For partners · 6 min read

My Partner Is Into ABDL: What Now?

You found out, or you were told, and now you are somewhere between confused, hurt and frightened about what it means. None of those reactions make you a bad partner. Here is a way through the first few weeks.

Written and clinically reviewed by Vanessa Cushing, LPC, NCC, MS — AASECT-Certified Sex Therapist, licensed in Virginia & Florida. The Cushing Counseling team covers Virginia, DC, Maryland & Florida.

First, the fear nobody says out loud

Many partners are quietly terrified this means their person is a danger to children. It does not. ABDL is a dynamic between consenting adults, and interest in an adult in a regressed role is not interest in a child. Those are different things, and conflating them has caused an enormous amount of unnecessary damage to relationships that were fine.

If there is any actual evidence of risk to a child, that is a separate and urgent matter — contact your local authorities. It is not what the overwhelming majority of people reading this page are dealing with.

Your reaction is allowed to be messy

Shock, disgust, grief, relief, curiosity, anger about the secrecy — often several at once, and often contradicting each other within the same hour. That is normal and it does not make you unsupportive.

It also does not have to be your final answer. A lot of partners land somewhere far calmer three months on than they expected in week one, and they get there by having the conversation in pieces rather than settling everything in a single night.

What the disclosure probably means

If they told you rather than you discovering it, that was likely the hardest thing they have ever said to anyone. People carry this for decades. Being told is generally a sign they want to stop managing a hidden life alongside a shared one.

If you discovered it, there is a second injury to deal with — the secrecy — and that deserves its own conversation, separate from the interest itself. Those two hurts get tangled quickly, and untangling them is much of the early work.

Questions worth asking, once you are ready

You are not obliged to ask any of these today. And you are allowed to say, honestly, that you need a week before you can talk about it again.

• How long have you known this about yourself?
• Is it about arousal, comfort, both, or does it vary?
• What role, if any, do you want me to have — and what happens if the answer is none?
• What have you been most afraid I would think?
• What would “good enough” look like for you here, realistically?

You can accept without participating

This is the piece partners are most relieved to hear. Acceptance and participation are two separate decisions. Plenty of couples land on an arrangement where one partner does this privately, with agreed boundaries about time, space and money, and it stops being a crisis.

Other couples find a limited role that genuinely works for both. Some find they want different things and have to decide what that means. All three of those are real outcomes, and none of them is decided by whether you liked the idea in the first week.

How couples therapy helps here

In couples work we are not there to talk you into anything. We are there to slow the conversation down enough that both people can actually hear it, and to keep the two separate issues — the interest and the secrecy — from being argued as one.

Our team is licensed in Virginia, Washington D.C., Maryland and Florida, with sessions in Old Town Alexandria, Washington D.C., Bethesda, Miami, or by secure video. The first call is free and either of you can make it.

Frequently asked questions

Keep reading

• ABDL & Age Regression Therapy — The main page: what kink-affirming ABDL therapy looks like with us.
• Is ABDL Normal? — The question almost everyone arrives with, answered honestly.
• What Does ABDL Mean? — Plain-language glossary: AB, DL, little space, age play, regression.
• Couples Therapy — For partners working out what they can share, hold and negotiate.
• Kink-Affirming Therapy — How we work with kink, BDSM and fetish without pathologizing it.

Also on this site

• Sex Therapy — How sex therapy works and who it helps.
• Fees & Insurance — Rates, out-of-network reimbursement and what to expect.
• Book a free consultation — A short, private call to work out whether this is the right fit.
• Contact us — Questions about coverage, scheduling or fit.

Clinical resources this page draws on

• AASECT — American Association of Sexuality Educators, Counselors and Therapists — The certifying body for sex therapists in the United States.
• National Coalition for Sexual Freedom (NCSF) — Advocacy and provider education on consensual kink, including its Kink Aware Professionals work.