Erotica and me

This post will probably never see the light of day - you see I have a strange problem - a kind of internet OCD. Anything I write or comment or submit to online, including emails, blog posts, letters, has been worried over, written, re-written - is it saying what I want it to say? Will it be taken in the spirit I intended? Could it be interpreted badly? Even clicking 'like' on a post sends my heart racing.

The only exception to this rule, is my actual story writing. That is where I am free and easy with everything I've got to say. It's like it comes from somewhere other than myself - I go into the realm of my own imagination and just let it all out. I can write over 60k words and not worry about it at all.

So why erotica?
When I was a teen I found some gentlemen's magazines and my world was complete - what fun I had, the things I was reading put into words the images I had in my head and wow, it was exciting! And then, I read My Secret Garden and Men In Love and Women on Top. Even better! These books with women's fantasies inside were amazing to me - some of the activities didn't ring my bell, but I feel richer for having read them, and some, well, I can close my eyes even now and read those beautifully put together words of erotic fantasy. And there's the word - fantasy.

Then, one day it somehow filtered into my mind through friends and the media that it was wrong to be titillated by such work. Porn was degrading to women and evil. I was horrified. I had never felt degraded, only extremely turned on, therefore, I must be evil - or worse, a bad feminist - or not a feminist at all. It really damaged me to feel like this. I really felt ashamed of my love of reading about sex - not the factual how to sex, but the explicit fantastical depictions in writing.

And so, I buried my love in a shameful grave, saving my exploration for my own mind and body with my partner. For a very long time.

And then, I started to write my own stories. And one day I submitted one to an Xcite anthology - and guess what? It got published and here I am over a year later with many more stories out, a novella and a soon to be novel. And yes, they are all about sex and erotica. I was worried my work would be too explicit - what with using such terms as the C word...

I needn't have worried at all - I started reading everything Xcite had to offer (well, that's an exaggeration - I'm a slow reader but you get my drift) - then Total E bound, Beachwalk, Ravenous and on and on. I filled myself up with the stories I'd craved for so many years. And the erotica community welcomed me. In all my life, I have never been made to feel part of something more than I have with the writers of romance and erotica - what a wonderful, lovely bunch of people.

But, something still lingers from my years of suppression. I do not shout loud and proud about what I do - close friends know - some think it's ace, others (strangely those I thought most open minded), visibly squirm and I have to assure them that no, I won't make you read it. As soon as someone hesitates with their response, I dive back into my shell.

I love that some of the erotica writers I have become friends with online have some really positive articles published in the news, really bigging up erotica to be the wonderful thing it is, thank you.

I think that sexual love is the most amazing thing you can share with another human - it heals, it bonds, it transcends, it thrills, it sets the relationship apart from all others. And to read and write about it is even better (well, not quite)!

So readers, if you have made it to the bottom of this post - thank you - this opening of myself has been pure torture for me and I may delete it by tomorrow, but for today, here I am.

Love T x x