Original subtitles

[soft music]

- [Raj Voiceover] The central part of my work

is the fact that

no matter age,

race, size, whatever,

it doesn't matter.

Your body deserves pleasure.

- [Oscar Voiceover] The reason that I like

providing the service is because it allows me

to really be present with that person who's in front of me

to make sure that I give them the most of my attention

so that they feel like they're being heard, understood.

- [Rogue Status Voiceover] In some way or another,

I'm kind of this sexual teacher, rubber, and leather,

and knot tying, and shibari, and BDSM play, and limits,

and what's right, what's wrong, how to navigate

and trust and bond with your partner in that way.

- [Jon Voiceover] There's still that taboo of,

oh, you hired someone for sex work.

That must mean something about you.

These are people that want human compassion,

want touch, want a massage,

want, you know, the same thing that everyone else does.

- [Rogue Status] I think people lie to themselves

about what their wants and needs

and desires are for so long.

It's a way for them

that they can actually be themselves for a minute.

- [Oscar] Touch doesn't always necessarily

have to mean intimacy, and intimacy doesn't always

have to mean a romantic situation.

We can separate those things.

- [Raj] That separation needs to happen.

Sex means so many other things than what it is.

It's just like another way of expressing yourself,

another way that your body receives any kind of healing.

- [Jon] Lots of people don't have the same benefits

of just that human interaction.

And it really is more of kind of like a healing,

kind of relaxing, you know, human contact.

- The more that we live behind our screens,

the more we forget to actually keep connected.

I think most people, in their regular lives,

if anything, they receive a handshake.

But for the majority of us,

we don't really get a lot of wanted physical affection.

So professional cuddler is someone

who dedicates themselves to providing affection and intimacy

in a platonic way to those who seek it

or who find are missing it from their everyday lives.

So a lot of people have the misconception

that it's just a coverup for sex work.

So when we talked in the cafe,

you mentioned that you wanna kinda start off things

to test sort of those boundaries

- with me. - Yes.

- I do find that there's value in having conversations

around sex, sexuality and sex work

because they're part of our life

and there's no denying them.

But the biggest thing that I always

have to drive home with people is that,

no, there is room for a platonic service.

- The service I provide is a bit more of a

sir dom BDSM kind of clientele relationship.

I'm mostly in charge and a sir or dom.

I'm Raj.

I escort.

What it is is I hold space

for people to experience pleasure.

Initially, what was stopping me from doing it,

I thought it was about,

I'm like, "Oh, I'm not attractive enough."

Much in the same way, initially,

when I got into go-go dancing, it was very much about,

okay, what does your body look like?

But then, you know, I had this realization

where whatever it is that you uniquely give out there

that's you, if people respond to it,

then that's what they're looking for.

- And that's why this kind of platform is there,

because there's a plethora to choose from.

Also, I just constantly remind myself

that I'm always somebody's cup of tea.

I'm constantly having repeat clients, which is great.

Anyone can fuck and be a bottom,

but if you can actually provide a mind fuck

at the same time, then you got something else.

The nice thing about this work

is people are looking at my picture

and booking me because of me.

They know what they're getting basically

when they're booking with me anyway.

My only fear was what if I just don't like doing it.

But that didn't happen.

I actually really enjoyed it.

One of my favorite parts during the massages,

I'll get on their back and just lie on top of them.

And it's amazing having people just feel that weight,

kind of just that being held, having a tight bear hug.

And I love seeing that.

That's when they get really comfortable

and just kind of, you know, you've had a nice moment,

and you know, you can go on.

You're able to see the journey

from when they are in their heads and being like,

"Oh, my god, what's going on,"

and then at the end of the session,

them being completely in their bodies.

And I'm like that's why I do it.

[soft music]

[Andrew] I moved.

I've been here two and a half years now, three years.

Two and a half years, so 2016.

2016, June, I moved.

One of my favorite qualities of Raj

is that he will actively listen to you and pay attention,

and he'll also share some of his own personal experiences

of like how his day is going.

- Hug my pillow, yeah, exactly. [laughs]

- [Andrew] It's so cheesy but it's adorable--

I know.

Because it's not...

And I think that builds connection.

So when we're having sex, it's like you're having sex

with a real person, and that's nice.

- And a lot of the clients that I have are the ones

that it's their first time experiencing something like this.

And when they first show up, they've never been,

you know, with another man before

or haven't experienced anything like this.

And I've had, actually, a client,

he had trouble kind of actually even being naked.

He said, "Thank you for helping me,

"bringing me from me head into my heart,

"because I was so scared of intimacy

"but you helped me do that and realize

"that my body is deserving of pleasure however it looks."

- What Raj and I do together in a session is we chat.

He comes in and we say hello, and we say, "How's your day?"

It takes away any weird power imbalances of like

he's a sex worker providing a service and I'm the lonely,

sad client that needs to get off with a sex worker.

It takes all that away

and it turns it into we're just two dudes.

So we'll have that comfortable chat,

then we'll move into like some making out

and some touching and some body stuff.

It's so variant in what it can be.

We don't decide we're gonna do this,

and here's a checklist of things I expect from you.

- The physical part of things might start a lot later.

It might start right at the beginning.

It depends on whatever energy you're bringing,

what each person is bringing in.

It's not for what we do, but it's the time spent,

that is what they're paying for.

Whatever sort of happens between us

is whatever happens between us.

So I know a lot of people might have an a la carte menu,

like this is for this much.

And for me, personally, I'm not a vending machine.

And keeping that sense of just going with the flow,

they get surprised because they end up feeling things

that they never thought they would ever feel.

The minute I go into, "Oh, they look like this.

"Oh, my god, how am I gonna get turned on,"

once again, then I'm missing the point.

So when it comes to honoring somebody's body,

I can't be in my head.

I have to be, and tap into that unique part of me

that connects with them so they are able to feel good

in however shape, in whatever place, in however they are.

There you go.

- My stage name is Rogue Status, and I identify with that

as a deviation of a standard variety.

There's a lot of negative definitions of the word rogue,

but one of them specifically is a deviation of a norm.

And I'm definitely not run of the mill and never have been.

So,

I left home quite early

and kind of had survival mode from a really early age.

I guess it kind of was a bit of a catalyst

for me to get into sex work because when you need money,

you do things that you're not, you know,

that you wouldn't normally think you would do.

I used Rentman, I used to use Rentboy

before the whole thing went down.

To protect myself and clientele.

I have a disclaimer that my payment is strictly for my time

because whatever happens in that time

is between consenting adults.

Anyone can hire somebody for time.

It usually starts with a quick phone conversation,

usually over text or a quick phone call

if it's very specific requirements

that they're interested in.

I like to narrow it down to what the timeframe is

and what they wanna do.

I usually arrive, take care of business,

which means finances first

because it takes that awkward element out of the way,

which is always awkward.

Quick freshen up, and that's usually

doing my shot of Trimix to make sure

that my boy's good to go even if I'm not using it.

Trimix, it's a triple-mix injection

that you put into the shaft of your penis to hyper dilate

the cavernosa and keep you hard for quite some time.

Sometimes I fake my orgasm, most times,

unless they really wanna see it.

But most of the time, it's not about me getting off.

I cringe at the thought of touching any stranger.

I also cringe at the thought of being touched most times.

I try to find something sexy

about each person that I'm with and focus on that.

People think that you can just go and get hard

and do your thing and get paid and go,

but it's a lot more than that.

And the majority of the time, I don't even get hard.

And I use Trimix because when you're filming in a movie,

you know, you don't have to be hard for two hours.

You have to be hard for many hours.

Not bad, not bad.

But one more time, and slow.

- [Rogue Status] What you guys all see in that 21 minutes

was actually eight hours.

I've been filming with Mainline Studios for about,

I don't know, 10 years plus now.

Up against the fucking wall.

Yes, sir.

- You know, a decade ago, when I started filming,

your pay scale was quite a big difference to what it is now.

Porn is basically your promotion

for your brand at this point.

I travel all the time for work.

I live very rural,

but I also have full-time construction work

because it's equally as good money.

I think it's really beneficial to have

an element of both worlds.

Otherwise, you're gonna get lost in your character too much.

That is one of the reasons why I go back

to my spot in the bush because I can get grounded

and reconnected to who I am after going rogue.

Rogue Status was actually a performer at big events

and parties before branching off into a porn career.

By the time I had already got there,

I had already built this brand and alter ego.

So Rogue Status is everything else

that I haven't been able to be myself.

- I've been called Kitten Bear for a while.

It was my online name for a while,

or for Scruff for a while.

I never identified with the puppy side of things.

I'm too independent.

I'll come and play with you

and then I'm gonna go do my own thing.

And so Kitten kind of just worked for me.

But Kitten didn't really describe it

because I was bigger than that.

And so Kitten Bear kind of came from cuddly like a kitten,

big like a bear.

And when I met Nigel, he was the one

that really grasped on that and jumped on that.

He's like, "Oh, that's your Scruff name?

"Why shouldn't this be your Instagram name?

"This is what I'm gonna call you from now on."

I grew up in Alberta, in a very small Mormon community.

And as you grow up and leave, you know,

I'd say it took four or five years to get fully comfortable.

I'd say now, I'm fairly well adjusted to, you know,

a new life and just my life.

I have an Instagram.

It's something that me and Nigel started more as kind of

a fun like, oh, let's see how many followers we can get.

One of the business opportunities that took off

kind of from Instagram, Twitter, things like that

was a site called OnlyFans where people basically pay

whatever monthly fee that you're charging

for access to all of the content that you post.

And so, you know, for us, we post, you know, naked pictures.

We have friends over to have sex with.

It's a porn shop for us.

For other people, it's fitness.

You can do anything you want.

It actually became fairly lucrative, for Nigel especially,

when we actually started throwing parties together.

It really kind of took off where, oh, this is something

that can really help in so many ways,

just having that much influence

as far as number of people seeing what you're offering.

And so, I mean, there's OnlyFans, which is that.

We have the parties that are going on,

and it's only increasing there.

I'm doing massage right now as well.

No, for sure.

What I offer is an hour of sensual massage.

So what that means is that

we can both be naked if you'd like.

It's a lot of touching on my side to you,

lots of body contact, lots of that,

and then mutual touching as well.

Some people, they'll wear a jockstrap.

They won't even be naked for the massage.

Other people will go all the way,

and you know, they'll have sex at the end of the session.

It's my control.

It's whatever I feel comfortable with, and obviously,

what the client feels comfortable with as well.

One client came and I was like,

"Oh, do you get massages often?"

He was like, "Yeah, I go probably every week."

And he's like, "I just like to be touched.

"I just like to have that human interaction."

The boner parties are really interesting and fun.

That's probably one of the things I'm most excited to go.

It's my favorite time of the month.

How the party started was we both come from big families,

both me and Nigel.

And so we were used to having people over all the time.

And so we'd throw house parties, and then we'd invite

our closest friends, and there'll be like 40 or 50.

And eventually, it was a hundred people

that were coming to our house for these parties.

It's a dance party where there's no rules.

And so there's a candy table.

You can go and, you know, eat everything you want,

which is one of my favorite things.

Food is the fastest way to my heart.

So if you add food anywhere, I'm automatically sold.

I like dancing.

I like food.

I like sex.

I mean, all three, all combined,

and I don't have to clean up the mess, I'm in. [chuckles]

Really, the core of the people that go is the hundred people

that come to our parties, and they invite their friends.

So it's a really close-knit group of people

that all get along.

One of the themes for boner

is come in whatever makes you feel comfortable.

And so you don't have to go naked.

You don't have wear lipstick.

If you wanna wear a dress, you can.

If you wanna wear a wig, you can.

If you wanna go naked, you can.

Do whatever makes you happy.

And that's kind of how we view our relationship as well.

Do what makes you happy,

and the people that complement your life,

the people that will fit, they're gonna fit in there.

[upbeat music]

- There is a lot of stigma around asking someone

to give you cuddles for a fee.

Do you prefer this or this?

- I think I like it the other way, like this way,

with the, so that I feel like I'm being hugged.

Yeah, exactly.

That's great.

The big thing that we're trying to address here

with professional cuddling is that we want

all cuddling and any form of physical connection

to be asked for and received in a respectful manner.

Can I trace your eyebrows and like your face?

- Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

'Cause I always like people tracing on my face.

I think that this practice as a whole

can be a great conversation starter

to get people really thinking about, you know,

what their own preferences are,

and also being able to stand by their own boundaries

but also respect other people's boundaries.

Michelle, can I give you a hug?

[Michelle] No, thank you.

Perfect.

You wanna give it a try?

Oscar, can I

touch your ear?

One of the things that we do

is called the no, thank you exercise.

The point of the exercise is to make three to five

simple requests, but then the goal of the other partner

is to say, "No, thank you."

Can I pat your thigh?

No, thank you.

And the point of this exercise is to reinforce that a no

doesn't necessarily have to be a negative thing.

We don't have to accommodate for the other person.

It's about what you feel and what you want to get out of it.

- Mm-hmm.

Okay.

So the next one is called the ask and wait.

So now, when I wanna ask, I wanna make a request,

you have three choices.

You can either say, "Yes, I would like that,"

"No, thank you," or you can suggest something else.

So you can say, "No, thank you,

"but I would like to receive x."

So the ask and wait method is more so

to create that understanding

that you don't have to make the choice out of guilt.

Only do things that you want to do.

Cool, um.

[Oscar laughs]

- All right, so how is this feeling right now?

Good.

I think that I'm full.

Yes.

- I remember there was one of the positions in the book

with just like the leg and the arm

- sort of like hooked. - Okay.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Do you wanna try that one?

Yeah.

Okay.

I like to start off the session with giving them, you know,

three simple poses, a good hug, you know,

even just interlocking hands, and then the eye gaze

to kinda get them started with that level of intimacy.

And then we go from there.

- Like if my leg gets pins and needles or something,

I'll be like, "Let's move on from this."

Let's switch it up. [chuckles]

And switch it up.

So that's like a nice comfort.

- So with cuddling, we're open to taking any clients

regardless of like sex, race, identity, gender,

anything like that.

But I am predominantly looking to help out

professional women, the reason being because right now,

as it stands in the cuddling industry,

there are more female cuddlers

and there are more male clients.

Touch-based services have always

catered more to male clientele.

Where I see myself in the grand scope of things

as a gay man, it's a good opportunity for me

to sort of give female clients that male attention

with that extra layer of that I'm for sure

not gonna try to give any sexual advances with them.

- Yeah, and I feel like if I did something like this,

I don't know, every few weeks or even once a month,

whatever the case may be, that I might feel more comfortable

with my own physical body.

I feel like I feel a little bit

out of touch with that sometimes,

and doing something like this, I already feel

like I'm feeling each part of my body

in a way that's nice and strong and secure,

and I don't feel stressed or uncomfortable

that you're expecting something else than what it is.

So yeah, it's nice.

- And if you are someone who, you know, is already working,

you know, eight to 10 hours or more at your job

and all you want to do is just feel held,

you know, going through the courtship of either going out

to a bar or even logging on to social media apps,

all of that takes effort and it takes emotional effort too.

- There's a lot of, you know, successful people

that don't have time to go, you know, on social sites

to spend an hour, hour and a half, half an hour

finding someone that likely isn't gonna be good.

It's easier to be like, "Oh, I know I'm gonna have

"a good time with so and so.

"I'm gonna call you so it's just easy.

"It's looked after."

- I was looking for relationships on the apps.

I was looking for sex on the apps.

I was doing all the things that we all do,

and I wasn't getting anywhere.

I was brushing up against ableism constantly,

dealing with discrimination

against my disability all the time.

[Raj] That was your bum.

[Andrew] My bum.

Your bum. [chuckles]

- Make sure that I don't fly across the room.

Being just discouraged that one day I decided

that, okay, let me go on these sites and see what I can do.

And it's not anybody giving it to me out of charity.

It's me actively deciding this is what I want.

The marginalized community of individuals with disabilities,

their access to their bodies

and their access to their own sexuality is so limited

by financial things,

by stigma around disability and sexuality.

So especially in queer male spaces, we can't go to the gym,

can't access certain social things we do,

can't access all the clubs we go to,

can't access the community the way we do,

are assumed to be asexual or non-sexual by our community,

so we don't tend to have a lot of success in going on dates.

Putting aside that money, there's a power play,

a really positive power play of me deciding

that this is money that I want to use for this.

I love pre-booking because it means that I can buy

two or three sessions and know that,

okay, for the next month, my sex is figured out.

I have it figured out.

It's a very selfish, a positively selfish act.

- I know how good that feels when you have

that part of you expressed and that part of you nurtured.

It's been a journey as with my acceptance of my own body.

Being South Asian, there's like that sense

of being less than because you're usually seeing bodies

that are white having sex when you're watching porn

or in movies or in things like that.

It creates these things.

Or if your body has to look a particular way,

it's more deserving of pleasure

than if your body looks this way.

You deserve love, pleasure, intimacy no matter how you look.

So the benefit of a repeat client

is you really get to know somebody,

how their body receives pleasure.

And you feel the healing kind of happen within the person.

It's an awesome part.

That's like the main, obviously, the central reason

why I do it, because I thin we take on these conditions

that we see in media and in porn and whatever,

and they'll be like," Oh, this is supposed to happen,"

or, "This is supposed to happen."

And I think with porn and stuff like that,

I think there's a lot of power given to sex means this.

It's penetrative.

But there are so many other ways

your body can experience sex.

And the thing is I think through my work,

I wanna be able to help people understand their bodies.

And I think that's what's so amazing,

because I think it teaches people that

there's so much possibilities when it comes to their body.

There are so many things that you can feel

that you don't even know.

Now I'm warm.

[Raj] There you go.

- Depending on the scene with the client,

I can feel really good about it

or I can feel really bad about it.

Clients don't know their limits and want me to push them

further than they're capable of to the point of

broken skin, or blood,

or very extreme heavy play.

Even for me, that's pretty extreme.

It takes me a minute to regroup after, sometimes a day.

I don't want anyone to get hurt.

I don't want anyone to get sick.

So scat play is out.

Anything with blood and serious pain is out.

When it comes to BDSM, there is an element

of pain and pleasure involved with it,

but I'm not about inflicting heavy bodily harm on people.

When I go to work, it's completely different

than what my sex life at home is going to be.

I don't really wanna have that crossover,

like I don't wanna bring work home.

I do have elements of BDSM play that I like

in my personal sex life, but that's more about bonding

and creating connection and trust and safety.

One of the best ways to feel safe and comfortable

with somebody is to be tied up by them

because you have to really let yourself go somewhere else.

And it's gonna be cathartic, and you might cry.

Sex work affects almost every relationship I have.

Everybody has a negative stigma based around it

as far as I can see.

Dating somebody that's not in the trade

or hasn't done the trade, you know,

again, trying to convince them of work being separate

from personal life is next to impossible.

- I think sex and kind of our views on sex

is changing drastically.

I definitely think religion had a long hold

that people don't realize is there,

but religion set up what sex should be.

It should be man and wife, depending on your religion,

when you're trying to have kids.

Even with OnlyFans and things like that,

I think that that helps the sex image because before,

you had studios and kind of what was,

oh, this is what it looks like.

Whereas with OnlyFans,

it really is us and our friends just having sex.

We set up a tripod on the counter

and then just enjoy ourselves.

And so it kind of takes away of like,

oh, people talk during sex.

Oh, you know what?

There's gonna be a mistake.

Sometimes it's gonna be like, oh, it didn't work.

Or this doesn't work, or you'll try to say something.

And today, we're gonna make for you guys a beef stir fry.

Let's get naked.

Perfect.

But it's nice because you see a different side

that's light and funny.

All right, let's get started.

It's fun.

It's all of our friends and lovers.

It's not these strangers that you don't know

and have no connection with.

Invite the people that you're most close with,

that you want to spend the most time with,

and invite them into the bedroom.

You will have a better time

than someone that you don't know.

And the best part about relationships is that

it can be anything you want it to be.

And I think that's where religion has had

such a negative impact, is it's this is what it must be.

And so soon as you deviate from that, it's different.

I had a previous relationship

where the sex and intimacy were kind of as one.

So I remember coming out of that relationship

and it was very like, I felt like super fucked up about sex.

It was this thing where I realized the only times

that I was sober was when I was like with clients.

Like I was just like, okay, so I can do this work,

but I'm like, I have some healing to do within myself.

To be able to help people condition that part

is something that I feel like is a very,

I think is very important, especially when it comes

to gay men and our bodies and what that means.

- When a client goes on to my website,

in order to book a session,

they'll see the cuddling commandments.

So these are the 10 basic ground rules that we have

with regards to the cuddling session,

which means that you have to be at least 18 years of age.

You have to be free of mind-altering substances.

You can't come drunk or high or anything like that.

It's basically talking about how it's not a sexual service.

And so once they agreed to all that and they book a time,

then it's up to the client to decide

whether they want to come to the cuddler's space

or host the cuddler at their own space.

And so if they're coming to my space,

what I'd like to do is I like to get some nice music going.

I have some sweetwood, and I have some sage

and incense that I like to light.

And then I prepare wherever we're gonna be cuddling.

So it could be on a couch.

It could be on the ground.

It can be on a bed.

I always like to encourage the clients

to come with their own ideas of cuddling positions

that they like to try, or to even think about

examples of touch in their lives that they have enjoyed.

- Yeah, generally, scalp touch is very therapeutic.

Yeah?

- Mm-hmm.

Cool.

So how about we start with that?

I started my performing career back in high school,

doing musical theater, which introduced me

to the world of dance and singing and just acting

and general body awareness.

I've noticed that a big component of the acting

and singing and even dancing,

there's a big understanding of breath work

and the benefits that that can bring along to our craft.

So that's something that I like to bring to our sessions.

Say we're in the middle of an embrace,

like breathing together can be very helpful

and stress relieving.

Very good, very good breath.

Touch has an immensive power to heal.

Because we're being taught to be so tough

and show a tough face, a poker face and not let the world

see our problems, I think that by reintroducing touch

in a healthy platonic way is a great way for us

to remind ourselves that it's okay to feel vulnerable,

because it's so easy to think that we're alone

in all these things that we're feeling.

It's so easy.

If you ever feel alone, something that you could always do

is you can take your hand and place it over your heart.

And if you just slowly breathe,

it's a great way for you to reconnect with yourself

and remind yourself that you're here

and that you're not alone.

There are studies that actually show

that you placing your hand over your heart and breathing

will help you reconnect, and it's almost as good as a hug.

By you acknowledging and connecting with yourself,

it will allow you to have deeper connections

with other people too.

[man speaks in foreign language]

[group chuckles]

- I always say in order to give of myself,

I need to know how to give to myself.

I give to myself through making sure

having like a spiritual sort of practice through meditation,

through writing, through my chosen family,

and through also having, you know,

intimate experiences for my own personal self.

Then before a session, it's so much easier for me

to go from here to here, 'cause then I'm very much like,

okay, it's all here.

- I call on Raj because I know he's reliable.

I've worked with workers who don't show up.

That's important for me as somebody who already lives

on the margins of trying to find [mumbles]

and trying to find connection.

- So when it comes to it being kind of

about sexual surrogacy and my work,

I had a client actually describe it as that, I remember.

And he said, "I've never heard an escort

"speak about their work in that way before.

"And it sounds like you're a surrogate or a conduit."

I mean, whatever I do,

it's healing work.

It is what it is.

When I got into my work, I think it deepened my connections

to the people who matter in my life

because I have a certain understanding and truth

in how I do my work and why it's fulfilling for me.

And if people can see that in me,

that means they can see me.

All of my friends know what I do

and understand why it's important to me.

And when you have that, you're able to tap into

your own intuition, which that helps you in avoiding

any potentially dangerous situations.

I've never had a bad experience.

I've had one where it could have been,

but then I kind of like listened to my inner voice

and got out before the person even showed up,

and I ended up being right on my [mumbles].

It was a good idea that I did not stay.

- You know, there's a scary dark side to the business.

Thankfully, I've never been in a situation

that's gotten out of hand.

I had one violent situation in Florida,

and that set my precedent for what was never, ever,

ever gonna happen again.

I was flown down and had my ticket

relying on somebody else's, you know,

because they booked it kind of thing.

Yeah, like now, I always make sure that, you know,

if somebody wants me to travel to go see them,

that they transfer a deposit which is enough

for me to manage my own booking.

I get every request you could possibly imagine.

Somebody requests to have me as a sub or bottom

in a bondage or BDSM scene, it's a firm no.

We already know that that's putting yourself

into serious danger, so that's not gonna happen.

I would never do that with somebody

until I have established a rapport with this client.

In terms of being a sex worker

and not having an agency per se as female sex workers might,

when it comes to male sex work,

you're basically on your own.

Whenever I'm going to work,

I always let somebody know where I'm going.

I have my location shared.

Depending on how long the session is,

I get something called knocking to happen,

which is, you know, a friend will call and check in

and make sure I'm okay.

- I like the fact that it's not me living here alone.

So if there was a problem, for the most part, Nigel's home.

If things get really bad,

I could yell and hopefully have that.

A few precautions I take before I head into this,

with meeting people, I generally don't do

the same day [mumbles] because I find people,

they're like, "Oh, I want a massage.

"Can you be free in 20 minutes,"

probably not the best kind of clients.

Whereas if you can have a little conversation beforehand.

If they're polite and nice, you know what,

I'm gonna take people that I feel comfortable with

because if I'm not enjoying it,

that client is likely not gonna enjoy it either.

What I like about the massage part is that I'm in control.

With escort, it kind of is assumed of what you're doing.

This is the first time I haven't had a job

with money coming in regularly.

With losing my job, it was definitely

one of the more traumatic things I've had in my life,

which sounds stupid, losing a job,

but just the manner it was done.

I've always been a good employee.

I've never been fired from a job in my entire life.

They pulled me, and the HR person came,

pulled me into a meeting.

They handed me a letter.

I read it.

With all your Instagram, due to this,

you're being terminated with cause,

no severance, no anything.

So right now, I'm going through kind of a lawsuit with them,

just feeling like it's not fair, you know,

after seven years working there, to walk me out the door

because you don't agree with something in my lifestyle.

I mean, luckily, I had OnlyFans.

I had a few things coming in that did help,

but it's just a different mindset to all of a sudden,

you know, go on one day and have your,

really, entire life changed.

And the more I looked at different job postings

and looked at other things out there,

I realized that it just, none of that sounded interesting.

It was like, maybe this isn't the end of the world.

Maybe this is a good chance to, you know,

try something that I haven't done before.

It wasn't the right circumstance or the right time

or how it was done, but I do think

that it'll be something that I look back on

and it's something that benefited my life.

- Now that I have kind of come out

as working with sex workers as part of my platform,

it's been a really freeing experience

because the stigma goes away.

I've talked about it on my podcast, Disability After Dark.

I had Raj as a guest a few weeks ago.

- [Announcer] Disability After Dark with Andrew Gurza,

shining a bright light on sex and disability.

[Andrew] Did you feel like,

what did you think when I was like,

"Hey, I'm a wheelchair user."

Did you have any feelings about what that might look like,

what gay sex with a wheelchair user might look like

and how disability would impact all that?

- [Raj] The thing is everybody's different

with however they are, with their disabilities.

So the thing was I was more coming at it

from a place of, you know, curiosity.

I had no idea what to expect.

I just was more curious to see

like how it would sort of like happen.

You know what I mean?

[Andrew] Awesome.

Were you like scared?

Were you like, "Oh, my god, this is wrong,

"What am I doing?"

- [Raj] There was a sense of just

I hope I do everything right.

It was more like you're another human being

looking to experience pleasure,

and our connection will be to help facilitate that.

You know what I mean?

- Thank you so much for being so vulnerable with me

and sharing intimacy with me.

I really appreciate it.

Telling my mom that I work with sex workers

was kind of a long time coming.

I just said, "Okay, look, I work with people,

"I work with sex workers to get my needs met."

She, without missing a beat, said, "Oh, okay.

"If this is what you're doing to make yourself happy

"and this is what you need to feel okay,

"I support it."

My family all knows I'm gay.

They know I'm dating Nigel and I live with Nigel.

I would say that's pretty much the extent.

I remember I posted a picture of us,

me and friends in a bar on my family Facebook,

because I have a separate account as well.

Yeah, my mom called and she was like,

"Honey, I'm concerned that you're at a bar drinking,"

where I was like, oh, wow, I forgot

we were that many steps back as far as

what you're comfortable with and what you're aware of.

Our lifestyles are so different, but my family knows

I would say on the lower side of most things that I'm doing.

My mom now knows.

It's the one conversation

where I was always so scared to have.

So I initially started talking.

I was like stammering a little bit.

I'm like, oh, my god.

And then once again, I just started to explain

the whole thing about the importance of the work.

And then she says to me that she's listening to my voice

and she says, "Well, I can tell that you're doing it

"from a good place, because I've heard your voice

"when you were not in a good place,

"and I'm hearing your voice now."

And my mom says, you know, "You were meant to be here

"to do something really great, and I can see

"that you're meant to be here to make people happy.

"And for that, I'm proud of you."

And to go to your mom and just say your truth

and just to hear that sense of understanding,

my abilities, I feel like I can tap into them that much more

because that shame, that fear takes up space.

- I'd like to not have secrets in my family.

So we have a very open-minded family

I guess is the way to put it, two gay kids, hippie parents.

I don't like to keep secrets about it

because at a time of survival, it was a secret.

Do I have an exit strategy?

Kind of.

Do I have a plan for it?

Almost.

Do I have a shelf life that I wanna cap it up at?

Absolutely.

Will all those things happen according to plan?

Probably not.

Rogue Showtime Status, five foot eight, 175 pounds.

This is my first time--

This is a very hard business to exit because it's your body.

You can't just leave yourself.

You get accustomed to a certain lifestyle.

My advice to anybody considering

getting into sex work or porn

is don't.

The porn industry will shoot you and chew you up

and spit you out until the next best thing comes along,

put you up to pasture before you even knew it.

Then you fall back on your sex work.

And when you become this 40-year-old hooker

that's washed up, then what do you have?

If you're really smart about it

and you do it right,

then you can make your good money and get out.

It's a bit of a trap as well

'cause it's really hard to leave.

- My goal is to kinda push this forward now so that

it can be recognized as an official holistic practice,

because right now, there is no regulation, obviously,

around it because it's relatively new.

Of course, people are more used to going to yoga class,

or buying essential oils, or going for massages,

or even therapy to address their own individual needs.

So if I can get it to that point, then that would mean

that it would allow for, you know, licensing of my teachings

or the practice, maybe writing books around it,

working with businesses who maybe are having HR problems

with what consent is and all that stuff,

working with those people

so that we can progress the narratives around touch

in a healthy way that promote consent.

- We have our own little family in Toronto of people

that, you know, we're very comfortable with.

We all get along.

We see each other separately, together.

The people that don't want that lifestyle,

they know who we are,

and they either stay away or they keep their distance.

There's that.

But because we are so open with it, you really do attract

the people that are kind of ready and looking for that.

And so, you know, I would say we're polyamorous

in the sense of we're allowed to have

multiple lovers and partners and friends.

It's that.

But I would say we're even moving past that a little bit

into more of kind of the family structure where, you know,

people that stay around, that's who you're with.

You're not dating.

I'm looking after me in doing that,

but obviously, the people I care about,

I'm gonna put their interests first.

But really, my happiness at the end of the day,

it's up to me to decide.

And people look at our lifestyle

and our sex life especially, something that is

a lot more taboo that people don't talk about,

especially having sex with your friends,

because that's even worse.

It's like, oh, you can have with strangers.

That's kind of the acceptable norm now.

But people see our Instagram posting

with all these friends in towels.

I mean, hopefully, it's coming through

that our personalities as much as possible,

that it's like these are not just,

oh, they're having sex [mumbles].

No, these are real genuine people that,

yeah, are just having fun

and sharing their journey with everyone else.

[soft music]