Most surfaces in this Alameda, Calif.
bungalow bear crystals and lit candles. It feels like being in a womb: In the
kitchen, a stove is on with the door cracked open and next to the massage table
a faux fireplace blazes. After nearly an hour of working her body over, Ben’s
hand slide between Becky’s legs and he begins walking her through a guided
meditation on her ideal man. “Imagine seeing him for the first time,” he says.
“You lock eyes from across the room.” After a lengthy narrative buildup, he
says, “His lips gently touch yours. Your knees melt out from under you.” Ben, a
tall all-American sort with ice-blue eyes, moves his fingers to her
clitoris, ”Let your pleasure spread, down your legs, all the way up to
your boobs.” As Becky’s moans deepen, he announces, ”K, I’m going inside.”
He slides on a pair of latex gloves and
liberally applies lube to his middle and ring finger. As he enters, Becky’s
“ahhhs” almost turn into song, and then she begins sobbing after Ben tells her,
“You’re ready for him.” Jen, a petite, near-platinum blonde, begins to recite
the affirmations that the three agreed upon during the intake
interview. ”You’re ready for your beloved,” she says. ”Your dreams
are your own!” Ben shouts to Becky, “Rub your clit,” and she does, her moans turning
into yelps. “Good goddess. Feel your goddess,” he says. “Feel the
Becky inside you. Feel her. Feel how powerful she is, ready to take on the
world. She gets exactly what she wants.”
Ben intensifies his hand movements and then yells, “Push it
out! Let it go! Surrender to the process!” Here she starts wailing like a
mother who’s lost her child, then howling like a wild animal caught in a trap,
and then making a sound I’ve only ever heard in a scene from “Saw
II.” “You’re so fucking ready, woman,” he says. “You’re so ready,
goddess.” Her back arcs, butt hovering in the air, and clear liquid begins
spraying out from between her legs. With this, a droplet of ejaculate lands on
my shoe.
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| Maitreya Lotus |
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While their sessions encompass a host of services — from past-life readings
to motivational coaching — there is clearly a sexual component in the literal
climax. But unlike a “happy endings” masseur, Ben is licensed in the state of
California as a sexological bodyworker. Last year’s release of “The Sessions”
starring Helen Hunt and John Hawkes increased pop-culture awareness about the
existence of “sexual surrogates,” who
sometimes engage in sexual intercourse with clients — but the realm of sexological
bodywork, which in the U.S. is only recognized in the Golden State, is still
little known.
The Rodes, who married seven months ago, just a month after
meeting, call their particular brand of therapy “explosive sexual healing.”
Most of a typical three-hour session, which costs $497, is spent talking to the
client about her personal challenges and goals, developing affirmations, and
then engaging in full-body massage and Reiki. This all builds to the
G-spot orgasm, which they use “as a state of hypnosis or trance,” says Ben, who
is also a hypnotherapist. He compares it to “hacking a computer.” As their
website explains, “What we’ve noticed is that a woman’s blocks to having a FULL
release (1 or 2 steps beyond orgasm), are the same blocks she has to getting
what she wants out of life.” They also claim they can cure everything from
depression to migraines.
Ben says they limit their services to women because his expertise is in the
female body (although they have hopes of Jen getting her sexological bodywork
certificate so that they can develop a way to offer couples joint treatment).
At 17, he set out to read everything he could about female pleasure. He says
his sexual partners started telling him, “This is sexual healing. What are you
doing to me?” and he began to think this might be his calling. He completed a
two-month program at the Institute for Advanced Study of Human Sexuality in San
Francisco to get his certificate in sexological bodywork and started booking
sessions in the evenings after his full-time job as a mailman.
After falling in love with Jen, who was formerly a preschool
teacher who offered Reiki, clairvoyance and “intuitive counseling” services on
the side, he quit his postman gig and began doing bodywork full-time with his
new partner at his side. Jen’s wifely presence seems to neutralize the
practice. At the same time, it’s easy to imagine clients worrying, “Is she
really OK with this?” But Jen tells me jealousy is simply not an issue — not
even on the rare occasions when she can read a client’s mind and tell that
she’s thinking naughty thoughts about her husband. (When Jen told me how rare
this was, Ben joked about being disappointed.)
Comparisons to sex work are inescapable. Joseph Kramer,
founder of the New School of Erotic Touch in Oakland, Calif., estimates that 90
percent of sexological bodywork does not involve genital touching. “We teach
people to touch themselves well, to touch their partners,” he says. “We keep
our clothes on, the touch is one way. We’re playing with erotic states, but
there’s not any interaction.” He allows, though, that “it’s a form of sex
work.” The key difference from prostitution, he says, is that “it’s contained.”
Kramer explains, “The playground is not our bodies. The playground is your body and I’m here to help you to map out
what’s possible with your body. This is foundationally about how you feel your
own erotic embodiment.” And referrals are often made from psychotherapists, he
says.
In California, the certification is recognized by the
Department of Consumer Affairs, but Kramer still advises sexological
bodyworkers to first talk to the county clerk, district attorney or police
force about what they do. There’s a movement in several other states to
recognize sexological bodywork. Kramer says it’s been “much easier” to get
the profession recognized in British Columbia, Australia, Switzerland and
Germany. This surprises him none: “Some [U.S.] states are still teaching
pure abstinence for sex education, even though it’s been proven not to
work,” says Kramer, but he remains optimistic. ”I think the actual
breakthrough will come when there’s enough data on what we do.”
Kramer compares sexological bodyworkers to Freud and
Jung at the turn of the century. “They were starting their psychological
investigations and it’s taken 110 years or more to get to this place where
psychotherapy is so prevalent,” he says. ”Not too long ago people
thought psychotherapy was really weird.”
