When I was a young child, I used to spend much of my time alone, either in the woods or in the local cemetery, where there was the grave of a 19 year old girl who died in the early half of last century. I felt close to that girl, and would pick flowers in the woods and take them to her grave.

In 2003, I discovered a mummified corpse of a young woman in a vault, in a church where I was doing restoration work. I fell in love with her, and it broke my heart to seal her in there. I wanted to take her home and look after her.

I day dream about having her here with me. Silly ordinary things like watching TV together, listening to music, taking her out for picnics, watching a DVD late at night before taking her up to bed with me. All very ordinary things, apart from the fact that I want to do them with a desiccated or mummified corpse.

I don't have a problem attracting living women. I'm just naturally attracted to the dead.

It's not cool being a necrophiliac. It's bloody lonely. I'm unable to talk to anybody about it and there's always the knowledge that 99% of people would be repulsed by me if they found out about my feelings. Some people would even want to harm me.

Do I feel ashamed? Sometimes, but there's nothing but love in my heart for that girl in the grave and the girl in the vault. I don't see myself as some creepy pervert. I'm just somebody who has feelings, real feelings, for dead females.

Huh, that's actually fairly awesome. Whenever I read about necrophiliacs, I always get the usual profile... you know, Jeffrey Dahmer types with no social lives. Kinda discouraging, really - I always have to spend at least 10 minutes convincing myself that, hey, I'm not like that. I don't really feel like that much of a pervert. I don't want to offend anyone, and I'm not on some sort of mad power trip. I'm not some kooked-out goth girl who has the insatiable need to shock people, either. In fact, I feel pretty well - balanced, on a psychological level.

Because of my job (and maybe just common sense?) I don't ever mention my little "differences". I don't even like thinking about the "N" word and how it applies to me...it still seems like the kind of thing that occurs in "other" people. It's like how my mum used to describe her tobacco addiction ("I always figured I could quit tomorrow, and because of that I never called myself a smoker...") Only now when she's trying to quit at 65 does she call herself a smoker. I still can't quite bring myself to use the term "necrophiliac", even though it's been the same old story since was 13. Funny how that works, isn't it?

Maybe 'necrosexual' is a nicer word?

Or is it knowing what others may think of you if they knew, rather than the word itself?

Jeffrey Dahmer types are not necrophiliacs. They are simply twisted, evil people who desire a completely submissive and unresisting sex slave.

I would say it's similar to the reason (however obscure) that my mum never called herself a smoker, even though she smokes. Denial maybe? Or maybe the label itself just feels unnatural. Even if I didn't work where I do, I still wouldn't ever talk about it.

I find it interestin that you are sympathetic to how the label necrophiliac made someone feel, but are quick to condemn "Jeffrey Dahmer types" as twisted and evil. Although I do not care to be in a relationship (and whatever that entails) with someone who has passed on, who am I to condemn them for their feelings? What the "dahmer types" do is obviously immoral and illegal, but I still hold a sense of sympathy for them. Their sickness I believe is situational, or a horrible manifestation of an intense fear of rejection.