Giles English, over at How Do I Get My Partner to Dominate Me wrote a few months ago about women not wanting to admit to enjoying femdom. How does this guy know so much about women, especially vanilla women? Anyway, it is a good blog post to read. In it, Giles puts his finger exactly on the one thing I have the most trouble with: Nice girls don't hurt, maim, humiliate, tease, hit, use, or otherwise be mean to the people they love (or anyone else.)
It is necessary to learn these lessons, or none of us would be able to survive in a civilized society (if you can call what we have, civilized)...well, a community anyway. So this is ingrained in us. How do we get over feeling guilty for being able to be mean to our submissive partner. His submission means he has given us permission to do so...but we still worry about hurting him, physically or emotionally. And being seen as a mean person. Or an abusive person. Or a bully.
My treasure likes me to be more aggressive with him, but all I want to do is clutch him to my bosom and love him up. Except when he pisses me off. Then I want to kick him. But nice girls don't kick. Do they?
What do you think about this, and how can I change this gut feeling, that I am hurting him when I do what he has given me permission to do?
That is a very interesting question. My wife seems to be on a tipping point with regard to our femdom play. I think she is at the point where she is enjoying inflicting pain on me. She certainly enjoys keeping me orgasm free. There is no question about it: I am a masochist. I enjoy it when she pushes my limits, and she mostly seems to enjoy that too, but she also feels a bit of guilt. As an example, we have recently started to explore male nipple torture. From feedback she has given me, she enjoys it mainly because it's very easy for her to do and she gets a big reaction out of me. But I think there are times when I may yelp a little too loudly and she seems to back off and feel guilty. I think she could either go back and lower the pain play, or go the other way and embrace it more. I rather want her to try to apply clothespins to my nipples, to see if I can "take it". But I don't want to top from the bottom, and I am a bit afraid if she really likes that and it turns out to be too much for me.
ReplyDeleteNot sure I have helped you much. Bottom line for me, I think my domme does enjoy the reactions she gets from me but she doesn't want them to be too extreme, because she doesn't want to hurt me. It's a fine line, and a difficult thing to balance. I would say that when she has pushed me beyond what I thought were my limits, I rather enjoyed it, and our trust bond grew a lot.
Good luck!
I have been reading a book called "At Her Feet" by TammyJo Eckhart, and in it she discusses this very issue, which seems tombe common among new dominants. What particularly struck me was her advice on how to distinguish between hurting and harming. I am afraid that i might have come very close to that line before with my treasure. But luckily I am able to admit that I have made a mistake, and apologize. I hope our relationship is stronger because I have done so.
ReplyDelete@Lovetosubmit: Sounds like your Mistress is neutral about the nipple torture. Lucky for you! There are some things I do for my boy that I am neutral about, but I save those for a special treat or a reward. I just have to make sure I am not harming him while I am hurting him!
ReplyDeleteThis is the issue with my daughter. Her husband is clearly submissive, and to some extent dosen't mind being the boss in the house. Yet, the overt concept of femdom is new to her. She did not grow up in an penly femdom home. John and I made the transition after she went away to college. In her mind being the acknowledged head of house and mistress to her husband is somthing hard for her to accept. Love you blog. Kathy
ReplyDeleteI am a big fan of yours, too, Kathy. I think that the very fact that your daughter and son-in-law are thinking about their relationship puts them way ahead of the power curve. They are not wasting precious years but thinking about finding their way to many more years of happiness. The only people who need to acknowledge her as head of household is her and her husband. Stealth!
DeleteI think you nailed it on the head when you discern the difference between harming and hurting. As long as your partner is experiencing more (or at least as much) pleasure than pain, then I don't think you have anything to feel guilty about. Going much beyond that feels like it's entering 'harm' territory.
ReplyDeleteThat said, sometimes we like to push our limits, but how far to go... that's what safewords are for. And even when you push those limits, remember that you are only giving him the opportunity to expand his definition of pleasure, too.
It can get confusing, though, for a sub when the fantasy is often more arousing than the realization, and where do the boundaries lie, and how to deal with them. We often like to imagine ourselves being taken well past our limits, but that doesn't mean we should be.
I guess it's kind of like a workout - it hurts when we push ourselves, and if we push it too much, we will likely abandon the whole enterprise. So I think even when it comes to taking matters beyond a sub's limits, the trick is to know when to stop so that they feel proud they achieved something, and will want to come back for more.
Of course, I can only speak for myself in all this....