I’m the type of woman who prefers to ask for forgiveness rather than permission, so when I enrolled in school to become a phone sex operator, I figured it was in my best interest not to mention it to my husband.
To be fair, it’s not something I intentionally set out to do. I was a happily married, middle-aged mom whose days were consumed with a calendar chock full of play dates and PTA obligations and whose nights were spent working as a freelance reporter.
When it came to talking dirty, I was pretty much batting zero. The last time I’d groaned was after stepping on a fidget spinner in the dark during a failed attempt to sneak out of our sleeping 9-year-old daughter’s room without waking her.
But late one night while my other half lay blissfully snoring in our marital bed, I was hunkered down in my home office, just a few feet away, furiously scouring the internet for some jaw-droppingly juicy content to inspire my next story.
I had once again fallen down the internet rabbit hole, and on this particular occasion, I landed smack-dab on the home page of an internet school, which, according to its enterprising young female founders, was the world’s first sex work academy specializing in training the next generation of phone sex operators.
Like most teenagers who grew up in New York City in the 1980s, I was well aware that one press of a switch on the ubiquitous Manhattan cable-TV box led to Channel J, a sexually themed late-night public access station filled with soft-core porn programming and commercials showcasing tanned, half-naked women sporting G-strings and urging viewers to call and engage in what promised to be mind-numbingly hot phone sex.
But that was the’80s, I told myself, a time when people still used phones that were connected to their walls.
How could something as antiquated as phone sex still exist today when free porn was only a search engine away, not to mention more high-tech options for getting off like webcamming were available?
I had so many questions, and although my initial thought was to contact the founders for an interview, my gut told me there was really only one way to get all the answers I was looking for. So, I coughed up $149.99 and registered for Phone Sex 101.
Within moments an email arrived in my inbox with a link to the course and a warning that students had 30 days to complete the six-hour video modules and score 100% on each test or risk losing access.
Graduates earned a certificate of completion suitable for framing, although I was certain when and if my time should come, mine would never see the light of day. We would also gain entry into a secret Facebook group exclusively for students.
The founders were so confident in their training that they offered a money-back guarantee to anyone who completed the course, implemented the lessons, and did not at least double what they paid for the lessons within six months.
I figured I had nothing to lose ― at least financially. On every other level, I wasn’t quite as certain, so I operated in stealth mode, keeping my tutelage under wraps from my family and friends. This is research! I told myself.
Call it a delayed reaction, but that first morning, as I pressed the play arrow on the video tutorial, it dawned on me that despite being nearly half a century old, I had never talked dirty to anyone in my entire life.
It was then that the instructor appeared on screen and said the words I needed to hear: “If you’ve ever told a lie, you can do this.”
We were off to the races.
Each morning after dropping my daughter off at school, I’d head home just in time to kiss my husband goodbye and send him off to work. Then I’d begin my lessons.
I became immersed in a completely foreign world, suddenly realizing the job was way more than simply moaning and groaning and tossing in some provocative language here and there.
I learned there are two ways to present yourself: create a character or portray yourself. Opting for the former literally meant I had to develop a persona from scratch.
For starters, I had to determine which category my character would fall into, ranging from identities like “barely legal” to “MILF” to “ethnic” to “submissive” to “financial dominatrix” ― which involved blackmail and all sorts of pay-to-play activities ― to “woman home alone.” Since I was essentially a woman home alone, I chose that one.
Next, I had to come up with fictionalized details about my character, including a first name that was easy to spell, pronounce and remember to increase my chances of getting repeat callers, as well as my marital status, the city I lived in (ensuring it was one I was familiar with), a high school and college alma mater if applicable, my birthday and corresponding zodiac sign, and most importantly, body measurements. In reality, I didn’t even know all of my own body measurements, but I soon learned it was the first thing many callers would ask.
When it came to character development, one of the most unexpected and time-consuming aspects I encountered was the process of securing legal model photos to use as part of my online profile, since I obviously wasn’t going to use my own.
Finding the images to buy was the easy part ― a quick Google search of “phone sex model images for sale” yielded hundreds of adult website listings where one could snap up image collections of 18-year-old-plus models explicitly for these purposes ― but deciding which model I was going to be turned out to be a challenge.
It took me three days to “shop” for a woman who looked nothing like me and yet I’d feel comfortable enough pretending to be.
In the end, for the bargain price of $11.95, I bought a photo package from a blonde bombshell named Lola containing 100 images in various poses ranging from casually lounging on a bed in lingerie to pretty much fisting herself.
With my character in place, we moved on to how to keep a caller on the phone as long as possible, which was the ultimate goal since you’re paid by the minute.
Much like what I’d learned in my journalism classes at NYU decades earlier, the importance of open-ended and follow-up questions was stressed. “Yes” or “no” questions were a dead end and certainly weren’t going to pay the bills.
We were instructed to ask “How was your day?” instead of “Did you have a good day?” And if someone asked what we were wearing, which inevitably most callers would, more clothing was always better because it ate up time. Building up the moment by dragging it out was the name of the game.
“Remember you are selling minutes ― not sex,” the founders drilled into us, which made me feel somewhat less guilty about how I was spending my days when the recyclables bin was overflowing and the dry cleaning needed to be picked up.
From there, the fetish module taught how to decipher clues as to what a caller might be into since it’s rare they just come right out and say it.
We were also instructed how to assemble a toolbox of props to be kept at arm’s length to help with special effects.
Is your caller begging for a golden shower? Pop open your toolbox, grab that reusable water bottle, and slowly pour its contents into the toilet in an effort to simulate a more genuine performance.
Does someone deserve a spanking? Put that hairbrush to good use by smacking it into your palm flat side down.
Did a caller interrupt your afternoon vibrator session? Reach into your bag of tricks and break out the loudest vibrator you can find (thank you, Amazon Prime).
After retaking a few tests because I didn’t score 100% (I mean, how was I supposed to know that water sports had everything to do with piss and nothing to do with actual water sports?), I received my certificate of completion along with access to the Facebook group where I was able to connect with other students, many of whom had already taken to the phone lines.
This is where I thought my journey would end, but as it turned out, a whole new crop of questions arose, starting with: Could this crash course really make you a pro when it came to phone sex?
There was only one way to find out.
I headed over to the largest online marketplace for phone sex and set up an operator account.
The first time I pressed the “Available for Calls” button, I thought I’d faint. It turned out there was plenty of time for the shock to wear off, as the calls didn’t exactly roll in.
After two days of radio silence, I sought advice from students in the Facebook group who explained the site’s algorithm worked much like other online marketplaces: You essentially had to put up some money to get your listing seen.
I followed their instructions, and on day three my phone rang.
I almost didn’t answer the call, but after reminding myself that, thanks to the online marketplace’s anonymous routing system, whoever was on the other end didn’t know who or where I was and that I could always hang up, I picked up.
The voice on the other end of the line belonged to a soft-spoken man who apologized in advance should he have to hang up unexpectedly, as he was his elderly father’s caregiver. I don’t know what I expected but this certainly wasn’t it.
We began innocently chatting about the news and the weather when he suddenly asked if I was ticklish. I mentally racked my brain to determine what type of fetish he had and in the meantime, found myself admitting I was indeed ticklish.
He asked if I’d mind if he tickled me. I wasn’t exactly sure how that was going to work but I said sure.
When he suddenly began saying “tickle, tickle, tickle” in a playful voice one might use on a child, I burst out laughing only to quickly cover my mouth with my hand so as to not offend him, but apparently my gut reaction was the one he was looking for.
“Louder, don’t be shy,” he whispered and so I got louder. “From your belly,” he said, directing me.
I continued laughing for my eager audience of one when suddenly I heard an elderly man’s voice in the background, calling out for something.
“Gotta go. Thank you. You were amazing,” the caller said and hung up.
A glance at my account revealed our call lasted 15 minutes. At my set rate of $1.69 per minute, after deducting the site’s connection fee and 30% cut, close to $18 would hit my direct deposit.
I had literally laughed my way to the bank.
That’s when my laughter turned to unexpected tears in what I can only imagine was a combination of relief, surprise and oddly a sense of pride. I’d actually done it and not been called out for being some two-bit imposter.
I continued taking calls ― testing out everything I’d learned ― in the mornings and afternoons when I was home alone. Over the course of close to a year, I spoke to more than 100 men and one woman, brought in a couple thousand dollars, and managed to earn a 5-star rating on the phone sex site I used to receive calls.
My customer reviews called me everything from “bright” to a “good conversationalist.” One caller said he “truly cherished his time with such an incredible human being.”
While I hid what I was up to from my husband, I did tell a few girlfriends. While fascinated by my confession, they were not as surprised by my actions as one might think, which should tell you a little something about my impulsiveness and how those closest to me view me.
Keeping such a big secret from my husband haunted me day in and day out, but there never seemed to be a good time to tell him. I mean, is there ever a good time to tell your husband that when he goes to work every day, you engage in phone sex with strangers for money?
Not only was I riddled with guilt, but I also feared he’d bust me before I had a chance to confess.
I knew I would have to come clean with him ― after all, as a reporter, I planned to one day share my experience ― but my biggest concern was he would consider it cheating.
When watching the news or reading the paper, my husband had been known to often proclaim, “The cover-up is worse than the crime,” so around nine months in, I came to the realization there would never be an ideal time to tell him about what I had been doing. So, I sat him down and told him everything.
Initially, he was silent. Then he was disgusted. In the end, he was primarily concerned about how others would react if they found out. But he was never angry, which was a huge relief.
One day a few months later, I realized all my questions had been answered and so I gave it all up cold turkey.
Never in my wildest dreams would I have imagined the level of dedication and commitment and various skill sets one must have in order to earn a living as a professional phone sex operator.
These women are not just one-trick ponies well versed in getting customers off.
They may refer to themselves as “hustlers” and “wallet snatchers,” but many are entrepreneurs in the truest sense of the word, and they have my utmost respect.
From developing a product in the form of their characters to marketing their business to creating additional offerings such as live calls and messaging, recorded MP3s, and virtual goodie bags filled with X-rated images, the most successful operators have to be proficient in social media and online sales promotions, database management and even coding to stand out among their competition, all while providing excellent customer service.
I also understand that not everyone has the privilege to do what I did. For many people, being a phone sex operator (or do any kind of sex work) is not an adventure they can call off any time they choose ― it’s a means of survival. What’s more, not everyone has the positive experiences that I did and, because they need the paycheck, they can’t simply quit.
As for the callers, I assumed they all had a one-track mind and were only in search of one thing: an orgasm. But I soon realized the majority were simply looking for human connection ― something that porn and most other options out there don’t offer.
I discovered people want to feel like they’re being heard, whether they’re sharing the mundane details of their day, mourning the loss of a loved one or waxing poetic about foot worship.
They also want their deepest, darkest desires and kinks to be accepted.
In the real world, society frowns upon and often penalizes those who don’t meet its norms. So at the end of the day, phone sex might truly be the last bastion of acceptance when it comes to living out your fantasies in a judgment-free zone, where there is no risk of rejection and your predilections and desires are entertained or at the very least tolerated.
As for me, the job taught me how to be a better listener, gauge people’s needs, think on my feet, and slow down when all I want to do is speed up. It also taught me to be less judgmental of people’s turn-ons, and that while all of our desires differ, our desire for human connection remains the same.
Every now and then my mind will wander to some of my regular callers, and I wonder whether I ever cross their minds or if they wonder why I vanished into thin air.
To this day, whenever my phone rings with an unknown caller, I pause for a moment, but then I remember I’m retired and send it straight to voicemail.
Jenny Powers is working on a memoir-in-progress, “Smooth Operator: Confessions of an Accidental Phone Sex Vixen.” You can see more of her work here.
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