A trip down memory lane: walking past my childhood home and remembering my sexual awakening.

Disclaimer: this post contains a discussion of nappy wearing for the purposes of pleasure. Second disclaimer: that is a doctored picture of me–but that’s my body, and if you know me, well, it isn’t so different that you wouldn’t know me

On a recent trip to South America I found myself drawn to my old neighbourhood, my old street, a flood of memories, and soon found myself standing in front of my old house.  Unlike the entire city around me, nothing had changed.  There were some bits of wear on the old wooden gates, but apart from that, the stucco was still the same colour.  Even the same trees were there.  Yes, the house looked smaller—isn’t that what they always say?

I could see the balcony off of my bedroom, the French doors as they had been.  There were no signs of the current residents about, the house was quiet.  It was in that room that I had my very first orgasm.  I can remember that I wasn’t expecting it, or even know what such a thing was.  It was not expected, I had never heard of an orgasm.  I wasn’t even touching myself.  But I did feel good.

What was going on?  I was wearing diapers.  It was the first time I had worn diapers in a few years, a problem of access more than of desire.  But by pure chance, I had discovered in our local supermarket, that they sold “old-style” diapers, which were essentially very large, thick, long rectangular pads sold with a stretchy vinyl cover—the kind that you would tie at the side like a bikini.  While I grew up in Johnson & Johnson plain white disposables (if that isn’t a marker of age I don’t know what is), these “budget” diapers had been around before and after my time.

If I lay two of these rectangular pads together lengthwise, they were long enough to feel real, and the vinyl cover was way too large for a baby without folding it down (as a way to create a flap over each end of the rectangular pad) so, together, this worked nicely.

It took me some days to work up the courage (oh the things we have to work up courage for in life!) to go and buy these diapers, but I finally did.  I hid them in our garden, and later that night, when the rhythm of the house had shifted from downstairs to upstairs and the maids had retreated to their quarters, I crept downstairs to our front garden and attached the rope I had dangled from my balcony to the handle on diaper bag, and then slipped back upstairs.  When I was sure everyone was asleep or in bed, I pulled them up to my room and took them to my closet.

Of course later I rediscovered the joys of scent—baby powder especially, but on this night, I took one of the soft white vinyl covers, lay three pads (two for length and one for bulk) onto the cover, positioned myself on top, and then pulled the cover and pad up between my legs.  To say that this feeling transported me would be an understatement.  I was in a kind of aroused fugue, a state of bliss that is hard to describe, and which I have come to associate with the term “little space” a kind of head space that is very similar to “sub space”, only it has to do with baby feelings.  It is a feeling of pure bliss.

And after I had tied first one side and then the other, I lay there as if paralysed, crippled by my own arousal.  The air was still and warm, the air rippled with static electricity, and I was transported almost as if I were in a state of hypnosis.  I don’t consciously recall having erections, though I surely did, before that time, or of ever having felt so aroused—though I am not sure I even knew what that meant.  And with barely a ripple of movement, I discovered just how good, good could feel, and presently I had my first orgasm.  I had no idea what had just happened, other than how good it felt, and how I wanted to feel that again.

It was also followed by a “come-down” period which was tinged with perplexity and shame.  I was 13.  Over the years, this cycle would repeat on a grander scale, and became associated with cycles of purging—when I might throw out everything I had bought and vow to never indulge myself in this way again.  But I wonder back how many of my orgasms in life have been in diapers and how many from intercourse, and I would most definitely guess that more than half have been in diapers, perhaps quite a bit more.

I was curious about this, and certainly the kinky letters about “adult babies” and such in magazines like Penthouse Letters or Forum, were always a joy for me to read.  But so too was Psychosexual Infantilism by Dr Wilhelm Stekel.  I learned about clinical words like fetish, and understanding never really lead to comfort, as neither the kinky writing nor the clinical writing did anything to really explain what was going on or make me feel better about it.

One of the reasons I turned to therapy for the first time was to excise my desire to indulge in this behaviour.  But it remained a difficult topic to discuss, as much I felt for me to bring up as what I perceived as a discomfort in my then therapist when we did bring it up.  There was a strong correlation for my “need” to wear diapers and how much I enjoyed it and the level of stress I was experiencing mainly in my professional life.

I could be in a super stressful situation, a meeting where I was put on the spot, or having to speak publicly and I was overwhelmed by this sudden vision of me in diapers, crawling around, sucking on a dummy, and being a baby, and I just wanted to crawl into this space and hide.  And then I would open my mouth, start my speech and everything would be fine.  Nappies accompanied me through some of the biggest steps in my career.

There were a few embarrassing moments too.  A customs official opening my suitcase in South Africa and asking why I had a suitcase full of diapers.  Being “caught” by a police officer after being pulled over for some traffic infraction and sitting in my car in diapers (he didn’t want to deal with it so just let me go).  That isn’t to say I was always going out, I almost never did, and was always super discreet…I never wanted to make my kink anyone else’s problem.

And in most cases, when I dated, the diapers were put away for the duration of the relationship.  As I grew older, and became a little more comfortable with it, I began to share that this existed for me.  It was always important to me to make the distinction, “but I don’t actually use them,” as if that makes any difference, but it mattered to me.  But sharing the existence of the need was not a way to play together—I wasn’t always comfortable with it, and I was also not comfortable with sharing something as an ulterior motive.  I was hyper-vigilant about that in myself—I didn’t want to impose my kink on my partners.

One woman I met seemed to see right through me, and started calling me “baby” almost the first time we met.  She would lean in to me and whisper it in my ear.   Not surprising that I fell for her really hard and fast.  She was the only person I ever dated who seemed as into it or possibly more so than me.  She loved to use it in playful conversation when we were out and about, loved to use it as a way to flirt with me, and she always packed my suitcase when I went on business trips with a little care package of diapers…and she was big on kinky telephone talk, and loved having me diapered in my hotel room and talking to me for hours, flirting with me, reading to me, and me going deeper and deeper into a kind of hypnotic trance state of love, comfort, and bliss.  It was really beautiful while it lasted.  That relationship blew up spectacularly, but she never once used this against me…instead she just took all of her favourite lingerie of mine…and even now when I see her from time to time, she is still so kind to this part of me and we can still use the same terms of endearment we had for one another…and I think there was a kind of innocent love that existed between both of us, and it fed and nourished both of us, and that’s why we never took pot shots at it even while everything else fell apart.

What is a fetish?

Strictly speaking, a fetish is “a form of sexual desire in which gratification is linked to an abnormal degree to a particular object, item of clothing, part of the body.”  Love the use of the word “abnormal” don’t you?  Well, this is pretty standard even from those in the therapeutic community that are supposed to help us.  And help?  Shouldn’t it be for us to not have self-loathing for things that hurt nobody?

Well, I certainly loved the feeling of diapers.  How soft and thick they are…and the smell of baby powder, and all that stuff.  But the more I read about fetishes, the more I realised that it didn’t feel right for me.  The term “ABDL” or “Adult baby diaper lover” is a popular catchall, but I also found that it didn’t quite fit how I felt.  Sure, I love diapers.  But I don’t love diapers for the diaper.  And I can’t quite identify with the role play aspects that many people who share this predilection get into.  

But the vibe that comes to me in this context is very powerful magic.  I went to see a couple of “nurses” or “mommies” many years ago in London, and I found the experience kind of clinical.  I remember that they diapered me and then left me to own devices to “have a wank” I suppose.  That’s really not me.  I rarely, if ever, set out to have an orgasm from this practice.  If I do, it is just because it happens.

Instead, I am in pursuit of a feeling.  There is a kind of emotional state, the kind I described from my first time, which is a kind of hypnotic state.  The people in London I went to really didn’t do it for me.  It made me hesitate to explore this with another professional, though recently I did, and it was really quite special.  And in truth, as with my GF, the “accessories” are incidental—they don’t really mean anything anymore.  They are simply triggers.  The triggering can just as easily be done with words, with tone, with touch, with a kind of energy emanating from another person.  

What is that feeling?

I know where this comes from, what need it fulfils, why it arose, and what purpose it serves.  The feeling is the safe space that a baby feels when held by its mother, attached to her breast, suckling, protected, nourished, warm, comfortable.  I don’t believe that anyone has figured out why or how certain things become sexualised by us, deep-seated needs, formed in either love or pain or in the crucible of some other strong emotion, but one of the many important things I learned in my time with M.N. was that the erotic is a gateway to something deeper—that which arouses us does so to show us the path to that door…and that door might have come into being for any number of reasons.

When my therapists tell me to learn to mother myself, to learn to cuddle and hold space for my inner child, to go back to that me of the past and reassure and comfort, they are doing the same thing in a way.  

By whatever process that led to it, I developed a need to feel nurtured and protected and held, and yes, the trappings of “babyhood” are tools that get me to the doorway, that help to put me in the right frame of mind, but whether on my own or with someone else’s help, that is a place that I need to go for my health and well-being in times of stress.  Those who live in glass houses should not throw rocks, right?  Well, living in this particular glass house has taught me not to throw rocks in the form of judgement—to always strive to not judge others.  That applies to all aspects of life, sexual, professional, emotional, racial, religious, whatever…tolerate or be damned.

But that feeling that comes when I am in “little” space reminds of that feeling I get when in “sub” space.  It is not a rational place, but a feeling place, where everything is touch and sensation.  And the arousal is intense.  It is not genital in the conventional sense, it is whole-body, but also emotional…like every cell in me has become awake and is tingling.  It is an erotic ache that because it isn’t genital in nature, does not seek to go anywhere, to do anything, does not have a goal of orgasm or anything other than just being, being in feeling, and soaking in it.  It is divine.

Sidebar on Infantilism and pedophilia

I am perplexed by how these two are often confounded.  So many people seem to associate infantilism—the desire of a person to be a baby or to adopt the objects of infancy—with pedophilia, an attraction to children.  And yet, they could be said to be complete opposites.  My understanding is that these two have not been documented together (though as with anything there are most likely exceptions)…

Many infantilists arrive at this point through some form of neglect or abuse, and in my experience, this produces a kind of reaction that is hyper-protective of childhood, children, making them/us the last people that would harm children, breach their trust.  I think of my own life, my own children, but also what upsets me most in human relations—and it is this.  Child abuse is the greatest stain on society that exists.  The crime of pedophilia is for me the worst.  I believe in charitable giving, and this cause gets the most of my attention.  It is the theft of innocence that hurts, and as someone whose innocence was stolen, I sympathise with children who face this everywhere.

So, it is with a mix of shame, anguish, and upset that I feel the judgement of others in relation to this particular topic.  My own wife, when we were in our early dating period, carried this prejudice against me—and it showed itself a few times.  I don’t know if it ever went away, and I will say that it consciously made me wary of being put in situations where there could be any ambiguity of my relationship with a child—including my own.  It was and is terrible, but it is no chance I would ever take…

When I think of the innocence that I seek as a “little” (which is the endearing term that I have adopted from this community to describe what it feels like), and how gentle and sweet it is, I can’t imagine what it would be like to have that dragged through the filthiest gutter that exists.

How it has brought joy to my life

I guess everyone has different ways to cope with stress.  Some are socially acceptable, and others are not.  This one is deeply therapeutic for me, and I can do it by myself if I have to.  I also don’t have a compulsion so deep that I need to do it to the exclusion of other things.  It isn’t a “have to” thing.  But it is a “nice to” thing.  And what I discovered recently is how going to this “place” with someone else who encourages you to be there, to be into it, and to be given the space to breathe in doing so, then other things can grow.

This feeling produced a euphoria and strength in me that triggered my willingness to come out.  This picture of me…which has been doctored in important ways, is still recognisable if you know me…that is my smile—the joy in my face is mine.