The Sugar Daddy Who Helped Me Overcome My Fear of Public Speaking

I never had grand ambitions about running my own company, giving a TED Talk, or becoming a politician. So, when I developed a fear of public speaking in high school (thanks to one bad talent show in which I forgot the words to the song I was singing), I didn’t feel like it was such a big deal. I could live without giving speeches. There were plenty of jobs that didn’t require me to be in the spotlight.

In fact, my dream job was to become a physical therapist, partly because I knew that I could work much better one-on-one. And it has been a career path that has brought me a lot of joy. Going through community college, then state college, and then my grad program was tough, sure, but I look back with a lot of love for those long hours in the library.

Getting thrown into the workforce, though, was a reality check. I made every decision possible to lower the cost of my education, and I hustled to finish as quickly as possible. But even so, I graduated with debt and in the middle of a global pandemic. So, things were not ideal.

I know how to put my nose to the grindstone, and that’s what I did for the first two years of my practice. I took the first job that came my way, and I put my heart and soul into it. But, it wasn’t very well paid, and there was no chance for me to move up in the clinic. I felt stuck and frustrated that my income barely covered my living expenses and my monthly student loan payments. I loved working with clients, but I could see myself getting burned out like some of my colleagues who had been working at the clinic longer than me. They made jokes about me getting out while I still could, but they didn’t feel like jokes.

Eventually, I took the advice of a cousin of mine who had recently gotten into virtual sugar dating during the pandemic. He said that it was easy to find partners online who were looking for companionship and maybe some spicy conversation from time to time. According to him, it felt more intimate and genuine than other kinds of video-based platforms. And since I’ve never been close-minded about stuff like that, I didn’t hesitate.

And that’s how I met Vancouver. Obviously, Vancouver isn’t really his name, but he wanted to stay anonymous, so I asked him what the last city he visited was. I started calling him Van, and he started calling me Payton (which came from him calling me PT). It was our first inside joke, and it still makes me smile when I think about those early days.

Now, Van has always been a skilled public speaker. He’s a writer of self-help books and is constantly touring the US and Canada on press tours. He said that when he was younger, he was a stand-up comedian and then spent some time as a traveling theater director. His first book was about the importance of comedy and laughter in interpersonal relationships. He was married at the time that he wrote it, but as he tells it, even a good sense of humor can’t save a relationship when one person is on the road for months at a time.

It was this constant traveling that first encouraged Van to pursue virtual sugar relationships. He said that he wanted the consistency of a long-distance partner, but he knew that actually being in long distance was too much to ask of someone for more than a year or two. He had gone down that path many times, but his career always came first. That was something that I could relate to, I told him. Even though I worked long hours and didn’t get paid well, PT was my life, and I wasn’t willing to compromise it for a relationship.

I honestly didn’t know that a sugar relationship could be so light and playful, but Van was a true theater kid in a businessman’s body. He often answered our phone calls already singing or would send me pictures of odd things he came across in whatever new city he was in. I never felt like I had to be embarrassed in front of Van.

That being said, the allowance I was getting from Van wasn’t quite enough for me to meet my financial goals, and I talked to him honestly about how he would feel about me taking on other sugar daddies. I could tell he was a little bit hurt by that, but he said that he would deal with his ego and that I should do what was right for myself. In the end, Van kind of ruined me for all other sugar daddies. I didn’t enjoy my relationships with anyone else, so I ended them and told Van I would just have to find another way to boost my monthly income.

“Why don’t you give workshops?” he said one day while we were Facetiming.

“What do you mean, like on how to be a sugar baby?”

Van laughed and then raised his eyebrows as if it wasn’t such a bad idea.

“Well, no, actually, but let’s table that idea because I don’t hate it. I had meant workshops on physical therapy. Strength training is having such a hot moment right now. You could talk about accessible exercises for busy people or students, or who cares, there’s a million different directions you could go with this. You’re the professional, so you would know more than I do. But I’m saying, people would be willing to go to a talk on how to keep themselves in good health at home.”

For a flash of a moment, I saw myself on stage in front of a PowerPoint, asking someone in the audience if they would like to come up and demonstrate an easy strength exercise for me. And then, in the next breath, I felt a sense of dread in my stomach at the thought of speaking in front of people.

“Public speaking is your thing,” I told him dismissively. “It’s not for me.”

“That’s funny,” he said, “Because you and I have done virtual karaoke, and I know that there’s a natural performer that you’re hiding from the world.”

I tried to change the subject before having to admit that speaking in front of other people terrified me. And Van sensed the change in mood, so he dropped it.

But, I guess Van didn’t drop it fully, because unbeknownst to me, he was looking into conferences and seminars that were hiring speakers in health and medicine. He reached out to an old friend of his who had become a famous personal trainer online. This friend was organizing a conference in a few months for trainers and fitness coaches, and he said that they would be open to a breakout session focused on incorporating physical therapy with training plans.

The next time we spoke, he brought up the idea to me and told me that he would be happy to cover the travel expenses and even meet me there so that we could see each other in person for the first time. There was no pressure, he said when he saw my face. I probably looked pretty angry.

I wasn’t angry at him, but rather at the situation and the realization that I would have to come out of my shell if I wanted to make a living in this field. Suddenly, I started to tear up and cry.

Van immediately felt bad and told me that I didn’t have to do anything that I didn’t want to do. And if the problem was meeting him in person, we could take that off the table, too.

I seriously thought about deflecting and blaming my hesitation on something else, but I decided to tell the truth about why I was so bad at public speaking.

As I was talking, Van’s face relaxed into a look of pure relief.

“You know that I’ve written multiple books on becoming a better communicator, right? And that I’ve taught theater? And that I also had to learn how to do this, it didn’t come naturally to me. You’re absolutely brilliant, Pay. Let’s work on this together, and if you still hate it after trying it once, we’ll find a different way to advance your career.”

It was all the convincing I needed to say yes, to just this one gig, but only if I could get some help with my public speaking. Van recommended some local theater groups where I could start improv classes, and he suggested that we meet each other in person a few days before the conference so that we could work on my presentation.

Meeting Van in person was less scary than speaking in front of an audience, but ultimately, both were worth the nervousness. Van and I got along great in person, and my presentation went better than I could have hoped.

Since then, I’ve been able to schedule about one speaking gig a month or every two months for the next half of the year. I’m hoping to add more and maybe even start a YouTube channel, which I never thought would be something I could build up the courage to do. But luckily, I’ve got just about the best speaking coach I could have hoped for.