An adult content creator who has spent more than two decades catering to weird and wonderful fetishes has revealed her most bizarre fan request yet – being paid to eat a very specific sandwich on camera.
Shaye San Juan has worked in the adult industry since she was 18, starting out in strip clubs and even an underground fetish club disguised as a photography studio before taking her talents online.
Now boasting more than 128,000 followers on Instagram @shayesanjuan, she says one loyal fan happily pays just to watch her tuck into a particular sandwich – layered in an exact order on a specific type of bread.
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“For me, things to do with poo and pee are normal stuff,” said Shaye.
“But the weirdest thing I ever got was this guy – he’s a regular, and he loves it when I eat a sandwich.
“It has to be a particular sandwich. It can be a grilled cheese, but it has to be cheese with the lettuce, with the tomato, with the turkey, in that order, with a specific bread.
“So every time he orders something, I’m like, ‘I guess lunch is on us today.’ I know what I’m eating.”
Shaye’s journey began long before the internet, when she first stepped on stage at 18 after entering an amateur night as a self-described goth girl.
“I just dreamed of being on a stage,” she said. “I turned 18, went on stage, and I haven’t been off stage since. It’s just ingrained in me.”
Her early look, however, raised a few eyebrows among the seasoned performers.
“I had fangs, I had a chain, I was whipping it around, and my name was Vampirella,” she said. “The girls who were veterans were like, ‘Okay, cute’ – but they gave me a makeover.
“They said, ‘Girl, you’re 18, play it up, wear some pigtails, go up there looking cute and don’t give the old men a heart attack with your chain.’
“Ever since then I’m part me, part character. I just ran with it.”
Over the years Shaye worked across strip clubs and the fetish scene, including one club cleverly disguised as a lingerie photography studio.
“I catered to a lot of interesting fetishes all my life,” she said. “In a way, I feel empty without it. It fuels me.”
When the pandemic struck, she moved her work online for the very first time.
“Of course, like many people, it was Covid,” she said. “It was an industry I was already familiar with, but I was not familiar with doing it online. It was a whole different ball game.”
Far from finding it daunting, Shaye says the switch handed her a freedom she never had performing live.
“I loved it because I didn’t have to be mentally on all the time,” she said. “I create what is requested of me, I’m in it during the moment, and there it is for you to cherish for a lifetime.
“Sometimes I can’t sleep at night and I’m like, ‘Who’s up with me? What do you all want to do?'”
She says the online world has let her connect with fans far more deeply than the clubs ever did.
“When you’re in a club, you get to know people for that hour they’re there,” she said. “But this time I get to know you and your life. I love knowing people – and their deep, dark secrets.”
Working from home, though, is not the easy ride many imagine.
“A lot of people think when you work from home it’s less pressure, less work,” she said. “But if anything it’s more, because your work is with you all the time. The difference is I can control it.”
Shaye, who is based in Las Vegas, says her endless curiosity about her fans is what keeps the job interesting – and she always asks how each fetish first came about.
“I was talking to this guy, and every time he smokes a cigarette it turns him on,” she said. “He dated a girl for 10 years and before they had sex she’d have a cigarette. Now, subconsciously, smelling someone smoke turns him on.
“I always like to ask, ‘How did this come to fruition?’ It’s really interesting what triggers the mind.”
Her career hasn’t always been easy on her relationships. When she started out at 18, she lost touch with her family for years.
“When I first got in the industry, I didn’t talk to them for years,” she said. “Now that I’m older, we never really talk about it, but they’re back in my life. I’m an adult, so at this point, if you like it you like it, and if you don’t, you don’t.”
Success has also allowed Shaye to see the world, swapping the occasional holiday for a life spent jetting between destinations.
“I’ve been able to travel a lot. Before, I probably went on a plane once – now I live at the airport,” she joked. “I recognise the employees and the pilots.”
She says she prefers seeking out lesser-known corners of the US over the obvious hotspots, and recently ticked Australia off her list alongside her partner.
“We just went to Australia and it was freaking amazing,” she said. “They have the best coffee. We’ve been trying to recreate it – we bought espresso machines and different beans. Maybe we just have to be there for the final touch.”
Looking ahead, Shaye hopes to move into creative filmmaking and finally show fans the woman behind the character.
“I can only share facets of me, but I want all of me under one umbrella,” she said. “I do a lot of skits, but I want to sit and have a conversation, open up and be more vulnerable. I really want to get into creative filmmaking, short-form style.”
Her biggest dream, though, is to write a book about the countless people and fetishes she has encountered over the years.
“I’ve always wanted to write a book about all the people I’ve met, their fetishes and what brought them there,” she said. “Something that puts all of that together would be the greatest thing. Then I’d feel like my umbrella is complete. Let it rain.”
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