2017.0202—What Deep Rubber Fetish Means to Me
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(c) 26.0607-1202.30 by AtaraxiA under Creative Commons CC BY-SA license
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**SUMMARY:** *Thalia writes from the Hahnestery at dawn, grappling with Marla’s question about Deep Rubber Fetish. She describes it as a lifelong, archetypal urge for total latex enclosure—the 100%/100% rule—and reflects on its meditative, comforting, and sometimes compulsive nature. She tours her sanctuary, detailing her collection of suits, masks, and gloves, and admits to dividing her life into “real” and “rubber” worlds, though she feels at peace with her weirdness.*
Over meatloaf and wine, James and Lorraine ask Thalia about her rubber fetish. She explains its origins, the meditative quality of enclosure, and the ritualistic discipline it requires. The conversation reveals their acceptance, and Thalia leaves the dinner feeling lighter, as if a weight of secrecy has lifted. The Hahns’ kindness and curiosity make her feel safe and understood.*
Thalia describes the step-by-step process of suiting up in latex, from powdering the suit to sealing herself in a hood, gloves, and socks. She explains the sensations of “dissolving” into the rubber, the meditative state it induces, and the eventual need to emerge. She reflects on how her practice has evolved from shame to routine, finding peace in the discipline and comfort of her fetish.*
Dear Marla,
It is an obscenely early hour here at the Hahnestery. The only light in my suite is from the halogen lamp clipped to the edge of my writing desk—everything else is black as the inside of a gunnysack, except for the faint pale blue that slides in under the balcony door.
I’m still in my pajamas (not what you think—these are my ancient, bleach-stained track pants and a once-green t-shirt with “PRONGHORN XC INVITATIONAL” on the front, both of which have long since lost the battle with time and clinging dog hair). But that’s not why I couldn’t sleep.
My mind has been chewing on a question you sent in your last letter: “Could you explain, in your own words, what Deep Rubber Fetish is?” I’ve tried to answer that question a dozen times, always thinking I had it nailed down, and always feeling it slip away as soon as I put pen to paper. So I’m going to write this like a science report or a confession, and see what comes out.
The basics: Deep Rubber Fetish (DRF) is not just an obsession with rubber clothing, or even a fixation on the look and feel of latex. That’s surface stuff. I think you already know that, though—our conversations have never shied away from the deeper, weirder layers of desire.
For me (and I am pretty sure for the many others out there, because I’ve met them in the shadowy online corners where these things gather), DRF is an archetypal, lifelong urge to be 100% covered in latex, 100% of the time. I call it the 100%/100% rule, and you can find echoes of it in the way that every truly “infected” Rubberist ends up escalating: first a pair of gloves, then a full catsuit, then total enclosure with a hood and gloves and socks, then (for the truly advanced) gasmasks, inflatable suits, lockable garments, and custom gear that blurs the line between clothing and prison.
Why? The answer is both obvious and maddeningly elusive. On the simplest level, latex feels incredible: it hugs your skin, it amplifies every movement and touch, and it isolates you from the world in a way that is at once sensual and deeply meditative. But that’s just the beginning.
The deeper truth is that the urge never really goes away. It doesn’t matter how much rubber I own, or how many hours I spend reading about it, or how much time I actually spend inside the stuff—I always want more. I want to be in it all the time, even though that’s basically impossible if you have a job, or a partner, or a circulatory system.
I know you think I exaggerate, but I swear: if it was socially acceptable and physically feasible, I would spend every waking and sleeping moment sheathed in the stuff. To call it a compulsion is not wrong, but it’s incomplete. It’s more like a calling, or a home planet that I keep trying to return to.
Most of the time, I manage to function as a normal human being, and I know that my brain has simply been miswired for this particular pleasure, and that’s fine. But every so often, usually when I’m doing something boring or repetitive (dusting, or waiting in line at the post office, or walking the dog), I get an urge that blooms in my chest like a secret firework. The next thing I know, I’m plotting how soon I can get back to my room, lock the door, and slide into my “armor.”
Even here, in the Hahnestery, where I am surrounded by tolerant, creative, and slightly mad people, I keep my fetish mostly hidden. Not from shame (I got over that years ago), but because I don’t want it to consume my entire existence, the way it did for a while after Frank kicked me out for being a ‘fucking pervert’ (his words).
I guess what I’m saying is: DRF is a persistent, ever-present hunger that, even when sated, always comes back. It is both curse and comfort. Sometimes it feels like the only honest thing about me.
Let me show you my sanctuary. When I took the job here, I was given the “master bedroom,” which is a funny term for a space that was last updated in the late 80s and is mostly remarkable for being about the size of a college gymnasium.
There is a king-sized bed (not a fancy four-poster, just a gigantic slab of memory foam), a little gas fireplace that chuffs to life with a whoosh when you flip the wall switch, and a set of built-in bookshelves so deep you could smuggle a small child in them. But the best part is the balcony: double glass doors open onto a tiny platform perched above a creek and a real, honest-to-god waterfall. On cold mornings like this one, you can hear the roar of the water even with the doors closed.
Sometimes I just stand out there in my pajamas (or, yes, in full latex) and listen to it, trying to imagine the years carving out that little chute in the basalt.
My desk sits at the far end, under a dormer window that faces east. The window glass is so old it makes the trees outside look like they’re melting. I keep my “work” things here—dusting cloths, a battered laptop, and an old-school tape dispenser with a cartoon sheep on it—but the real heart of the room is the dresser.
It’s a five-drawer oak beast that I inherited from the previous housekeeper, and while the top drawers are filled with socks and old running shorts, the bottom one is my secret reliquary.
You already know about my collection, but I don’t think I’ve described it in detail. There are five full catsuits in varying states of repair (black, pink, metallic blue, clear, and a “natural” skin color that makes me look like a living Oscar statuette); three gasmasks, all with different filter styles; a couple of hoods; four pairs of gloves (two of them opera-length, the others standard); a pair of ballet boots (I can only wear them sitting down, but they make me feel, I don’t know, regal?); and my most recent addition, a sleeveless catsuit with double dildos.
Don’t make that face. I clean them.
Most of it I can’t wear for long, especially during the day—the suit underclothes work, but the full enclosure stuff gets sweaty and uncomfortable pretty fast. Plus, latex does not breathe, so if you move around too much, you become your own private weather system, generating fog and rain and the occasional thunderstorm under your skin.
Still: every night, without fail, I put on at least some part of it before bed. I rotate through the suits like a priest cycling vestments for the liturgical calendar. At my age, it’s not all that sexual most of the time, not exactly—it’s devotional. I’m not sure there’s a better word.
It’s probably obvious that I spend a lot of time alone, even when I’m not in the suit. The Hahnestery is a big place, and while the Hahns themselves are friendly and fun, they spend most of their time in their respective work spaces. Lorraine works from a rolling command center that looks like it was stolen from NASA, all monitors and ergonomic armrests, while James has a den that smells like a combination of pipe tobacco and old soldering iron.
I see them for meals and during the “family hour” when we watch TV or play a board game, but otherwise I am left to my own devices. This is exactly how I like it. I never thought I would enjoy the role of caretaker, but it turns out I am a natural at it—give me a list of chores and a little space to myself, and I will hum along like a well-oiled robot.
The job is never overwhelming, and the pay is honestly more than fair. Sometimes I wonder if the Hahns keep me around as much for the company as for the work. I hope so. It’s nice to feel necessary.
But even here, in this fortress of tolerance, I can’t seem to stop myself from dividing my life into the “real” and the “rubber” worlds. During the day I am efficient, capable, and, for lack of a better word, wholesome housekeeper. I wear jeans and flannels, and I make banana bread from scratch. At night, I turn into a latex-clad revenant, prowling the silent upper floors and reading fetish blogs on my laptop.
I don’t think the Hahns know, but if they do, they’ve never let on. Maybe that’s the greatest kindness.
I am not sure if this is what you were looking for—a taxonomy of perversion, or just a travelogue from the borderlands of fetish and daily life—but it’s the most honest answer I can give. I miss the city sometimes, and I miss you, and there are days when I would sell my soul for a cheap bottle of wine and a night spent wandering the bars, but more often than not, I am at peace here.
Is that what growing up is? Learning how to make peace with your own weirdness? I hope so.
Yours, somewhere between the waterfall and the wardrobe,
Thalia
P.S. There is a crow that has taken up residence on my balcony. It leaves shiny objects on the railing for me—bits of foil, pop tops, once even a small metal spring. Sometimes I wonder if it knows we’re kindred spirits. I named it Persephone. It seems to fit.
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Dear Marla,
Tonight’s dinner was meatloaf (James makes it with ground turkey and the secret ingredient is oyster sauce), a pile of mashed potatoes, and the kind of peas that come from the freezer but still manage to taste like hope. There was a bottle of red wine that I can’t pronounce. Lorraine and James sat at either end of the table, I in the middle, and the mood was warm enough to unfreeze a dead battery.
All of which is to say: it was a night made for confessions.
The topic was not mine to choose. About halfway through his second glass, James said, “I hope you don’t mind me asking, but what is it about rubber that does it for you?” He asked it so matter-of-factly, so without a trace of prurience or judgment, that I almost laughed. I took a sip of wine to stall for time.
“I guess it started young,” I said, watching the wine spiral in my glass. “I used to steal my mom’s rubber gloves from under the sink. It escalated from there.”
Lorraine looked at me with the gentle curiosity of a botanist discovering a new weed. “So it’s the feel of it?”
“Partly,” I said. “But it’s more than that. The feel is just the doorway. Once I’m in, it’s like—” I searched for the word. “It’s like my brain changes channels. Everything else turns down, and there’s just this steady hum. It’s comforting.”
James chewed a mouthful of meatloaf and said, “Like meditation?”
“Yes!” I said, surprised at the accuracy. “It’s exactly like meditation, but with more sweating and laundry.”
Lorraine grinned. “You do a lot of laundry up there. I always wondered why.”
I felt my ears go hot, but she waved a hand as if dismissing any embarrassment. “Don’t worry. We’re not judging. If anything, I’m impressed by your commitment. I have to force myself into anything tight these days, even Spanx.”
The conversation drifted to other topics—news, a podcast James had been obsessed with, Lorraine’s latest email battle with her insurance company—but always, it orbited back to rubber. James asked if I wore it every day (not quite, but close), if it ever made me sick (once, with a bad rash), if I ever wanted to stop (never).
Lorraine wanted to know what the best brand was (Rubber’s Finest, for gloves; Fantastic Rubber, for catsuits), if it was hard to put on (no, because all of it has been chlorinated), and how I managed in the summer (“with a lot of air conditioning”).
At one point, James asked, “Do you ever think of it as a kind of religion?”
I hesitated. “Not in a literal sense, but… there is a ritual to it. A kind of discipline. I have to do it. If I go too long without, I get irritable. Anxious.” I shrugged. “So maybe, yes. Maybe it’s my own weird faith.”
He nodded, as if this made perfect sense. Lorraine said, “Maybe that’s why you fit in so well here. We’re a house of odd rituals. Just ask James about his morning tea ceremony. Or my spreadsheet meditation.”
I laughed, and for the first time since the question was asked, I felt the knot in my stomach loosen. The rest of the meal went down easy. Even the peas.
After dinner, we moved to the living room. Lorraine had her tablet out, James nursed another glass of wine, and I curled up in the overstuffed armchair with Polly, their Dalmatian dog, at my feet. The conversation wandered—old jobs, travel, the relative merits of different kinds of peanut butter—but every so often, one of them would circle back to DRF. Not to gawk, but to poke at it like a fascinating artifact.
James asked if I ever wished it was something else—something easier to indulge in. I thought about that for a long time before answering.
“No. It’s a pain in the ass, sometimes, but it’s also mine. If it was easy, it wouldn’t be as interesting.”
He seemed to like that answer. “You know, I went through a phase in college where I was obsessed with self-hypnosis. Got really deep into trance states. I liked the control, the transformation. Maybe it’s not so different from what you’re describing.”
“I think a lot of people have something,” I said. “Some private thing that gets them through the hard parts. We’re just honest about ours.”
Lorraine looked up from her tablet and said, “I envy that, sometimes. The clarity of knowing exactly what you want. I’ve spent my whole life being a little bit of everything and not enough of anything.”
I wanted to argue, but she smiled and waved it away. “It’s not a bad thing. Just different. You have your rubber, I have my color-coded spreadsheets and my bonsai trees. Maybe I should try a latex catsuit next time I prune the Japanese maple.”
We all laughed, and the tension that had haunted the earlier part of the evening evaporated. I realized I’d been waiting for some subtle sign of disgust or disappointment, some signal that I’d overstepped. But it never came.
If anything, the Hahns seemed relieved that I trusted them enough to share.
Eventually, James said, “You know, if you ever want to talk more about this stuff, or show us your collection, you’re welcome to. We’re not exactly strangers to weirdness around here.”
Lorraine nodded. “Just don’t make me try on the ballet boots. Even in the wheelchair I’d somehow find a way to break an ankle.”
I promised I wouldn’t, and we spent the rest of the night watching old episodes of “Jeopardy!” and trading bad puns.
After they went to bed, I walked upstairs, feeling lighter than I had in months. In my room, the lamp by my desk threw soft shadows across the bookshelves. The dresser waited in the corner, quietly holding my secrets.
For the first time, I didn’t feel like I had to hide from the world to enjoy what I loved. Maybe it was just the wine, or the rush of honesty, but I felt—content.
I changed into my black catsuit (just the basics tonight, nothing fancy), lay on top of the covers, and listened to the waterfall outside. The sound was steady and familiar, a lullaby for outcasts and weirdos. I drifted off almost immediately, dreaming of crows and waterfalls and a house big enough for every secret to find its place.
Yours in contentment and mashed potatoes,
Thalia
P.S. If you ever want to visit, bring your own weirdness. It’s the house specialty.
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Dear Marla,
You asked what it’s like—the actual, physical process of total enclosure. I realized I’ve never described it in detail. Maybe I was saving it for myself, or maybe I just thought it would sound ridiculous out loud. But tonight, with the wind howling off the creek and my skin prickling with anticipation, I’m going to write it out for you, step by step.
The ritual begins with the suit itself. I keep them in the lowest dresser drawer, each folded inside a pillowcase. It’s not about secrecy anymore (I doubt the Hahns would care if they saw me, at this point), but about preservation. Latex is finicky. It tears easily and hates sunlight; it crumbles if you let it dry out, and every little crease is a potential rupture point. So I handle them like museum artifacts: slow, careful, a little bit reverent.
Tonight is black catsuit night—a tradition I started for myself to mark Fridays. The suit is heavy, chlorinated for ease of dressing, but I still dust the inside with cornstarch, just enough to make it slide. I’ve gotten good at using the old cotton sock as a powder puff, making sure to get into the toes and fingers, every joint. The smell is sweet and sharp, and already I can feel my pulse speeding up in my wrists.
I undress, sit on the edge of the bed, and pull the legs on first. There is a moment of resistance as my calves and thighs enter, and then a wet, silken gasp as the latex yields and wraps me tight. Arms are next, then the body. The suit has a back zipper that ends just above the butt, and I use a length of dental floss looped through the zipper pull to finish the job. There’s a trick to it—raise one shoulder, then the other, wriggle like a fish, and finally, with one decisive tug, seal myself in.
Now for the hood. I’ve had this one for years—a custom job, black outside, scarlet inside. The eyes are cut, but the mouth is just a tiny hole, and there are two more tiny holes for the nostrils. I powder the inside, stretch it over my head, and roll the edge until it mates perfectly with the collar of the suit.
The first breath through the hood is always a shock. The world narrows. Sound dims. I can feel my own exhale warming the latex over my face. The gloves and socks are last. Each finger must be aligned just so, or else the suit will bunch and pull. I smooth out every wrinkle, then sit on the bed, my hands in my lap, and let the sensations settle in.
At this point, the hunger is sated and replaced by something else: a low, constant hum of pleasure that is not quite sexual and not quite spiritual. I have called it “becoming rubber” in my letters, but that’s not quite right. The better word is “dissolving.” My sense of where my skin ends and the suit begins vanishes. My body is encased, but my mind is free.
The house is silent except for the faint drone of the fridge downstairs. I go to the balcony door, unlock it, and step outside. The cold hits me like a slap, but the latex is insulation—for a brief moment, then the cold hits, especially if it’s raining, which is most of the time here. The wind snakes over my head and shoulders, smooth and relentless. I close my eyes and listen to the waterfall.
The sound is different like this—muted, but somehow closer, as if it’s coming from inside my own skull. I stand there for a while, breathing slowly through my nose, letting the cold bite at the rubber, until I start to shiver—not from cold, but from a weird, joyful tension that builds up until I have to move.
I lean on the balcony rail and imagine the moonlight bouncing off my head like a disco ball. I wonder if the crow is out there, watching me. (Hello, Persephone.)
Eventually, I come back inside. I sit at my desk, still in the suit, and do what James calls “the R.A.S.P. thing.” He taught it to me as a meditation: Relax, Accept, Savor, Persist. It’s supposed to quiet the mind, but in my case it just amplifies the sensations.
I relax my jaw, accept the urge to fidget, savor the weird rubbery hug, and persist—try to stay in the moment for as long as possible. Sometimes I write in my journal during these sessions, though my handwriting changes a bit with the gloves on. Mostly, I just sit and stare at the wall, counting my breaths, letting the pleasure build and subside like the sound of the water outside.
It’s nothing like the furtive, frantic sessions I used to have when Frank was away on his frequent business trips. Back then, every second in the suit was haunted by guilt, or by the fear of getting caught, or by the worry that I’d never be able to take it off in an emergency. Now, it’s just a part of my routine, no different from brushing my teeth or making the bed. There is no more shame in it. Just relief.
Most of the time I sleep in it—that took a while to get used to. The first few nights I did not sleep well, but, by about the fifth night of enclosure, my body finally ‘mapped’ it as normal and I slept like a baby. Now it expects it and won’t let me sleep if I don’t put something on.
Eventually, I have to come out. Latex does not tolerate long-term wear, no matter what the fantasies say. If you stay in too long, your skin blanches and puckers, and you start to feel clammy and weird. So, by the following morning, I go to the bathroom, peel off the suit, and rinse it in cold water.
The release is always a shock. My skin tingles and flushes then. I hang the suit over the shower rod to dry and stand there, naked and buzzing, for a minute or two before coming back to myself.
And that’s it. That’s the whole thing. I go to bed, read a little (tonight it’s Ursula Le Guin again), and drift off knowing that I’ll do it all again tomorrow.
I wonder if this is how monks feel—caught between the discipline of the flesh and the longing for something beyond it. I’m not pretending that latex is enlightenment, but it is a kind of peace. And for now, that’s enough.
Yours in black rubber and the moonlight,
Thalia
P.S. If you’re ever in the mood for an initiation ceremony, I have some suits that will probably fit you. I promise not to laugh. Much.