What Makes Something Sexual?

I took a shower on Thursday. I don't like the feeling of putting on clothes while my skin still feels damp. You know that feeling, right? When you pat yourself dry with a towel but your skin isn't deeply dry. When I try to put on my cotton stretch pants they don't slide up my leg. They grip my skin like a cat gripping the carpet as a toddler tries to pick it up. The more I tug the more stretched my pants become and I get little movement of the pants up my leg AND the movement I do get is twisted and frustrates me. SO, when I am repeatedly frustrated by something I change how I do it.

Instead of fighting my clothes after bathing, I air dry.

Thursday, after my shower, while air drying in front of my open curtain, I watched the light hit my belly and change as my stomach rose and fell with my breath. I found it soothing and joyful. I thought about how I would receive this experience prior to my personal sexual revolution 6 1/2 years ago. I would not have been able to enjoy watching my fat belly rise and fall because I was well educated in fat shame. I love my fat belly now. It's soft. It glows in sunlight. It has tiny little hairs and some rather unruly big hairs... more and more of them seem to pop up out of nowhere with age. It jiggles when I laugh and when I cry. It's mine. It's me.

As I watched my belly I decided to capture my appreciation with video.

Fat Belly Button Breathing, 2025

There is nothing overtly sexual about this video. I think it's a bit goofy. I couldn't just breath normal like I was before I started recording. I had to start exaggerating my breath and playing around. I make videos like this all the time and just keep them to myself. I decided to post this one to instagram and see what happens. I have a variety of followers ranging from family members to coworkers to those who follow me for purely sexual reasons... and probably some lingering (loitering?) haters as well. This video was heavily liked by those who find me sexually desirable and it inspired some sexual messages. I am not bothered by the sexual responses but it makes me ask, why are the sexual responses so predominant?

I guess it makes sense purely because of the nudity but it also makes me wonder why we sexualize nudity. We're all nude at some point in the day. Nude is a normal state of being. In the video, I'm not touching myself in a sexual way; I don't actual touch myself at all. My breathing gets a bit goofy and is not purposely sexual. It is just me, a nude fat woman, embracing my fat belly joy. I wonder if there were people who saw the joy in the video and wanted to like it but were hesitant to like it for the joy because they knew it could also be considered sexual and therefore deviant. The social pressure to conform is so strong that the possibility of being seen as deviant gives people anxiety and prevents them from being themselves and expressing their joys openly.

I am not against this video being seen as sexual. I just wonder what makes something sexual if there is not sexual act involved. Is it simply the nudity? Is it my history of making sexual art? If another fat woman, who has never made anything sexual, posted a video like this, would it be sexual? Am I, an artist who explores sexual topics, permanently branded as sexual without consideration as a complex human being? Many people in my life have written me off as having a sexual agenda and excluded me for that reason even before my sexual revolution. I used to be very embarrassed by body... even before I was fat. The cruelty and acceptance- if not expectation- of cruelty regarding fat people is well documented in every aspect of American life. Breasts are another story. My large breasts, that cannot be hidden -I have tried, automatically sexualized me when then developed in my teens. People who were previously nice to me were no longer nice to me. Women, who felt threatened by their own assumption that my large breasts provide me with opportunities that they do not have, have made it their business to be an obstacle for me. In reality most people who give me opportunities expect me to work harder and produce exceptionally higher quality work than others because they do not want to be seen as allowing even a potential sexual attraction to have swayed their judgement. My sexual revolution and exploration of sex in my artwork was born in this soup of other people's sexual hangups that I have been treading water in my entire adult life. Being sexual free is wonderful but the biggest prize I have received from my sexual journey has been learning to love and enjoy my fat jiggly belly without any sex context.

If you found this video enjoyable in any way it adds to my joy, sexual or not.

I am happy to provide a moment of joy for you.

If you didn't enjoy it in any way, what on earth are you doing on my website??? The internet has so many options to find your thing. Stop hanging out here and go find the things you do enjoy ...or better yet spread your own joy!