Conversations with LaRue Swann

Today we’d like to introduce you to LaRue Swann.

Hi LaRue, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstory.
Hi, I’m LaRue Swann (she/her), also known as Belle Hendrixx. I’m 31, born and raised in Florence, Alabama, and about three years ago, I made the move to Atlanta. My path here wasn’t linear. I studied Hospitality Management and Professional Writing at the University of North Alabama, with every intention of diving headfirst into the wellness industry. But personal fear got in the way, and I shifted into makeup artistry instead. Being an MUA taught me something I still carry with me: how amazing it is to witness a woman truly feeling good in the skin she’s in, and how to help her not just get there, but stay there. It was my bread and butter for a while. But with every client, every runway show, every product showcase, I kept being pulled toward deeper questions about the body, the spirit, and pleasure. Specifically, what healing looks like for Black women when we’re allowed to explore all three without shame. That pull is what eventually led me into Sex and Holistic Fertility Doula training through the National Black Doulas Association. I owe so much gratitude to Tracie Collins and Krystal Taylor (Krystal the Tantric Yogi) for being the pioneers I needed to see and hear, who affirmed the path of sacred sexuality I was already beginning to embody.

My introduction to kink and BDSM didn’t start where most people assume it does. It wasn’t about scenes or dynamics with a partner. It started as a curiosity about control, about what it might feel like to finally put mine down. I’d spent so much of my life being taught that holding everything together was what I was meant to do that the idea of submission first appealed to me on a purely human level, long before I understood it as a practice.
The more I studied it, the more I realized submission was never really about a partner or a scene at all. It was about me. It was about learning to trust my own body again, to stop performing strength I didn’t always feel, and to ask what it might mean to simply yield to myself, to Spirit, to my own becoming. Submission became less of a dynamic I stepped into and more of a mirror. Every time I practiced it, I learned something new about where I was still holding on, still armored, still afraid to let go. That internal shift is what eventually led me to the physical language of submission in the form of  submissive positions themselves. Once I understood surrender as something happening inside me, the positions stopped being performance and started being embodiment. Kneeling, bowing, opening — these became physical prayers, ways of letting my body catch up to what my spirit had already decided. That’s the foundation everything else in my work is built on.

That led me on toward the journey and birthing of Bound to Heal: Submitting to Self-Actualization through BDSM and African Spirituality’ was born. For Black women, surrender has so often been framed as dangerous, even irresponsible. We’re taught to lead, provide, protect, and pour, and told that softness is a liability. My work asks a different question: what if surrender isn’t weakness, but wisdom? All of it draws on womanist thought, Afro-spiritual understandings, and erotic ritual to show that surrender isn’t collapse, it’s clarity. It’s how I reconnect Black women, and myself, to the divine intelligence of our bodies, our Ori, and our erotic selves.

I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
Honestly, no, and I don’t think it should have been given the landscape that I was in. I mean, Alabama isn’t the go-to spot for the type of discussions I wanted to have. For me, talking openly about kink, pleasure, and sexuality as a Black woman meant constantly proving I wasn’t just being provocative for the sake of doing it. It meant that I had to prove that I was trained and well-versed, which is part of why my love of education has cleared pathways for me, as I continued my pursuit of sectors such as human research participant protection, Good Clinical Practice, and Stanford’s Women’s Health & Human Rights program. I also spend a lot of time bridging two worlds that people don’t always see as connected — the clinical and academic side of my work through research volunteering with TASHRA, and the spiritual and erotic side rooted in things like Isese Ifa and sacred submission. Building trust took time, too. Growing The Lair Company and Erotic Essence’s audience from nothing, in a space many people are still uncomfortable discussing publicly, meant a lot of slow, patient work. And honestly, the biggest struggle was personal: learning to apply my own philosophy of surrender to my career, letting go of the safer, more expected path for something less certain but truer to who I am.

As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
I’m a spiritualist, sacred BDSM educator, and content creator. Through my work, I lead research and education initiatives centered on Black women’s sexuality, BDSM, and holistic healing, ranging from workshops, courses, and content built around sexual autonomy and pleasure-centered living. At Erotic Essence, I write and curate research on self-development, kink, and African spirituality for an audience of 8,000 and growing) and I host bi-weekly book club discussions on the literature we cover. What I’m known for is bridging rigor and reverence. I hold research-based trainings in clinical sexuality and reproductive health alongside a deep study of Ifa spirituality, and I bring both into how I talk about surrender and submission. I’m proudest of pieces like ‘Bound to Heal: Exploring Isese Ifa & Sacred Submission,’ which I presented at the Black Queer Dom Society Submission Summit, and being invited as Guest Editor for Wellspring Words on ‘Love, Surrendered.’ What sets me apart is that I don’t treat sexuality as separate from spirit. I see them as the same conversation.

What matters most to you? Why?
What matters most to me is healing the generational shame so many of us carry around our bodies, our pleasure, and our spirituality, especially as Black women. I believe surrender isn’t just a kink dynamic, it’s a spiritual practice, a way of understanding that yielding control can actually be a path towards your fullest self rather than a loss of power. And underneath all of that, I care deeply about access — making sure the education, resources, and language around these topics aren’t gatekept from the communities who need it most, but are instead shared with warmth, rigor, and care.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://larueswann.substack.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thelarueswann/