How to prevent romantic feelings

xandriarain

There have been a handful of occasions in my cuddling career where a client has developed romantic feelings for me and had to stop seeing me. This is a lose, lose situation because I lose a client and the client loses a much-needed service before they were able to find touch in their personal lives. I already take steps to prevent clients from developing feelings such as making my boundaries extremely clear, dressing modestly, and being open about the fact that I am in a committed relationship. I am not sure if there is anything else I can do to prevent clients from developing romantic feelings but it's very frustrating and I would like some additional tools to help mitigate this issue.

@xandriarain this is suuuuuch a tough one because, despite everything we do to prevent clients developing feelings for us, it does happen because of the emotionally intimate nature of our work. When I suspect that one of my clients may be becoming too attached to me I suggest to them that they see another cuddler (one that I recommend) for a one off session. Obviously it's not ideal because I lose the one payment but then my client can see for themselves that the other professional cuddler is just as nice and attentive to them as me because that comes with the territory of the job and actually it is not because of some unique connection that they think they have fostered with me. I have found this has worked in my case and they have come back with a fresh mindset and we've continued to have sessions ever since. I really feel for you though as it is not a good situation to be in - good luck!

cuddlerforu24

If the client suspects he’s experiencing transference, then he’s free to see another provider , it’s that simple .

How to “prevent “ ? You can’t without discouraging them from hiring you in the first place . You describe boundaries , attire , and a personal relationship , in this quest to neutralize a potential attachment . I guarantee every client that’s ever booked with a provider had some kind of little spark Of attraction to the pro , because they identified a pleasantry in their advertisement, thier photo , profile commentary , and messaging . To utilize a “ tool” to prevent possible romantic feelings will probably prevent the client from making a booking in the first place . So , you’ll be just as bad off , financially.

Just deal with it if or when it happens , we’re talking money , it’s business , it’s full time cash for cuddling , scaring up a living , with all the bucks , boners , and blankets , if you can’t , then a day job with benefits , holidays etc is probably nice , and you can still do some hobby pay cuddling .

Despite your previous warning about making unnecessarily rude and provocative comments in the forums, you continued on to make a comment of this nature. Your 10 day forum timeout starts now. -squeakytoy

CuddleDuncan

@xandriarain ignore the previous post, it's utterly heartless and unworthy of anybody who claims to be a cuddler. It doesn't even attempt to answer your point: I suspect because the poster obviously doesn't understand it.

@Healing_Hugs' advice is excellent.

This is an extremely serious and very difficult question. A cuddle professional who I know very well and admire enormously had to take a short break from cuddling altogher because of this very problem. The part that upset her the most was the pain that she was inadvertently causing to her client.

I can't speak as a professional, obviously, and I can't even speak as a client who has developed romantic feelings for a professional. But I can speak as somebody who did became dangerously close to being over-attached to a professional. (You will be happy to hear that I was aware of the situation and we got through it successfully.)

There were three key lessons I learned from that experience. Firstly, honesty and openness on the part of the professional are vital. You are already doing this by being straightforward and clear about being in a long term relationship. An additional point might be to demonstrate clearly to all clients you commitment to the 'therapists' code', whereby it is not permitted to enter into any kind of personal relationship, romantic or otherwise, with a client.

Secondly, boundaries. Keep 'em clear and keep 'em strict. Clients are like toddlers. If you get it right 894 times, and wrong once, it's the once that defines the rule for the future. Is that hard to do? No .... it's impossible. Which leads me onto my third point.

Successful professional cuddling relies on the creation and maintenance of emotional boundaries. We draw hard and fast boundaries that everybody keeps to all the time, such as the ones around sex. (Obviously when I say 'everybody', I mean your kind of professional cuddler, not the various other kinds.) However, it is becoming increasingly apparent to me that you cannot draw such strict boundaries around cuddling as you can around, say, psychotherapy.

I know nothing about my psychotherapist. I mean, I know her well: I can tell a lot about her mood and sometimes the actual answer to a question which she is not going to answer. With a cuddler it's totally different. Our stomachs are pressed together - I know how the digestion of her lunch is going. I can feel the consciously imperceptible tension when she's having a tough day or a tough week. More than once I have temporarily removed myself from a cuddle because I didn't feel comfortable, because the professional (who I knew well and liked) wasn't 'right', and I've said, "Come on, you don't really want to cuddle me today, what's going on?"

The consequence of all that is that the lesser boundaries are broken sometimes, whether you like it or not. And once you start breaking the boundaries, then the risk of excessive attachment increases. (This is what happened to me.) The answer - yes, you've guessed it - is communication. Breaking the boundaries is not bad in itself. For a start, they should be individual to the particular client. But you have to be really open and strong and clear in talking about them. (The part that my cuddle professional didn't manage to get right at the time She demonstrably learnt from the experience.)

I think what I'm trying to say is that although you can do things to reduce the risk of this situation occurring, you can't prevent it altogether. The trick then is to spot it early, if you can, and in any event face it head on and talk about it. Remind the client that these are not 'true' feelings - they don't actually know you. It's hard to accept that feelings you feel very strongly aren't 'true', but they are not: they are just a natural human reaction to being cared for.

I suppose we could create a protocol of what the client is supposed to do if they are starting to develop romantic feelings. After a certain number of sessions you could say, "Now we have to have a talk. With regular clients, there is a risk of romantic feelings developing. This is perfectly normal, and if it starts to happen to you here's why it isn't real and what we're going to do about it."

In other words, you can't stop it happening. But you can attempt to head it off at the pass, and if you catch it early enough there is a hope that you can talk it through.

When I became too attached to my professional there came a moment when I was very upset by something that happened. I wrote her a somewhat angry and distressed email. She happened to see it the second it was sent, and thirty seconds after hitting Send - I was still staring at the screen - she rang me. I was astonished, we had never spoken on the phone. Her first words were "Duncan, I'm so sorry." At that point she didn't even properly understand what she had done. But I knew, in that moment, that it would be ok. And it was.

CuddleWho

IMO the key is what @Healing_Hugs touches on, although as she mentions it's not necessarily best for your bottom line in the short term: cuddle clients should be cuddling multiple people. If you're someone's only source of physical affection, and you see them on a regular basis... it seems almost inevitable that they're going to get overly attached.

Melancholy

I think some clients will always develop feelings no matter what you do.

CuddleDuncan

I agree with both @CuddleWho and @Melancholy.

ubergigglefritz

@CuddleWho agreed, but the problem is that many people struggle to find just one "good" professional in their area (some can't even find one of those), let alone two, or more. 😔

xandriarain

All of these are good points. It sucks for me because I very much enjoy having a consistent group of regulars rather than a revolving door of clients with lots of slow weeks. It sounds like it is an unavoidable situation and all I can do is make my boundaries clear and try to talk to the client about it if it becomes apparent. However, in my experience clients find the whole experience of having romantic feelings that they cannot act on to be frustrating and they voluntarily stop seeing me before we can really have a meaningful discussion and one time I did have a discussion with a client and I was able to hold on to him a bit longer but in the end, he realized he needed more than I could offer and had to move on.

timetocuddle07

To be honest I'm be real as a man and not one catering to another sex. If you are attractive it is a gift and curse. Let's be honest it brings the majority of pros clients here. Yea men read profiles but we are way more visual . The negative though is these guys will want you . Who know if it's really deep feelings beyond the surface. Most time this will happen just have to accept some alow weeks because some will always want more than offering. And hope they can date you or whatever they think can happen that benefits them too in the long run

cuddlerforu24

@cuddleduncan .... you say the pro can attempt “ head them off at the pass” ( the feelings) with talking about them . Are you suggesting some coaching about this ? Certainly not unlicensed counseling . I always thought pro cuddlers were listeners not advisers. With a pattern of cuddle sessions that do not include discussions of human emotions, you are proposing a shift in session dynamics . You can’t force the client to attend these sessions that include a portion of the time discussing unrequited love if he does not want to .Think mutually ageeable cuddle activities .Then the pro is back to square one .

CuddleDuncan

@cuddlerforu24 I suppose I'm suggesting that we all have a conversation about how a long-term professional cuddling relationship should work. Which is really what this thread is about anyway.

I'm not sure exactly what you mean by 'coaching' but it suggests an ongoing thing, and that's not what I meant. Clients and professionals have to talk about how they are going to work together, and this is just one part of that conversation. It's different from most parts because it doesn't happen at the beginning (there's no point) in only happens if the relationship is continuing. It is of course a matter for the professional whether to discuss this once, repeatedly (which might be necessary in come cases) or not at all.

It might be helpful for professionals to exchange ideas and experiences of how they have had this conversation, and how things have gone, in the hope of developing a 'standard form' which works well for everybody.

Cuddling is an intrinsically emotionally activity, and in most cases (although obviously not all) it is helpful to discuss these emotions, and/or harmful not to.

I quite agree that cuddle professionals should not, in general, give advice. But they can and should provide relevant information: after all, they are supposed to know more about cuddling than the client does.