First Dates With People Who’ve Already Seen Me Naked

A case for sharing your sexual preferences—and your nudes—with a potential new partner

I’ve been on several first dates with people who’ve already seen me butt-naked. Some of these have, in fact, not even seen my face — only my body.

The reason is that I occasionally meet people, both for friendship and dating, through the kink and fetish social-network Fetlife. I say that this is a place where up is down and down is up, for a few reasons.

First, the pictures people post of themselves here are vastly different from what you see on any social or dating platform: In this corner of the webosphere you’ll find headless bodies engaging in any (un)thinkable act, but their faces, as well as their real names, are rarely revealed.

Apart from this, Fetlifers don’t usually share what we do for a living on the site. The type of music, literature, and movies we like, our political beliefs, or other factoids about our personal lives are left for later.

In this place where up is down and vice versa, we start by sharing our roles and leanings in the bedroom, a list of our kinks and fetishes, as well as our soft and hard limits (aka, what we’re on the fence about and what we’d definitely never want to do). Most users will have an additional intro text, but the length and detail in these wary vastly.

Anonymity can encourage authenticity

There’s a certain freedom to this. Akin to writing under a penname the act of removing or altering our most recognizable features allow us to express sides of ourselves that we might otherwise be scared or shy to reveal. We can be more naked, both literally and figuratively, yet hidden at the same time.

This was part of the appeal to me: By retaining a sense of anonymity, I got to artfully live out an exhibitionist side that had longed to come out. It gave me a platform from which to project my authentic self without fear of scrutiny.

When dating in the regular world, many will say it’s ill-advised to reveal too much or bring up sex too early. If we, especially women, start to discuss our sexual preferences on the first date, our new acquaintance will immediately think they’ve got it in the bag. If we pull away after that, we’re a cock tease, right?

It’s better to be modest and wait a bit until we know that all the other aspects of our lives mesh. We should first know if our lifestyles, interests, and hobbies match—that we have a similar outlook. Then, and only then, is it ok to start discussing sex — if we ever talk about it at all, that is.

But is this really the best way to go about this?

I have met people normally, both with apps and the old fashioned way and through the kink scene. There are challenges and flaws in both scenarios, but with the latter, I observed some interesting things:

Being open with others forced me to confront myself

When I joined the platform, the freedom of allowing myself to be unabashedly transparent about my sexuality, as well as my lack of knowledge and experience, helped me figure myself out. When you’re asked to outline what you’re into sexually, to great detail, you’re left with little choice but to do some deep soul searching.

It allowed me to pursue pleasure for the sake of it

Dating in sex-positive circles gave me permission to seek out the things that caught my interest head-on, and since everything is out in the open, I didn’t have to go through countless dates to find someone who’d match my desires. Instead, with my role set to ‘exploring,’ I journeyed into mundus inversus to do just that.

I met people I otherwise wouldn’t

It goes without saying that I met my share of unusual characters — to me at least. We often end up surrounding ourselves with people that are, more or less, like ourselves. My existing circle, therefore, consisted of a variety of other liberal creative folks, often of the ex-pat variety. Suddenly, I was meeting everything from nerds to high-ranking business-types and social workers, anarchist punks, hackers, engineers, stand up comedians, and everything in between. Sometimes, we had little in common apart from what we liked in bed. Other times, we were more similar than I would have dared to assume.

I found that beneath our clothes, we’re all the same

The beautiful thing about openness and nudity is that with the removal of our clothes, and or inhibitions, we strip away the very markers that separate us. We become the same…sort of, at least. Sure, there are all kinds of bodies as there are kinks and preferences — but we’re measured by entirely different criteria than those that apply in the real world. To my surprise, in a place where everyone’s displaying themselves more or less naked, I found an overwhelming acceptance and less prejudice with regards to body type, shape, size, and age than anywhere else.

I met some of my best friends and lovers

Over the last few years, I’ve met some of the most significant people in my life through the scene. My neighbor, for example, is one. She and I had lived down the street from each other for years and have kids that are the same age, but because our lives are so different, we had never met, and probably would never have, had it not been for Fetlife. Now, we talk almost daily and are invaluable supports for one another.

Of those I have regular contact with and call my closet friends, well over half of them are from the same community. And, of the lovers I’ve met there, a few were what I’d call pivotal to my personal development. They were partners that disrupted my (sexual) world view, shattered past beliefs, and opened me up to completely new arenas. And, I can guarantee that I would have swiped left on every single one of them had I found them on a regular online dating app.

It’s far less awkward than you’d think

I’m sure a lot of you wonder if it doesn’t feel strange or uncomfortable to meet people for the first time who already seen it all.

My honest answer is, no, it’s not, and instead, it’s kind of liberating. It can sound like starting on the wrong end, but I’d like to challenge that notion. Now that we already know what we look like, and what kind of sex we’re into, in theory, we can get straight to figuring out whether or not we have chemistry and if we connect in areas.

It makes rejection easier

When all has been revealed, we know we’re drawn to each other, but then meet to realize that we don’t click, I’ve found it easier to say that straight out: It was great to meet you, but I didn’t feel it. You can’t really argue with chemistry.

There’s still plenty of mystery left

I suspect the obsession with preserving the mystique (to keep the man interested) is something that’s been drilled into women in an effort to preserve our virtue. I can attest that, even with appearances revealed, there’s plenty of mystery left. Having seen someone is far from having smelt, touched, and felt someone’s energy. And getting to know someone’s heart and soul—that’s where the real mystery lie.

I won’t claim that it’s easier to meet a steady or long term partner this way than anywhere else, but because the starting point and perspective are different, you end up with different challenges as well as opportunities.

What matters most? Sex or friendship?

Through Fetlife I met lovers who knocked my socks off and turned my world upside down in the best of ways. And while I won’t say that all of my experiences were great, I learned more about myself sexually in a short amount of time than I had in decades before that. In the end, those I met here remained lovers that eventually faded away in the realization that we lacked a foundation to build anything more on.

Through regular dating avenues, I met interesting people that I had a lot in common with. But I quickly saw that my open attitude around sexuality, and wish to expand my horizons frightened many, which caused me to step away before letting things get serious.

Can’t we have both?

When I met my current partner, I realized that it is possible to combine it all. He and I happened to follow each other, first on Fetlife and then on Instagram, but had never met. When we later matched in a dating app, I was quick to connect the dots, and, when I revealed to him that he knew me from two other places, he was as intrigued as I was.

Here, I had someone who had seen all of me — at least all there was to see online— and he was not overwhelmed, but excited to learn more. I saw someone who seemed like a match—not just sexually, or just in terms of our lifestyles and convictions — but in all of them combined. We saw the potential for something deeper and more expansive.

We met, we clicked, and while we took it a bit slower than I had with some of my past Fetlife escapades, we knew we had tons to explore and build on, in many areas. Now, almost a year and a half later, we’re still finding this to be true, with both our joined sex-lives and regular lives growing and blossoming; the two are interrelated and feed off each other.

In my case, I wasn’t initially looking for a steady relationship, as I had just come out of one. I wanted novelty, expansion, and adventure while retaining a sense of independence, thus dating in the kink scene with the objective of finding sexual matches accommodated that.

But, even when we are hoping to find a long term partnership, whether monogamous or not, I’d argue that sexual compatibility matters a ton here too. Anyone who cherishes a fulfilling sex life will agree that if this part doesn’t work, the entire relationship is on rocky ground. So why do we so often leave this important part until the end? Why do we down-prioritize something that, to many, is responsible for a significant part of our overall well-being?

Put your cards on the table

I’ve argued before that we should talk about sex on the first date and that communication is paramount. Based on experience, I truly believe that whether our preferences are on the kinky side or more vanilla, whether sex is something we want daily or a few times a month, and whether we want to be monogamous or open, we should bring this up as soon as possible.

Sex is too important of a part of an intimate relationship to be treated as an afterthought, and thus, making it the priority that it is could save a ton of misery, dissatisfaction, and potential heartache down the line.

So, put your cards on the table, and while you’re at it, you might consider throwing in a nude or two as well…