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I’m crawling downhill, my arms so tense, spiderlike fingers searching for the bit of rock to grab, red soil filling my shoes, the Sun burning my face and the wind drying my tears. I am so ready to give up. I am so... ready... to... give up.

I am eight years old, descending the Valley Of Castles in Kazakhstan and my dad is ahead of me, effortlessly making his way down. He knows we’ll get to the water and it’s going to be glorious. But I am eight years old and I want to make him proud but this canyon is just as big as the void in my soul and I can’t keep up. I freeze and just sit there and think I am going to die.

I am not screaming for help, I’m just sitting there, silently, I feel like a failure and yet I pray for him to rescue me.

I am standing in the spotlight, my hands above my head, holding the bar. I am scared. I want to make Hoss proud of me. I don’t have much will to fight for my life but whatever is left always comes out with him around. The light is so intense I can barely see him. But I know he’s there, so I can close my eyes.
And there goes the cane.
And it’s not even started but I’m already sobbing. I am sobbing because I feel like I am trapped up that canyon, although the man I love is not facing away this time. Every hit of his cane is a reminder that I can make it and I am in control and I need no one. It hurts like hell, it’s my first proper caning and I can spot some people watching but I don’t feel them, I can only feel my body until I don’t. And it stops. Everything stops. My thoughts stop. The pain is everything and I know I can still make it. I like it. I love it. It’s like being home, somewhere I can scream, somewhere I don’t have to be ashamed of my own pleasure.

The reason I don’t want to be tied up is because I can make it, not because I know I can let go but because I know I won’t. It’s like being in that canyon again; grabbing the rocks like they’re the last thing I’ll touch in my life, because I am fighting for life. I give up control in my mind, because if a man can get hold of that, I become infinite. And Hoss definitely can, with so much grace and elegance, reading me so well, anticipating my emotions, creating a safe space, giving me a home...

I am still crying, and the Sun is still shining, so careless... My eyes are shut and I am sure I’m going to die alone. I can smell my dad’s flannel shirt now, I feel his arms wrap around me; I hear his voice, he’s telling me that my fear is bigger than my eyes; he’s giving me the instructions on how to keep going.

And so... I keep climbing down. My dad is just a touch ahead of me this time, I am not alone. I feel the sweat in my hands and it’s quickly absorbed by the rocks, or by the Sun. I just need to make sure I am slow, and I am breathing.

I wish I could stop crying but I can’t because this loneliness is just pouring out of me in the form of physical pain and it needs more time, just a little bit more time to become my will power. Just a bit more... Just a little bit more. My hands are sweaty, slipping off the bar but I won’t let go, I will never let go. I am fighting for my life.
“Breathe”, Hoss is telling me. So I do and I realise that my whole life is a fucking apnoea.

Dad and I are in front of the river now; it’s so blue it hurts my brain. The descent is just a blurry memory and the Sun is behind the edge of the mountain now. Nothing matters. I made it. No one tells me I did well so I think it’s only normal that an eight years old kid climbs a fucking canyon. And I spend the rest of my life climbing, never really appreciating my achievements because I take my success for granted; not because I am spoiled or lucky, but because I never learned to stop to appreciate the very fact that I am alive and that that in itself is amazing.

Kink is teaching me to take that moment for myself and share it with my top, someone who tells me that I did well and it’s not taken for granted. I know BDSM is not therapy but when I look at the signs on my body I see beauty, intimacy, pleasure, and I breathe in and only then can decide if to take someone in or just leave them on the surface. Pain is healing me and I only now know why I hurt myself for the first time when I was eighteen. I just needed to prove to myself that I could make it, I needed control and I just didn’t know there was a safe way to channel that energy.

I went back to the Valley Of Castles in 2013 the last time. I stood on top of the canyon and just felt the fire in me getting bigger. I would breathe in the wind and breathe out the fire and fill up the mountains with my essence. I could have died right there and regret nothing. That’s how I feel at the end of a bottoming session and why I cannot have sex during or afterwards, everything is linked to my childhood too much and there is still a lot to process.

It also has a lot to do with my gender identity. Pain allows me to neutralise my gender to zero, it happens through my body but it doesn’t have to be sexual, it’s above and beyond sex. My breasts and pussy are a hard limit, apparently... for now. I’d love to explore that side of my sexuality but I need to make space first. One step at a time and I will be climbing that canyon all the way up by myself and my dad will be out of the picture and I will have my sexuality back. And I will stop to appreciate it.

I am so ready to fight.

Skin on fire

Write something, write something, write something. I keep telling myself to write something, anything; nothing comes to my mind but I am not empty, rather filled with this synthetic fatigue and exasperation because the skin on my arms, face and neck is itchy as fuck and I have to keep my sleeves rolled up because the t-shirt’s fabric makes everything worse, and I pull away when Hoss tries to kiss me because my lips are inflamed too.

My scalp is burning, and it’s like the continuation of an endless stream of thinking, it stops at the epidermis and bounces back in a needling nervous tick throughout my system. I want the world to stop, I wish I could lie down and cry but I know that the salty tears will burn my cheeks even more and I will struggle to keep my eyes open afterwards, and when I’ll try to wash off the tears with fresh water, everything will flare up again.

Eczema.

My only way out is to sleep, or take illegal drugs because alcohol has a devastating effect on my body. Sex is also not the easiest choice because if I want to be fucked from behind, I need to be careful not to lean on the sheets with my face, if I am on top or in any other position that leaves my face visible to my partner, I lose my confidence and even though I know no one cares and I probably still look beautiful and it doesn’t matter if I don’t, I dissociate.

Perhaps I can write and dive into this, accept it, feel it, allow myself to hate it without retaining the bad energy for too long. It’s like physical pain, when Hoss says “focus on the pain, and now let it go”. Maybe I can do this with this inflammation too. It’s my body literally fighting itself, me not accepting this condition equals to not accepting myself.

What would I do if a friend of mine had an eczema flare up? Would I be checking on their physical appearance at every occasion? Would I tell them off if they’ve mistaken or overlooked a triggering food? Would I make a list of all the things they should have done better to prevent the inflammation from happening?
No.

But here I am, struggling to love myself when I need it the most but pushing myself to write because I know I’d hate myself even more if I failed at this commitment. When it comes to writing, the best advice I’ve ever heard was “write about what you know”. Sometimes I don’t know... but I feel, and I just focus on describing that feeling and somehow I end up knowing.

My dear readers, I am so tired. I am tired of my overly sensitive body, so open to harm but so stiff and afraid of pleasure because of my PTSD: I am tired of not having a place I could call home, as I am so easy to adapt and I happily live on the move but I wonder how much of it is in my nature and how much of that personality trait is actually pure survival; I am tired of giving my soul away to people I believed nice but who just don’t know what they want and project their shit onto me, blaming my “luck” instead of focusing on what they could do for themselves without comparing their life to someone else’s; I am tired of pulling back and dosing myself because sex work is not seen as a real normal job, and I am tired of my privileged point of view only because most of what I create doesn’t involve my face in front of the camera; I am tired of being told off by the people I trusted because of their poor communication skills and my ADHD, because I do fucking care, my dear readers, I care, I care so  much, I care too much and I am harming myself to keep me grounded in order to listen to every single word I’m told and I will still miss some bits and beat myself up to put a sentence together and show you that I did my best, my absolute best but my brain is not like yours and the only tool I have to absorb everything and say everything is writing.
I am tired of not sleeping at night because I am already thinking of how to structure my morning in order to get shit done, no one else will, this is my life and I have the absolute control... and that scares the shit out of me.

To come back to my eczema, maybe it’s food, maybe it’s stress or a combination of both, but maybe it’s me in the need of love for myself, craving acceptance and rest. Maybe it’s time I say a big “I don’t give a fuck” and move on and if things don’t go as the others expect them to go – I don’t have any expectations, I just always do my absolute fucking best, so I see no issues -, maybe the others can go fuck themselves (and ask me for advice re sex toys, but hey my job is not a real job).

You see? I was in agony, and I didn’t know what I was writing about, but I could feel... and now I know.

Can you see me? - my film

Aaeysha is standing in front of the window; I am behind her to the right so I’m sure I’m not in the frame; James is at the camera, outside, so I’m getting this really strange effect, because when Aaeysha is further from the window and the camera, she is closer to me physically.

I look at the monitor and the light is perfect, she is beautiful and this is exactly what I imagined when I was writing the treatment nine months ago.

I remember the casting, Aaeysha on Skype as she’s telling me what she liked the most about the story, and I am not even sure I am listening anymore because something clicked in my brain and I know she is the right performer, she is Teicu, she is even better than Teicu because her smile is real.

When I completed the script, I immediately thought of Bishop because he has this natural way of channelling his sexual energy... but it’s not like he acted in something like eleven XConfessions films, we had to see our options but in my head he was Min and it would have been really difficult to step out of that. Here we go, sitting in a bar in Berlin, me trying to explain what I want, hoping he says yes. He says yes.

“Camera happy?” I ask.

“Camera is very happy” says James and when I hear that particular inflection in his voice I know we are connected and we’ve got the shot. I love my DOP. I came to this level of trust and understanding with James, when I just know I can say “it’s a sad morning” or “it’s a neutral scene” or “his thoughts are warming up to his fantasy” and James knows, he nods and he is moving the lights already. When I say “it would be nice to have a camera a touch ahead of the action, to convey a nervousness, to leave the viewer edging”, he gets the movement right each time and I can feel my muscles relax and I can focus on my feelings, and I feel like I am creating and I am doing what I was born to do.

I remember “Coffee With Pleasure” and how nervous I was before and during the sex scene, not knowing exactly what to do with myself, focusing on James and his second camera operator, directing them instead of the girls. “Can you see me?” is different, because I explained everything to James in advance, thoroughly but leaving enough space for him to decide for himself, so I am in the room with the performers, to make sure they are safe, to make sure they don’t need anything and to make sure I am control of such a vulnerable intimate moment; I am praying the gods of ethical porn and hope I am doing the right thing. I look at the monitor and again I am blown away by the fact that two human beings are sharing their sexuality with me in order for my characters to come to life. It’s not an easy job. I stand there and everything looks perfect because unlike my first film, this time I give up control at the right time and let Bishop and Aaeysha express themselves and I trust James and Marshall that they are filming exactly what needs to be filmed. I am calm, breathing slowly, I know not everything is going to be perfect, but as they say, the film is told three times: shooting, editing and colour grading. I feel like adding a few more: writing, scripting, shooting, editing, grading, composing and sound designing. And I trust my team of passionate and skilled humans. It is going to look great, maybe not as perfect as in my head at the time of scripting, but it doesn’t have to be, because this is tangible, this is the proof that we go places when we dream.

I pitched this story to Erika Lust for her to direct it nine months ago, and although her production manager and she liked the treatment, they didn’t have time to produce it, pretty understandable considering how much content they release throughout the year. I just thought to myself that no matter how, with whom and when, “Can you see me?” will go to production. And it did. In August I’ve got an email from ELF proposing to work for them again, I dusted off Teicu and Min’s story... and four months later the footage is with Hoss, sitting next to me sending out releases and pulling the reins to make sure we go smoothly into post-production. Hoss! The love of my life, my partner in crime, in work, my best fuck, the best human being I’ve ever met. Who else could have been my producer? This is so huge I cannot imagine trusting anyone else, and I was right, and I am honoured he wanted to accept the job offer, and all this wouldn’t have been the same without him by my side, as a professional and as a warm presence on and off set, someone believing in me and reminding me that others believe in me too or they wouldn’t be there. I remembered about Victoria+Jean working together and how fascinating that felt to me, and how badly I wanted something like that...

I always get what I want, when I know what I want and when I am not afraid to want it.

Thank you to everyone who worked on this project, and who still is... The filming was a blast, and I can’t wait to go into post-production and see this vision pulled together. I could see the passion alive in your eyes, and I was impressed but not surprised with your skills; I know this level of grace comes with hard work, dark days, sweat and tears, doubts, but also trust, love, strength and perseverance. I know it because I’ve been there, and I am still there sometimes, but I am also here, here with you.

I want to mention something Marshal (second camera) said when I asked him how it was for him to film a real sex scene being that his first time, and he said “it doesn’t make a difference from filming any other film”. And that’s how I want to see our future, making beautiful porn, treating it with respect and importance, normalising sexuality to the point it’s just another beautiful thing humans do, and not a scary marginalised taboo.

I am proud of my sexuality and of the creativity that comes within, I am not my job but my job is a big part of who I really am. Thanks to all of you who respected that so far.

All backstage photos by Kriz Barvsson and his partner and assistant Dorota, another example that life partners can work efficiently together. I like these two humans, they are nice and always bring a positive energy on set, it’s so so so important to smile when things get tougher, and they can definitely do that. We worked few times together now and I can’t imagine my set without them.

Levels of pleasure

The first time I tried a Doxy wand I was blown away. I remembered those kink.com films in which people would lose their mind over a vibrator and I thought it must have been because of the intensity of the BDSM session in itself and because of that only. Well, I was partly wrong.

I was in Berlin and it was the first time with my current partner and I found myself worried because I struggled to orgasm. I had no issues on my own but it would take me a while with a new partner, and most of the time it just didn’t happen altogether. He was going down on me and I was turning into a bunch of nerves, my thoughts drifting away, dissociating. He must have sensed it and he took it easy, said he wanted me to try something and took out his Doxy Die Cast. It looked intimidating, my eyes went wide but I was back into my own body and I decided to give it a try.

I am not saying Doxy is now the solution to all my problems related to sexual pleasure... But it is.

He pressed the wand’s silicone head against my clit, softly, and turned the vibrator on. I don’t remember which level of intensity he started from but I had no idea I could feel like that in my own body. It was simply too much and yet... I didn’t want it to stop. I could feel myself alive and present, very grounded but without all the worries in my head, nothing mattered, only me and the release of endorphins and serotonin in huge quantities I thought were not possible naturally.
I sometimes forgot to breathe to the point he had to remind me; he told me there were nine levels of vibration and we were on level four and I thought “holy fuck”. And because the Die Cast model is made of aluminium and titanium, it’s heavy, it has a natural rumble to it when you apply more pressure, so it’s just a blessing for someone like me, because I like it hard but I become too sensitive very quickly; you can play between all those levels of vibration and how much pressure you apply and find the perfect balance, you have options, you can personalise your experience, and you deserve it.
Later on he started to use his fingers too, holding the wand’s head in his hand and pressing it against my clit, his fingers inside me passing some of that vibration to other internal spots. It was too much for the first time. Everything was just so wonderfully too much! It was an interesting experience, observing myself getting used to more, more of pleasure, more of everything, more of myself and the levels I could climb were simply infinite. Our bodies can take in everything.

I can take level nine now and I will also press the wand against my body to feel it vibrate in my bones and as someone who made of their sluthood a job, I am just grateful to myself for prioritising pleasure and for the fact that my pleasure is taken seriously by the people I sleep with, by the industry I work in, and by companies like Doxy.
I came back to London still smiling, and my vagina would flare up anytime I would remember how I felt with the Doxy against my clitoris. It was a relief to know that I could orgasm anytime I wanted, with anyone I wanted, as much as I wanted. A granted orgasm. A strong, overwhelming, mind blowing guaranteed orgasm that would remind me that I deserved pleasure at all times.
With this new awareness in my mind, I opened the drawer next to my bed and took out all my sex toys and tried each one of them and realised that the only orgasm I could get was not making me justice; if I wanted more than one, the toys I had were simply not enough and two of them died on me because they are rechargeable and the batteries couldn’t keep up with my libido. I felt disappointed and frustrated and I made this.

Laughter is a good way to process negative emotions and sitting around crying was not going to get me anywhere anyway. I reached out for support and understanding from my community but got so much more. Doxy got in touch with me and I now have my own wand, it’s a classic black vibrator and I leave it plugged in next to my bed, so it’s always ready and it never fails me and I can cum as much as I want and no one can stop me (well, perhaps an electricity blackout). The classic wand is less intense than the Die Cast, it is not as rumbly but its lightness makes it easier to use during penetration so that your partner can apply more pressure with their body against yours with the Doxy between the two of you. You can also use it on a penis, that’s so, so, so much fun! But that’s a story for another time.

This is my story. What’s yours?