tuscl

Stripper as therapist

Tuesday, May 22, 2007 7:34 AM
Another discussion here got me to thinking about something. I know most people here go to strip clubs looking for a part-time playmate, and I always thought I did too. But when I look back on it, some of my most enjoyable times were spent just sitting and talking to an intelligent and sympathetic attractive young listener. My ATF and I used to sit and talk for hours. She always called me her therapist and I called her the same thing. We were both dealing with some depression at the time and I think we both helped each other enormously. I wonder how common that really is. Seems to me you see a lot of lonely older men in clubs, especially during off hours, just sitting and talking to their favorite dancer. It would probably be cheaper to see a real therapist, but then she'd probably insist on keeping her clothes on.

31 comments

  • Book Guy
    •
    17 years ago
    Is it therapy or company? There's a mild difference ...
  • DougS
    •
    17 years ago
    Stripper as Therpist? Nahhh... I prefer Stripper as The Rapist... I don't mind strippers sexually assaulting me in the least!
  • FONDL
    •
    17 years ago
    Book Guy, can't they be both? I went to a therpist once and all she did was ask questions and sit an listen. My ATF was better than that, she offered some helpful suggestions. This is funny, as soon as I posted this topic my ATF called me and we talked about this exact thing. She's had a lot of therapy, BTW, and finds that talking to me is more helpful. Maybe that's all that a lot of people need, a sympathetic and uncritical ear.
  • happylap
    •
    17 years ago
    FONDL, Another word for that (a sympathetic and uncritical ear) is "friend". Probably the best therapist is a good friend. I've never had a stripper as a friend but I could imagine it happening if I spent enough time with her. hl
  • evilcyn
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    17 years ago
    FONDL, I agree that relationships developed in this bis can be therapeutic. My ATF who I have spoke of manytimes, has been a great friend and great therapy at times and I know I have as well for him.. .. When the right connection is there it is bound to happen..
  • motorhead
    •
    17 years ago
    I never have considered my time spent with my ATF to be "therapy." However, I do very much so, consider her to be my friend and she has told my likewise. (Being truthful ??? Don't know) So, I think there is a difference. For the longest time, she wouldn't admit to me that she was in a relationship, for fear of losing me as a customer. But now that it is out in the open, we have deepened our friendship. I guess she trusts me more since I have told her I have no desire to see her OTC. We spend a lot of time discussing her relationship with her long-time S/O (good and bad) -- So maybe it's therapy for her (at my expense!)
  • FONDL
    •
    17 years ago
    I agree with the comments about friends. The problem is that a lot of guys spend so much time working and taking care of family obligations that they never have time for close friendships. They have no one with whom they can discuss their innermost thoughts. I think that's why some guys go to strip clubs and have favorites, not just for the fun physical stuff but for the intimate conversations that they can't have anywhere else. In that sense it's a lot like therapy. I think that's why I used to go clubbing a lot but no longer do, because my ATF now fulfills that need. Anyone else enjoy that aspect of clubbing?
  • ummyeah
    •
    17 years ago
    Absolutely. The best times I've had in a strip club have been with the friends I have there. When its slow and we're just talking, joking and having a good time. I think its actually spoiled me a bit. I'm currently in Tulsa, OK for some company training. I've hit up a couple of clubs around town and I didn't have near as good a time as I do at my home club. I have found that I prefer to spend most of my time just talking and getting to know the girl(s) rather than just watching and getting some private dances. Of course, I think I would have enjoyed the few dances I bought if they allowed two-way contact in OK, but that's beside the point.
  • Clubber
    •
    17 years ago
    Spot on, FONDL!
  • DandyDan
    •
    17 years ago
    I got to say that is probably true with my two current favorites. Except a real therapist doesn't allow any DATY action like the one girl does.
  • FONDL
    •
    17 years ago
    I used to visit my ATF when the club was at it's slowest and we'd sit and talk for hours, often about the most intimate stuff. I don't think I've ever been able to talk like that with anyone else. She opened my mind and introduced me to entirely different points of view on a whole range of subjects, and as a result my opinions and beliefs today are very different than they were 10 years ago. If that's not therapy I don't know what is.
  • chandler
    •
    17 years ago
    A good crotch grinding can be therapeutic. Sitting and talking about innermost thoughts is something I get plenty of in my daily life, so it's not my idea of a good time at a strip club. I like to relate to a stripper as lovers first and foremost more than friends. You know she's only going to reveal the side of herself she wants to show to customers anyway, so it's not like a true friendship. Friends don't work with a safety net.
  • FONDL
    •
    17 years ago
    For me it's the complete absence of friendship - the fact that we're almost total strangers - coupled with the intimate SC environment that can lead to the kind of conversation to which I refer. My ATF and I had a great many such conversations long before we became friends. It's happened to me so often that I got to wondering if anyone else has had similar experiences. Chandler, I gather that you've never had to deal with depression. And I hope you never do. But oddly enough, I'm glad it happened to me, because it forced me to face truths and make changes that I otherwise never would have done. The thing that makes it so hard to deal with is that depression can be oddly comforting. There's a part of you that wants to hang on to it, that doesn't want to get better. I once wrote a poem that began, "My old friend Mr. D arrived again today, just like I knew he would." If you've never been there I don't think you can quite understand that aspect of it. I'm writing this stuff because I think that Book Guy is going through something similar to what I did 10 years ago. And I hope hearing me talk about my experience will help him a little. Or anyone else here for that matter - I think strip clubs attract a lot of lonely and depressed older men. Just like they attracted me.
  • evilcyn
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    17 years ago
    Chandler, You are so right, to 99% we only show what we feel relates to the job and what someone is looking for in a stripper that day.. Sometimes though it just happens, with my ATF, the friendship just was there from the start, we have known eachother 9 years I think, he is someone I am thankful to have met and have in my life..We have been that ear and or shoulder for one another many times.. Just one of those things that make life a little brighter !! FONDL, it amazes me how similar our relationships seem to be.. There are things about my self now that I know are a direct effect of having met my ATF..
  • chandler
    •
    17 years ago
    FONDL: Good point that complete strangers can reveal intimate thoughts and feelings to each other that friends would be inhibited about sharing. I made my lovers-first-not-friends case in response to all the other posts about stripper faves being great friends and confidantes. I've had intimate talks with strangers and acquaintances alike in a lot of unexpected settings, like airports, and yes, strip clubs. Sometimes it does just happen. It's not, however, a goal of mine when I sit with a stripper, as some here seemed to indicate.
  • shadowcat
    •
    17 years ago
    I can tell by the content of the conversation, if a stripper is just leading up to "wanna dance" or she is enjoying the conversation as much as I am. From a new mother "God, I can't wait untill he sleeps all night". or "This is how I cook my pot roast". or " Did you see ( former ATF) Wednesday? She wants to come back to work here again when she can figure out a way of getting out of her relationship with her new boyfriend". or "I hope to make enough money here tonight to pay my rent". Which one was the downer? Then there was the first time that I met my true ATF. Shekitout can attest to this. She sat down and immediately placed my hand on her bare knee and at the same time shoved those lucious tits into my arm. Then she fired off question after question. I'll bet 30 questions in 30 minutes. "what is you name, where are you from. why are you here, are you married, do you watch porn, do you masturbate, what kind of music do you like, what is your favorite food." She knew more about me in 30 minutes than my ex wife did in 27 years. Then we went to the back room. When she slipped out of that black cocktail dress, I knew that I had died and gone to heaven. Truely a "10" in any mans book. She rocked my world for an hour except to ask "Are you OK, Moneywise?" She continued to rock my world for the next 2 years, Through my divorce etc. Was she theraputic? Absoutely. I was saddened when whe finally quit the business. But I always knew that she would. Since then, there have been scores of dancers that have been theraputic to me. They know where I am at. They know that I do not want a relationship with a women my own age (65) and that I just want to have fun untill I am too old to enjoy it. Yes, they are therapists...
  • Book Guy
    •
    17 years ago
    I don't claim that I "can tell" merely from the content of the conversation, whether she is on her way to "wanna dance" or on her way to "spend quality rapport time and get paid appropriately for it." The reason I don't make that claim is, that I've found plenty of girls to be adequately good actresses to make A seem entirely like B. I don't really mind that I don't know. In the long run I'm there for the fantasy that A IS B, and therefore if I mistake A for B, then I'm just as happy as if I had gotten a real B in the first place, right?
  • happylap
    •
    17 years ago
    BG, I think that actually makes a lot of sense. hl
  • chandler
    •
    17 years ago
    I've made the same point, Book Guy, that you can't tell whether B is an act, but you shouldn't care as long as it works for you. Thing is, I'm so used to hearing B *as* an act that I can't take it seriously, especially the 30 questions interview (never my favorite way to get to know somebody anyway). Always reminds me of the overly familiar small talk sales people have been trained to engage in for 1.5 minutes before finally getting down to the business you know they're there for.
  • ummyeah
    •
    17 years ago
    I think you have to work under the assumption that it's always an act, until you get overwhelming evidence to the contrary. Not paying them for their company seems to weed out the actresses pretty quick, in my experience. I've always made it perfectly clear that if the dancer wants to come over and chat with me she is welcome to and, by the same token, if she needs to go hustle up some private dances, she's welcome to go make her money. I've found that I'm almost never wanting for company and I hardly ever spend much money. It seems odd to me to pay for "quality time". I guess I don't see how it could be all that "quality" if I have to pay for it. Enjoyable, maybe, but not "quality".
  • chandler
    •
    17 years ago
    I wouldn't know about anything but not paying strippers for their company. However we all pay indirectly when we pay them for dances. The time they spend providing company is part of their new business and/or customer service effort. Whether or not it's an act, I assume they do it at least partly because they hope it will pay off. That's no reason not to enjoy it. I would just prefer it to be more sexually entertaining than therapeutic.
  • FONDL
    •
    17 years ago
    I agree with Chandler, it doesn't matter whether it's an act or not, it's how she treats you that matters. IMO it almost always starts out as an act. And even though some act or other most likely will continue, there can also be some genuine interest on her part at the same time. Some dancers truly enjoy meeting and getting to know new people - my ATF was one of them. I don't think I ever paid my ATF for just spending time with me. But I did buy about a thousand LDs from her (at $10 apiece for you math majors) and I usually paid for one more than I received as a tip, plus tips on stage, so she made out OK. She never charged extra for the therapy, nor did I.
  • Book Guy
    •
    17 years ago
    Well, I view the money for dances as a kind of after-the-fact rental of the girl. She earns the money by buttering me up properly BEFORE the dances, and then by making sure the dances aren't REALLY disappointing. (It's, after all, quite difficult to give a poor lap-dance, as long as certain minimum expectations ((depending on venue and jurisdiction)) are met.) So I kind of "rent" the girl's time, but pay after she's spent it. I do know that I know it's a fantasy, and that I like the fantasy, and that I go to a strip club to get the fantasy, and not a reality. And I know that I like going to strip clubs. :) But I don't know whether or not I LIKE the fact that it's a fantasy. Sometimes that just gets me down. Like I've posted in other threads, I feel MORE lonely after a great interaction with a cool chick, whether or not I also pay her a lot for a strip-club-determined experience. Especially if a certain kind of rapport is established -- the kind that simply cannot be created in a real-world situation in which two strangers, hot for one another (fantasy or reality), meet and then begin to interact. There's simply no crossing the social gulf in that manner at a "regular" bar, because the woman has an agenda different from the man's. There, the woman is doing what she can to PREVENT the male from having a good time (in my experience) and basically is showing off how NEGATIVE a person she can be. Meanwhile, the man is doing what he can to "beat" her at that game, and showing off that her negativity doesn't fluster him. "Look at me, I'm able to take it" versus "Look at what I can dish out." In a strip club, the two members of the couple work toward one another's mutual gratification. Each presumably knows the ground rules and the reasonable expectations (how far the fantasy can extend, before it rubs up against unfortunate reality). And therefore each is simply leading the other down the desired path. It isn't dialectic or competitive, it's cooperative. I actually don't perceive that the real-world version -- competitive, negative -- is something that can change or that I can't learn to play in. I just don't like it. I also don't REALLY think that the strip-club version is an adequate alternative to real-world socializing. I just don't get enough real-world success to do without the strip-club type of crutch to prop myself back up again. I can't manage to "cross that social gulf" in the real world and therefore regularly REQUIRE something else, simply to remain sane. I guess I "could" somehow "resist" the call of strip-clubs. That might even give me a new perspective on the man-woman thing in real-world interactions. But I lack the will-power, or simply choose not to try. I am also a pipe smoker. I "could" somehow "quit" smoking, but I like it and I'm not currently concerned about it. Same for strip-clubbing: it's probably got a long-term deleterious effect, I probably should quit, it probably has negative consequences for my real life. But ... I just don't work that way right now. Wish I did ... then again, maybe I don't wish I did ... In fact, ideally, all that I'd like to see is that the "cooperative" dynamic were to become a part of real-world interactions. I've never experienced that. Chicks are always so bitchy and vigorously "I'm being flighty on purpose" around me. Not sure how to cross that hurdle.
  • happylap
    •
    17 years ago
    BG, When I first started reading this discussion board I didn't expect to run across words I have to look up. I think you've done that to me before but it's one of the reasons I keep reading this board--guys like you make it interesting. I don't enjoy some of the dialectic (there I used the word) gibberish on this board but someone comes up with something interesting at least once a week. I'm also addicted to strip clubs. I'm married so my prespective is probably different from yours. Sometimes I wish I could be like Carl Hiasen who wrote a book of fiction about strip clubs in Florida. I can't remember the name but a movie was made from it starring Demi Moore, I think. I heard an interview of him. When he was writing the book he hung out in a lot of strip clubs and just talked to dancers and tried to get to know them. I presume he did not partake of any dances. It would probably make it a lot more difficult to write about it objectively, I guess. That's a weird fantasy, isn't it? Wishing I could resist the sexual desire to rub up against these attractive women so that I could get to know them better? The title just came to me: "Strip Tease" I believe.
  • FONDL
    •
    17 years ago
    Book Guy, you raise an issue here which we've discussed before, the fact that some relationships are cooperative (win-win) and some are competitive (win-lose). But I don't think that where they occur has anything to do with it, there are plenty of cooperative relationships in "real" bars and plenty of competitive ones in strip clubs. It depends on the nature of the people involved, not where they are. HL, we've also talked about "Strip Tease" before. The book is much better than the movie. The mvie tries to make a social commentary which ruins it, the book is pure humor.
  • Book Guy
    •
    17 years ago
    "there are plenty of cooperative relationships in "real" bars and plenty of competitive ones in strip clubs. It depends on the nature of the people involved, not where they are. " Yes, this of course is a true (and rather obvious) statement. I personally don't experience "cooperative" relationships in civilian non-strip-club bars. This must have something to do with MY nature, though I'm not a ridiculously aggressive person. I just seem to twig women into the whole "good girl DON'T FUCKING TOUCH ME YOU MASHER!" and "make him wait" act. Other dudes are out there getting laid and therefore getting girlfriends. I'm getting my wallet drained. And often it turns out, that I find out later, while I'm being "made to wait" the female objects of my interest are also actually fucking other guys. Other guys whom the women characterize as "bad catches, and therefore what I do with them 'doesn't matter.'" This qualifies as very very frustrating, to me. I guess I should learn to be a 'bad catch' too. Hmm, maybe that's why I keep losing my job, I want to join the ranks of despicable hoboes who actually get enough sex ...
  • happylap
    •
    17 years ago
    FONDL, I haven't seen the movie Strip Tease but I did read the book. To me it was more than pure humor. There was some political commentary there as well. Hiasen is a native Floridian and he always has a point of view in his fiction, usually in relation to Florida, overdevelopment or some other topic. In Strip Tease, it was about the sugar industry, and how the US government props up domestic sugar producers. But I'm going way off topic. Sorry.
  • Book Guy
    •
    17 years ago
    Hiaasen is pretty funny however you put it. Casting Burt Reynolds (an ol' Florida boy himse'f) as the Governor was right spot on. Fit him to a T. But putting Demi Moore in the lead role was idiotic, at least from a characterization perspective. Shoulda been someone much more "has been" and weathered.
  • FONDL
    •
    17 years ago
    HL, of course the book had some social commentary, it would be hard to write a book that didn't. Even his more recent children's books have some soical commentary. But not enought to ruin the humor in them. Which is what the movie did.
  • casualguy
    •
    17 years ago
    Talking to a favorite stripper can be therapy as well as enjoying some lap dance attention. To me it often seems to get a bit more complicated at times when before I realize it, I'm suddenly on a first name basis, have her personal cell phone number she only gives to friends, and I know she wants to get to know me better away from the strip club. A dancer can leave an impression on you if she says she wants you to take her out to dinner and she seems sincere. This coming from the mouth of a dancer whom you weren't even paying much attention to. I remember my first ATF was like a puppy dog all over me as soon as she found out I was in her club. I think she made of habit of getting to me first. At times I thought she seemed like the top bitch in the strip club since she would chase away any dancer who dared to talk to me before she got to me. Only new dancers ever seemed to do that. I thought she was thinking of me as a customer even outside the club for a while so I got a bit startled when she made a comment to me one time. I was talking about the possibility of getting a job in her hometown and then she smiled and said she could come over to my house and dance for me everyday. I was startled and thinking "I can't afford that." I didn't even realize she wasn't thinking of me as a customer at that point. Knowing where you stand takes some experience to know whether you are still a customer, fuck buddy, or friend.
  • MisterGuy
    •
    17 years ago
    Strippers are *not* therapists...they are professional money makers, period. I've had favorite strippers of mine tell me that I'm their "therapist" (most likely cuz I listen quite well), and I'm sure that they meant it...but it still was mostly about the steady money stream that I gave them. I totally understand the "lonely guy needing a young girl to pay some attention to him" routine though. It is a nice fantasy watching a hot, young girl actually engaging you in conversation, but it's just a fantasy kids. I would *never* want to see my actual therapist naked...lol... :)
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