Why I can'T.

This conversation on Grindr was one of the most thoughtful explorations of how some guys feel on meth that I've ever experienced. This guy has done a lot of thinking, and I feel like he's more self-aware than most. It's been an issue for me - guys who are using are often very difficult for me to have fun with, for very complex reasons, and this helped to kind of pin some of it down. Quoted in its entirety, with permission. Just for grins, I included the permission part, because I feel like letting people SEE  me negotiate consent is important, whether in a conversation or a scene in meatspace [Also: how awesome would "MEATSPACE" be as a name for a sex club?]. To be painstakingly clear, the T - along with several other euphemisms and nicknames, such as getting cloudy, calling Tina, ice, ice cream, the ice-cream cone emoji, the snowflake emoji, getting spun... they're all about methamphetamine. This drug has caused more damage, ruined more lives in the gay community, than anything else besides AIDS. It makes me sad, and it makes me angry, and I know that each one of the guys using, is using for reasons of their own that I have no insight into. 

And I want to thank this beautiful complete stranger for allowing me to quote our conversation, because that takes a lot of vulnerability and openness, and I feel like it's a big thing for him. I see you, beautiful boy. Thank you for your honesty. 

Heyo there Sir. How are you doing? 

I am doing well. Running errands. How's by you?

I'm doing well Sir. Was just looking for someone to join me chilling tonight.

Tonight isn't feasible for me. I'm interested, but busy 

I like to be very honest and transparent. I am a submissive bottom here, into mild to wild and kinky play. Bondage, role play, choking, poppers, cnc, ws,  but I am a parTier and I know that can be a hard limit for people so I bring it up. 

Thank you. Yeah, that's a hard no for me, the T

Absolutely understandable. Maybe we can play when I'm sober sometime 

I remember something on Sniffies and cumming to your profile when you said you pride if they bleed…. 

Hmm... I haven't used Sniffies in a few years 

But I have that on Scruff 

NOTE: to clarify, exactly what it says: "I don't go out looking to get blood on my cock, but when it happens, I feel oddly proud." [see also: Shrouded.]

I'm sorry I meant scruff. I use Sniffies and don't have a scruff anymore… but I remember seeing/imagining the scene… and I had to get off 

Aruuuf…. Holy fuck 🥵. I can't imagine 

😳… I can't imagine what that would be like… I have my gag and lockjaw…. But I still fantasize about you ripping my hole and being proud when you send me packing breedings and bleeding…being choked out and used 

Is that ever going to be possible for me Sir…

The T is a big issue for me. I have had several bad experiences with guys on it. 

Is it just how they acted or? Cause I don't act any different it just makes me horny at this point 😣. 

And I pride myself in my honesty and that is the truth Sir…

There's a way they feel to touch. It's kind of jittery, anxious. Most guys on it want to get fucked, but can't cum. It just doesn't feel happy for me.

I know exactly what you are talking about. That comes from the person and there reasoning for smoking usually. What's subconsciously going on. I know I am shy by nature when meeting someone… so that does come out as anxious energy. And that jittery is mostly just depends on the volume of T they have done. 

I'm sure that factors into it. I just keep thinking "he's so hot... What could it hurt?" and then it feels weird and disconnected and sketchy. It's like he is not able to connect with me as a person... His brain is all rushing in circles with

I WANT TO GET POUNDED. SO HARD. FUCK ME, FUCK MY ASS, FUCK MY HOLE UNTIL BLEED, YEAH, ROUGH ME UP

And I'm just like the dude there with the dick. 

I as a human being become a placeholder. He doesn't see ME there, he just wants stuff done to him. 

And that's the thing that gets me. Guys on meth, and for the most part guys who WANT meth... They're not in the room with me. I do some deep, weird, intense shit. I'm very sensual, in addition to being kinky and rough. And you have to be really present for that to work. 

And a lot of those guys, it feels like they go into the clouds because there's something in their lives they can't be present for. 

And in that dodging, that avoidance, they go to a place where I can't reach them. Or, rather, they go away, so that I can't take them with me on a trip. 

I'm all for adjusting your chemistry if you need to. I like to fuck on THC, and I'm a fan of poppers. I have recently and radically rewired my brain with the help of psychedelic-assisted therapy. But those things make the experience more sensory for me. They don't take me away.

This is weird I know... But would you mind if I include a couple of your text messages in a blog post? 

This is mostly how those blog posts start. I am having a conversation with someone, on Scruff or Grindr or instant messenger... And by talking through it, something becomes clear to me. And this is the first time I've really put a finger on why guys who are on meth and coke are not good for me to fuck. 

Sorry for the late reply. And yes you can, I have found from the inside that if you aren't using with said person also when you get high and are sent into space if you aren't both in it it's like one of you starts to circle the other instead of being in orbit together. 

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And this is an unrelated story, but it helps to illustrate. 

There was this handsome Black guy at Club Dallas; this must have been over a month ago. He was STUNNING - an angular, bearded face, an underwear-model body that I would have enjoyed drawing. Sometimes guys doing various kinds of sex work will go there to meet with clients; he looked like the kind of guy whose rates would be pretty high because of all the print modeling work. The point I'm trying to make - he was HOT. The kind of hot that I usually don't hook up with, because they're on a different mission, or just out of my league. 

He mostly stood in the doorway of his tiny room, watching guys go by. He looked like he was waiting for someone that he had only seen on an app, and was examining all the guys walking past as if they might be the one - or maybe he was just hoping for a connection. It's hard to tell, and I don't often ask. He caught my eye, and I stepped up to him and I told him he was a beautiful man, and he told me I was hot, and we made out a little bit. He played with my dick, but he was looking left and right, furtive, as if he was afraid of getting in trouble. He wanted me to step into his room, but I had just arrived and was making my way around the place checking things out, so I thanked him and said maybe later, and wandered on. He felt twitchy. 

A while later, I was in my own bigger room with a hot boy I was fucking. We were having an awesome time, and I had the door open so that guys could watch - some of them would stand there and stroke their dicks, others would wander off, a few would step forward into the room. I made it very clear who was allowed and who wasn't; it's MY room, and I'm in charge. He asked permission, and came into my room, and engaged with me a little, and then he shut the door. I opened the door, and I explained that while he's welcome to stay and hang out and play with us, it's my room, and I want the door open for now. He hung out a little, but then left. It felt like the attention was too much for him, like he didn't want to be seen.  

Then later, I was walking around, and he asked me into his room. I decided to give it a go. He really was an astonishingly handsome man. You see them more often than you'd think at a place like the baths, and they're often some sort of special edge case - married, mostly straight, can't date guys because of church, or family, or job, porn performers meeting a client, or just having fun... if you play it right and keep your eyes open, there are some spectacular and unexpected experiences. And sometimes guys who are twitchy have a specific thing, and once that's sorted out, they relax and they're fun to play with. 

We made out. He sucked my dick. I enjoyed touching his body all over - he was so strong and muscular, and his skin was a satiny caramel. His beard was thick and strong, and I loved the texture of feeling it against me and stroking it with my fingers. We tried a variety of different positions, and he wanted me to fuck him, but was having a tough time with it. I put him on his back on the bed, and then I saw something I've never seen before in my life. The whole area around his asshole was covered in dense, velvety soft black hair. It was fucking beautiful; it swallowed light to the point that it looked like part of him had been removed with Photoshop. It was plush to the touch, and every time my cock rubbed against it, it was delicious. Watching my dick vanish into it was magical, like it was a portal into nothingness. This is a total aside, it was just one of those things that made me stop in my tracks in wonder at the variety and beauty of the human animal.

After a while, he asked if I minded if he smoked. He pointed to his pipe, and I knew what he meant, and suddenly several things made more sense. I explained that I'm not a fan, I don't want to be around it, and I should probably just go. He begged me to stay, and said that he'd just do a little bit and it would take the edge off and it would make it so much easier for him to ride my dick like he really wanted. I finally relented and said OK, and stepped out of the room. After a couple minutes, he reopened the door, and I went back in. 

He was different; calmer, less agitated. He had clearly only smoked enough to take the edge off; there was no smell of it in the room, and he wasn't to that glassy-eyed point of being out of things. We tried a few more positions, and then he got self-conscious about whether he was clean enough. I get it, I totally understand being anxious about that, but it was a problem the way he fixated. He would rub his fingers on his ass and sniff them, again and again. The thing is - he was fine. He was clean; there was no bad smell, I wasn't complaining. Maybe he felt something up inside that I didn't know about. I told him he should just relax and enjoy the ride, and if we needed a shower after, I was fine with that. I honestly don't know whether the drug had amplified his anxiety, or if there were multiple issues going on, or what. But after a while more of this, I told him I needed to get a drink of water and wander around, and I left. 

As it so often is with things like this for me, I think it's TWO things. The actual way that somebody behaves, feels, interacts with the world, shifts when they're on meth. They produce an energy that I don't like. It's hard to connect; it's difficult to feel like they're fully present. They are twitchy and weird. At higher doses, they can be checked-out and glassy-eyed, especially if they shoot up instead of smoke. But the other thing is that there's a REASON that guys turn to it, and the reason often is a deep and abiding problem of its own - insecurity, fear of connection, internalized homophobia, inability to deal with being quiet and alone in your own mind. For similar reasons I've taken Xanax, and Welbutrin, and Prozac, and Pristiq, and Zoloft, and Valium, and THC and Flexeril and Trazodone. Doctors gave them to me (well, except for the THC) but they're not drugs that make it better, they're drugs that help ease the pain. It's the reason I've been in weekly therapy for years, talking through the fears and the anxieties and the terrible aching existential loneliness. I totally get that part. But if you numb that emptiness with chemicals instead of turning toward it and recognizing that it's just part of the human condition and it's the other side of joy and the counterbalance to connection - you can't fix it. If you connect, and you come to peace with yourself, and  you fix your own shit, you find you don't need it the same. And when I said that he was trying to close the door because he didn't feel comfortable being seen - it has a deeper meaning, too. Like he was uncomfortable with another person really SEEING him, recognizing him as a full and whole human being with all his joys and his flaws, looking at him without judgement or shame, and giving him space to be himself. He seemed uncomfortable with direct eye contact, with quiet pauses, with holding still. I've read a LOT of Buddhist writing.  Pema Chödrön writes and speaks at length about a concept called shenpa - being hooked, being attached - and I think that's what it is. We get hooked, we feel that shenpa, and we fall into the pattern of soothing and numbing and scratching, instead of relaxing and feeling the itch and letting it fade.