Today I want to spend a bit of time talking about how D/s relationships deal with that pesky thing called “the real world.” But first, please indulge me as I offer some brief comments on style. A couple of months ago I penned what I thought would be a light throwaway piece titled “Ten Things Every Dom Expects a Sub to Know.” To my surprise, it took off (last time I checked, it was just north of 1500 reblogs) and it generated a lot of reblog commentary, both for and against. I think I found the “against” commentary the most gratifying, because it meant people were actually thinking about how this D/s life of ours works. One reblogger’s commentary, however, really irked me: “This essay has a lot of good ideas, but I couldn’t get past the offensively gendered language.” Jesus Christ. Look. I am not a tenured professor writing papers for presentation at the Modern Language Association convention. This is Tumblr, for fuck’s sake. I am a heterosexual, male Dominant. My submissives have been, without exception, heterosexual or bisexual females. When I write, I use (and will continue to use) the personal pronouns that map to my personal experience: “he,” “his,” “him” for the Dominant, and “she,” “hers,” “her” for the submissive. If the reader finds this offensive, please scroll on.
Now, to the topic at hand …
This piece is offered for both Dominants and submissives. The primary audience is the so-called “baby Doms” and “baby subs,” but sadly I’ve seen far too many “experienced” Doms and subs who just don’t get this. So here’s how things work in an ideal universe. The Dom lays out his tasks, rituals, rules, and expectations. His sub obeys, on time and without exception. Simple, yes? No. Because every D/s relationship must contend with this annoying thing called “reality.”
Let’s look at several ways in which reality can impinge on the “purity” of how some envision a D/s relationship.
Mary. A very good and dedicated submissive. She is a mother, possibly a working mother, possibly a single working mother. Work responsibilities. After work responsibilities. Weekend responsibilities. Soccer practice. School meetings. Sick kids. Sick self. Oh, and how about that monthly monkey wrench called menstruation?
Joe. A very good and dedicated Dominant. He works 70 hours a week. His normal life is frequently disrupted by business travel. Maybe he’s a single father, or has non-custodial children with whom he’d like to spend more time than he’s able. Let’s say he’s on a battery of meds, which he sometimes forgets to take. And oh dear, he’s losing that manly, luxurious head of hair that, in days gone by, won him the heart of many a lovely submissive.
Now, let’s take these two people, their lives, their baggage, their (often precariously juggled) priorities, throw them together into a D/s relationship, and … what? … magic happens? Depends on how you define “magic,” I suppose. What probably happens, more often than not, is “life happens.” And that’s where reality can impinge on a D/s relationship to a greater degree than on a vanilla relationship. Because here’s the thing about D/s relationships that is absent from vanilla relationships: they are founded on structure. Not on giving and obeying instructions (I abhor the word “orders”), not on spankings and blow jobs, but on structure. The Dominant and the submissive share a singular craving for this structure. The Dominant lives to provide structure, and the submissive lives to be wrapped safely inside that structure. But reality isn’t structured, not at all. Alvin Toffler once wrote, “the future arrives differently from what we expect, and in the wrong order.” The same can be said about reality.
Where too many D/s relationships run up on the rocks is when the couple’s hope for the idyllic serenity of a perfectly structured relationship gets pimp-slapped by that unexpected, disordered reality. The sub is getting her kids fed with her phone tucked under her ear taking an important work call, and a text comes in: “You are to go to the bathroom and edge for me right this minute.” The Dom gets home from a business trip, collapses into his recliner, promptly falls asleep, and as rosy-fingered dawn creeps over the eastern horizon, a text comes in: “You didn’t text me last night to tuck me in!” No, these examples are not absurd. Yes, they happen all the time. Such relationships are brittle and subject to breakage because, over time, as life gets in the way, both people come to feel the same subliminal resentment, a resentment that can be summed up in a single, dangerous sentence: “My needs are not being met.”
Here’s the deal. If your relationship does not have provisions for flexibly managing that royal pain in the ass called “reality,” then you would be well advised to build such flexibility and such provisions into the relationship right now. How does one manage this potentially damaging confluence of needs and reality? See, there’s this thing called “communication” ….
Outside of the relationship, God Emperor McDomly is a computer programmer named “Joe.” Outside of the relationship, Dirty Little Cum-Slut is a working mother named “Mary.” Because they are smart people who want to make it work despite their crazy lives, they carve out a space outside of the power dynamic’s internal energy and structure. A safe place, where Joe and Mary can sit down, put their heads together, and collaborate. “OK, so what’s our plan when X happens?” “How do we get around this recurring inhibitor to the full flourishing of our dynamic?” And, most importantly, “How do we make this even better for both of us?” Most people, one would hope, have such foundational discussions at the outset, but it’s even more important that such discussions be ongoing. Because life happens, and it happens all the time, and it happens in ways that are always changing and mutating. The best laid plans, parameters, and structures put in place at the outset of a relationship are all well and good, but more often than not they suffer the same fate as Germany’s vaunted WWI battle plan: “It did not survive the first shock of combat.”
Now, there are a couple of reasons why many people in a D/s relationship — and not just those new to the life — find themselves unwilling or unable to carve out that space and collaborate on a “meta” level, as “Joe” and “Mary,” and deal as ateam with the many situations where life just rears up and bites them on the ass.
The Dominant may feel that by engaging in freewheeling discussion, collaboration, and even negotiation outside the power dynamic, he will appear “weak” to his submissive. The Dominant who feels this is making a fundamental error: mistaking flexibility for weakness. The Dom believes that if he does not keep his sub in total, metronomic, lockstep obedience at all times, she is going to see him as “weak,” even “unworthy.” His greatest fear: his sub will leave him, because she cannot abide a “weak Dom.”
The submissive may feel very uncomfortable challenging any detail of the power exchange, even in a “safe place” where they’re just Joe and Mary. Submissives have a very deep fear and resistance to saying, “I want to meet your expectations with this, but here’s a reality check on that. Can I suggest this instead?” For far too many subs, the idea of having any kind of dialogue as equals with her Dom is deeply abhorrent, believing that doing so upends the power exchange dynamic and essentially “invalidates” the relationship. The submissive who feels this is making a fundamental error: mistaking collaboration for topping. The saddest words I ever heard from a submissive of my acquaintance: “Shit, if Sir and I have conversations like that where we collaborate as equals, then it might as well be a vanilla relationship!”
Talk to each other, people. A lot. Communicate. Collaborate. Find a common ground that works for both of you.
Dominants: talk to your submissive. Trust her enough to know that she will see your engagement as a sign of strength, not weakness. If your sub does see it as weakness, then you have a fundamental problem on your hands, and need to rethink your involvement with this sub.
Submissives: talk to your Dominant. Trust him enough to know that he will see it as a sign of your deep emotional investment in the relationship, not as an attempt to top him. If your Dom sees this as a refusal to “respect mah authoritah!” then you are in a dangerous place, and you need to run, not walk, to the nearest exit.
Reality sucks a lot of the time. It’s messy, noisy, inconvenient, and it gets in the way of any D/s relationship. Any kind of relationship, really. But if the two of you really respect and cherish each other, and this thing you’re building together, accommodations to reality must be made. Be willing to look honestly at the ways that reality intrudes, collaborate as a team, and forge workable solutions together that will serve you in good stead for the long term.
Because your relationship is worth it, right?
Amo and I know the sting of reality all too well. I think the key for us has been to remember that needs come first. When Amo stays up late working, we change plans, and I serve by giving him a warm body to snuggle while he sleeps. When I have a sick child, perhaps we sneak in a Skype call, just so I can feel the comfort of his presence.
When something gets in the way of completing a task, I am to tell him immediately and, if possible, suggest an alternate solution. That IS obedience for us, because it’s how I show that his desires are still a priority for me, even when I can’t serve them immediately. Amo reminds me that I am his slave in all moments. Owned when we can tuck ourselves away in a fantasy cocoon, and owned when we can’t escape the harsh light of the real world. We talk so that we understand one another’s needs, finding little ways to feel our roles even when it’s hard.
You began it as an
idle game. You had read something about denial on the internet and
the idea took root in the fertile soil of your lusty little mind.
Something about relinquishing control, or being controlled.
So you decided you
wanted to try it. You considered sitting me down and explaining it.
Direct, honest communication. Perhaps even showing me some of those
websites you’d stumbled across and kept going back to, helplessly, to
gaze at the expressions on their faces, to re-read those stories of
the frustration and what it began to do to their bodies and their
minds.
Instead, though, you
decided to be sneaky about it. Were you ashamed? Nervous of
rejection? Or was it just that you thought our relationship wasn’t
like that? Perhaps too vanilla to risk destabilising it with some
weird, perverted request. Perhaps you feared driving me away
Whatever it was, it
meant you had to sidle up to the issue.
At first you tried
dropping hints. “I’m nearly there,” you’d moan, as you got
closer. And then: “I’m too close!” Not I’m close but I’m too close, hoping
I’d pick up on your inflection. But I just took that to mean I was
going a good job. And so I’d tip you over every time.
Then there was that
time I was caressing you, stroking you closer and closer. You began
to shiver in anticipation, then you caught my eye and whispered: “May
I come?” and bit your lip. And I said: “Of course!” Perhaps I
even sounded surprised. How frustrating that must have been for you.
In the end it was
purely by accident that I realised. I’d been idly playing with you
one morning. You basically gave up on your plan for denial, right
then, and instead decided to relax into the pleasure and simply
explode. Something about my lack of enthusiasm combined with your
acceptance meant that you were right there on the edge for much
longer that usual. But getting closer, so very much closer. You felt
yourself tipping and-
Then the doorbell
rang.
I stopped, took my
hand away from you and you had what we now know is a ruin. But then,
it was a first for the both of us. The way your eyes snapped open and
stared at me with surprise, with agony, with frustration. The mewling
wail that escaped your throat, a sound I’d never heard you made
before, torn from deep inside. The shivering of your limbs as you
felt that single, pathetic pulse of pleasure that trickled away like
water through fingers.
I have to say, it
make an impression upon me. And as I walked away to answer the door
and glanced back to see you there, sheened in perspiration, mouth
open, watching me leave, I remembered it…
The trouble was, you
made two serious mistakes.
The first was that
you really had no idea how deep inside you those roots of denial had
penetrated, how fertile the soil of you needy, greedy imagination
was. All that time you had spent fantasising about giving someone
else control of your pleasure, your arousal and your release, had
been time allowing those slow threads of that fantasy to grow. And
those urges are deep and primal.
All that time you
spent stroking yourself, getting aroused and letting your thoughts
idly drift in the direction of denial, you had begun to associate the
very physiological responses of arousal with denial.
In many, the promise
of a shuddering release is the thing that stiffens their nipples,
swells the sensitive skin between their legs, the very idea of racing
towards climax. But those who crave denial, the wicked, deliciously
kinked idea of having that release denied them, stolen from them by
someone else, only to make them weaker and more pliable? Well, that
is the itch that makes them want to scratch.
By masturbating to
that very thought, you were conditioning yourself to associate
arousal with tantalising disappointment. So when you got that first actual, real, physical taste of it – even by accident – of
course it was overwhelming.
To have someone else
stroking your most sensitive places always feels better. To have
someone else stroke you closer to that enticing edge … and then for
them to stop. Oh God, it was a fantasy coming true. A fantasy you had
been entertaining for so long. No wonder it was so powerful. That
first time, after so long anticipating in your imagination, it was if
a switch had flipped in your brain. You couldn’t go back. And
although you didn’t know it at the time, you were caught in a trap of
your own making.
The second mistake
you made, the entirely unforeseeable mistake – the mistake that
became your downfall – was underestimating how addictive it would
be for me.
I’m going to be
honest, I had heard about the idea. And the thought of almost
giving someone an orgasm but then … not? Well, I thought it was
crazy.
Until I saw the
effects.
That very first time
I pulled my hand from you, that expression on your face became etched
into my mind. That surprise. That desperation.
So the second time
wasn’t an accident. That was entirely my choice. I wanted to see what
it would do to you, to get you all the way to the edge and then stop.
If the first time,
that accidental time, was the moment you realised how weak and
helpless you were against the effects of denial, the second
time was when you realised the absolute power you had given me.
That second time, I
was looking right into your eyes when I stopped touching you. When I
whispered: “No, I don’t think so. Not this time.” The expression
on your face was priceless. Surprise, then raw physical desperation,
then a hint of arousal … and then something else. A realisation,
perhaps tinged with a little fear but also a little excitement, that
I got it.
That I understood.
And it was then that
you were lost.
Even thereafter, for
a time, you were still shy – perhaps yet unsure I would accept this
side of you. But something had changed in me, too. I took charge. I
began to experiment. And each time I assured you the experiment would
end and that that time would be the time we would take a break, that
I would allow you release, and then changed my mind at the last
moment and left you short, I saw you accept our new roles more. And
that aroused me.
Every moan of
frustration, every writhingly dissatisfied conclusion to your
stimulation dropped you deeper and deeper into my control, helplessly
carried further by your own long rooted self-programmed arousal at
this process. Oh God, you hated how you loved it. Each day without
release making the next more of a challenge but more of a triumph.
And I was so good at it, teasing you forward with a finger between
your legs, the lightest touch, whispering in your ear how good it
would feel to come this time, how much of a reward it would be having
gone for so long. And then I would give you a ruin and you would cry
out in dissatisfaction, at the unfairness after being so good.
And I would tempt
you further, draw you into deals, have you make pacts, obey me
more and more deeply for the promise of release that became a ruin,
or the promise of a ruin that was just an edge, or even just the
promise of a single touch. Weaker and weaker you became, more and
more compliant, throbbing, frustrated, grateful.
How far we have
come. It’s been longer than you can remember. You have become what
you darkly fantasised about for so long. Just a hopeless, eager
little thing, so desperate to please, so responsive to even the
faintest touch now, a stroke upon your sensitive neck, a breath upon
your tingling flesh.
And the real secret?
The thing I’m sure you fantasised about, although by now you have
probably forgotten, living as you are in the moment, from touch to
touch, edge to edge, is that this utterly desperate, mindless,
helpless state of denial that sees you curl about my feet like a
contented kitten, happy just to feel my fingers stroking your hair,
this entire state is just the beginning.
Now you are this
obedient and conditioned, your real training begins.
A PM from a Follower, abstracted in the interests of privacy … “Awhile back you mentioned in passing a Dom shutting down a scene if it got too intense for the sub to be able to use her safe word responsibly. What are the symptoms, so I can watch out for it and be aware?”
This is a great question. First, respect to you for wanting to understand and keep your girl safe. Here’s the thing: we hear all this stuff about “the sub is safe, because she always has her safeword.” And that is true, as far as it goes. But what happens when, in the intense heat of a scene, the submissive has lost the power of rational volition? That sounds fairly nebulous, and probably useless, so let me break it down to some characteristic external markers that I’ve encountered over the years …
Loss of rational speech. Is her speech mumbled, incoherent, and “off-topic”? You need to shut that shit down.
Irrational demands for “more, harder.” If you’ve pushed her to (and possibly a bit beyond) her previous limits and to a place that you know is beyond her tolerance (for pain, intensity, etc) and yet she continues to moan “more …. harder …” then she has dropped too deep into sub space to be a rational player in the scene, and you need to shut that shit down.
“What is your name?” If you think she’s slipped away, ask her “What is your name?” I once had to ask a girl her name three times before I got a mumbled response. If she can’t answer immediately and coherently, you need to shut that shit down.
Safeword. Above all else, if you ask “What is your safeword?” and she does not immediately respond crisply and coherently with her safeword, you need to shut that shit down at once.
Now, what do you do to bring her back? Hydration, a damp towel, under the covers, and a lot of cuddles and aftercare while talking to her softly and letting her know you’re there and all is well.
Hopefully these “indicators” will help you to keep your scenes Safe, Sane, and Consensual.
Thanks to my good friend @1-sadistic-lover for finding this. For the person who messaged me about this piece last night.
Uie's Cage 