has anybody had a very negative reaction to this fetish?

[Guest sweet_hitch]

Hi -

As you can see, this is my first post. I have, involuntarily, reacted with fascination and pleasure to sneezes ever since i can remember.

It was such a shock and delight to find this forum, and i love reading the stories and observations.. but i can't imagine ever 'confessing' this to a partner!

Every time a see a boy sneeze, it sends a little jolt of passion through me, and at least some of that is because of its secrecy, the fact that they could never GUESS this reaction!

I guess it comes down to; i don't know, personally, what telling someone would really achieve, if part of the thrill is based on the reaction's spontaneity?

Many of my fantasies involve sneezes, but to have these come to pass with active role-play wouldn't have that power.

Of course, everyone's different, though -

I'm just happy i found somewhere to explore this and express myself

[brownsville]

Other related wild speculations: (just throwing these out there to see what anyone might think)

Almost all fetishes involve things that are experienced at a very early age; eg various bodily functions, specific textures, physical sensations such as being restrained, tickled or even spanked. To me this also supports the idea that a fetish, or at least the basis for one, is formed in early infancy.

Many fetishes involve some degree of vulnerability or helplessness, which to me seems a key element. Perhaps some of us find it easier to experience desire when the object of our desire is helpless and unlikely to reject us. Conversely perhaps some of us are only able to let down our emotional barriers when we ourselves are physically helpless.

I think you are absolutely right there, certainly from my experience. t's interesting that you cite this as a possible reason, because i think thats EXACTLY why i like it. I've often analysed myself and my fetishes and they all revolve around some kind of vulnerability and helplessness. Now, when i was a child, my parents were quite tough and undemonstrative people, and i was raised to be the same, and i feel almost "cast" in that "come on, get up stop crying toughen up don't be daft!!" mold. if i ever perhaps said to somebody as a kid"oh, are you okay?" somebody would go " oh a rare moment of concern there from her!!" and would have made a big issue out of it, as if i were acting out of sorts. i think that many people see me as tough and capable and cool and hard headed. And ive never felt as though i've been able to break out of that. i'm the type of person that if somebody started crying, i would go "haha! come on, don't be silly," and try and make jokes to cheer them up, and say come on sort it out man!

ive never felt comfortable with emotional situations, and i feel awkward in them, and sympathy and caring was almost something that became taboo to me. but with most things that are forbidden or taboo i think theyve become more tempting. i'd often feel sorry for somebody but feel unable to express it. when i became a teenager and became involved with vulnerable men, ones who didnt know me very well initially, and people i had to become intimate with and do things like kissing or hugging with, i felt as though they were begging for my attention and i cringeworthily gave it to them, and found they gladly took it without making an issue of it or calling me soft or whatever. i think in this way, i associatated the societal taboo of sex with my own taboo of signs of vulnerability like sneezing, colds, crying etc. hence my fetish was conceived.

i'm now a woman who has an incredible soft spot for vulnerable men, and i long to comfort them, but i'm still bound in this way that any kind of sympathy is taboo.

the other night i went out with friends. we ended up in somebodys room, and the guy whose house it was was very drunk and feeling a bit low and (!) had a cold. he was sitting next to me on the bed and i know this guy well, and he was saying things to me to the effect that he wanted me to come and sit with him and give him a hug. now because two others were there watching me. i totally froze. utterly. i really wanted to do something or say something to him, but ended up taking the mickey out of him going " oh, hes moaning, shut up, here he goes! cant handle his drink!" and i felt as though i could not do what i wanted to do, because there were two sober people in the room with me watching me. i kept trying to tell myself that i could go over there and see what was up with him, but these two people were stopping me, because i couldnt get over the shame of breaking down the barriers id cast in my own head. when they went to the kitchen, i got straight up and sat with him and said "oh, whats the matter, you okay? oh, there.. you're tired huh?" because he was so drunk i guessed hed never remember me doing it and there were no people present watching me, so i guess your exactly right in youre theory! which is why i dont tell anybody about this fetish and i keep it private because i guess if anybody knew, the self consciousness would stop me enjoying it.

[resolution]

As for the more general environmental account you sketch here, I tend to agree with that, too. The only concern I would have is that the account is sufficiently general that it is probably true of a wide range of deviations from the norm, both sexual and non-sexual. That doesn't mean the story is in any sense wrong; it's just that I would like to know more about how parental absence, or a particular sort of parental absence, leads to a fetish in particular, and then ideally to this fetish in particular. (I also tend to think a particular sort of parental presence might be important, too, at least in our fetish: a kind of over-monitoring, particularly about illness and/or body functions.) That's asking for a lot, of course, but the kinds of explanations really are hard.

I strongly suspect that my theory applies to any fetish, not just sneezing. If a parent is emotionally unavailable, or even if parents do not demonstrate any affection for one another, it could inhibit the formation of a healthy model of intimacy for a child in relation to one or both genders. This is what I'm suggesting could make the child more likely to develop a fetish of some kind. The specifics of the fetish are quite possibly random; we happen to fixate on sneezing because perhaps we were given a lot of attention when we sneezed, or maybe we just happened to be feeling something pleasurable at an early point in development when someone nearby sneezed, and we formed a connection.

In fact I also suspect that a great many people have minor versions of fetishes, but they're simply things the person happens to like; minor turn-ons as opposed to actual fetishes. For those of us who did experience the kind of factors we're discussing here those turn-ons go on to develop into a full-blown fetish; something that becomes necessary rather than just fun.

lk, I like your idea above that over-fussy parenting could also be a factor, this makes a lot of sense to me.

Other related wild speculations: (just throwing these out there to see what anyone might think)

Almost all fetishes involve things that are experienced at a very early age; eg various bodily functions, specific textures, physical sensations such as being restrained, tickled or even spanked. To me this also supports the idea that a fetish, or at least the basis for one, is formed in early infancy.

Many fetishes involve some degree of vulnerability or helplessness, which to me seems a key element. Perhaps some of us find it easier to experience desire when the object of our desire is helpless and unlikely to reject us. Conversely perhaps some of us are only able to let down our emotional barriers when we ourselves are physically helpless.

I've often wondered why many straight female fetishists also like female sneezes but the same is seldom true of males. Maybe it could be because the primary caregivers for an infant are much more likely to be female (mothers, aunts, female nurses and/or babysitters are more likely to be involved and for greater periods of time than their male counterparts), and so we are simply more likely to experience female sneezing during our early development.

Psychological theories this sweeping are generally....well, too sweeping.

By the way, vulnerability and sexuality are not just connected within the context of this fetish, they are intimately connected in general. Even the smile (in the first stage of romantic encounters) is speculated by many anthropologists to be a sign of submission.

[Nevyn]

Brownsville: thanks for sharing your story. I can relate to it and I'm confident there are others here who can too. I love being comforting and supportive to a person (especially a sneezy female!) in private, but I find it hard even to say "bless you" if there are others present.

Psychological theories this sweeping are generally....well, too sweeping.

By the way, vulnerability and sexuality are not just connected within the context of this fetish, they are intimately connected in general. Even the smile (in the first stage of romantic encounters) is speculated by many anthropologists to be a sign of submission.

Both good points. My theories are certainly not complete, I just think it's interesting to throw some ideas around and see what people might think. And I totally agree that most sexual practices have elements of submission/dominance, and fetishes in particular often highlight or formalize this. It's not as if we fetishists are all that different to anyone else really, we just happen to be turned on by a very specific form of vulnerability.

[Guest]

I did, bitch. It's just about blown over now but its still tricky. I've been more lucky recently.

[count tiszula]

I sympathise. I have told very few people, the reaction has not always been the entirely favourable one most people tell us about, and when someone found out without being told, it was pretty disastrous...the bitch, I must echo. [Though she seemed to forget about it at one stage]. Which is why I advise anyone to be very careful, particularly in youth when you can't really control who you associate with.

On the related matter, it seems to me that there are many varieties of the fetish. I have always assumed that it has a very strong hereditary component, unsound though it be, because I assume it begins with my own pleasure I derive from sneezing, which is most likely a hereditary trait. In my view I have extrapolated that to assume that other peolpe enjoy sneezing too. So all this notion of control/humiliation and the like does not really chime with me. I am not primarily concerned with illness, so to me an attractive girl with hay fever, pursuing an active life with moments of extra ecstasy, is an admirable figure, momentarily but not essentially vulnerable, and neither of us is humiliatong the other.

[Frozencat]

For me I have had people ask me to explain it (the majority of my high school friends know of it and some others as well) and how I could find it attractive, but they have been largely positive or accepting and playfully joke about it if at all.

I have been lucky, though it gets thrown around when friends are having temper tantrum arguments and start throwing around irrational things. That is pretty much the worst that has ever happened for me, personally, which I'm kind of glad about because it might been I have accepting friends