Today we welcome back Sheers4fears who has posted here before. This three-part article tells his personal story as a wearer of pantyhose. Sheers tells me the title was his wife's idea! I think it means therapy for those who have the 'nylon gene', but I am not sure ...
We had just moved house. Dad was at work, Mum was in the kitchen and I, not yet started at my new school, was idly wandering round a spare bedroom littered with boxes and cases still unpacked from the move. My eyes came to rest on a suitcase lying open on the floor. There, on top of the other folded clothes, I could see a pair of my mother’s stockings and, with a sudden rush of excitement, I just knew what I had to do.
It was perhaps a defining moment for, although the garments were a far from good fit (it was well before Lycra came along) I will never forget the wonderful silky feeling as the material did its best, albeit in a rather wrinkly way, to cling to my seven-year-old legs.
After a while I carefully removed these fascinating new friends and put them back in the suitcase before I could be discovered, as my excitement was already starting to be tinged with guilt. The last thing I wanted was to be caught, especially as my Dad’s views on anything remotely ‘sissy’ were already well known to me!
And that was that – almost. My parents never knew, of course. My life was soon filled with a new school, new friends, and most of all, wanting to fly a space ship like Dan Dare from my ‘Eagle’ comic. Except that sometimes, just occasionally, I would remember my first nylon experience and feel that I must be a bit odd to have wanted to wear a pair of stockings in the first place. The thought that I would have loved the chance to wear them again did nothing to reassure me, but all I could do was to try to push these feelings away. For many years I was successful.
My life as I grew up was typical for any boy and teenager in the 1950s and 60s. School, hobbies, sport, pop music – and a growing interest in girls. I recall one afternoon when I was sitting on the bus with my first real girlfriend. Out of the blue she casually mentioned that some new things had just come out instead of stockings – tights! While thinking, ‘Wow! They must be fantastic to wear!’ I’m sure I just mumbled something like, ‘Oh, really?’ but this hid the whirlwind that had sprung up in my head as long-suppressed memories and feelings came flooding back.
It became clear to me that what I now know to be the nylon gene was not going to go away, but guilt, and the idea of not being normal, meant that any thoughts of trying legwear again would have to be resolutely pushed into the background. I still lived at home with my parents, and their reaction if they had known just didn’t bear thinking about. Despite my best efforts, though, along with the normal feelings of any healthy male on seeing nylon-clad female legs, a sense of envy would sometimes rear its head.
Yes, you're quite right Geraden - my wife meant that the best therapy for
anyone with worries about having the nylon gene is to actually wear! She
enjoys a bit of retail therapy herself...