For obvious reasons, I don't talk about this publicly, though i still think about it a lot, even though I'm retired (which is a funny thing to say, in my 20s).

For two years after university, I did a bit of casual male stripping here in the UK. I was working as a private tutor and wanted to supplement that income with something more fun, so I signed up on a few platforms and eventually got representation through an agency (which was much better). Anyway, I thought I would give you a truthful perspective on what the whole thing was like.

To begin with, I was only being solicited by gay men who wanted to use an escort service, which was not something I was interested in. Before I got any stripping gigs, I did a few butler in the buff services where you hand out drinks only wearing an apron and a thong (or no thong, on request). These were quite fun and easy, but the money isn't great (£20-30 an hour). But it led directly (through the client) to my first stripping gig, which was a 50th birthday party! That was maybe 20 middle aged women, and just a quick flash of cock at the end of the routine. But they were very nice and the money is better (£150 for the show). I did a second birthday for the same friendship group, within a month.

Getting a couple of shows done also allowed me to sign with a company that arranges strippers. This is a huge deal, for anyone trying to get into this work. I showed the video of a show and then had a quick interview and photoshoot. For those curious: I'm 5'11 and in good shape, which is a must. They wouldn't hire anyone without muscles. My dick is 6.5 inches which isn't particularly big for the industry, but most strippers are about 7 inches max. Under 6 inches can be sniffed at, but there tend not to be super big dicks (or, if there are, they are marketed specifically as that).

I was with the agency for 18 months and, in that time, performed 42 times. So while the money is decent, there's not a huge amount of work to go around. I live in a mid-size UK town, and travelled within an hour or so, so that market wasn't huge (it may be better in London). About half the shows were solo and the other half with 1 or more fellow strippers. Middle-aged birthday parties were definitely the biggest seller, though I live in a town with a uni so there's a big student population and I did quite a few sports club or drinking society events, which were more fun. Slight mythbuster: I only did 2 hen dos over the whole period. I did the same number of stag dos for gay men!

To answer some of the obvious questions: do women grab your arse? Constantly. Do women grab your cock? Constantly. Do women suck your cock? Occasionally. The terms of the contract between stripper and client expressly forbid sexual activity, which makes it a little different to porn. It wasn't like everyone has a taste and then the birthday girl blows you in the middle of a circle! But the women did get drunk and carried away and quite often go in for a suck (i suspect they watch the same porn) if it's a full nude show (not every show is).

Obviously, some of the women were old and some were fat. Some were quite young and fit. It just depends on the function: a 60th birthday party is going to have a different demographic to a freshers week soiree. And I wouldn't say that the older women were more cock crazy: uni girls loved taking photos with a dick by their face. Only one of the hens touched my penis (but both the stags did!). In full nude shows, women quite like to touch the penis in non-sexual ways too, so you can expect a lot of pokes and flicks.

Women love telling you that your dick is bigger than their boyfriend or husbands, but they also LOVE telling you that their husband or boyfriend is bigger than you. And straight guys on a gay stag cannot resist getting their own dicks out. Drunk women can be quite rude to you! Equally, a lot of women get super shy when they're receiving a lap dance or being danced in front of. It's a real mix and it's nice to get a sense of the different reactions and try to cater for them.

As for the obvious question of how much sex you end up having... the answer is basically as much as you like. Strippers are usually booked for the late evening but not super late (so 10pm rather than 1am) and usually an hour max. If you want to leave straight after, you can. If you want to stay and party, you, usually, can. I had heard rumours that you could get huge tips after a show by agreeing to have sex with people there, but my experience was that, generally, if you wanted to have sex or get a blowjob, you had to offer that pro bono (or pro boner).

I fairly regularly did because that was part of the reason I had started doing it, and by the end of a show I was usually quite horny (but tired). Over the two years I had sex with a wide and strange variety of women, usually in the toilets or a car. A couple of times I went home with the lady in question, including for a threesome with my colleague JonnyXXL (you can guess his specialty). That was one of two times that I was paid an extra tip. Only on 3 occasions (out of 42) did I 'finish' during the main show, in front of people. And any one of those could have lost me the job!

There are a lot of downsides to male stripping. You are constantly assaulted. After most shows I was covered in scratches from acrylic nails. You get all sorts of things shoved up your arse: some pleasant, some painful. The money isn't great so you'll definitely need another job, and the cancellation rate is annoyingly high. The women are generally older and less sexy than in porn!

But, in the pros column, it was generally quite fun and made me feel good about myself at a time when I was feeling a bit lost. I occasionally had good sex, occasionally got to teabag or bismark cute uni girls, occasionally got arse licked by a 60-year-old grandma. It was an experience, to be sure and i don't regret it.

But two final tips: don't do it in the town that you grew up in, because you'll bump into some of your mum's friends (and possibly your mum). And make sure you move after you quit. The former I was fine with, as I grew up halfway across the country. But I stuck around for a while after I'd finished and got a job in town (not to mention a gf) and on a few occasions bumped into women whose chins i'd rested my balls on (and, on one occasion, a lady i'd shagged in the toilets). That can engender some tricky conversations when you're trying to go straight!