.S., families like Percy's who once thought worship was off-limits are returning to faith communities thanks to a small but growing number of sensory rooms in religious settings. Located in underutilized classrooms, storage spaces and former nurseries, these rooms vary in size and appearance, but are all designed to offer a calm, predictable environment that can help with nervous system regulation. Disability advocates say the rooms signal that a community prioritizes the needs of neurodivergent and disabled members. At St. Joseph's, the Rev. Jim Worth said the new sensory room, which opened in December, isa natural extension of the parish's faith values. To him, the room is evidence that inclusion — a principle Worth linked to Catholic social teaching — isn't just given lip service. 'When you put intentionality behind something, it makes a world of difference,' said Worth. On a 60-degree day in late March, the church, located on a quiet residential street, had a front stoop featuring three signs: one quoting Martin Luther King Jr., another quoting Pope Francis, and a third welcoming anyone in the community to visit the Still Waters Sensory Room. Named after the biblical Psalm 23 passage — 'he leads me beside still waters' — the sensory room was converted from an unused confessional. It was designed by Together We Bloom, a Maplewood-based nonprofit that helps make events and spaces more accessible. The room's dark indigo walls match the comfortable chair glider and beanbag, each contributing to the soothing atmosphere. The total cost of the room was under $2,000 and was largely paid for by church funds, plus some donations. 'This sensory room has really changed everything for us,' said Pavitra Makam, a St. Joseph's parishioner and mother of two neurodivergent kids. 'Being able to worship together has been the biggest thing for our family.' Jay Perkins, who has been in the sensory room business since 2009, said it's often parents in need of a safe, supportive space for their kids who are spearheading the movement to build sensory rooms. When his daughter began exhibiting signs of aggression at age 4, places like libraries (too quiet), playgrounds (too loud) and trampoline parks (too crowded) were inaccessible. That applied to his Episcopal church, too. 'There are so few places where special-needs kids with sensory integration disorders can enjoy it,' said Perkins. The lack of accessible spaces for his family inspired Perkins to begin building the kinds of rooms his daughter would thrive in. In 2018 he officially launched his company, The Sensory Room, which builds high-end, durable sensory rooms from start to finish and trains people on how to use them. 'It's catching on,' said Perkins, whose company built roughly a dozen rooms in 2022 and 80 in 2023. Though The Sensory Room specializes in schools, Perkin's company has also built rooms for a Broadway theater and an airport, and three in evangelical churches. Most of his custom rooms, he told RNS, start in the $20,000 range. One of those projects was the $35,000 transformation of a storage room into a state-of-the-art sensory room at Encounter Church, an evangelical congregation about 30 minutes from Dallas. Completed in February 2024, the renovation included interactive tactile and texture panels, bubble tubes, mirrors, new carpet, paint and electrical work, and an LED-star ceiling complete with a digital shooting star. According to the Rev. Chris Binion, who co-founded the church with his wife, Tracy, the decision to create the room was prompted by the Holy Spirit. 'I was in a season of prayer and fasting, and I felt like the Lord asked me how to take care of his 'littles,'' Binion told RNS. He felt God was urging him to support kids with 'diverse needs,'including autism. 'We decided through the direction of the Holy Spirit to say yes, and move forward in this kingdom assignment." It's not just churches that are revamping spaces to focus on sensory integration. Temple Emanu-El, a Reform synagogue in Atlanta, has adapted two of its rooms to help folks process sensory input. A former cry room just off the main sanctuary was altered to become the Shalom Sanctuary, a small space with a large window facing the main worship space equipped with fidget toys, beanbags and headphones. The synagogue also received a $10,000 grant from the Jewish Federation of Greater Atlanta to improve the accessibility of a classroom. That renovation is almost complete, and the room, which features a wall of sensory engagement toys, flexible furniture and alternative seating (think large rubber balls), will be especially helpful for children who need sensory breaks during religious classes or events such as the annual Purim carnival, according to Rabbi Rachael Klein Miller, associate rabbi at the synagogue. 'Something important in Judaism is the idea that we are all created 'b'tzelem Elohim,' in the image of God,' said Klein Miller. 'And much of that is connected to the golden rule of treating people the way we want to be treated and finding space for everybody in the community.' According to Rebecca Barlow, a regional disability specialist in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, adding a sensory room to a house of worship doesn't automatically make it accessible to those with sensory needs. 'It's just one piece of a bigger machine that you're trying to build,' said Barlow, disability specialist for the Desert Ridge Stake in Mesa, Arizona. The first step to building that machine, Barlow said, is asking disabled individuals and their families what it would take to make church feasible for them. When she first became a disability specialist roughly five years ago, feedback was invaluable. 'The biggest thing was listening. The parents of these children know what they need,' said Barlow, who is the parent of a child with autism. Based on the families' input, she created a sensory room in her meeting house with new donated items. Knowing it would be used by kids who could become aggressive, she removed hard chairs and chalkboard lips that could pose safety risks. She also filled the room with the usual sensory items, added light-blocking curtains and included a night-light that projected a calming light pattern. Still, it took more than that to get families back in the door. "We, as parents of disabled children, often can become jaded, and we lack trust that our children are going to be cared for in a manner appropriate to how special they are,' said Barlow. To build trust with families, church leaders invited some members of the ward to serve as one-on-one aides for each child with a disability. The aides were trained in the homes of their assigned families and eventually accompanied the kids in the sensory room during church meetings. Barlow also introduced the kids to the sensory room ahead of time via pictures and tours, and ward members, too, received basic training on understanding disabilities and how to use the sensory room. In the few years since that sensory room opened, the model has gained traction. Barlow says the seven wards in her stake now each have their own disability specialists and sensory rooms, and she routinely takes calls from LDS church members across the country and the globe seeking to set up sensory rooms of their own. 'It feels like we're seeing a cultural shift toward understanding and accepting and integrating people with disabilities,' said Barlow. 'If we want to follow Christ, if we want to emulate him, if we want to be his disciples … they need to be foremost in our mind.'
The Guardian
4 days ago
- The Guardian
I used to be an escort, and a former client wants to be friends. What should I do?
Until four years ago, I was a sex worker – specifically, a high-end escort. In my experience, when clients treat you with respect and understand the boundaries, it's possible to form a relationship not unlike that between a therapist and a client. One client I was particularly fond of was a man a few years older than me. He is on the autism spectrum, which makes him somewhat socially awkward, but he is intelligent, creative and empathetic – and passably handsome. I always felt he would make a wonderful partner for a woman who could see past his quirks. Last week, I ran into him at the library. The first thing he said was he'd understand if I didn't want to talk – but I was actually glad to see him. We spent about 15 minutes chatting pleasantly, and when we parted he asked if I'd consider meeting up as friends. I took his number and said I'd think about it. I'm pretty sure he's hoping for more than just friendship, but if my sense of him is accurate, he'd accept a 'no' gracefully and respect my privacy. The problem is I'm unsure what to do. Had we met under different circumstances, I might well have considered dating him, and I would definitely like him as a friend. I'm aware of the stigma directed at men who see escorts, but he doesn't fit any negative stereotype. Even so, the fact he's tied to a chapter of my life I've moved on from leaves me conflicted. I don't know if reconnecting would add something positive to my life – or blur boundaries I've worked hard to establish and maintain. I think the fact you're writing to me shows you do want to consider it, but are aware there may be some pitfalls. In some ways you're front-loading the issues you would have – because you already know something of each other's past – more than if you met someone the more conventional way. I consulted clinical psychologist and psychoanalyst Dr Stephen Blumenthal, who has worked with people who visit sex workers. He wonders if this might be less a case of 'wanting a relationship, but rather exploring your boundaries in relation to your previous work and the life you have now'. You said in another message that you had hitherto kept your past work private. Perhaps you now feel ready to merge your past and your present/future, and by allowing this man from your past to possibly be a friend, you can see if this will work for you. Dr Blumenthal explains that he's known 'situations where men have formed relationships with sex workers. Some have succeeded and some have ended in disaster. It's impossible to know how things will turn out, there's no predetermined outcome. And yes, most people assume the relationship between sex worker and client is just about sex, but I've heard many a time it's less about sex and often primarily an emotional relationship that has sex as part of it. It's not always like that, of course, but it can be.' I think you have to be honest (as with all potential relationships) about what you want from this man, and if that's possible. You've been very good at boundaries before, this will need a different set of boundaries and they may need renegotiating, both at the beginning and at various other times as things change – if either a friendship or a relationship blossoms. 'The important thing,' says Dr Blumenthal, 'is to be fully cognisant of where the original relationship came from. A lot of sex work is about an illusion – that the client is the only one, that maybe they're loved by the sex worker. Here, exposing the relationship to the outside world may be problematic if you deny where it's stemmed from.' All relationships, whether platonic or romantic, start with a bit of illusion and projection, and what makes them succeed is communication, with the other person but also with oneself. That communication may allow the relationship to grow, or founder. You seem grounded and have established boundaries. If you feel safe with this man then it may not be a bad idea to meet him again in a public place and see if you can develop a new way of being together. Every week, Annalisa Barbieri addresses a personal problem sent in by a reader. If you would like advice from Annalisa, please send your problem to Annalisa regrets she cannot enter into personal correspondence. Submissions are subject to our terms and conditions. The latest series of Annalisa's podcast is available here.
