I've been struggling to write because I have a rat king of thoughts in my mind. Every thought intersects with another, feeling tangled and I do not know how to untangle them. During these past few months, a lot has come to the surface of my consciousness and it is clear that I have a lot of unprocessed trauma from vanilla relationships under patriarchal conditioning. Processing it and unlearning toxic ideas has been a journey.
I cannot express enough how much I love the forum posts on this platform because they are humanizing in a way that I did not think was possible on a platform centered around sex. It is saddening that I feel this way though. Some of the discussions ought to be common sense but we are conditioned within wider society to accept so much abuse. One is punished when they conform to wider societal norms and one is punished when they deviate. It is confusing to know how to build meaningful relationships, it helps to have someone reminding you that you are worthy of respect and safety.
One thing that I keep pondering on is how much consent is emphasized in a way that isn't done in vanilla relationships.
I love that one is not obligated to send images but I have flashbacks of conversations with a friend about my experiences on Tinder. I didn't have full-length images but quite frankly, I was exhausted of the false starts that come with internet dating. Sending images comes with so many risks in a time of advanced technologies, there is something that gives me the ick about the thought of my image existing on random men's phones. On the other hand, how are they sure that I am not a catfish? My dating profile had at least one full-length image and multiple images of my face and I would send a face portrait image but that wasn't enough. Was all this work of taking a recent full-length image worth it for someone who barely had any real interest in me?
I have flashbacks of my long-distance sexual situationship that I so badly wanted to be a relationship. He had such an amazing life as a businessman, community organizer, and environmental activist, who traveled the world to attend courses and conferences with organizations and institutions such as the US Embassy and the UN. He was the type of man who would come back after I blocked him and beg me to speak to him, blowing up my phone with multiple calls a day that overwhelmed me. Yet for some reason, this man did not see me as worthy of holding a conversation with or had any real interest in me as a person. The whole relationship was purely sexual, all I was worth for him was free porn and it was so taxing on me emotionally. I hate feeling like an object outside of play. I think the pain from that experience was such a wake-up call for me that I never wanted to engage in that type of relationship again.
Being on this platform felt counter-productive to my healing at first but I laid ground rules for myself and I was ready to lose connections if I had to. My emotional health meant more to me than anything, so I was ready to drop anyone as soon as my "no" was ignored a third time. Three strikes were my limit because I try to be a forgiving person. I refused to feel pressured into something that made me feel uncomfortable. It felt so validating when I finally took the time to learn about BDSM and realized that boundaries are perfectly fine and recommended.
The submissive women in vanilla relationships that are heavily influenced by patriarchal thinking are expected to be quiet, to not have thoughts, opinions, or questions. Every interaction with a man is somehow an invitation for your autonomy to be taken away. When you are taught about consent, it's already late because you have internalized these oppressive ideas about women. It is a sad existence to not be able to create meaningful relationships because your only objective with the opposite gender is to gratify your urges. When I first came to this site, my only goal was to gratify my urges because I was not expecting better. I had never received better in vanilla relationships, why would I expect it in a space that is centered around exploring one's deepest darkest fantasies? Boy, was I wrong!
The BDSM submissive is allowed to have a voice, to express their preferences, and their consent is held in high regard. Of course, I know that it is not a utopia, I have heard stories of consent being ignored and I have had mild experiences of my own. I am just glad that I don't have to be in a space where a submissive person is treated as though their autonomy does not matter because they consented to sex or being submissive.
The dynamic between a sub and a dom is based on friendship and it takes a long time to cultivate. I recently realized that I am demi-sexual. I have always craved emotional connection over physical, but I have forced myself to accept physical relationships without an emotional connection because I desired to feel wanted. I had been told before that "men want one thing" or "You're only worth having sex with". In the past, my desire to feel wanted took over me to the point of placing myself in harm's way. I also felt extremely guilty for the act of desiring sex, that I entered a community that places emphasis on celibacy from a purity culture perspective, that teaches that women are temptresses. I thought that I deserved every bit of punishment, or pain that I received for being a "bad girl'. This is not the pain that I consented to. I had no say in how I would receive this pain and it was not for my pleasure. It was a punishment after all. I felt punished with distance within relationships for expressing my needs. If I was not completely submitted to a man, never questioning him, even when he placed me in harm's way physically and emotionally, I would get discarded. I felt as though I deserved to be discarded because that is what happens to women with no sexual purity.
When I started exploring kink, I thought that degradation was my kink. My intrusive thoughts were so loud that I thought that I had to off myself for them to be silent. There's something more empowering about being called a slut on your own terms than when it is used to "put you in your place." Suddenly these words had no power over me. Internally, I don't feel like I am a worthless slut but in play, my brain knows that this is the tone that I consented to, that it is being done to pleasure me and it's not that serious. Feeling heard is the most empowering and liberating part. Then I feel relief that the world did not fall apart because someone called me a slut. In this time, in this context, I allow myself to be a slut and that doesn't make me any less of a person. Outside of play, I am treated like a person who breathes, feels, hurts, and has a mind.
That is my frustration with existence in general. How one finds safety in spaces that are often demonized and the places that are generally considered safe by society are often the most unsafe spaces or they are only safe for some. Does this count as irony?
It is interesting how much things can change in 3 months. I have outgrown the need for degradation, as liberating as it felt, it was originally intended to be a form of self-harm. These days, besides the existential crisis that is a constant in my life, I am at least not experiencing intrusive thoughts anymore. I am craving more intimacy and gentleness alongside the rough play. I am now taking time to get to know myself.
The ability to change feels liberating too.
