For most of my life …in friendships, relationships, and even kink dynamics, I thought it was completely normal to feel anxious. I thought being on edge, overthinking every word, and being afraid to be fully myself was just part of caring for someone. I didn’t even know what it meant to feel “safe” with someone.
Like the term that is being commonly used now…my nervous system was wired for chaos, for tension, hypervigilance, emotional distress, simply because that’s all I had known. But after experiencing something healthier with My Domme, I’ve realised: I will never again accept relationships that make me feel small, anxious, or scared.
A recent interaction with a past Dom reminded me just how far I’ve come… and how important it is to listen to my body when it says: this is not okay.
A while ago, I had ended a dynamic with a Dom. It hadn’t been a good space for me, but at the time, I didn’t have the language or self-awareness to understand why fully. I only knew I felt tense and unsure around him.
Recently, out of the blue, he called me. He said he missed me and wanted to get back together. I calmly explained that I was taking a break from all Doms/Men for now ....just focusing on myself, with the support of my Domme. But instead of respecting that, he became passive-aggressive: accusing me of choosing “little friends” over him about a situation where I confronted him when I found out he was actively talking to a sub friend, telling me that the gifts he had bought me had arrived to complaining about how we were supposed to be spending Father’s Day together.
I noticed very quickly that he wasn’t listening to me at all. He kept calling me a “bad girl” for talking to other men AFTER the conclusion of our dynamic, then switched to saying how he hadn’t “played with me enough,” and then bombarding me with messages asking to see me after work, pushing for a face-to-face where we could “talk and fix things.”….when his messages portrayed a different picture.
It was clear this wasn’t about what I wanted or needed; this was about his needs, his control and his ego. And my body reacted fast: my heart raced, I felt panicky, and my voice was shaking. I felt small… frazzled… unsafe.
As I sat with those feelings later, I realised something powerful: I had felt this before, many times in different intensities, in many relationships, and I had thought it was normal. That low-grade constant anxiety, that walking on eggshells, that tight chest feeling, the waiting for something to snap.
And more than that, I remembered how much I had always performed in relationships. I questioned myself before replying. I second-guessed my tone, my words, my emotions. I thought twice before saying what I really wanted to say. I shaped myself into what I thought the other person wanted, the “good sub,” the “put together woman,” always trying to manage their moods, and never fully myself.
And the scariest thing? I didn’t even know I was doing it. It was autopilot, if I could call it that, wired deep in me from years of living through chaotic, unsafe connections.
But through my dynamic with my Domme, I began to experience something I hadn’t known before: true safety. She didn’t just tolerate my honesty… she expected it from me. She refused to let me shrink myself for her. She saw through the chaos and front I’d been running on… and created a space where I didn’t have to perform. Where I didn’t have to “earn” love or approval. Where I could show up fully as ME...silly, messy, soft, strong, and anything in-between.
For the first time, I didn’t feel the need to do 100 front flips, to “be enough.” And in that space, my I finally calmed down. The constant hypervigilance, the second-guessing… it melted away and was replaced by clarity, a level of self-confidence that is growing every day and more. I learned what real trust and connection are, and what that looks and feels like in my body.
That’s why this recent call hit me so hard, because now I could feel the difference.
I caught myself questioning myself again. I caught myself thinking twice before replying. I caught the tightness in my chest, the unease in my belly. I realised that this is not who I am anymore. I’ve worked too hard to heal from this to go back to old patterns.
And so, from this experience, I’ve made a promise to myself:
I will NEVER go back. I will not shrink myself again just to keep a false peace. I will not perform to “earn” care. I will not ignore the tension in my body just because I think I “should” be okay.
It’s strange how much of this was invisible to me before. For so long, it was simply how things were. The constant edge, the need to second-guess myself, the feeling of always having to be more …more good, more pleasing, more in control of how others felt.
But once I experienced true safety … once I began to settle in a space where I didn’t have to fight or perform, I could finally feel what had been missing. And now that I know that feeling… I cannot unknow it.
If you’re reading this and you’ve ever felt that kind of tension... that constant undercurrent of anxiety...caught yourself second-guessing your words, walking on eggshells, feeling like you have to be “more” just to be worthy of care...You’re not alone.
For a long time, I didn’t know it could be any different. I thought that nervous energy, that edge, was just part of what it meant to be submissive. That if I could just be good enough, pleasing enough, then maybe I’d feel okay.
But real safety doesn’t ask you to perform. It doesn’t want you to shrink or silence parts of yourself. And when you finally feel it, that peace and calm, with care that allows you to be your full self, you’ll start to see those old patterns for what they are…unhealthy.
You deserve that kind of space. One where you can kick your boots off and breathe. Where you can be soft, messy, whole …without fear.
And if you haven’t felt it yet…please know, it is possible. And once you do, you’ll never want to go back to anything less.
Xoxo
Nirvana