YAS Podcast: Sex Coaching By Amari #137 Transcript
We sat down with Amari, a UK-based sex coach and founder of two sex-positive businesses, to talk about the intersections of sexual health, mental health, and censorship. She shares her journey from sociology student to agency owner, how shadowbans really work, and why sex workers need to back up their Instagram accounts. We also get into personal kinks, like fantasizing about money, and the emotional reality of working in this space.
*This transcript was auto-generated and may contain minor errors.* Begin transcript after opening credits.
AMD: Hey everyone. Welcome. I’m AMD. I’m your host for today’s episode and our producer is Daisy Ducati here with me as well.
Hey.
Daisy: Hello.
AMD: Hey, your hair looks extra amazing today. Did you like just-
Daisy: thank you.
AMD: Did you just do it or something?
Daisy: Yeah, I just touched it up last night.
AMD: Yeah. And you can totally tell I just love the purple.
I love it.
Daisy: Thank you.
AMD: Yasss!
Daisy: I did the eyebrows too.
AMD: Oh, snap. All the details. Yes. Well, [00:01:00] thank you for producing with me, Daisy. I just love working with you. You, yes. Um,
we have a very exciting guest today, someone that I’ve been wanting on the podcast. For a while now. Um, did you look up Amari at all? Did you go on their Instagram account?
Daisy: Yeah.
AMD: You did? Okay. Did you see anything of interest? Anything that caught your eye? I, I am just really excited to hear what she has to say today. Yeah. Did you see the banana post where she put a condom on the banana?
Daisy: No, I don’t think I saw that one.
AMD: Okay. Well, for some reason that one really intrigued me probably.
’cause I haven’t used condoms in like over a decade. And I was like, oh, that’s how you do it. Isn’t that crazy?
Daisy: Oh yeah.
AMD: Yeah. I mean, I don’t know, I just haven’t used them in so long and I was watching all the tips, like how she was like, and then you wanna like push the condom over to the side before you rip it and I’m like, oh my God.
That’s so [00:02:00] smart. Yeah. So smart. I love it.
Daisy: They’re so easy to mess up, you know?
AMD: They really are. And those jawns are slippery too, right?
Daisy: Yeah,
AMD: it’s just me. It’s been a while though. Maybe they’ve gotten better over time. I don’t know.
Daisy: No, they’re, they’re slippery little buggers.
AMD: Okay, well we’re gonna have Amari come on and join us and tell us all about what she’s up to.
Sex coach, health educator, um, social media genius agency. Like Goddess, empire Runner, um, she’s got it all. So, um, Amari, why don’t you come in the room and join us, and you and I will chat for a bit and get to know you better.
Okay.
Amari: Hello.
AMD: Hi.
Thank you so much for being here with us today, Yasss..
Amari: Thank you so much for having me.
AMD: You are so welcome. Um, it is been, it is a little trial and error, but we’re here today, round two. We’re making it work. And um, [00:03:00] just so grateful that you made the time ’cause we see how busy you are. So, um, it’s just, you’re doing incredible work and so we wanna get into that.
But first let’s just ask a couple of defining questions. Um, number one, what are your pronouns that you would like our audience to know?
Amari: She, her, she her.
AMD: Perfect.
And do you identify as a sex worker?
Amari: No, I do not.
AMD: Perfect. Thank you. Yeah. Sometimes we do have non-sex working people on the show, especially if they’re experts in their field and they’re adjacent to sex work, which we feel like you are.
You would feel similarly.
Amari: Absolutely. Yes, absolutely.
AMD: Yeah. So can you sort of like round out what you’re up to and who you are? Like in a brief synopsis, let our audience know who is Amari, who are you?
Amari: Okay, so my name is Amari and I run two sex positive businesses. So [00:04:00] one of them is called Admin by Amari Agency, which is a social media and virtual assistant agency tailored for, uh, sex positive individuals and people within women’s health.
So we help a variety of people from sex coaches to sex workers, to um, to charities, to sex, toy companies, anything under sex positivity and women’s health. Then I also run a second business called Sex Coaching by Amari, which is a sex coaching and sex education platform for anyone and everyone who is looking for sex coaching and sex education.
So I’m an accredited sex relationship educator, a clinical sexologist, and a certified sex coach.
AMD: Aren’t you pretty young?
Amari: I’m 20- I turned 27 on Tuesday.
AMD: That’s, that’s what I thought. Happy belated birthday.
I think that’s what I saw. I was like, I think that I saw that post and it was, [00:05:00]
Amari: hang on a minute, and.
AMD: But I’m like, I’m listening to your list of accreditations and it’s, it’s long, you know, you’ve done so much in a short period of time, like. What inspired you to go so hard, so fast and get into what you’re doing now?
Amari: Oh, so you know what? It was a complete accident to be completely honest with you. So at university I studied sociology, so that’s another kind of sex related accreditation I have because I was able to basically pick the topics that I wanted to study. And everything I studied was sex, sex, work, porn, feminism, domestic violence.
Um, anything kind of within that remit. So that’s sort of where I got my first set of like sex related qualifications I guess. Um, but during that time I was working at a nursery, so I kind of ended up going down like the childcare route. Um, but then, so then Covid hit and in this country I’m from London.
[00:06:00] Um, well, UK is the country, I guess. Um, nurseries didn’t shut down during Covid, so I was able to graduate to a full-time job in the middle of a pandemic, so I was like, woo, I’ll take this. Um, but when I was at schools, like I really enjoyed teaching like sex ed, and we have something called PSHE over here.
Um, which is kind of like life skills I guess you could call it. Um, so yeah, I really enjoyed that and then I kind of switched over from the teaching. I got really ill and basically just couldn’t teach anymore. And then, yeah, just reached out to a bunch of sexual health charities. Um, and I’d worked with loads at uni and then, yeah, I’d worked for Sex Workers Charity as well at university and then
AMD: Nice.
Amari: Kind of, yeah, emailed a bunch of people, someone needed a virtual assistant. And then from there I accidentally started two businesses and got a whole bunch of qualifications.
AMD: Yeah. Yeah. But you seem to have like a, you’re drawn to this…? Yeah. Um, to sexual health and, and [00:07:00] sex work in general. Like, do you have, do you know where that comes from?
Amari: I think the initial part, if we’re going way back, I think my interest in sex
AMD: mm-hmm.
Amari: Stemmed from, I think I was like a reg, well, you know what, let’s, it was Tumblr 2012 Tumblr. There was before it got, um, whatever it is now. I know. They really censored the, the crap outta Tumblr in the recent years.
AMD: Yeah.
Amari: Um, and I always had a real interest into sex as a whole, and I think a big part of it when I was younger was because I wasn’t having it.
Um, and even though I got older, I was having it, but it wasn’t great. So I just had this real interest in all things sex. So that’s hence why at uni I ended up doing so much stuff around sex work, sexual health, um, sexual violence, things like that. Like I, anything and everything to do with it. I was just really interested and really intrigued.
And I do think, yeah, a huge part of why I decided to kind of go on to do a lot of sex coaching and things like that. Just came from the fact that [00:08:00] I was still so fascinated by it and I wasn’t having a lot of it, if I’m being honest. And I think that was something that really, um, kind of pushed me towards it.
I was just so curious to like, understand it.
AMD: Right.
Amari: And like everyone I know spoke about sex very openly and things like that. Had a couple of friends that did sex work. Um. Just as a whole, I just found sex just so interesting. And then, yeah.
AMD: Yeah.
Amari: Here I am now with two sex positive businesses.
AMD: It is interesting.
One of the things that I found super interesting that you said on another podcast, I think, which I saw on social media.
Amari: Mm-hmm.
AMD: Um, and it, and it was like so plainly said, I was like, dull. Why didn’t I ever think of it that way? Is that like how. Sexual health and mental health are just health and that it should be considered as such.
And why? Even as a person who I feel like I’m experienced in the world of sex work and just sex in general and [00:09:00] sexual health, how come I didn’t think of it that way? How come I’ve never, you know, like an experienced person never equated it that way.
Amari: I think it’s just, it’s one of those things that is, so both mental health and sexual health are still things that are quite like taboo, I would say.
Obviously over the years, especially of mental health, it has become much less taboo than it was 10, 20 years ago. Absolutely
AMD: right.
Amari: But I think they’re always just those two things. I think when we think of health, mental health and sexual health, both seem to be like somewhat excluded or like separate things.
Like if someone says, oh, I’m ill, people will think, okay, you know, you are ill within. Your body, I guess no one would think, oh, when I say Ill, I mean there’s something wrong with me mentally or there’s something wrong with me sexually. ’cause they’re just like the two ways you almost like can’t be ill when we know.
Obviously we know that you can, but it’s just not the automatic thing that people [00:10:00] go to.
AMD: Right.
Amari: Um, and I think where we segregated it so much in terms of the different types of issues that we can have, it just like, why would you, why would you think of them as one thing when they’ve always been such separate identities from each other and from just health as as a whole. Like they’re definitely like if we’re talking about any sort of all the health taboos, like those two, I would say would be probably like the number ones, like we know about so many other health issues. Um, but yeah, with those two, it’s just still very much, just not, it is spoken about way more, I don’t wanna take away from how far that we have come, you know?
I mean, I’ve got my auntie who worked in sexual health, you know, 35 years ago. So, you know, there’s a huge difference when, you know, I speak, I speak to her about it. But yeah, like you said, you know, you are very, very experienced person and even you were just like, oh yeah, like. That, that makes sense. Um, so yeah.
AMD: Right. Yeah. Wow. That’s amazing. Um, I think, I wish that I, [00:11:00] I look forward to the day that more of society considers sexual health and mental health, like super important like. Getting checked up meant like getting a mental checkup every year, like
Amari: mm-hmm.
AMD: We don’t really, we don’t do that, you know, and I, and I was having this conversation with my partner the other day because of your, um, thread that I was talking about where like couldn’t, like, it isn’t sexual and mental health also like don’t, doesn’t that intersect a lot as well?
Amari: Yeah. Of course.
AMD: Yeah. Yeah,
Amari: absolutely. Like I think it’s really. So I think even things like, not even so much sexual health, but like if you’ve ever had like a chronic yeast infection, a chronic UTI, I like things like that. How it affects you mentally is crazy.
Like it can, yeah, it can, it can really mess, mess with your head. And again, that’s more like gynecological is, um, like concerns that I’m talking about there. But it can, and I think also [00:12:00] as well, you know, if we are looking at sex in terms of like, if you have a partner and there’s sexual concerns there, like that again, will affect you mentally.
You will think, oh yeah, you know, that can, you know, that’s the breakdown of some marriages. That’s the breakdown of relationships. There’s so many things. And then going back to mental health, you know, a lot of people with mental health issues might have a really low sex drive and not be able to work out why.
Especially if you’re taking, um, medication for your mental health that can have a direct, um, direct correlation to, um, your sexual health and the way that you view sex. It’s just everything, everything intertwines and even like general health, when people get ill can affect their sexual health. It’s all like their sexual wellbeing.
It’s just everything’s interconnected and yeah, I just don’t think treating them as separate issues is helping anyone. Um, it just makes it more, it just makes it harder for people to, to talk about.
AMD: Yeah. Yeah. Um. So I’m having all of these flashbacks while you’re saying that. So [00:13:00] like a past relationship of mine where there was like a lot of mental health issues happening for my partner at the time, and therefore like the sex- our sex relationship was really failing and then it was causing me mental distress.
And so I’m just, I’m looking back on that and I’m like, oh, where were you like 10 years ago? 12, 15. That was a long time ago.
Amari: School. I was at school. I was, I was just school. I was in school.
AMD: Yeah. Um. Yeah. So I just, I wish that I could have had this sort of like, aha, like this sort of information. Then I’m sure it was available to me, but you know how it is. It’s like you don’t find it until it’s like, yeah. Um, and even like when you said UTI, the last UTI got, I got so upset that I walked to a nearby field and like screamed at the sky.[00:14:00]
I was so upset. I’m not upset, um, because they’re, they’re extremely painful. Yeah.
Amari: People don’t realize, honestly, I, I had a UTI once and I, I was ready to go to A&E literally was like, I could not walk. I was just lying in bed, like, oh my gosh, this is horrible. Like, how do people think? Yeah. I was like, I was like, no way.
This is a UTI, I was like, it has to be something worse. Like, and luckily, you know,
AMD: yeah.
Amari: God, the NHS beautiful. I was able to, um, literally called 1 1 1, one of my parents went to go pick up the tablets. Had the tablets, and I was fine, but oh my gosh, it was, yeah, I understand. Wanting to go and scream in the field, honestly.
AMD: Totally.
Amari: People do not realize.
AMD: Yeah.
[00:15:00]
AMD: so, so because this is a sex worker podcast, we definitely should talk about how does your work delve in-, like how do your services and resources, how are they tailored to support sex workers? Where’s the intersection there? Can you talk on that?
Amari: Yeah, no, [00:16:00] absolutely. So I’ve only very recently sort of become an agency, so beforehand it was just me and, um, obviously some people, uh, as, as you said, like you normally have sex workers on the podcast, but you know, I do so much work with sex workers, so I just thought I’d talk a little bit about like my, my background I guess, which like not makes me qualified to work with sex workers, but how it kind of came to be, I guess. So I think from what we discussed, as I mentioned, I was really interested in alling sex from a really young age. Um, and I was fascinated by sex work at like the age of like 14 or 15.
AMD: Right.
Amari: Um, as I got older, I had a couple friends that got into it. Cool. Um, but when I was at university, um, again, everything that I studied was sex related and I did two essays on sex work and one of them was basically, I can’t remember the exact title of it, but it was looking at sex working in society and how it’s deemed and like looking at the stigma stigmatization and the violence that happened with it.
So, because a lot of the stuff I did was based around [00:17:00] feminism and sexism. The intersex of sex work, sex, feminism, and sexism was like perfect. So I was like, right, this is gonna be great to do the essay on. So I just did like loads of work on that, did like a lot of research and I was like, wow, this is so interesting.
And obviously we have, you know, a feminist who are well feminists that are anti-sex work. So that was really interesting looking at like, both those arguments are being like, okay, well what point are you trying to make? And what point are you trying to make? And I just got really, really into it. And then I did like another research on, uh, sex work.
I can’t remember what that one was about specifically. But yeah, so I did like two quite big like essays on sex work and then I basically started a volunteering at sex workers charity. So I went to university in Nottingham. Um, you guys are in the states, that means nothing to you. Um, but the charity was called POW Nottingham, and they were, yeah, basically a sex workers charity.
And they also worked with, um, like child, [00:18:00] um. Like preventing child, ex sexual exploitation. So kinda like two ends of the spectrum.
AMD: Okay.
Amari: And I just reached out to them and started doing some charity work with them. I did some backend social media stuff, some backend admin stuff. Um, yeah, for about maybe like eight months and then covid hit and obviously everything just kind of like shut down.
AMD: Sure.
Amari: Um, so I just became really interested and like really passionate about, about sex workers’ rights. Um, I think I just had a real interest in feminism and a real interest in sex, so it just really like intersected and I just loved like the conversations around it. And even now to this day, like I love hearing people’s thoughts and opinions, and it’s been amazing getting to work with sex workers as well, and like, sort of being within that community, like the different opinions that sex workers have. Oh my gosh, it is so,
AMD: mm-hmm.
Amari: It’s so broad. Um, that it’s just been, yeah, really interesting- You know, like there’s one thing that, that you could agree with and another sex worker would be like, oh my gosh.
Like, how can you agree with that? Um. [00:19:00] And I just find, find it really interesting. So yeah, when I, um, initially started to come back to work in like the sex positive space, I was contacting like women’s health, sexual health, and then like sex worker charities. ’cause that’s what I did at university and that’s what I loved.
- Um, and then, yeah, slowly, like I had a few sex workers come to me looking for services, so doing like admin, personal assistance, social media management.
AMD: I see. Okay.
Amari: Um, just because it was stuff that I, um, yeah, was clearly passionate about and had a really good understanding of. And then, yeah, from there onwards, I just had like more like dominatrix sex workers, uh, come in, coming to walk, coming to me, and I was like, okay, amazing.
And then as I expand to an agency. Um, you know, when I’m interviewing people and things like that, I get their views on sex work. I’ve got some people that work for me that do, do sex work, um, which is great. So yeah, it’s just, everyone’s very passionate about sex workers, right. That I work with. Um, everyone has
AMD: Yeah.
Amari: An understanding of it. Again, like I said, some are sex workers, so
AMD: Yeah. Yeah. [00:20:00] Yeah. Yeah. That, that’s awesome. And I, and I get that, um, working with you on social media as a sex worker. Right. And you, you’re, you’ve probably become an expert at this point of how to talk about sex on social media, right? I’m guessing.
Amari: Yeah. I like, I like that.
AMD: That’s fair to say.
Amari: Forever changing. Like one minute I’m like, yeah. And then two days later I’m like, no.
AMD: Yeah, but how to like not get deleted, navigate without, like, has that ever happened to you with talking about sex so much on social media?
Amari: Yeah, no, absolutely. I,
AMD: okay.
Amari: So the first time I ever got censored, it was actually for a nonsense reason.
Um. Which is how I know that algorithms just nonsense. I basically, I was on a podcast and I commented like, oh, I can’t wait for everyone to hear about it. And then they deleted my comment and like deleted the post and I was like, what? Um, but yeah, it’s just, I was like, okay, like if you’re gonna block me, at least do it for something relevant.
Um, but [00:21:00] yeah. So I would say the most recent, which I like telling this story because I want to share people how the algorithm is understanding what we are doing more and more now. So firstly, a preference. There is no one way to fix censorship. I will never promise a client that their account won’t get deleted, that their posts won’t get taken down, that they won’t get censored, because unfortunately that is just not the world that we live in, um, at all.
You know, I can help with, um, you know. Like if you are shadow banned and like getting out of the shadow ban, I can obviously make sure you don’t get shadow banned in the first place. But it’s not something I can promise. I’ve been shadow banned for stuff that have been completely wrong. Like my favorite one was I got shadow banned ’cause I was talking about weed and alcohol.
I have never once spoken about those on my profile whatsoever, and they still banned me for it. Um, and obviously I appealed, and then a few days later they like lifted it. But this is what I mean, they’re not even, whatever the algorithm is, whatever [00:22:00] AI tool they’re using, it’s nonsense. So that’s something I wanna preference.
I would say my number one tip for censorship is make your peace with it. Because yes, many people are fighting to, um, to, you know, get rid of it or to make it, you know, actually have a real human look at it and things like that. But for the time being, it’s just something that’s going to happen and you can’t be stressed out every time.
Um, sorry, my original point.
AMD: Yeah.
Amari: Um, what was, oh, that’s it. The algorithm. So as I’m sure you know. People don’t say the word sex on the internet. They spell it in whatever way they wanna spell it in. Sure. I, on TikTok, I put hashtag seggs positive. So S-E-G-G-S positive, right? Sex is not a real word. And then I get a notification saying, oh, um, I think they said they were removing the video or removing the hashtag because they’ve noticed that under the hashtag stakes positive, there was inappropriate uh, content.
So what that means is that even where we’re [00:23:00] censoring our stuff, the algorithm is clocking on to being like, oh, people are saying this word, but we are noticing this content and now we are gonna flag this made, made up word.
AMD: Damn it.
Daisy: So that’s just, yeah, it’s ridiculous. I couldn’t believe what I saw. I was like, oh, for God’s sake.
So it’s just, yeah. Yeah. That’s ridiculous.
AMD: Yeah. That is wild. It reminds me of a story also, your, your, you know, your innocuous comment, the comment that like didn’t give way to anything.
Amari: Yeah.
AMD: Um, doc, Dr. Carolina Are talks about this too, and she tell, tells the story Yeah. About how she posted a photo of her with her grandmother sitting at a dinner table and like that got her in trouble on social media.
Amari: It’s honestly, this is what I mean when I say, you know, so I do speak to a lot of people with social media and I just say, listen, I can’t, I’m not gonna make any promises to you. I’m not gonna pretend like these things won’t happen because like you [00:24:00] said there with Carolina, with me, nothing related to anything whatsoever.
And it would just be like, no. I had a friend had an Instagram account since she was in year seven. Nothing exciting on it. One day woke up, 10 years later it was gone and she couldn’t get it back. She- Literally it was just personal how a couple hundred followers, nothing exciting, just gone. It’s, yeah.
AMD: That’s so wild. And so I’m guessing that this is what you try to help sex workers navigate when they’re posting on their social media.
Amari: Yeah. No, absolutely. Like I’m very, it’s especially being a sex worker, it’s so much harder as well to like promote your services and things like that.
AMD: Yeah.
Amari: But that’s what’s really important to have backup accounts.
It’s important to have links like your links very clear that go to like your other social media or website. So I always say, especially a sex worker, have a website that’s yours. No one’s taking that away from you.
AMD: Yeah.
Amari: When, while social [00:25:00] media is a huge part of everything, it can’t, it’s not allowed to be everything.
It can’t because with the way sensitivity is.
AMD: Yeah.
Amari: With the way social media is even like irrespective of censorship, things like that, your accounts are still not yours. Um, so it’s really important to spread across everything. Um. Yeah, especially like I do say like websites are a really good way to go about it and like sometimes I do have people who are like, yep, I want like social media management and things like that, and that’s obviously really important.
But I am also like, you know, make sure you have your stuff elsewhere. You know, word of mouth is really, really important as well.
AMD: Yeah.
Amari: Yeah. It’s, there’s, there’s, social media isn’t everything, which is what I like to tell people. I think people get very kind of like panicky about it, and I get it. The first time I was censored, I was like, oh my God, all my business is gonna fail.
I’m gonna lose all my income. This is it. Like I thought it was, I really did. Um, but it’s not, I promise.
AMD: Yeah. And I, I love the idea that [00:26:00] you’re saying like, have a website. Um, I think a lot of sex workers do have their own websites, but for newer sex workers, I don’t know if that’s really something that’s like on their radar, but it is so important because it is, what you said just a second ago is so profound.
Like these accounts that we build up, they’re not ours. Right.
Amari: Yeah.
AMD: And I think that we feel like they are, we feel like, well, this is my content, this is my work. It’s mine, you know, and you’re taking it away from me and, and it’s so painful because it’s like, it sometimes years of work that is just gone., yeah. Do you have any like advice for how to like keep that work, like preserved in case of something happening?
Amari: So backup accounts are really important and you can do like collaboration posts with your backup account. So you have stuff there. Um, and then there is a way, um, where you can download all your data from Instagram. I think you, if you go onto, like, off the top of my head, I [00:27:00] wouldn’t be, I, I wouldn’t be able to tell you, but there’s a way where like, you know, every few months go onto like your account setting.
I mean, you can log in on your laptop and go onto like the meta settings. It’s really complicated. Um, and you can download stuff. You can download all of that. Um, but I would say just everything that you post, save it to Google Drive, download it to your laptop. It’s, you know, just back up all your content and again, like spread your content out.
Have, you know, um, depending on what business you do have LinkedIn, have YouTube, have TikTok, have Instagram, like spread all your stuff out. Like if you have the content, cross post it on everything. Build up an email list.
AMD: Yeah.
Amari: And then you can have that again, have a website like just. It’s really hard because I, I’m saying this and like Instagram is like my main, like that’s how I run majority of my business.
Like I’ve got my own website now I’ve got LinkedIn, but Instagram is still like my baby. Um, but don’t rely on just one form of networking. Um, I work with a couple of other people who, they’re like sex coaches and therapists [00:28:00] and they’ve like never had, well I don’t work with them, but like I’ve spoken to them and they’re like quite a bit older than me, but they grew up like without any social media and they’ve managed to kind of create their own business, like outside of that.
Um, which is amazing for me. I can’t comprehend not being on the internet.
AMD: That is-
Amari: I don’t, I dunno how, how. Sure. Like maybe they might have a website or something, but they’re not, they don’t do any kind of like Yeah. That digital stuff. ’cause they don’t want to, they don’t understand it and they’re fine. Um, and I know, yeah, a couple of people who have um said, oh, I know this person. They’re not on any social whatsoever. They don’t do any online stuff. Um, and that’s amazing. If that works for you, go crazy. I physically like my brain can’t comprehend that. Um, but people do it.
AMD: Yeah.
Amari: You know, there have been businesses and sex workers since the dawn, all time people were doing it, so
AMD: Totally.
Amari: There’s a way, way there.
AMD: Yeah, I mean, because like what happens, you know, horrible scenario, but what happens if like social [00:29:00] media, something just happens to it altogether? I mean, in today’s world, the way things are happening, I mean, so many people were, were, have been worried for like, I don’t know, a year now that TikTok is gonna go away and people have like built their livelihoods on that.
Amari: Yeah.
AMD: So like, yeah, you, you’re right. You can’t put all the eggs in just that one basket for sure. You have to spread it out. Yeah. That’s so smart. But like what would, what would I do if, if Instagram was like, was like took away our account? Oh, it would be so upsetting,
Amari: honestly, and I just think it’s so. And it is, it is sad because when I think, oh wow, I’ve worked so hard on my Instagram, that account is my baby.
And I just think, wow. Like, it’s not actually mine. And that’s really sad. Um, yeah.
AMD: Yeah.
Amari: So, yeah, just,
AMD: it’s just such a, it’s such a, it’s, again, it’s like one of those little things that you’re saying that I’m like, why didn’t I ever think of it that way? But it’s so, like, I, it makes me feel like [00:30:00] more. I want to make sure that my account is backed up at this point.
’cause I, I’ve never done that with the YAS Work account. Um, and it may, I wanna be more aware of that. I don’t know how to explain it. I just, I’m just, it’s gonna make me post differently knowing that. And like save differently, you know? .
Amari: Because even for me, like in terms of all my posts, like I make a lot of graphic posts in terms of like on Canva.
So I know I’ve got everything saved in Canva. I know that I like download my images, so there’s all, I’ll be able to find everything. I guess it’s just like it’s building up that following again and things like that. That can be a bit daunting.
AMD: Yeah.
Amari: Um, but again, that’s why you just, you know, I’m saying this, obviously I’d be heartbroken if anything happened to my account, but it is just something you need to-
A kind of, yeah. Kind of work with,
AMD: yeah. I feel like we need like a coalition of like sex workers who like support each other if and when [00:31:00] that happens to you. You know what I mean? Like how do we like take one person that’s like lost a hundred thousand follower, um, account and how do we like, take them and like help them rebuild, you know, or anyone, any number a hundred thousand. It doesn’t have to be a hundred thousand for it to be devastating, but like, how, how do we, like, how do we support each other? I don’t know. This is like a random question. I don’t expect you to have the answers.
Amari: I do, I do have some answers. So I’ve been, so like I’m, I’m in the UK and I’m in a couple of group chats.
I’ve got one group chat where there’s like 80 of us and we’re sex coaches. There’s another group chat where there’s 40 of us and we’re like sexual wellness influencers or sexual health influencers.
AMD: Okay.
Amari: And um, in, we’ve had a couple of occasions where people counts have been deleted and again, yeah, we’re talking about a hundred K followers.
And the best thing that we’ve done is you can report a problem to Instagram and say, Hey, this account has been wrongfully taken down. Please. Can [00:32:00] you, um. Like reinstate it or have a look. Um, and loads of people will do that. They’ll share on their stories like, Hey, this person’s account’s been wrongfully deleted.
Um, you know. Please check it out. And yeah, really just sharing that the account’s been deleted and like writing to Instagram or report a problem. And then, yeah, normally the accounts do end up coming back within a couple of days. Um, there is on, and if, if your account’s deleted, you can, you can appeal it and normally, um, you can end up getting it back.
But I think that’s where community comes in. Um, yeah, because yeah, I’ve seen accounts be deleted and then within a few days the account is back up. Um, so like truly the community really is, yeah, such a, such a big, a big part of it. Um.
AMD: Totally.
Amari: To be able to be able to get it back. So I was like, yeah, that, that would be, that would be one of my tips there is just to really Yeah.
Find, find your people. Um, and even if you’re a shadowbanned, you know, getting people to like, like your post and comment on them. Like it can really, it can really help.
AMD: [00:33:00] Yeah. Yeah. That’s huge. Getting that engagement is really huge. So what’s the, at the success rate of people coming to you and into those groups and like, you know, all of you reporting to Instagram?
I mean, has there been a time where it didn’t work?
Amari: Not that I remember. I mean, I can only say this has happened maybe four or five times. Um
AMD: Okay, gotcha.
Amari: In, yeah. Sort of like the last, the last year or so. But yeah, I think, actually, no, I think I remember seeing one, maybe a year ago, it was a swingers account, and I don’t think she ever got her account back and she made a new one.
Um, but I just saw this on Instagram. I don’t actually know what the Yeah, what the,
AMD: okay.
Amari: What happened.
AMD: But generally it,
Amari: I think that’s the only one I’ve seen.
AMD: But generally it seems to work. .
Amari: Yeah.
AMD: That’s really great.
Amari: We could get it back. Um, but that being said, there are, you know, don’t let that fool you.
There are plenty of times where that will not work and you
AMD: Sure.
Amari: You might never get your account back. It’s, um, sure. Yeah. It’s on, it’s a lot of it is, I [00:34:00] think down to like luck sometimes as well, because
AMD: Yeah. I hear that. Um, so what are some ways that you want to continue to engage with sex workers and this type of work that you’re doing into the future as we move forward?
Can you share with us about that?
Amari: Yeah, so I think definitely I, um, in terms of like starting my sex coaching business, which I’ve really only started it properly, like I would say this month, I would love to be open to having, um, s ex workers as clients. okay. So again, obviously I’m super like sex worker positive and I have a lot of, lot of knowledge and insight and I work with a lot of sex workers in my other business, so it would be amazing just to be able to kind of move that into Yeah. The, my, my other business basically.
And then, yeah, just continue doing what I’m doing with the other one, to be honest, like I’ve, um, you know, been able to work to some like amazing people and just like continue my life.
AMD: Yeah,
Amari: own learning and discovery. I just continued being able to help sex workers. It’s been amazing. Um, and I’ve got a couple of really longstanding clients as [00:35:00] well where we’ve, we’re gonna collab on like a few, like educational posts about sex work and yeah, just
AMD: nice.
Amari: Keep, keep, keep up what I’m doing.
AMD: Yeah. That’s awesome. And what kind of, is it okay to ask, um, what, what types of conversations or things come up in, um, your sex coaching? Um, in your sex coaching sessions? I guess you wanna call them like- with sex workers. And, and the reason I’m asking is because, um, typically in my, in of my understanding, you know, you become a sex worker, uh, and after a while you like, you sort of become a sex coach in a way, right?
Through the work, the sex workers. Yeah. Yeah. And so how does. So I’m just curious how, um, like what, when a sex worker is coming to you for sex coaching, um, what is entailed in that? And so, ’cause we want our audience to know as well, so make sure [00:36:00] that it’s something, I mean, maybe people listening are interested.
Amari: Yeah. So to be honest, I graduated last month. I haven’t set up the business yet, so I can’t
AMD: Okay, gotcha. Okay. Okay.
Amari: I can’t answer that question. I think I can tell you where it’s come from in terms of like why I. Sort of thought of that. It has been like me just speaking to sex workers in general. It’s been really interesting hearing their views on like their own intimate, like their own sex lives, like separate to their, their sex work.
Um, and it’s just been really interesting just hearing like, like, you know, some people just say, you know, they. Um, like some people, like they struggle to have an orgasm, like when it’s their own, um, like when it’s their own sex life and like the way that they view sex and the way they view their partners and like dating and sex work and things like that.
So it’s just been interesting hearing, um, kind of like yeah, their, how sex work affects their, like, personal life. Um, and it’s not necessarily in negative ways at all, but there’s definitely been, um. Yeah, just like comments here in there that I’ve heard that I thought, okay, wow. [00:37:00] Like that you could definitely benefit from talking, um, like about that in like a deeper way or, yeah, like I spoke to someone who was saying like, yeah, like even though like my whole business is sex and I do sex work and things like that, I’m not a sexual person.
So I find it really interesting doing it in like my, my personal life. And I was like, oh, that’s like, I would like love to, you know, to be really nosy and hear more about that. Um, so yeah, I just heard like various different thoughts and opinions and things like that. Um, yeah.
AMD: Yeah. I have a confession.
Amari: What’s your confession?
AMD: In my, before my current partner, who’s amazing and wonderful and pleases me in many ways, um, with like other people who I was like, whatever, you know, just hooking up with here and there. Uh, if I wanted to have an orgasm, I would imagine and pretend that I was getting paid for what I was doing.
Amari: Oh.
AMD: Is that weird? No, I like never, I can’t believe I’m [00:38:00] saying this publicly, like I’ve never admitted this like publicly.
Amari: I get it. So like, do you, like when you were doing sex work with like clients, not in terms of having sex with a partner, were, did you tend to orgasm then? So that’s why you imagine it being paid or sometimes, not all the time, but sometimes I.
Yeah, because I mean, there’s still like pleasure happening, so sometimes, but I would say less like it, it wouldn’t, I would say more often I would not have an orgasm. Um, but, but sometimes I did. Yeah. And, um, yeah, and then I would, I like didn’t really want them to fully know, you know, at the time, you know, I didn’t want them to know that they were pleasing me.
It was really, it’s kind of twisted. I don’t know. Yeah. And then,
okay. Yeah, I get that.
AMD: Yeah. I don’t know. It’s something going on upstairs psychologically. That’s why [00:39:00] like I love the phrase, money makes me cum because. It does. Like thinking about getting money, I’ll have an orgasm.
Amari: So yeah. Amazing. It’s that No, I get, I get that.
But yeah, that’s just, that’s just so like that’s so interesting to me. Like I just love talking all things. I know. Everyone’s so different as well. That’s what I love as well, like, yeah. You know, someone, there’s plenty of people who listen to that and be like, yeah, actually, you know what? Like that, that makes sense.
I get that. Um, so thank, thank you for sharing.
AMD: Okay, thanks. Yeah. That was my first time saying it out loud to a bunch of people. There’s like, lots of people listen to this, so that’s fine. So, so to wrap this all up, where, what can we expect for you from the future? Like you said, you just started the business, so you would love to work with more sex workers.
So, um, where can like people find information and find, learn more about exactly like what it is that you’re doing so they can connect with you better.
Amari: Okay. So for the [00:40:00] um, sex Positive Virtual Assistant Agency, you can find me, uh, on Instagram at adminbyamariagency. You can check out my website, which is www.adminbyamariagency.com, and then for my sex coaching business, you can find me on Instagram.
Um. SX Coaching by Amari. ’cause you can’t say sex on Instagram and then
AMD: can’t say sex.
Amari: You can check out my website, which is www.sexcoachingbyamari.com. Um, and yeah, you can find all of my information and insights there.
AMD: Awesome. Well, and y’all should definitely check out Amari’s accounts. I have so much fun following you.
Um, thank you for your posts. Thank you for your work and thank you so much for your time and for being here with us today. It’s been a real pleasure.
Amari: No, thank you so much for having me. I’ve really enjoyed it. Thanks. Awesome. Yay.