While on a long drive home this afternoon, I found myself dwelling on my wam fetish which has been a secret of mine since childhood. It dawned on me that there has probably not been a week in the last twenty years where I didn't visit these forums. Over those years, the only ones who knew about my fetish were girlfriends and spouses - with the exception of my first girlfriend, I have been able to easily bring my fondness for gunge and pies up with any of my sexual partners and only one time has this backfired - the person in question immediately shared this information with her friend, who it turned out had also facilitated another man's gunge fetish.

Anyway, even though I was able to tell these women while in relationships with them, the thought of admitting this openly in conversation to anyone else, friends, family or even strangers; has always been unthinkable to me. But today I found myself asking why...

I do not want to trivialise this at all, publicly admitting I am sexually aroused by the sight of women being gunged, must be the equivalent of a gay person 'coming out' - and if that's a fair assessment then I have never previously appreciated how much courage that act requires.

And then it got me thinking - well okay, what IF the world knew. What does it matter? Why AM I ashamed. Why am I considering this as a possible course of action - What would doing this achieve. What are the pros, more importantly, what are the cons??

Here's the big question.... should I bring this up with my therapist?

I say this generally, and not to anyone specific..

Every detail of someone's life doesn't need to be revealed. A little mystery is nice sometimes.

Yes, this absolutely sounds like something worth bringing up with your therapist. Therapy is one of the few spaces you can have open, judgment-free exploration of things that feel vulnerable or confusing. If you're already asking yourself why you feel shame, what "coming out" would mean, and what the pros and cons might be, that's exactly the kind of material therapy is meant for.

At the same time, I don't think there's any obligation to make a public declaration about your sexual interests. Most people don't openly discuss their fantasies or kinks with friends, family, coworkers, or casual acquaintances. That kind of information is usually reserved for partners. Nobody outside of my wife or users here knows about my kinks. That doesn't automatically mean I'm ashamed; I just value boundaries.

You've already shown that you can communicate about this with partners when it matters, which is really the key piece. Beyond that, disclosure is a personal choice, not a moral requirement.

So talk to your therapist if it's on your mind, but don't feel pressured to turn this into some grand public revelation,

I can understand a betrayal of trust so to say and being nervous about that happening again. BUT, and this is a big one, if you are questioning talking with a therapist about this, it makes me wonder if you really trust your therapist. No topic should be taboo. Some of this might be your uneasiness with talking openly about sexual things with someone who is not a partner.

With the shame part, a lot of that from what I have seen stems from conservative people who spread shame about sexuality in general. It makes me think they have never had a eye roll to the back of their head orgasm. As Robin Williams said in Good Morning Vietnam, they are in more dire need of a blowjob than any man in history. Sexual repression is no reason to project that on to others. I also know that this kind of thing is very different based on what continent you live on. For example, in Britain Monty Python could get away with cartoon nudity on TV. In the US, not so much we are too repressed.

With the way that people use sexual fetishes for revenge or humiliation/shame I can understand being cautious. There have been situations on this site where people tried to use the activity of users here in custody disputes and other bullshit. I don't think that anyone has the right to be informed about what happens between consenting adults. I think that instead of it being very taboo or used for shame, it should be the opposite. That a person trusts someone enough to share some of that information with them should be seen as a sign of trust.

Just wait until you find out what our TV show 'Naked Attraction', broadcast on national TV, is all about

This is one of those things that very much will vary with individual people. In my case, I've always been wide open about it, everyone who I know even remotely well knows that I'm into fully clothed splosh, and that I find women in boilersuits, overalls, or wellies, sexy. Most folk aren't fussed, some make fun jokes, and some end up as models. I do have a very progressive and left-leaning friend group, I live in a major metropolitan area, my religion is open minded, I work in IT, all of which probably makes it easier. But part of my thinking is "you can't be blackmailed for something that's in the public domain", plus there's nothing shameful about consensual adult sexual activity, kinks, or fetishes.

My fiance knows and is completely supportive of it. She'll even wear a dress in the shower on occasion.

My therapist knows and I bring it up on occasion as context for other stuff.

My parents don't know, as far as I know, and I've never told them. I did do quite a bit of searching things on the family computer before A)I had a smartphone and B)I knew about search history, so they may have seen things, but they've never brought it up.

My wife knows about it, and is quite understanding of it all. She's joined in a few gunge filled sessions, but while she enjoyed it it's not really her scene.

My general rule of thumb is 'do you need or want to know?'
Partner- yes
Mates- depends on context/mate, but generally no.
Family- NO. Close family do NOT need to hear details about my sex life; for the same reason I really do NOT want to hear about theirs.**
Random Stranger- don't care, we'll probably never see each other again anyway.


As a 'general life' rule of thumb- go careful with workmates. Lest some soulless knob-jockey from HR decides your personal private conversations violates company policy.

If you feel it will help your therapy journey in any way, by all means talk about it to your therapist. That's a safe space to do so. Sorry to hear that you had a bad experience with sharing it, but it sounds like that was just one bad instance out of several good ones so try not to let one bad apple ruin it for the others.
I thankfully haven't had any bad experiences telling anyone yet (touch wood). I did have that fear of being judge about it when telling others, but, while I do get a few raised eyebrows and a couple of giggles, generally everyone's fine with it. I thought I'd have to keep it a secret I'd take to my grave given that I do stand-up comedy and, if I ever got famous for it, someone might use my splosh side to try and ruin me, but I ended up talking about my wam experiences on stage and get there first. Audiences laugh and fellow comedians reactions vary from not bothered to curious. Met a few who wanted to get pied in the face and some even got their wish, myself included. Sharing a video of that moment on my socials was the most open I've been about it and it's kinda liberating as well as enjoying people's reactions to it.
If it makes you happy and you're not harming anyone else, go for it. And if anyone shames you for it, tell them to get f**ked. They're not the people you want in your life.

I absolutely can't, never could. Maybe linked to the "phobia in reverse" theory of fetishism...I couldn't/can't even say the word gunge out loud in an IRL situation. Shows on TV with family around made me wildly uncomfortable even when tiny & not understanding what the feelings were.

Add to that loads of shame/embarrassment plus complicated real life stuff & it's a hard no. So I have to keep it locked in a separate box.

Bad news is this can make me really down. Good news is when I do get to play I really have fun

I usually don't tell people about my fetish. However, I have told strangers in bars about it (long story) and the usual response has been something along the lines of, 'This is not a big deal - the way you led up to the revelation made me expect something much more serious like 'I punched a stranger in the face.' (Obviously I never did such a thing.) I would definitely tell your therapist, because this is an important part of your identity.

I can, but I prefer to keep things to myself around friends and family, I always found casual sex talk with people I know personally weird/awkward regardless of whether or not the subject is vanilla or fetish related (outside of relationships, I've told every past partner my fetish and nobody had an issue). Like there's a place and a mood, I don't ever feel the need to tell my dad or my cousin or sister that I really like to get off while covered in goop, same reason I wouldn't tell them I like good toppy or doggy style, it's just not appropriate

I imagine the whole "I can't tell anyone" mindset is more difficult the older you are. A life of repression does a number on the mind, a reaction of shock and disgust at such a tame fetish as WAM is still probably the norm for gen x and up. On the other hand, a lot of millennial and gen z are open about their fetishes, the furry, weeb, and bdsm communities along with a bunch of pop stars kinda paved the way and now a lot of us just don't care about keeping it a secret anymore. That said, if you're writing your fantasies out and posting it on your public social media that your family and friends follow, yeah that's always gonna be creepy

If I was in a relationship I'd want to bring it up probably...I've really only had one serious relationship that lasted just over 2 years, and the closest I came to bringing it up with her was hinting that maybe we could bring some chocolate syrup into our play time, I could lick it off her...which of course, was nowhere near saying "I have this fetish where I love seeing women getting gooey stuff dumped all over their head, specifically their hair..." but nothing really ever came of it, she said something like "that could be kinky." Aside from that all my other relationships have lasted anywhere from a week to 2 months, so not really enough time had passed to even bring it up. It'd be great to have someone to bring it up with. Some people on here have had great success...I'm just born to be a loner though. Relationships are great while they last, but it seems like they always turn to shit for me. I get overly attached and get way too crushed when they end. I decided I don't like that and just gave up all together. Been single for something like 17 years now.

As for anyone else, I can't see the benefit to bringing it up outside of a relationship...I don't really know much about therapy, but if you're open about everything else with them, I guess you could bring it up if it's troubling you.

For the whole what if the world knew thing? I thought about that a bit before posting pics...like what if someone I know sees these and recognizes me? Then I was like well, if they come across them on a fetish site, it must mean that they have the fetish too...and they're probably not going to say anything, just like I don't go around saying anything about it. I'm not really a social butterfly; I don't have many friends. All the ones I was friends with in school have pretty much all disappeared from my life, so I'm not really worried about what they'd think if they saw stuff...or if some stranger at a convention I go to sees me and recognizes me, it's like...whatever. I don't really see anyone taking my pictures into work and posting them all over the place or anything like that, not sure what it would accomplish, I don't really have any enemies, and no one wants my job.

In total I think I've told 3 people about my wam fetish. One was my ex girlfriend who partook in several wam sessions after I told her about it, another is a close female friend of mine and another was a girl who gunged me when I was younger and was unaware I had a fetish at the time.
Pretty much all of them did seem to think I was I was making fun of them at first but once I went into why I was into it they seemed to come around and whilst they themselves didn't think it was arousing, they could see why someone would.
They were all pretty open minded women too and the topic of conversation was on kinks and fetishes each time I brought it up so I think that also helps when they're being vulnerable and open with you too.

I am very much in your camp though of not really wanting people to know about it though. I've had this fetish since I was really young and didn't even understand it was a fetish until my mid to late teens and during that period had a really strange relationship with mess that it became obvious to some people when I was young and they had suggested to my mum that I may have OCD (I don't btw, just pointing out how obvious my fetish was coming across to some people when I didn't know I had a fetish).

As others have said though there's no need to share all aspects of your life to the world. If it's just a case of wanting to tell someone so you can actually can talk openly with them about your fetish then I would just say tell a friend you trust

I don't have a problem discussing my kinks openly but I also don't just talk about sex stuff all of the time with everybody. There's a time and a place for just about everything. One just needs to know their audience.

If somebody's my close friend, there's a good chance sex stuff gets talked about, in which case, I don't mind discussing my personal kinks. I think for some folks there might be an element of thrill that surrounds having a somewhat secret kink and that elevated adrenaline can feel good. Being a thrill seeker who has jumped off of a building, jumped out of airplanes, rode a motorcycle past 150mph and traveled internationally for the sake of riding rollercoasters, having a secret fetish doesn't really tip the scales.

When it comes to therapy, you should feel pretty comfortable discussing it with them, especially if you're curious about the genesis of the interest or anything like that. The WAM fetish is essentially harmless and probably wouldn't even raise the eyebrow of a seasoned therapist.

There is one platonic friend I talk about it with her - a special friendship in which we can say anything, so I feel very lucky about that. Otherwise, I share it with people I have physical relationships with, as they sometimes already involve some form of fetish, such as PVC clothing or mild bdsm. I also agree it's very much not family business and doesn't need to be.