“I Just Hated ‘Hair'”: What Saved a Woman in Her 30s—Who Became a Sex Worker When Her Life Hit Rock Bottom—From Her “Days of Hell”
“Stinging at the Limit” [Part 1]
“He was throwing up nonstop in the restroom of the waiting room.”
In today’s world, where anyone can share information, social media is overflowing with posts about adult entertainment establishments—from sex workers calling out “terrible customers” to customers warning others about “landmine workers.” From each side’s perspective, there’s probably some truth to both sides of the story.
Published on September 1, **Mandala*’s book *The Stinging Limit: The Unvarnished Diary of a Fat Sex Worker in Steady Decline* (Shishiosha), published on September 1, candidly details various behind-the-scenes aspects—from the behavior of the men she observed while working as a “low-tier sex worker” for three years to her daily earnings.This is the first part of an interview in which *Mandala*, who is now an independent sex life coach, speaks in detail about “clients as seen by a sex worker.”
*Mandala* first entered the sex industry in the fall of 2014. She worked as an office worker by day and attended a vocational school at night, but due to a developmental disability, she was struggling with conflicts with her parents and poor relationships at work.On top of that, she had accumulated a massive debt from student loans for the vocational school she had dropped out of three times due to being unable to adjust, and her life fell apart. She suffered from mental illness and was unable to get out of bed for three weeks, eventually getting fired from her job. With her life on the brink of collapse, the path she chose was the adult entertainment industry.
*Mandala* ended up working at a “plus-size” escort service in Gotanda, but she says the work was so physically and mentally grueling at first that it left her completely worn out.
“I’ve changed jobs more than 30 times, and I usually felt like I could adapt to a new workplace within a month of starting. But with the adult entertainment industry, even after half a year, I still couldn’t get used to it. Especially when it came to hygiene. I was constantly terrified of STDs; I’d have flashbacks in the middle of the night, and I’d be so scared and anxious that I’d sometimes have to take sleeping pills just to fall asleep.”
She says what she hated most was “pubic hair.”
“It felt like pubic hair was getting into my mouth, and no matter how much I tried to remove it, it still felt like there was more left. It was so disgusting that there were times I kept throwing up in the restroom of the waiting room. That’s how physically uncomfortable it was.
It wasn’t just the hair—I’ve always had a hard time with the squishy, flaccid feel of a penis before an erection; it made me feel sick. Normally, I think most girls wouldn’t lick it if they didn’t like it, but maybe because of a ‘all-or-nothing’ trait associated with my developmental disorder, I’d push myself to do it, so it would end up in my mouth.Sometimes I could even taste blood in my mouth. I suffered from the persistent sensation of having a foreign object lodged there.
Also, with clients who had an abnormally strong sex drive, I felt like they were sucking the very life out of me, and it left me completely drained. Sex workers get touched all over their bodies, so many of us are exhausted by it. After one client ejaculates, feels relieved, and leaves, the next one arrives. That’s when it feels like my very life force is being drained away.”
Male customers come here to release “happiness hormones.”
Even so, quitting was never an option. *Mandala*, who has a developmental disability and says she’s struggled to get by since childhood, found she couldn’t fit into society even in her 20s and 30s, and felt she was a “social misfit.” Believing this was her only way to survive, she ultimately turned to the sex industry as her last resort.
That’s why, even when she hated the job, she never walked out or called in sick on the day of a shift unless she was physically unwell. However, the work in the adult entertainment industry—which had initially been purely about making money and was a source of pain—eventually became a source of emotional healing for *Mandala*.
“I was distant from my family, and I had no friends or peers. I was in a situation where I had no one to talk to when I wanted to. But the clients would listen to me. While some people only think about satisfying their sexual desires, there are also clients who communicate with me and listen to what I have to say. When those kinds of people become regulars, it really feels like a lifeline. I realized that the adult entertainment industry isn’t just a ‘place to get off.’”
According to *Mandala*, what male customers seek from the adult entertainment industry is “the release of happiness hormones.” She says they often fall into two categories: the “dopamine group,” who simply want to ejaculate or experience pleasure, and the “oxytocin and serotonin group,” who come seeking physical contact and communication.They come to adult entertainment “seeking healing” to replenish whichever of these elements is missing from their daily lives.
“Some people can put their loneliness into words, while others find it so elusive that they don’t even understand it themselves.People who can’t put it into words—like saying, ‘I want a hug because I’m lonely’—come here carrying emotions they don’t know how to handle. For those people, I just give them a hug. Then they say things like, ‘Ah, I feel so relieved,’ ‘I feel safe,’ or ‘I feel healed,’ and for some, ejaculation becomes the least of their concerns.
As a job in the service industry where I’m paid, I used to think that ejaculation was the bare minimum requirement. But when I get a ‘thank you’ on top of that, I feel fulfilled too.
Wondering if there was anything else I could do besides helping them climax, I decided to serve my clients with the goal of “making them laugh at least three times before they leave.” That’s why I can’t provide service where I fall head over heels in love with a client (laughs).
I’m actually pretty good at making people laugh—or rather, I just enjoy it. It’s not about creating a romantic connection; I’m good at breaking the ice with shy people. I’d strike up a conversation while trying to figure out what makes them laugh, and once I got a sense of it, I’d poke at that spot, and they’d laugh. I’d do my best to make them laugh before they left. I operated on the principle of “ejaculation plus laughter.”
Amid the excruciatingly painful work in the adult entertainment industry, *Mandala * gradually began to find a sense of “fulfillment.”
In [Part 2], *Mandala* reveals the three clients who left the strongest impression on her out of all the people she’s met so far.
Burning at the Limits: The Unvarnished Diary of an Overweight Sex Worker in a Downward Spiral