Every now and then, I get letters that stop me in my tracks — not because they’re shocking or scandalous, but because they come from a place of real honesty and emotional awareness. This one comes from a man who calls himself Elmer, a self-described bull who is surprisingly philosophical about his role in the kind of relationships we often talk about here. He sees himself not as a disruptor, but as a bridge and a “marriage aid,” as he puts it. His letter is a fascinating window into the mind of a man who understands that sometimes, being useful is its own kind of intimacy. This isn’t an Ask Emma since there isn’t a question so maybe we can just call it “Tell Emma”. Without further ado, here is Elmer.
Dear Emma,
My name isn’t really Elmer, but it’s the name I use when I write about this part of my life. I live in Tampa, Florida. I’m an African American man in my early forties, tall, fit, v-safe, tested monthly, smart and, blessed with certain anatomical advantages that tend to make me useful in a very specific kind of way. I’m what people in your community call a bull.
I like that term. It’s strong, primal, and a little wild and oddly utilitarian. A bull serves a purpose. He fertilizes, he energizes, he stirs life. In my case, I suppose that’s figurative more than literal. I see myself as a kind of marriage aid, an enhancement, an accessory of sorts. I like to say I’m like a vibrator that happens to breathe, talk, and carry a conversation afterward.
I know some people think that’s demeaning, but to me it’s quite the opposite. I find purpose in it. For a long time, I thought sex was supposed to be about me — my pleasure, my conquest, my ego. But when I stumbled into this dynamic — where I’m invited into a married couple’s bedroom not to disrupt but to serve their connection — something shifted. Suddenly, sex wasn’t about ownership. It was about contribution.
It started by accident. I met a couple through a mutual friend at a party, and the husband, after a few drinks, half-joked that his wife might need “a little outside help.” We laughed, but she didn’t laugh as much as he did.
Two months later, I was in their guest room. It was awkward, careful, polite. We talked about boundaries, about safety, about respect. I remember thinking how unusual it was — how much communication went into this arrangement compared to the casual dating world. That night didn’t feel like a fling. It felt like a ritual.
And when it was over, they didn’t ghost me or treat me like a secret. They thanked me. They said they hadn’t felt that close to each other in years.
That was the first time I realized that my presence could be catalytic — that I could help rekindle something for a couple that had gone quiet, not by replacing the husband, but by giving the wife space to feel desired again, and giving the husband a reason to see her again.
I’ll admit I probably overthink things. I read psychology, sexology, and relationship theory like some guys read sports stats. It’s partly self-defense; I know this lifestyle can sound shallow, even transactional. So, maybe I try too hard to sound like a man of reason and not just a man of appetite.
But I’ve come to believe what I do has a kind of quiet nobility. Not the romantic kind, but the practical kind — the kind that builds bridges between bodies that forgot how to reach for each other. I’ve seen what stagnation looks like in marriages. You can feel it the moment you step in the door: the polite laughter, the way the husband touches his wife like she’s delicate glass instead of fire.
And then, for a few hours, I get to reintroduce that fire. I’m not there to dominate or to humiliate anyone personally. I’m there to serve her, and in doing that, I serve them. The wife becomes the center of gravity, and the husband learns — often viscerally — that her pleasure is the real pulse of their relationship.
I find that fascinating. It’s almost alchemical. You shift the focus from male release to female fulfillment, and suddenly everything realigns. Desire becomes circular again. The husband’s submission, her arousal, my participation — it becomes a feedback loop of energy that restores what routine had eroded.
There are rules, of course. I never go in blind. I talk with both partners. I ask uncomfortable questions about what they want, what they fear, what they absolutely don’t want to happen.
And I only play safe. Always condoms, unless I’m in an exclusive arrangement and even then, it’s discussed like a contract, with testing, honesty, and intention. I know that might sound clinical, but I think of safety as part of respect.
When I step into their lives, I step into something sacred. Their marriage. Their trust. Their home. That deserves the same care you’d give a fragile, living organism. One careless move and you can do real damage not just physically, but emotionally.
I’ve seen it done wrong. A bull who treats the wife like a conquest and the husband like a prop can break something that was already fragile. That’s not me. My job is to amplify what’s already there, not replace it.
What fulfills me isn’t dominance. It’s reaction.
It’s the way a wife’s eyes widen the first time she realizes how different I feel, a moment of surprise and wonder. She may have only been with her husband for the past ten, twenty or even thirty years. It’s the husband’s quiet awe, sometimes shock, sometimes fascination, as he watches the woman he loves rediscover a part of herself that had gone dormant. A part of her womanhood that she thought she lost many years ago.
I don’t take ownership of that. I witness it. That’s the difference between arrogance and awareness. I don’t want their devotion. I want their gratitude, not to me personally, but to each other, for being brave enough to share something so vulnerable.
Sometimes, the aftermath is more beautiful than the act itself. When the wife curls against her husband and he holds her tighter than before, I feel a sense of accomplishment that no casual hookup ever gave me. I become the proof that they’re capable of deep connection, not just routine affection.
People assume I’m into dominance. I’m not. Not really. The power dynamic that turns me on isn’t between me and her. It’s between her and him.
I love when she takes charge, when she speaks directly to her husband, when she teases him or praises me to him. I like seeing that shift of power, but not because I want to be worshipped. I just like seeing a woman own the space she deserves. A woman who is showing the signs of aging, gracefully and taking charge of that, in a way that shows her husband she still has her feminine sexuality and she isn’t apologizing for wanting it all.
Humiliation, when it happens, isn’t about cruelty. It’s theater. It’s a way for her to express that she’s the one steering her pleasure, that she’s in command of her body, her desire, her marriage. And when he responds — with reverence, jealousy, or even joy — that’s intimacy at its rawest form. From the outside, people call it kink. I think it’s truth wearing lingerie.
I’ve been asked if I ever feel empty. If it ever gets lonely to be the man who provides pleasure but doesn’t receive permanence. The honest answer? Sometimes.
But fulfillment, I’ve learned, isn’t always about possession. It’s about purpose.
I know what I bring to a couple. I bring contrast. Perspective. Excitement. A reminder that she’s still magnetic, and he’s still lucky. That kind of validation can change the way they treat each other for weeks, sometimes months.
Sure, I sleep over sometimes, or even when I leave afterward and go home to my quiet apartment. I go home, pour a drink, take a shower, and reflect. Sometimes there’s a twinge of envy, not for the act, but for their connection. But that’s part of the job. I’m the spark, not the flame. When you understand your role, you can find peace in it. Is the bull often envious of the cuck, yes this bull often is.
Even with that, there’s something deeply satisfying about service without servitude. I’m not submissive, but I’m also not dominant. I exist in the middle space as a neutral catalyst. If anything, I’m a service Dom existing with purpose and love and service.
It reminds me of a term from chemistry; an enzyme. It accelerates reactions without being consumed by them. That’s me. I accelerate intimacy. I help couples access feelings and sensations that were buried under routine or resentment. But I don’t stay. I’m not consumed.
It’s humbling, really. You learn to let go of ego. You stop measuring your worth by emotional ownership and start measuring it by impact.
And in a world where most men equate masculinity with control, that’s a kind of liberation.
A lot of people think bulls are homewreckers. That we seduce bored wives and emasculate their husbands. Maybe some do. But that’s not what this is.
When done right, it’s not about destruction. It’s about restoration. I’ve seen couples rebuild their connection from ashes because of this dynamic. I’ve seen men rediscover their confidence — not in competition, but in collaboration.
And I’ve seen women bloom. That’s my favorite part.
When a woman realizes she can want, demand, and receive pleasure on her own terms, you can almost see her shoulders drop and her smile return. She laughs differently. She moves differently. She looks at her husband like he’s lucky — because he is.
I live for that shift.
Maybe that sounds corny, but it’s true. I think a lot of long-term relationships fall apart not from lack of love, but from lack of awe. When a woman feels adored again — really, viscerally adored — she reclaims the part of herself that makes her magnetic. And the man, if he’s brave enough to witness it, falls for her all over again.
I’ve tried to understand why this works psychologically. Why seeing your wife with another man can actually make you love her more. I think it’s because it dismantles ego.
For the husband, it’s the ultimate act of vulnerability. To watch, to allow, to participate in a way that isn’t about control — that’s radical trust. And for the wife, it’s permission to exist fully, without censoring her desire for the sake of comfort.
I’m just the mechanism. The bridge between repression and release.
That’s what I mean when I say I’m a “marriage aid.” I don’t fix marriages. I just give couples an excuse to look at each other differently — maybe for the first time in years.
I have one rule that’s nonnegotiable: no deceit. If the husband doesn’t know, I’m out. If the wife’s trying to rebel or cheat, I’m not interested. I much prefer when the husband is there because it puts it all out there, nothing going on behind anyone’s back. Here we are and this is what we are doing.
The beauty of what I do lies in transparency. Without that, it’s just infidelity dressed in fantasy.
I respect every man whose wife I meet. That might sound strange, but it’s true. It takes courage to share something that intimate. To face your insecurities instead of hiding from them. I don’t mock that. I honor it.
And for the women, I admire them even more. It takes strength to claim your desire in a world that still tells women to be demure, selfless, accommodating. The wives who invite me into their lives aren’t weak. They’re brave. They’re rewriting the rules.
I keep doing this because it still fascinates me. Because every couple is different. Because every experience teaches me something new about intimacy, psychology, and humanity.
I’ve learned that arousal isn’t just physical. It’s emotional architecture. It’s built on trust, curiosity, and the willingness to face your own shadow.
And maybe I like being part of that journey, the guy who gets to hold a mirror up to a couple and say, “Look, this is what you still have. This is what you can still feel.”
That’s not meaningless. It’s art, in its own strange way. And it gives me a sense of purpose that ordinary dating never could. Yes, being a bull can feel like art. Like I am bringing performance to a relationship that has long sense lost its performative nature.
Sometimes I wonder how history will look back on all this, open marriages, ethical non-monogamy, cuckolding, and all the variations of love and sex that are now being spoken about openly.
Maybe people will say it was indulgent. Or maybe they’ll say it was the beginning of honesty, the point when we stopped pretending that one person could meet every need, every fantasy, every desire.
I don’t have all the answers. But I know that for some couples, what I do keeps love alive. It keeps connection warm. It turns routine back into romance.
And if that’s my role in this world — to be a catalyst for closeness, a living reminder that desire still matters — then I’m proud of that.
I might never have a woman look at me as hers, but I’ll always have the satisfaction of knowing that I’ve helped others look at each other that way again.
Maybe that’s what being a good bull really means, being useful in the service of love.
With respect, curiosity, and a bit of philosophical overthinking,
If you are in or around Tampa, wish to travel to the area or wish to cover expenses for me to travel to you, please contact me at [email protected]
—Elmer
Tampa, Florida
