I was asked a beaut the other day: what should a woman do if her man discovers her porn stash?
Whoa! Hey! Time out!—- can you say-gross invasion of one’s personal space? (I knew you could). Many relationships have been nerfed (my new fave ‘pet’ word) because of someone else’s or your own paranoia and insecurity. It happened to my previous marriage because my ex would rather believe that I was cheating on him than the more colder reality that I had fallen out of love with him.
See, there’s plenty on the Internet about the reverse situation but nada with this one, and for the simple, albeit the most hypocritical reason: the fallacy is that it’s virtually unheard of for a woman to have an interest in porn much less a secret horde of it. Guys, I seriously hate to break this to you: you don’t corner the market on smut or smut collecting and in some cases, yours truly as well, have just as large (ahem….) and varied of a collection of smut as you. Where this gets the most hypocritical is that women tend to get pissed off when they discover their man’s stash so the men in their lives seem surprised that their women would have one, too. Pardon me while I dive into a friend of mine’s can of snark.
Is this some kind of weird sort of backlash from the sexual revolution? I’m inclined to think so. But it comes back around to this so-called personal space. Everyone is entitled to some measure of it, whether you’re in a martial relationship or just dating. And that shouldn’t suddenly go away just because you are in a committed relationship with someone. But the minute the other person or even you, yourself, crosses the line and starts to snoop around or other wise ‘get curious’, chances are very good that you are going to be bitten, and bitten really…badly! Now, this is not saying that the relationship is doomed by the uncovering of one’s smut collection or even porn interest. But it’s the fact, the other person or you had to sneak around behind the other’s back and look for it that screams there may be some underlining issue somewhere. An anti-trust thing? Or whatever it is that needs to be ironed out.
The person in your life is and should be your reality. Porn’s fantasy, or put in another way that I like: manufactured reality. So what makes our fantasies any less valid or personal than our man’s? Or do the other people in our lives think that the people we watch in porn are what we ‘wished’ our significant others looked like or acted like? That one never really touched a nerve in me because I’ve always felt pretty convenient in my personal body image, despite all the bullying in my childhood and even now I feel pretty good about myself. And I’m also smart enough to know that what happens in movies isn’t truly how something is in reality, and that pretty much goes for sex in film. So if it never bothered me before about how people in porn looked and acted, why should that come into play now if my man was into lesbian porn? (Yes, my man is into lesbian porn…WOO HOO! 
) Should I be thinking that he wishes I looked like the women in the videos? Probably. I’m not going to deny that one. But would he come out and tell me that? No, and the thought should it come as a shocker to many of you, never even occurred to me. By the same token, I doubt very much my man has the same trepidations about my watching the guys in gay porn, and I’m certainly not going to be stopped because my active fantasy life revolves around these guys….there I said it. That’s basically the nature of sexual, intimate fantasy, and in many ways they’re best kept secret. And really, who knows: things may work out that the both of you could possibly have discovered something you can share together if you feel comfortable doing so. If not, no harm no foul, right? And in the end, where really is the harm?
But, in my own fiercely honest opinion, and for what it’s worth, to invade someone’s personal space for whatever reason is so NOT cool and that will more than likely end your relationship faster than freely admitting your porn interest. I don’t care how much love there happens to be in the relationship. It flies out the window or presses the eject button the minute one’s trust and privacy are violated! I think that pretty much goes without saying.
First off, I’m going to state some things here. Again, like everything else I’ve disclosed previously about myself personally, this is mostly taken from my own personal experience. Right off the bat, everyone is going to be different in how they handle these things and basically how people have chosen to handle their own sexualities; I completely respect that. This is coming from me and me directly, just so you know. How me and my husband have dealt with it could be far different than how you would approach it. And I’m not a sex therapist. Period. End of story. What I think qualifies me to answer and have an opinion on this one at all is that I care and I care a lot, and I don’t think that really requires an advanced degree in psychology in order for me to do so. So I’m not going to offer up any advice here, just my own personal insight into the issue and how me and my current honey have chosen to handle it. And in all honesty, I truly have to say that my husband is truly an amazing, lovely guy who has put up with my love affair with the Bel Ami Boys since I first disclosed to him my gay erotica interest. He also knows how firmly grounded I am in reality and despite all my secret wishes to the contrary, he knows I’m not going to hop on a plane for Prague tomorrow. Damn! I certainly think about it a whole ton, and maybe he and I may make a trip there together at some point, but I’ll never act on it without him or without his knowledge. And most important to me of all: I don’t think I could have carried on Bella as long as I have without his steadfast support.
So, having said all of that…..
In a previous post I made a rather long treatise about how I came to love gay porn in general, and you can re-read that if you wish. What I’m about to relate to you now is what happened after my discovery and my interest had firmly entrenched itself into my being.
It was February of 2010 and I had already amassed a fairly decent sized collection of gay porn. Raging Stallion were the first films I collected. Bel Ami’s films came to me around March of that year. My horde was wrapped in TLA Video bags inside my computer desk drawer, sight unseen…..or so I thought. 
My collection suddenly grew to the point where I really couldn’t keep it hidden much longer and I would have to find a new ‘home’ for it. It was when I had bought my first Bel Ami films I knew I had to finally ‘come clean’ to my honey about my porn. It happened over dinner and a beer at our local ‘watering hole’. After imbibing my liquid courage of choice, I got up the nerve to tell him. I explained to him that I was curious about it mainly because of my brother and only partly because of the novel I had finished and working to edit. His reaction to my news was something I didn’t expect: he wasn’t angry, or upset with me. In fact, I can laugh about this now (we both can), I would find out that he knew about it even before I told him. Guess I didn’t do as well of a job of hiding my collection as I thought. He told me about his few lesbian porn DVD’s he had. I thought that was awesome. 
The thing too is that we live in a very small apartment, where we have our computers side by side in our living room (only places for them really). Being in such close proximity made it pretty difficult not to see what the other was doing or looking at on our computers. The thing of it is: we know about the other’s interests and we support one another in our pursuit of them. Neither of us have tried to discourage the other from watching porn. When we watch it, it’s our private time. In my case, he knows that it’s my job, my work I do for Bella (he knows I also watch it in private). There are times he can’t help but see what it is I’m creating: a video edit, a slide show, another gallery.
The point is and what it comes down to in the end is whatever makes the other one happy. And as long as you treat one another with respect and love, your fantasies can and should be yours. And if you’re feeling brave enough or kinky enough, maybe you can invite your own porn heroes and heroines into your bedroom….on video, of course. 🙂
All images remain the sole property of Bel Ami Entertainment and no copyright infringement is intended.