Is seeing a sex worker cheating?

One of the definitions of cheating is: to have a secret sexual relationship with someone who is not your husband, wife or usual sexual partner.

Being cheated on by someone who we love and trust can be truly heartbreaking. We start asking - how they could do it to us? Why did they do it to us? Why wasn’t I enough? Did they ever love me? The agony of betrayal can be devastating. Question is - Do we feel angry because our loved one was being sexual with someone else or do we feel angry because we were perhaps being lied to? And because they were doing things behind our back, that will put us into a position of not just being angry at that person, but also we start feeling self doubt, we start contemplating what was real and what wasn’t, and if there was ever any love between us two.

Love and sex are two very different things. Those two can be combined together but also not. But it seems like most people can’t get their heads around it. Friends who are having sex but are not in a relationship? Impossible. A woman enjoying one night stands, not seeking anything serious, just looking for some casual fun? She’s broken and has issues. A married couple that decided to open their marriage? They need couples therapy or they need to break up because they don’t love each other anymore. You know, in the past it used to be completely normal for a man to have a mistress even though he had a wife. It was something the wife most likely wasn’t happy about but she tolerated it. Yet if woman had a lover she was a whore and deserved to be treated like trash. Somehow the society moved towards monogamy instead of giving women the same freedom from shame and stigma as men used to have. Now if a man cheats it’s just as bad as if a woman cheats although some individuals will always be saying things like woman cheating is so much worse because - boys will be boys and they can’t control themselves whilst women can.

The line when cheating actually starts is different for everyone. We would normally think, as the definition states, that cheating occurs when there’s a sexual relationship. So what if your partner was having secret romantic dinner dates on a regular basis, with someone they were strongly attracted to, but they would never have sex? For some people that could be cheating. Now how about getting a professional massage? What if a woman is being massaged by a really attractive man and whilst he’s massaging her bare glutes, she starts to have very naughty thoughts and a desire for the masseur to stop being professional and touch her in places that he’s not allowed? (Yes, I'm definitely talking from my own experience here.) And then she comes home, grabs a vibrator and satisfies herself over that fantasy? I bet you could find a man whose ego would not be able to handle this. Not to mention the fact that men are often offered a happy ending as part of a regular massage. Massage, no matter what, is pretty erotic isn’t it? You’re lying there as a customer, completely naked, vulnerable, and a total stranger is touching you the way not many people do. Yet this is a professional massage and we’re paying for the service so everyone tolerates it. How about a tantric massage? Perhaps you decide to book yourself in because you desperately need a release, or you are desiring the experience but you only tell your partner you’re getting a regular massage. It’s not necessarily lying, is it? We skip the part about our genitals being involved and that sexual pleasure will occur, because it’s just a massage and it’s completely legal, right? When in full honesty - you’re basically paying a glamorous tantric sex worker to get you off because maybe your partner hasn’t been in the mood. Now let me ask - is this cheating? (And please if you think sex is only sex when it involves penetration what the hell are you doing with your life?) And how about porn? We all watch it. It’s just something that helps us let the steam off for a couple of minutes, then we close our laptops or phones and we forget about it and get on with our day. But for some people it’s unbearable to even think that their partner is watching porn. But by the definition it’s not cheating. It’s also completely harmless. It’s a fantasy. It’s not real. And it doesn’t even have to be porn. It can just be a really steamy sex scene from a mainstream movie that pushes you over the edge. One day I read a tweet from someone saying that watching a camgirl and talking to her is not cheating, but taking her to a private 1 on 1 show IS cheating. I mean, lol? Who the hell is making these absurd rules? So by pressing one button you go from harmlessly watching and talking to a camgirl to cheating on your partner. Maybe someone should write a book with all the rules because I personally can’t keep up. I see it as an online thing. A masturbation. The guy just paid someone to be called daddy through a webcam instead of watching porn, because porn can be so impersonal and some people just want to feel like they are part of something and not just being a voyeur.

Our society forgot that we are sexual beings, most of us with very perverted minds, and we were made to think we should be ashamed about it. The idea of finding “the one” has been sold to us for many, many years. After we finally find the one it means we will never be attracted to anyone else, we will never desire anyone else and we will always want each other and crave each other no matter what. For some people this idea actually works. For most it doesn’t. Because if it did, there wouldn’t be such a high rates of divorce. Growing up most people including me were raised by single parents. We grew up being in the middle, bouncing from one parent to another, wondering why our lives aren’t full of love like you see on TV.

Thinking about my previous monogamous relationship, I remember telling my then-boyfriend that if he ever cheated on me I would want him to tell me. Because it wouldn’t be the cheating part I would be upset about. It would be the lying to my face and pretending like “nothing happened” part that would make me wanna smash his face. Speaking as a person who has cheated on someone in the past - this shit just happens. Whether it’s just sex or actually falling in love with someone else, it happens. We are not meant to suppress our desires or keep them secret, and we’re not meant to suppress our feelings and emotions. By doing that we only end up unhappy. And then we blame our partners for that.

I’ve had plenty of married clients and maybe to your surprise - most of them were in a really happy marriage. They weren’t looking for an affair. They were looking for excitement. Something new. Routine can be a bitch and fucking the same person for 20 years unfortunately becomes a routine. Having sex with a familiar partner is amazing, but being touched by someone new for the first time, them exploring your body and you exploring theirs? We will always crave this sort of excitement. One of my clients deeply cherished his wife and family. But he really enjoyed being pegged, and it’s something he felt like he couldn’t tell his wife because she was very old-fashioned. So he would be seeing me, enjoying the sensation of being penetrated, and then we would have regular sex. Afterwards we’d take some molly and have deep talks about life. At the end he was happy, he felt refreshed and he could go back to be with his family with these positive feelings. Thanks to that his relationship with his wife could be even better, because he wasn’t lacking a thing. In a way, we could be sad that some people feel like they can’t talk about their sexual needs with their partner, but he comes from an older generation, and no matter how much we try - some people won’t understand other sexual desires apart from the obvious ones. For example, in Desperate Housewives when Rex, the husband of Bree - the most uptight wife on the street - was seeing a sex worker because he had a deep desire to be dominated in bed, and he thought his wife would never understand. He wanted to enjoy that part of himself freely and without shame. Bree eventually found out and was disgusted. After some time she turned around and actually decided to give it a try to make her husband happy, but life is not a movie, and the possibility that in real life the wife would never change her mind and will never be able to look at her spouse the same way is very high. It’s something that will never happen with a professional. And doesn’t it feel so great to be free of stigma for once, when the whole world is based on shame?

Then of course there are clients in unhappy marriages, maybe only staying with a spouse because of the children, and they don’t have the time or emotional availability for an affair. So they hire a sex worker for a little escape. Because with us they can truly forget their reality, even just for an hour, and feel some intimacy that truly makes life worth living. Maybe you’re asking me if I ever feel bad sleeping with married men. And the answer is no. Because I am providing a service, and personally - I just listen. I would not bitch about anyone’s wife, I would never give any advice about anyone’s marriage, and even though it may not seem like it - I have respect for the wife. You know, no sex worker wants to steal your partner. We are just trying to make a living. And if you ever found out that your partner has cheated on you, would you prefer if it was a drunk girl/dude in a bar, their colleague at work, or a professional with absolutely no bad intentions?

So back to the headline of this post. By the definition, it is cheating. But as I said, every person has completely different boundaries and different ideas of what cheating actually is for them. For some, even porn is unacceptable, and for some, it’s not cheating unless actual penetration was involved.

I believe seeing a sex worker is harmless. You are paying for a very discreet service, just as if you were going to get a massage. It’s not an emotional affair. What truly hurts is when feelings are involved and we are being lied to by our loved ones. Not really the sex part.

Of course, the best scenario would be to have clear communication with your partner and be able to talk about needs and desires with no need for secrecy. But we are not living in a perfect world and relationships are everything but easy. We are all trying to do our best in a world full of unspoken rules and unrealistic expectations.

And I just want to be clear and say that with this post I'm definitely not saying that cheating is okay and going behind your partner’s back is okay. But I also don’t judge. And people have their own reasons for doing things that they do.