As a smalltown boy from the north of Belgium, my early life and explorations as a gay person were rather quite plane and heteronormative. I grew up in a very open, loving and supporting family. One might say quite hippie-esque. Having my parents, who were raised in quite conservative families themselves, walking around naked for most of the time and talking about their open views on sex and their sex life (as a reaction to their upbringing), led with to quite an inverse reaction with my brother, sister and me. In our teenager years and after, we were very prude and closed about our sexual life and journeys. It was always us kids that became super uncomfortable and started making awkward jokes when our parents were talking about sex, or when there was sex on the television when we were watching it together, is stead of the other way around.
So with this blockage on sex, and being a gay teenager with not a lot of representation, no network or community of queer people around me, I felt quite alone in my self-discovery. Add on to this that I had been bullied for a couple of years, no wonder I built quite a wall around myself. I became a huge people pleaser, that was afraid to be vulnerable, erecting also a barrier around my sexual being.
I was not shy about my body, on the contrary, it was always me that got naked as first if someone mentioned skinny dipping, or me showing my ass at parties (sorry). But the nakedness was never linked to something erotic or sexual arousal. It was part of laughter, of jokes. It became part of my armour that I had constructed as people pleaser, to be the funny one, to make people laugh. It was the sexuality itself, the uncontrolled desires, the arousal and the erotic ecstasy that became taboo. Maybe because there was too much vulnerability in this primal state of being? Maybe because as a people pleaser I was always focused on the wellbeing and experience of my sexual partners, so sex became a sort of performance, but I never figured out what I really wanted? Or was it because I liked to be in control of situations (reading the room, doing what others expected from me), and letting go of this control was hard? Or was sex also a way to please people and make them like me?
It was only when I moved to Brussels seven years ago that I started to re-deconstruct this blockage, and to explore who I really am. Away from my straight childhood friends, the expectations that they have of me, I could really find out who I really am. What do I want? And what gets me off? I still am on my journey to find myself and my sexuality, and I like to discover new things. This photoshoot is part of it. Yes, I am quite a late bloomer, but it does make me more conscious about it. During my explorations I did find out for example that it does arouse me to be naked in front of people. Or in nature. So am I after all not that different than my parents? But even more to just be naked, I also find it exciting to have sex in nature. Or to have sex in front of other people. To take sexuality and arousal out of the taboo-sphere. To share it and show it to others. It also is a way of challenging myself, about not caring what people think about me, but also to put boundaries and to enforce them when things go too far or are unwanted. In the past, I found myself in situations where I went home with guys to have sex, while thinking ‘I actually just wanted to make out on the dancefloor for a while, nothing more’. For me, making out or hugging for a while can be far more intimate and fulfilling then sex. Sex is beautiful and fun, but boundaries and listening to yourself and your needs is key.
It is thanks to the people and communities I got to know here in Brussels that I got a wider view on myself, relations, identity and sex in general. That I finally understood my parents. Sex became something normal on its own. While before it was for me always something you did in function of love, sharing your intimacy with the person you love (also to please them), it now can be part of life as a thing on its own. Like a Sunday afternoon activity. And I thank my boyfriend very much to give me the space and openness to discover this more, even if this is not always easy. I love you.