After losing her job, Pippa Jacobs, 50, from Manchester, started working as a webcam girl on a site for adults.
But nobody knows she’s doing it. Here she tells Julia Sidwell about her secret double life …
Snuddling in my partner Adam while we watch a movie, I am distracted by my phone that lights up.
When I see who it is, I rub the toilet so that I can read the message in which I ask when I will be online next time.
The sender says that if I don’t answer immediately, he will choose someone else to spend the night.
Although I am deeply in love with Adam, with whom I am two and a half years, I hide a secret that could crush our relationship.
For the past five years I have worked as a webcam girl, who streamed explicit content live on the internet in exchange for money.
I love everyone’s secret and tell them that I work in digital marketing – and that’s how I want it to stay.
I will never tell Adam, 48, who works on sale, because my work is not who I really am. During the day I am actually pretty shy.
And I feel much more comfortable in a floaty maxi dress than in low-cut tops or bodycon dresses.
But at night I transform into a sexual self -confident and provocative cam girl, an expert in falsifying orgasms.
Adam stays past every Friday and Saturday and we enjoy long walks, watching movies and have soft, intimate moments.
Our relationship is in stark contrast to the energetic, often disturbing requirements of my online job.
If Adam stays with me, we can have sex or not, and if we do that, it is what some people consider ‘boring’.
For me it is beautiful, soft sex with real emotions. I enjoy the clarity because I am sick of all the different perversions at work. Loving love with Adam is like medicines for my wounds.
I have to tell the men who are about my fawn online that I am horny for ten hours, while I could not think of anything worse.
At the age of 50 I am not interested in an hour of sex. Ten minutes is even enough for me. Fortunately it also seems to be enough for Adam.
But the fear that he discovers the truth is heavy. I keep my camming -hidden, knowing that if he ever found out it could destroy everything.
After our two nights together I kiss him goodbye and I see him leave, the feeling that familiar feeling of relief and guilt was washed over me. The calm intimacy of our weekend is over and my second life begins.
‘Full of sex toys’
First I move my double bed to the corner of the room, where the lighting is better for filming. Then I take a shower – I have to feel clean and fresh for my customers, ready for the present performance.
The drawer next to my bed is full of sex toys, essential tools for my work that I was careful every day and carefully prepared for me.
Adam was surprised to find my collection for a weekend and in my panic I told him they came from an ex.
He accepted and technically it was true – my ex liked to use toys in the bedroom. Little knows Adam that they are used five nights a week.
During the day I usually chill at home to look at crime series or reading, and my laptop is ready on the desk to host the four adult sites where I work.
When the evening arrives, I take a deep breath and prepare myself to log in.
And when I start my service, I can’t shake the fear of being caught one day. During the weekend I hide my laptop and use a desktop computer for watching films with Adam.
Even if I knew the history on my laptop, there is always a persistent threat of meaningful pop-ups.
One innocent click can blow my whole world apart.
The thought that he sees an advertisement with his introvert girlfriend in all her naked glory makes my stomach mark. He would never look at me in the same way again.
The internet gives men a feeling of anonymity that gives them the feeling that they can express their darkest desires
Pippa
As soon as I have slipped in a simple lingerie and I sit in front of my camera, I listen to the sound of a cash register – a message that a man wants me.
I flick from site to site, live streaming to four customers at the same time, unveiling my breasts and buttocks while I flooded over my bed.
I find the different types of men strange fascinating. Most are around 20 to 60 years old, but one ordinary is 72.
He doesn’t want sex, he just wants to chat for hours and loves the company.
Then there are the men longing for a mother figure. They pay me to tell them: “Mummie loves you”. If I didn’t do it, I would lose more than half of my customers.
Men with a foot fetish ensure a simple and pleasant shift because posing with my feet to the camera is easy.
Then there are people who want to be humiliated and offended, or want to be in slavery and want to be tortured, which I can’t do. There is also a lot, much worse.
The internet gives men a feeling of anonymity that gives them the feeling that they can express their darkest desires.
I made the choice to avoid those extremes. I make about £ 2500 a month, which is modest, but enough to cover the rent on my flat with a little bit for indulgence as a trip to the Spa-my-needed escape.
The young women who meet these disturbing requirements can earn my monthly wages in one night, but that is their choice.
“Tolen”
I never intended to become a cam girl, but when the pandemic struck, I lost my job in marketing and eventually took care of my terminally sick mother, so I had little income and even less self -respect.
A friend suggested that Webcam worked as a solution and although I doubted whether someone would be interested in a then 45-year-old woman who had lost her curves, I soon heard that women are worshiped online in all shapes and sizes.
Compliments from customers, who tell me that I look much younger than my now 50 years old, increase my self -confidence and keep me going.
The tragedy that I suffered in life has taken its toll on my mental health.
I lost my mother and brother in the past three years and struggled with serious depression, and isolated myself for months.
The Camming task, although far from ideal, offers a way for me to make contact with others without meeting them personally. It fits my introverted, anxious nature.
Only one day after my mother’s funeral I was in front of a webcam in sexy clothing, used toys, a good mood.
My heart was broken and my soul hurt, but I needed money.
When I met Adam on a dating site in August 2022, after being single for three years, it felt like a new start. I did not intend to tell him what I do and so far it has worked.
My lie hangs over me like a ticking time bomb
Pippa
But if we were ever married and moved together – which of course is a chance to at some point, although I am happy with the way things are for now – I should find a way to keep my work secret. And that scares me.
I cannot imagine that I will ever give up now, because it has given me an inner confidence in a strange way. And I only have to work three to four hours a night.
When Adam asks me what the work was like, I keep my answers generic and usually truthful.
I tell him if I was busy, if I had difficult customers and if I am exhausted from work evenings because many of them are located in America.
Lying against Adam is not easy and if he ever discovered my work, I would be devastated because it is not who I really am.
I am constantly making sure that Adam or a member of his family could see an advertisement for me one day.
I also avoid introductions with his friends. In case one of them recognizes me from online.
Even if he could forgive me, I would have trouble looking into the eyes. I should disappear without explanation, because I would be ashamed that I did it behind his back.
Some may consider my work cheating, but not me. I am not emotionally or physically involved with one of my customers.
They are strangers on the other side of a screen, many of them too young, too demanding or just disturbing.
I don’t find them attractive and I have no feelings for them. For me it is just a way to pay the bills. But my lie hangs over me like a ticking time bomb.
One day I might have to choose between my work and my relationship. Until then I will continue to live this double life.
*Names have been changed.
