Like I belong
When Jamie asked how I felt about the finished photos, I said, “Like I belong.”
A few seconds later, I added, “And the space I carved out is mine. Authentically. I’m not copying anyone else.”
It surprised even me – that quiet conviction. It’s taken years to reach a point where belonging doesn’t feel like something I have to prove.
In the beginning…
When I first entered sex work, it was to pay for my Masters. I needed money, and the work I’d been doing before wasn’t enough.
Kink was part of my private life – a personal fascination, a language I was only just learning to speak – but it wasn’t the reason I started. Becoming a dominatrix wasn’t in the plan.
I used to joke that I got bored of sucking balls and preferred to kick them instead. The truth is less flippant: full-service work began to blur into my private life. I’d find myself playing submissive, thinking, I could do this better.
Sometimes the dynamic would switch mid-session, completely organically, and the client had a better time because of it. I realised, almost by accident, that power suited me.
Learning Control
I sought out training – not in some mystical art of dominance, but in safety, skill, and communication; Kinks I had heard of but never tried like CBT and pegging, and in things I thought I could already do…
At the time, I was told I’d make a good Schoolmistress – Posh voice, good with a cane and spanking. It didn’t speak to me, but I played along. Then the pandemic hit.
I’d had maybe ten professional sessions as The Siren – I’d been doing kinky work before that, but the persona Herself was still new – and suddenly, in-person work was gone. Overnight, I had to become visible online, competing with people who were experts at performing for a camera.
I tried camming and hated it. I can’t dominate a webcam; there’s nothing to feel.
I remember thinking, this would all be easier if I just showed my fanny, but that wasn’t me. Instead, I poured my energy into creative shoots and femdom writing – a small but loyal following appreciated it. It didn’t make big money, but it was mine.
I could live with “enough” if it meant being proud of what I put out.
Some of the content published on my now deleted OF and AVN…
Finding My Space
When in-person sessions returned, I worked in dungeons across Bristol and London.
And while I was grateful, something was off. The décor, the atmosphere – it felt like performing inside someone else’s fantasy world, not mine. Clients enjoyed themselves, sure. But I knew what I was capable of, and those environments didn’t allow it.
It’s an odd kind of dissonance: promoting one thing online, then walking into a room that doesn’t match it. It makes you feel counterfeit, even when your work is genuine.
Meanwhile, I’d go to events, meet other practitioners, and feel both admiration and envy. They seemed so assured – they’d found their niche and built an empire around it.
I wanted that, but I didn’t yet know what my space looked like.
then…I built The Nest
I didn’t fully realise what I was doing – I just knew I wanted a space that reflected how I saw kink: luxurious but warm, intimate, grounded, sensual, colourful.
The first session I ran there, I knew I’d done it. Watching a client walk in, their body language shifting almost instantly – shoulders dropping, breath slowing, curiosity softening into surrender – I thought, this is what it’s meant to feel like.
Session after session, I could see people arriving as themselves and leaving a little changed.
The space allowed my work to flourish. It allowed me to flourish.
Six months in, I noticed how different I felt — more creative, more grounded, more in control. My sessions became richer because the environment was mine, and so was the energy.
Belonging had become something tangible.
Becoming The Siren
I used to walk into rooms full of peers and feel small. Like I was still earning my place at the table.
Now, I walk in and feel like I can hold my own.
The Siren isn’t an act anymore. In the early days, she was a character: wig, lipstick, persona.
Now she’s simply me – the parts of me that have always been there, given permission to be bolder, freer, louder.
The difference is that I no longer perform her; I am her.
On Growth and Permanence
Authenticity is a moving target.
You only see it clearly in hindsight – when you look back at the moments that didn’t fit and realise they were pushing you toward what does.
I could delete the early photos, the baby-Dom cringe, but I keep them there because they’re proof that growth happens. That belonging isn’t found fully formed; it’s sculpted.
The internet complicates all of this. Everything we create is immortal, even the things we outgrow. Somewhere out there are photos of me at eighteen, doing dodgy shoots I’d rather forget. They’ll probably resurface one day. And maybe that’s fine.
Maybe authenticity means owning even the awkward chapters – acknowledging that every version of you was just trying to move forward.
Integrity Over Algorithms
People sometimes tell me I should post more, lean into ‘kinkfluencer’ territory, do the education, the trending sounds, the viral tips.
And yes, I could. I have the knowledge.
But algorithms reward shock value and sameness, not depth.
To play that game well, you have to flatten yourself into something that fits the feed.
For me, integrity will always win out over engagement. It has to.
My work is built on consent, trust, and intimacy – things that don’t translate neatly into thirty-second clips.
The algorithm doesn’t know what to do with nuance. But still, I keep creating – slowly, stubbornly.
I’d rather have a small audience that truly connects than a vast one that doesn’t see me at all.
Belonging and Influence
Every so often, I see traces of my influence – someone imitating my aesthetic, borrowing my tone, referencing The Nest in their setup. I even get a steady stream of requests now to consult or help design other people’s spaces. Perhaps I’ll add a page for consultation fees soon.
And instead of frustration, I feel a quiet thrill.
They’re asking because it works. Because what I built resonates. Because I stopped trying to fit someone else’s template and made my own.
That’s what belonging feels like.
Legacy
I want to change what people picture when they hear “BDSM.”
Not just black and red, not endless latex and anger – though all those things have their place.
I want people to see the spectrum: the elegance, the humour, the intimacy, the creativity.
To understand that power doesn’t need to shout to be felt, that control can be both exquisite and kind.
When I think about legacy, I sometimes imagine a distant descendant finding an old photograph of me – draped in a vintage kimono and polished latex, laughing – and thinking, my great-grandmother was a badass.
That would be enough for me. Because that, more than followers or algorithms, is what endures:
the art of carving out a space that’s yours, and filling it, unapologetically, with your own light.
Because I belong.
Because I built it that way.