Baby Steps…how much did you tell your SO and how long did it take you?

[peach2218]

I told my husband my fetish about 3 weeks ago, after over 8 years of being together and almost 4 years of marriage. It was the hardest thing I’ve ever had to tell him, no joke. 
 

We didn’t discuss it any further after the initial reveal, but last night we had a date night and ended up having a few glasses of wine and playing a couples game together. It was a card game where you ask each other questions ranging from ice breakers to intimate personal questions. One of the cards had the question “do you have any fetishes?”  He laughed and raised his eyebrows at me, and said “you’ll have to tell me more about that one some time.” 
 

There were a couple of cards that had questions that would have allowed me the opportunity to divulge a bit more info about the fetish, but I was too scared to do it. I think if he asked me specific questions about the fetish I’d answer them, but I don’t see myself volunteering information unprompted. I’m still super embarrassed about it.

How much does your SO know? Did you tell them everything in one conversation, or was it more like a trickle of information over time? 

[Melody]

First off, congrats peach! I've seen your posts about you debating this decision for years. I'm sure it wasn't easy, but I hope eventually you reach your ideal situation with your husband and the fetish. 

I told my boyfriend (of now three years) about the fetish 5 months into dating. Unfortunately he is vanilla to his core. But I did it because we are both very emotionally intelligent and always had impeccable communication when it comes to anything about our relationship. I also like being uncomfortable so I also did it to spice up my life, add some excitement to the mundane of my every day existence.  Anywayyyyy, so I told him super early on just for shits. Luckily, he had a completely supportive and normal reaction. He didn't ask many questions about it, not from a place of not caring, he just didn't know what he didn't know. He didn't and still doesn't know how this fetish is a huge part of my sexuality. How I have to think about it to really achieve any type of deep sexual pleasure. I've never volunteered the information because I am still working with accepting this fetish and feelings of deep shame around it. 

Anyway, over the years, he's tried asking about the fetish for more details. He still doesn't understand much, his question about it are simple and are at the tip of a massive iceberg but I answer them pretty vaguely. Like you I would never volunteer any info without being prompted. Still, he's offered to indulge in it with me, which I have always denied. So in short, it has been a slow, very slow trickle of information over time. I am the queen of baby steps, I've fed him little morsels of information - then he forgets about the topic for months at a time and will randomly bring it back up. He understands the basics - I like when attractive people sneeze and him knowing that has been what I wanted him to know. But he still doesn't understand most things. That's my own fault and doing though. I suppose he could do more research about this fetish, he knows about the forum and some general information but has never done any. Sometimes this hurts me, because if he told me about a rare fetish of his, I'd like to think I'd research it. But overall, I think it wouldn't matter anyway, because each fetishists individual experience with the fetish varies immensely. He should be hearing about my personal experience from me. 

So now I feel like I am on an important precipice in my relationship. I think I need to have a long serious talk about this fetish with him and supply the details I've kept vague for years. This is just my personal experiences, but I feel like I am deliberately hiding a huge part of my authentic sexual self from him. I still enjoy our vanilla-ish sexual experiences together but they pale in comparison to anything fetish related. No matter how much I've tried to deny it over the years, fuck myself into being a vanilla, it will never work, the fetish will always be the strongest for me.

I know that I dont ever have to do fetish stuff with him if I dont want to. But I think he needs to know how this fetish is such a huge part of my sexual life, how I think about it really during all sexual encounters, how I listen to wavs, how I equally enjoy certain things related too sneezing but not actually the sneeze itself. I am agonizing over this conversation because the idea of having it with him makes me want to crawl into a small hole and die. He is the sweetest, open minded, non-judgemental, man I have ever had the pleasure of knowing in this life. I know he will not judge me and would love to hear these details but my own fear and shame makes me afraid of this conversation. Though, I think the other option, of him never knowing is worse for me. If he kept me in the dark about something of this magnitude I would feel deeply, deeply, hurt. So why should I be doing this to him? You did not ask for this long tangent, and I apologize. In short, it has trickled in slowly, the bare basics over the years but it's time he knows more deeply about something that has always been a part of me. And who knows, maybe one day I'll explain to him the existence of chinkinni and see what happens. And even if we don't, I'll sleep better at night knowing he understands an important integral part of who I am. 

The reason I went on a long unasked for tangent is because I have deeply sympathized with your feelings of telling/not telling your husband from afar, for years. I've said it before and I'll say it again - being in a relationship with a vanilla while having this fetish is hands down one of the most challenging things I've ever had to deal with in my life. So I deeply, deeply, sympathize with you. And I hope and know you will do whatever makes sense for you and your relationship. This shit is hard to talk about. Okay.

Sending you all the love and strength. ❤️ 

If you ever want to talk about this topic in more detail, shoot me a PM! 

 

Edited July 23, 2023 by Melody

[peach2218]

2 hours ago, Melody said:

First off, congrats peach! I've seen your posts about you debating this decision for years. I'm sure it wasn't easy, but I hope eventually you reach your ideal situation with your husband and the fetish. 

 

I honestly could have quoted and responded to your entire post because it’s so spot on! I have no idea what he thinks the fetish really is. For all I know, he thinks that the act of sneezing/my own sneezing turns me on and not his or other people’s. He has no idea that this is a straight up fetish and not just a kink. No idea that I have to be thinking about it to orgasm. One of the card questions last night was “is there anything non-sexual I do that turns you on?” And that was obviously the PERFECT time to say sneezing, but my shy self just said something about wearing a baseball hat backwards. 
 

He is pretty vanilla and doesn’t have a fetish or unusual kink so I’m extra nervous about telling him the details. 

[Chris]

I told my current wife about my fetish the day I asked her to be my girlfriend. Though I did know her for 8 years by then. I don’t know why I wasn’t more nervous about it, I just somehow knew it’d turn out perfectly fine. 

[peach2218]

2 minutes ago, Chris said:

I told my current wife about my fetish the day I asked her to be my girlfriend. Though I did know her for 8 years by then. I don’t know why I wasn’t more nervous about it, I just somehow knew it’d turn out perfectly fine. 

In hindsight I wish I would have told my husband when we were still in the talking/dating stages, but we were only 18 and 17 and it seemed like the worst thing in the world at the time and I was terrified. 

[Chris]

8 hours ago, peach2218 said:

In hindsight I wish I would have told my husband when we were still in the talking/dating stages, but we were only 18 and 17 and it seemed like the worst thing in the world at the time and I was terrified. 

I completely understand. I’m normally a pretty open person and typically don’t hide things, plus I’m a horrible liar most of the time. So I just flat out said it. I’m super happy it turned out so well, it could have gone very differently. 

[Melody]

11 hours ago, peach2218 said:

For all I know, he thinks that the act of sneezing/my own sneezing turns me on and not his or other people’s. He has no idea that this is a straight up fetish and not just a kink. No idea that I have to be thinking about it to orgasm

This was one of the basic questions my boyfriend has asked me over the years. If I liked my own sneezing. And I simply couldn't have him walking around thinking that so I had to set it straight immediately. I always try to equate this fetish to any type of sexuality. My response to him asking me this was something along the lines of "are you attracted to yourself? Do you get off on looking at your naked body in a mirror? No. Same thing with me sneezing." 

Things like this are hard to navigate.

[Mr Sneezy]

35 years. She didn't bat an eyelid and now sniffs chinkinni for me.

[obsexion]

On 7/23/2023 at 9:50 PM, peach2218 said:

I told my husband my fetish about 3 weeks ago, after over 8 years of being together and almost 4 years of marriage. It was the hardest thing I’ve ever had to tell him, no joke. 

Congrats! I can't imagine keeping it a secret for so long!! It's such an important part of my life that I could never wait that long, also because I'd want to try stuff with my partner etc. In my previous relationship, I mentioned to him I had a fetish like a week into dating, and then 2 months after that I told him what it was. We then didn't talk about it for a while but then he respectfully asked for some clarifications and so I dived a little bit deeper into it. It was always kind of weird to talk about it to him, it was a mixture of excitement and fear and embarrassment idk. It was exciting and scary to hear him talk about the times he sneezed and how he would do it because I had never seen him do it and I was extremely curious and scared. After like a year I had the courage to ask him to induce and he did. It didn't really end well but that was because I wasn't really attracted to him anymore and the relationship was falling apart but I'm looking forward to having fun with this with a future partner! Hopefully. 

[BlessMeAchoo]

I did tell him a couple month after we knew each others. I wanted him to know, so I would be more comfortable when we would get to 18+ parts