Advice from Mr. Savage

After a bit of a break, I’m back to blogging.

Working in communications, I spend a large part of my days writing. So when work get’s crazy, by the time I get home, the last thing I want to do is sit at my keyboard and tap out coherent thoughts. Work got a bit hectic for a month there, but thankfully it’s calming down.

This post was actually inspired by a recet chance encounter.

I was grabbing dinner at Chipotle after work last week and ran into a gainer friend (because New York is just one of those places where that kind of thing happens), and we got to talking about our respective developments in coming to terms with gaining.

He mentioned that a few years back, when he was in a much more conflicted state, he had called into Dan Savage for some advice. For those of you who don’t know, Mr. Savage is a gay man with an internet radio show through which he dishes out sex and relationship advice to straight and gay people alike.

My friend is rather embarrassed by how much of a mess he was when he made the call, but he agreed to share it with me and you all in the gainerverse.

The recording is available here. (Just skip forward to 13:15 to hear the conversation)

I was impressed by how much Mr. Savage seemed to understand about this kink, but he also appeared to conflate the act of feeding with a broader interest in gaining. It seems like he didn’t quite understand the caller’s desire to actually get fatter and not just play with food in bed or put on a couple pounds.

But otherwise, Mr. Savage had some pretty sensible advice to give. Anyone who’s ever felt conflicted about this—or any—kink, should give this a listen. I’m sure you’ll hear something in my friend’s voice that sounds altogether familiar. I know I did.


KNOWING IS HALF THE BATTLE

The conversation covers a lot of ground really quick, so there’s plenty to take in, but one of the things that struck me most was that my friend had all his facts straight—they just weren’t connecting to something deeper within him.

You can hear him say that this kink is a part of him and will continue to be for a long time. He seems to know that to be happy, he needs to engage it, whether that means telling a civilian partner about it or dating guys who are into it as well, or even gaining some weight himself.

And yet, he seems to be unable to make the connection between those facts, which he accepts on a conscious, visceral level, and something deeper that’s happening inside him.

No matter what he knows—and what Mr. Savage says—it just doesn’t feel right in his gut (pun intended).

For as much as we like to think that people are rational beings, we’re largely not. We’re emotional beings, which is what makes us so unique.

If we were rational, and always acted in ways that served our own happiness and prosperity, life would be pretty routine and boring. But we’re unpredictable. We act based as much on feeling as we do on facts, if not moreso.

And the thing about facts is that they don’t always coalesce with our deeper feelings. So even when we accept them (like accepting that this kink isn’t going anywhere and that to be happy, I need to engage it) it’s still hard to make the jump from simply knowing that to really accepting it—and living it.

Deep down inside, I think a lot of us want to be “normal.” Most kinks only manifest themselves in the bedroom. If you like feet or scat or bondage, all of it happens behind closed doors. So you can engage those kinks and 99 percent of your life can still be “normal.”

But gaining has ramifications for our lives outside the bedroom. Those extra pounds don’t disappear when you climax. And your friends will notice your partner’s added girth.

All of that can make accepting—and I mean truly accepting—this kink a little bit more difficult. Especially when that little voice deep inside you is sending all kinds of mixed messages about your body, your role in life and what others will think of you.


CERTAIN MISERY VS A CHANCE AT HAPPINESS

Mr. Savage said something during the conversation that I thought was particularly profound:

“Just like at one point you had to accept your homosexuality, you need to accept that you have this [kink]. And it’s not the [kink] that’s making you miserable. It’s you not reconciling yourself to the [kink] that’s making you miserable—it’s the conflict in your heart that you maintain through not accepting it and having a sense of humor about it.”

In a nutshell: the kink isn’t the problem; the conflict we create about the kink is.

I think that’s an important line to draw for those who are conflicted, because when you view the kink—and with it, your sexuality—as a problem, you end up turning it into an “other”. It becomes something separate from you and damaging to you. So you focus your baggage on that darn kink. If only you could shake it off, everything would be better.

By turning something that is naturally a part of us into an “other,” we keep ourselves from accepting it. The only way to get over that is to take all that anxiety and fear and refocus it. Instead of hating and resenting the kink, hate and resent the conflict you have with the kink.

Make that conflict the thing that needs to go away, not the desire to get bigger or make someone else bigger.

Mr. Savage continued with his advice:

“You’re miserable right now. You have the certain misery of continuing on as you have up until this point. Or you have what? Maybe you’ll be open about and some people will be shitty about it, and you’ll feel a little bad about it. But only by being open about it will you meet other people who are open about it and self-accepting about it, and find some happiness and contentment. It’s just like when you’re in the closet, when your option is certain misery in the closet or a chance of happiness out.”

The idea of accepting this kink and all that goes with it can be scary (it is uncertain, after all), but it’s a wholly happier prospect than ignoring or suppressing it.

My friend on the call refers to being dealt a weird hand. I think all of us were dealt weird hands, but I’d hardly call them bad hands.

We can’t control the cards we’re dealt. That’s for certain. But we sure as hell can decide how we play them.

I say, play for a chance at happiness.