Origins and Nature of fetish

This is a tough one to take on, but someone asked about this recently, and I was thinking about it myself, so I wanted to take a shot at explaining this fetish a little bit, if I can.

I think like a lot of behavioral traits, its either inborn or starts very early. A lot of folks I've talked to have similar stories. Certain images during youth that trigger a strong response. Not even a sexual response, at that age, but more of an emotion of envy -- "I want to be that person". But stronger than standard envy, more of a borderline compulsion. What this image is tends to differ quite a bit based on what the core fetish is.

For me, the first thing I can recall seeing as a kid was the TV show "Flipper". I didn't even see it that often (it was already old when I was a kid, I believe). The show had images of kids in wetsuits playing in the water. I was growing up far from the ocean, but yet I wanted to be that kid, wearing a tight wetsuit playing in the water.

Similar images in the future also reinforced this urge. The olympics were always a safe bet, speedos, downhill ski suits, etc. They all carried the connotation that the wearer was somehow transformed, improved, streamlined. It didn't hurt that these images were always on fit althletes and so on!

As soon as I had disposable income as a kid, I started to act on some of these urges. When I was quite young, we were in the local department store and for some reason they carried speedo-type swimsuits in kids sizes, and I practically begged my parents to buy me one, even though it was quite an odd choice in our area (wouldn't make sense to Euro folks reading, of course). Later I would buy (or more accurately collect) whatever lycra I could get my hands on - mainly bike shorts from sporting good stores.

As I got older, I took up hobbies that allowed me to reinforce my fetish. I started biking so I had a good excuse to buy lots of lycra shorts. When I finally moved to the coast, I took up diving and surfing. It took me something like 10-12 years to go from seeing wetsuits as a kid to finally wearing one, and that was a very strong emotional moment, first pulling on a wetsuit and looking at myself in a mirror. Mind blowing. It wasn't even a very sexy wetsuit, a rental 2-piece, but it was a feeling like transformation, no other good explanation for it.


Orca Triathalon Wetsuit

I think its a natural tendecy of fetishes of this sort to escalate over time. Once you've tried "A", that's no longer exciting enough and you have to go to "B". In that sense I guess that pair of Nike shorts is a "gateway garment". At some point when I was independent and on my own, I started to expand beyond basic sports gear that I could justify, and into new areas. Dance gear, for example. A triathalon wetsuit even though I had never competed in a triathalon. Once those experiences were exhausted, I moved on to fetish-specific garments -- rubber suits, lycra suits, masks, and so on. Starting tame and getting progressively more adventurous.

Its hard to say what is at the base of it. For me, I think its mainly a sense of transformation, feeling a bit more like an athlete or a superhero or even a different species. It makes you feel special, outside the mainstream, privileged, in some way. More powerful, more attractive, more everything. For rubber there is a bondage aspect as well, but I think that is separate, or at least tangental, to the core fetishism in the material itself. The main thing is covering your normal mundane skin with a more interesting one.

What I don't think it is -- I don't think its primarily a sexual fetish, although the strong feelings it produces are so strong that sex is the logical outcome. I definitely don't need to be geared up to have sex, so its not a necessity, but when geared up I get excited to the point that I want to have sex or get a sexual release. I think many folks erroneously see a fetishism as a pre-requisite to sex, I see it more as an enhancement. Given the choice between vanilla sex and geared-up sex, the increased pleasure of the latter will win every time, if its an option!

I suspect other fetishes follow a similar track. Furries probably get really excited the first time they go to Disneyland or see a character at a mall or something, and buy animal-themed streetwear as kids, eventually going to full-scale fursuits at an older age.

So what's next? For me, it would definitely be graduating from mainly solo play to going to group events or 'real time' play with others, whatever form that takes. More on that later.

Backing up a second, I often think about whether there was some traumatic or formative event when I was a kid that might have induced this or nurtured it, and for the life of me I cannot. I had a very vanilla childhood with no abuse, trauma, no divorce, nothing. Prior to seeing my first 'trigger images', I can't recall anything specifically related to rubber or wetsuits or lycra or anything. It seemed to be something I was, for lack of a better term, born with, just waiting to be triggered. I don't suspect there is much way to avoid it, nor any way to shut it off. I think it would be fairly easy to deny it and just ignore it, but it wouldn't be nearly as fun. Its like if you know you enjoy something, you can quite easily deny yourself that pleasure, but you're missing out. It probably does go beyond a "hobby", but I wouldn't say its an uncontrollable compulsion, either. It's not like smoking crack.

Despite this insight, I have quite a few open questions that I wonder about.

Why does it seem like far more men are pre-disposed toward these sort of "material" fetishes than women? Certainly there ARE women into this fetish, but the ratio must be like 2:1 at best. The motivation for women seems to be more consistently about dominance or fashion, but I'm only guessing and may be working from incomplete evidence. A lot of women that are into rubber seem to do so as part of S&M play, or to try to accomodate a partner. I've not run into many women with a pure lycra fetish, but they may be out there in some numbers.

What is the relationship between these fetishes and Asperger's syndrome? I've seen others citing this theory, and it does fit my profile pretty well, so perhaps there is something there. Of course since they don't know the cause of that either, its just swapping one label for another.

Why is this fetish mainly associated with certain ethnic groups? It seems that people with this fetish are largely of european / northern european / nordic descent, at least in my experience. There are exceptions, but I definitely see 10 Germans or German-Americans for every Spaniard or Italian I have met on-line. There is also a lot of Japanese involvement. I myself am of German descent, so I fit this mold as well. Is it actually linked more to certain ethnic groups, or is it just more tolerated/accepted in some areas as opposed to others?

I'd be interested in hearing comments from others about their take on these questions, or to hear if their stories are similar to mine. I have yet to meet someone who felt like their interest in rubber or lycra started at an older age, almost everyone has some childhood story to relate on this subject.

Catsuit #2

After I got my first basic gear, I wanted to get something a little more risque. I might have gone too far, but that's getting ahead of myself.

One of the best vendors for truly fetish-specific gear is a UK based company called Cocoon. Their website is not too sexy, but they have a huge array of customization options for suits that make it a great site for going nuts. Inflatable suits, every possible sort of probe or hole, its like Wal-mart for pervs.

My first suit was great, but felt a little tame, so I went onto Cocoon's site and started playing with all their options and stuff. I went back to the site over and over again over the course of like a month, fantasizing about the utlimate bondage/play suit.

One of the first things I decided was to try a suit with an attached hood and feet. The fantasy of a more complete second-skin is very strong and even though it can be less practical, its a bit turn-on for me (and others). I debated about attached hands as well, but opted against it. The feet are pretty simple and hard to screw up, but there are a lot of options in terms of hoods. Cocoon offers lots of hood choices, some very cool. I ended up selecting an open-face hood for this suit.

The think in retrospect, the open-faced hood was a mistake. An open-faced hood has all the downsides of an attached hood without the real feeling of enclosure, bondage, or anonymity of a more closed hood. I'm not sure what I was thinking, maybe shaving a few $$ off the price? Anyway, I would recommend if you go with a hood, go all the way, or skip it and add your own.

Another downside of an attached hood is that its not compatible with shoulder zips (from most vendors, anyway). So I had to go with a back zip.

One thing Cocoon offers that most vendors do not is a big array of very kinky add-ons to suits. I found the idea of a suit with lots of "plumbing" to be very exciting, so I wanted to try some options here. I think most of these worked better in theory or fantasy stories than in reality.

First, I opted for an inflatable cock sheath. Basically this is a fairly standard thin black latex cock sheath from molded rubber attached to the suit, along with an outer, glued layer with an air-tight space in between that can be inflated/deflated with a bike-tire style tube. The idea is that the inflatable sheath gives both a pleasant feeling of pressure or denial of pleasure, and also is an extreme outward appearance without being nude. In reality, I found this to be more of a pain. In practice when inflated, the sheath puts pressure to push the wearer's tackle out of the inner sheath and back into the suit. The only way to make it work is to use a cock ring or something to counteract this. I think the better option would be to just get a normal sheath, or a cod-piece/hole and add your own.

The other downstairs customization option is to include some type of ass-toys in the suit. Again, this is something of a turn-on for a good many in the scene, the idea of a suit that "plugs in" to the wearer. A lot of the rubberist stories focus on such things. I opted for the relatively inexpensive option of adding an 'anal rod'. Sounds very clinical. Its basically a short dildo-type solid rubber piece, flat/smooth about 4 inches in length. Its not really a butt-plug since it has no real shape to it. It is glued to a reinforced panel near the bottom of the suit. Again, the reality falls short of the theory. Even though I got the suit custom-sized, for whatever reason, the positioning of the rod never really matched my anatomy, and because of the shape it tends to just slide out rather than stay put. To keep it positioned during a play session literally requires frequently pushing everything back in where you want it. My recommendation to others would be to, again, either go all the way or not bother. Cocoon also offers an inflatable rod which presumably could be inflated to lock itself in place better. They also offer the option of either a hole or a sheath of rubber to allow 'stuff' to be inserted externally. I think any of these three options would be better. The sheath idea sounds interesting if you want to maintain the 'total coverage' vibe but still allow for some butt play.

Ok, what's next? Color. I wanted to try something other than basic black, and the idea of a metallic color seemed cool to try. I had not seen any "pearlsheen" colors before, so wanted to see what they were like. I thought about silver or pewter (darker/grey silver), but opted for blue. Not sure why, I guess that's just where my mind was at when I finally pulled the trigger. Again, if I were doing it again, I would probably go for a silver metallic color, or perhaps a really vibrant color like yellow or orange to be as wild as possible. Blue was sort of luke-warm choice.

The material thickness for these colored/pearlsheen colors is generally limited to the lighter grades, I believe this is because the manufacturer doesn't offer them in some of the thicker grades. As soon as you opt for a thicker latex from a vendor like Cocoon, your color choices drop down to basically black, red, white, and transparent. I really wanted to try a pealsheen color, so I opted for the thinnest grade of latex.

So how did it turn out? Despite all the regrets on design, it actually still came out Ok. Not perfect and not all that I had hoped for. I found the material to be a bit too thin for my taste--I didn't realize, since my first suit was a mid-range weight, how different the thinner rubber would be. It is nice and light, but when pulled over the body, has a bit more tendency to create little folds, rather than lying smooth and flat. I like a suit best when it can achieve a totally smooth look over the body, and this was harder to do. And the thin latex does a bit less to shape the wearer, and there is less of a feeling of hands/pressure all around the body, which is arousing in and of itself.

The attached feet were a bit of a pain when donning the suit - air gets caught in the closed foot as the legs go in, so a bit of work is involved to push the air back up the leg. The fit overall was pretty good, particularly the legs and arms were perfect. The torso was a little long, I think. Might have been my measurements; not sure. That's a hard measurement to take when doing a bespoke garment. I'd recommend if you are measuring torso length for a suit, try to err on the smaller size, since smaller/stretched is a better mistake than longer/loose/bunched up. With the torso too long, the "seat" tends to drop with lots of motion, which is decidedly not sexy. The torso length might have contributed to the mis-positioning in the butt-toy department, too.

The back-zip was OK, I still prefer the shoulder zip, but it works. The vendors never seem to include a zipper pull like you'd find on a wetsuit, so plan ahead if you want to self-dress.

(In a pinch, grab a shoelace or something. My best zip pulls come from taking convention badge holders necklaces which usually are like long thick shoelaces with little metal spring clips on the ends, perfect! You owe me for that tip... )

The color was good -- but also felt more green/grey than blue. It was a nice change from black, either way.

So the verdict at the end of the day, I can't blame Cocoon for making the suit I requested, I think I should have either been more practical or less practical about the design of the suit. It could have turned out more as a functional play suit with a few cool options, or I could have gone all the way and had a full tailored bondage hood, inflatable plug, cod-piece, etc. I would definitely recommend that folks avoid specifically the options mentioned above as being a bit impractical.

The construction of the suit was very good. I've had it for quite some time now. While it doesn't see as much action as my basic black, it has not had any maintenance problems to date. I ended up cutting off the outer part of the inflatable front sheath myself with scissors, so now its just a standard molded cock sheath which is more practical. I also cut some tiny holes into the attached feet to make it a bit easier to avoid air pockets. I do like the feeling of the attached feet, I sort of wish I had opted for attached hands, at least on one suit, just to try it out.

Cocoon is definitely the go-to vendor if you want to get a wild tricked-out playsuit. I have not seen another site yet with as many crazy options. I would recommend if you use them, either go all out, or opt for just a more basic design with off-the-rack sizing. Their custom-size service doesn't seem so accurate that its worth bothering with unless the suit is already a pricey one.

Hopefully this advice can help others avoid a similar "sophomore slump". But again, nothing against Cocoon, they do good work and will make whatever suit you ask them for, so beware your own desires.

www.cocoon1.com


Blue metallic suit from Cocoon

Catsuit #1...

One of the biggest investments with a rubber fetish is the basic catsuit. For anyone that's truly "into" this sort of thing, selecting the right combination of manufacturer, sizing, features, etc. is maddening. I got some positive feedback about the previous run-down on lycra suits, so this is the next logical step, I suppose.

Here's a quick run-down on the various suits I have tried. My first catsuit, and actually one of the best, was a off-the-rack black shoulder-zip catsuit from Mr. S, which is a local SF-based retailer of S&M gear catering to the gay community. Mr. S makes all their own stuff, but you can find very similar designs at most shops. Mr. S sells a lot of configurations for zipper/entry. I think zipper location/type is one of the key decisions.

The shoulder-zip style is good (IMO) for several reasons. First, zippers on latex suits don't stretch like the rest of the suit, so an "all around" zip can be limit how tight the overall suit can be without limiting mobility. Also if you want to dress yourself, shoulder zips are easier to access, since everything is up top at arm's length. It can still require a bit of contortion, but generally you won't need to be an escape artist to get in or out.

The other big decision for a more fetishy outfit and less "fashion-y" is whether to include some sort of access system for your naughty bits. This particular suit had a cod-piece, which basically means a well-positioned hole in the suit, surrounded by three metal snaps, and a separate triangle of rubber to fit those snaps and cover whatever happens to poke through the hole. The suit has no butt access, but I've seen suits that have both a cod-piece and a small zip further back. The cod-piece is a nice compromise, you can wear the suit in 'public' where nudity is a no-no, but still get easy access for play of any type. Being fully enclosed, yet utterly exposed down below is a great feeling. Choosing a zip rather than a codpiece gives access too, but with a bit more hassle. The crotch-zip or multiple runners on a "through" zip means you're dangling yourself through an opening that has nice plastic teeth on both sides, and zipping/unzipping can easily pinch skin. Unless of course pain/discomfort is the goal. I like the codpiece myself.

Next up, color. Black is the basic color that literally everyone has. Basic black. Mr. S sells 99% black, with a little red mixed in occasionally. So black it is. Can't go wrong with black for a first suit.

Latex material also comes in different weights. The thinnest materials are almost like baloon rubber, very thin and stretchy. The heaviest are basically unstretchable and very industrial-feeling. The Mr. S suit is about one or two steps above the standard "thin" latex used for garments. I didn't know that at the time, but found out later when trying other suits. The thicker the latex is, the more accurately it ideally would be sized to your body, because it won't stretch as much. The upside is that it applies more pressure WHEN stretched, which is a pleasurable feeling, and helps mold the body inside more to the shape of the suit. So love handles disappear like magic! Good for us Americans...

So the overall verdict, A+. This is my first suit and its still in great shape. Its common for suits to have problems over time, rubber can deteriorate, glues seams can burst under pressure, etc., but this suit is going strong. Its not custom-fit so it can sag a little bit in the crotch (torso is a bit too long for me), and the arms are cut a bit too small, so after wearing it for a while, the shoulder zips start to dig into the flesh a bit. After taking the suit off, I usually have like little zipper lines embossed into my biceps. The only other possible downside is that the suit doesn't have attached feet/gloves/hood, which can add to the full coverage aspect and is a definitely turn-on, but the more attached bits the suit has, the less flexible it is for play, so I think no hands/feet is good for a first/only suit (which this was, for a while at least).

The suit also has a nice high-neckline, like a turtle-neck on a shirt. This is nice because when worn with a hood, it has a great seamless look to it. With a wide T-shirt style neck, it wouldn't look as good.

Mr. S does do mail order. The suit was around $450 at the time. It would highly recommend this vendor and configuration if it meets your needs (and floats your boat)..





Black latex catsuit from Mr. S