Demystifying S*x Work with Lance Navarro

1st September 2023 John Hernandez

Lance Navarro, or Daddy Lance as he’s often referred to, has dedicated his life to helping people. The terminology for what he does varies depending on who you talk to. He’s been referred to as a sacred intimate, a surrogate partner, a sex coach, a sex worker, an escort or as he prefers it, a sacred whore.

In addition to that, Lance specializes in massage therapy and was professionally trained as a sex therapist. Bringing his 13 years of experience to the table, his clients can rest assured that they are in very safe and capable hands. Charming, confident, furry and handsome, Lance has a way about him that immediately puts you at ease which has served him well. Located in St. Petersburg, Florida, Lance owns his daddy status and has a lot of love for the bear community. And we certainly love him back.

I am very proud to bring this interview to Bear World readers to help shed some light on his profession. Check out our conversation with Daddy Lance below.

John: Hey Lance! Thanks so much for joining me. Let’s start at the beginning. What led you to doing this type of work?

Lance: I’ve always been interested in massage therapy. It sounds deeply inappropriate, but I used to give my father massages. (Laughs) People are going to turn that into whatever they want, but it was innocent. I think he paid me like a nickel a minute or something stupid like that. He’d play racquetball and he’d be sore and had me message him. I didn’t know what the fuck I was doing, but I think I was figuring it out along the way. And I certainly used massage as a clever way to get my friends in high school to take their shirts off! (Laughs)

Cut to some years ago, I lost my job in retail management and was collecting unemployment. A Buddhist friend of mine who was a massage therapist and sacred intimate recommended I attend an all-male, clothing optional massage workshop. So I did, and I learned that the instructor had been through the body electric classes, which is the root of sacred intimate work. The class was about massage, but it was with this undercurrent of, ‘what would your life look like if you had more intimacy in it’, which struck a chord in me.

The workshop ended up affirming what I kind of already knew; that I had a good sense of touch and that I enjoyed helping people through my touch. I took some more classes, and I started doing massage while I was unemployed, as a way to make a little extra money. At the time, I was open to it being erotic, but I also I was in a relationship that was monogamous, so that would have to wait. Eventually I got a job in retail / fashion merchandising again and at that point I realized that that life was not right for me anymore. So, I left that job, went to massage school, built up my message practice, and left that sexless relationship.

Once I left that relationship, I pretty much immediately opened myself up to doing erotic work. It felt perfectly natural to me when sharing message with somebody, to be able to take it to a deeper level – even if it meant just being able to hold, cuddle and kiss them….or… swap blow jobs and give them a deep dicking. (Laughs)

At the same time, I got back into porn. I had done some a few years prior, before that relationship I mentioned, so it was easy getting back into it. I got really lean and toned and did some work for Raging Stallion, Hot House and Kink.com. Because of that work I was already very comfortable with being naked and comfortable with my sexuality and sharing that with other people. It was just very natural from there to be open to doing sex work privately. And I felt like I really wanted it to be my career. And here I am, 13 years later, and I couldn’t be happier. I wish I were busier. That’s my only gripe in life, I wish I were busier because I love what I do. I’ve actually started doing landscaping work to fill the extra time, which keeps me in great shape. I’ve not been to the gym in two years!

John: Fascinating! Can you talk a bit about your training in somatic sex therapy? Can you explain what that is for us?

Lance: Somatic sex therapy, to me, is a fairly general term. Typically, it is a session where the touch is one directional because you’re trying to teach that person to receive touch and to realize what that feels like in their bodies without getting to touch back, which can be very, very difficult; because we all want to give back what we’re receiving, right? There’s definite value in just receiving, feeling worthy of receiving, being able to stay in touch with your body and not feel like you’ve got to give back. Many would argue that this is somatic sex therapy.

I see it as a little bit more of a broad term, where you’re connecting on a deeper, more intimate level than is permissible in traditional talk therapy. The things I’ve trained the most in is what’s called surrogate partner therapy, which previously was called sex surrogate therapy when it was developed by Masters and Johnson back in the 50s or 60s. Of course, at that time it was only designed for heterosexual married couples. Each was paired with a surrogate of the opposite sex who acted as their surrogate partner. Since the 80s or 90s, they started preferring it be called surrogate partner therapy because when you say sex surrogate, everybody latches on to the sex part immediately.

With surrogate partner therapy, it depends on the client, but typically if you’re going through the full process, it should take weeks, if not months for you to even be naked together. And this is because you begin with the basics of what’s called sensate focus, which means touching for your own pleasure, which I think even for people who feel like they’re very in touch with touch, is something that we can all benefit from. The whole idea is, you touch a person’s hand, but you’re not trying to make them feel good, you’re just feeling how wonderful touching feels for yourself, not doing it to create pleasure for the other person. It’s something that I found powerful in teaching even people who have had so much sex in their life. But it can be very difficult as well because a lot of people who seek out sensate partner therapy have deep issues with touch and connection oftentimes related to them having been abused or molested.

For it to be sensate partner therapy, they also have to actually be seeing a licensed therapist who’s doing the talk therapy, and, in that way, it forms sort of a three-way team. They see the therapist, they see me, I talk to the therapist as well, and we discuss the treatment – how things are going, what we did. And it’s amazing. It’s not something you can do in one session. It doesn’t work that way.

John: And what did the training look like?

Lance: I trained with the organization called IPSA, the International Professional Surrogate Association, they’re probably the most well-known. Honestly, early on, people were buying books, reading Masters and Johnson and other authors and just teaching themselves. IPSA thought to put together a curriculum, a process, and a two-week intensive training. I actually went down to Southern California for it, we all stayed in a big old house. There were only six of us and they put us in pairs, each with one other person of the gender that we would normally be working with. We spent two weeks together in this house. We had one day off in the middle of it all, but every day it was, waking up at 9, starting training, reading a lot of stuff and then taking the techniques and going privately and doing them with our partner.

We got to see how that slow progression happened and it was beautiful. The fact is, it’s not for everybody though. It’s a huge commitment of time, and of money. If somebody wanted to come to me for surrogate partner therapy training, it’s an investment of thousands and thousands of dollars between what I get and then having to see a therapist. But for those who really need the healing, it’s amazing. Many of the things that I learned from that I’ve been able to incorporate with my regular clients.

John: Your website says that a session with you can involve a mixture of massage therapy and somatic therapy? Is there any such thing as a typical session?

Lance: Whenever somebody comes through my door, the first thing I do is I give them a big hug, and I can gauge from that hug where they’re at in their body, what they’re feeling. Especially if it’s the first time, they’re going to be anxious, but then so am I. I’ve been doing this for 13 years and still, I get nervous meeting someone for the first time. Doing a lot of massage work, I can usually tell during the hug if a person might need a little massage to start or if they are already comfortable.

Usually after that long hug, we’re good to start. There will be some intimate cuddling, that’s a huge part of it for me. It’s how you ride the wave of intimacy and eroticism. People, I think, often just want that in and of itself. I find being able to allow that eroticism to build through cuddling, breathing and reconnection throughout the session makes for a great experience. There’s always a lot of cuddling in my session. I always try to allow plenty of time for it in the end, whether orgasm has been reached or not. Orgasm is not necessary. It is necessary, however, that we have some really good cuddling at the end, even during more intense, bondage sessions. Even if it’s dark, even its a client who just wants to be abused, pissed on, have me sit on his face until he passes out and then cum on him in the end. I always end off by giving him some cuddles and some head rubs and make sure he feels cared for. I always want you to leave feeling higher.

John: I love that your site makes mention that you’re welcoming of all ages, sizes, races, ethnicities, and abilities. Why did you feel it was important to specify that?

Lance: Because sadly some escorts are jerks about things like that. Just today I saw this ad from a local guy that mentions he’s very selective – his clients have to submit pictures, and they have to be athletic before he’ll even agree to see them.

I’ve also had clients tell me that they went to guys who made them feel disrespected. Their bodies were not respected and honored. That’s why I feel I’ve gotta truly lay it out there, so clients feel comfortable coming to me. And honestly, I would rather have a larger client in their 60s or 70s than a 20-year-old twink.

John: For sure. I think bigger and older bears welcome that reassurance. Do you feel your work has changed the way that you view or have sex in your personal life?

Lance: Outside of my husband, I don’t have a ton of sex in my personal life for multiple reasons. One, hopefully, I’m having enough sex already! My husband and I, after 13 years together, we still have a great sex life, which I feel very blessed about. Between my husband and clients, and the occasional filming, I have should be having enough sex.

I have a couple of close friends who I’ll hook up with every once in a while, but it’s very few. And occasionally my husband will be like, ‘hey, I’m talking to this guy or this other couple’, and I definitely love watching my husband with other people; I love being part of it. I enjoy that when the energies are right.

John: Do you have a memorable story or two from your clients that you can share with us?

Lance: I do! In 2013 I was hired by this man. He reached out to me via e-mail, and he was in his early 70s at that time. He explained that he’d never been with a man and that he had lost his wife a month and a half ago and that he was ready to figure out this part of myself, how to be a gay man. He knew a quick session wouldn’t be enough, so he booked me for four days to come stay with him at his house. We talked extensively for an entire month before we got together in person. He told me he was in a wheelchair. He had a debilitating condition where his muscles were atrophied over time and so although he could stand up, he couldn’t move around.

When I arrived at his house, he opened the door and wrapping my arms around him for that first hug, I could tell this was the first time he had an intimate, loving hug from a man. One of the things that I thought was absolutely incredible was that despite his wheelchair, despite his limitations, this man had ordered a sling! It was still in the box in the garage because he wasn’t able to set it up himself, but he was ready. He had learned. He had installed a shower shot in his shower. Lube, dildos, he was doing everything he could to learn and to be prepared. He also let me know that all he really wanted was to get fucked. He really wanted to feel uncut dick inside him.

We chatted a bit, but within a very short time, maybe an hour or so, he wanted to get naked. And although I didn’t want him to rush into anything I realized, who was I to say ‘let’s slow down’? He had waited 60 some odd years here! So, we made our way into the bedroom and started playing around, eventually making our way into that sling over the course of those four days.

We spent those days having fun, driving along the coast and enjoying the view from his big, beautiful house on the water. He had a little theater room, so I exposed him to the gay films that I thought were worth watching, Sordid Lives was definitely one of them. He shared his love of music and so many stories from his life, and it was just so deeply intimate and beautiful and definitely transformative. He wanted me to teach him what it was to be a gay man. And though I couldn’t do it all, I certainly did my best.

John: That’s really sweet and beautiful. It shows the power of what you can do for people. I’m sure there are more kink-oriented requests you get too?

Lance: Oh yeah. On the opposite end of the spectrum, I have some clients that like deep, dark bondage. I have a client who likes to get ‘caught’ sneaking in my backyard and I catch him, making believe that he’s my wife’s ex-husband – and I proceed to choke him out, and then piss all over him while telling him that I’m filming it and that his ex-wife is watching.

Typically, I’m a kind person – caring and nurturing, but I’ve also learned that when somebody wants it and can take it; and the trust is there, I can smack a bitch around! (Laughs)

John: Very specific – and hot! Is there a common issue or theme that you see amongst your clients?

Lance: One of the more common things I hear is they want to be a better bottom. Of course, the root of that is so multi leveled, what does that even mean – be a better bottom? Does it mean you can take getting fucked for a longer time, or take bigger dicks?

For me, the core of all my work is that I want them to feel deeper and greater pleasure. That might mean working with them to revise their thinking about anal – that deep dick penetration is the only way sex can be good. I try helping them explore all the range of anal pleasure, not just the interior, not just deep, but the exterior and everything else associated with it.

Erectile dysfunction is another issue I see a lot. I think a lot of guys will just decide to be bottom-centric, because of their fear of not being able to perform. That’s perfectly understandable. I try to educate people about all the options out there because I have to utilize them as well. Letting them know how Viagra might work for them and trying that out. I have educated many people about injectables. If it’s something that’s worth it to them, depending on the right dosage, it’s a pretty much guaranteed erection.

I’ve also had a lot of previously married men who were married to women and once they come out, they just want to be a bottom because topping was such a chore for them. In many cases, these guys have absolutely no problem with getting an erection, they just don’t want to do something that feels like a chore. Helping clients realize the incredible pleasure of bottoming, where sex is no longer a chore and they’re discovering pleasure with a man is truly a gift. It’s transformative. I love helping guys in all these ways, it’s the best part of my work.

John: I can only imagine. I’ve always said, sex workers provide an amazing service for people, and I wish more people would see it as such. Thanks again Lance for taking the time to chat with us and for all that you do to make the world a more sexually gratified place.