When It's His Idea

Jan 2011

Dear Readers,

Yes, I'm still here -- and the good news is that my batteries are a bit recharged and I've been working on the next book. I didn't want to mention it until I was fairly sure it would happen, since, like many creative people, I'm never quite sure if a project is going to make it all the way to completion until, well, it's almost all the way to completion.

In the meantime, I appreciate everyone's patience and encouragement during my hiatus from the blog. After two books, I think I was DD'd out for awhile. But writing the book -- a collaboration with my partner articulating more of his point of view than mine -- has given me more food for thought. So I hope to share some of those thoughts with all of you in the months to come. Bear with me if the articles come slowly, however -- I am, as you have surely noticed by now, not a Constant Blogger by any means.

Meanwhile, I'm publishing a letter I received below, along with my reply. Perhaps you all might weigh in with your thoughts for Kathy as well.

Happy 2011,
Viv

____________________________

FROM KATHY, in response to the blog post "When I'm Angry":

Viv,

I recently met a man who is interested in DD and has been trying to teach me about it and show me why it is a good way to manage a relationship. I'm not completely convinced yet, and one of the big reasons I'm not convinced is exactly because of this issue you described. So I sent him your blog entry, told him about my concerns and asked for his opinion. His e-mail response to me was as follows:

That is an excellent description of the issue. The best way I know to handle it is SERIOUSLY.

--Go into High Protocol … Ask permission to speak …
--Kneel, take lil' Master {his penis} out … lick him … suck him
--Then tell me what I did and how it made you feel.

I can't guarantee anything,but I'm pretty sure that:

--you will have my full attention
--that I will not get pissed off at you
--that I will not think you are out-of-line
--& I won't think you're being disrespectful

There's a good chance I won't do it again.

So seriously.....what do you think? I would love to let him know what someone else thinks of his idea. I told him that if I was all that angry, I wouldn't be able to do those things. If I was able to do those things, I wouldn't be very angry and I wouldn't NEED his apology all that much.

His follow-up response to THAT was:

"Keep in mind that D/s is all about Control, DD is about Self Control.
I think you can learn Self Control..."

As a woman who has a lot more experience in a DD relationship, what is your take on his comments?

MY REPLY:

Dear Kathy,

I'm sorry for the delay in responding to your email -- real life, as it often does, interfered!

I've read your comment several times in an effort to formulate a response, as this is clearly very important to you and your partner. Your situation is also more unusual, as most of the time in my experience, it's the woman asking her partner for a DD relationship rather than the other way around. (At least that's true of the ones who normally write to me!)

I must admit that my first response is a strong caution for you. I'm not at all sure that DD will have the power to elevate, transform and enlighten when the woman doesn't come to the relationship predisposed to the idea. I'll have to give that question some thought - perhaps in a future article.

Making a DD relationship work is hard work. Very hard work. I've yearned for a DD relationship with a man since I was very, very young, and still, I find submitting to discipline and his authority one of the most difficult things I've ever done in my life and I fail most of the time. (This is why my books are about asking for spankings, not maintaining successful long term DD relationships -- which I'm still working on as well.) The idea of a woman entering into a DD relationship without being inherently aroused and excited by it feels dubious at best and unsafe at worst.

I'm assuming that your partner is asking for spanking or other discipline to be incorporated into the dynamic? (There are couples who practice DD without spanking.) Being spanked -- hit, in essence -- by your partner is an extremely emotionally volatile situation even when you want it and have initiated the request for it. Experiencing that trauma without having a built-in attraction to it seems likely to lead to anger and shame on your part, and guilt on his part.

Your situation also brings up an interesting question: the foundation of why most people in the DD world don't consider it abuse is that the woman is consenting to it, and in most cases, has asked for and initiated the relationship. If you spank or otherwise discipline a partner who wants to be spanked or disciplined,, even though she may protest at the time, there's an implied consent there. If you spank a partner who doesn't want it and hasn't asked for it in any sense, does that cross the line? I don't have a clear answer, but it's worth thinking about.

I suspect your partner is encouraging you to try this because he himself understands and has experienced the transformative power of DD -- but, again, he's experienced it because he is already primed to want such a relationship. And while I do think it's possible to create a situation in which the submissive partner learns to appreciate the power of DD, it's a difficult road to travel.

So I would ask you one simple question: Are you considering this solely for his benefit, or somewhere, deep inside, is there even a tiny flicker of sexual interest/arousal/excitement at the idea of having that kind of relationship with your partner? Because even a flicker can be fanned and suggests that once you and your partner experiment, you may find it ignites in a flame. If not, it's still possible, but my suggestion would be to tread very, very (very) slowly.

This isn't to say that the foundation of DD has to be sexual. There are certainly couples out there who engage in DD and who claim, at least, that neither of them is aroused by it. Personally, I'm skeptical, given the potent sexual archetypes that are invoked by DD, but I think what they may be communicating is that the act of spanking doesn't inherently arouse them. Fair enough. But it certainly helps if there's at least an interest in your loins for such activities -- it helps get over the rough spots if there's a sexual charge to motivate you.

You haven't mentioned whether or not you've experimented with dom/sub behavior in the bedroom -- if so, did you like it? That's at least some indication that you might like to take it into your regular life with him. If not, that seems like a safe place to start. No, it's not the same as DD, as I'm sure your partner is well aware, but it's a safe, non-threatening, loving place to experiment with some basic tests about how you'd feel being ordered around, spanked, dominated, etc.

Your partner's suggestion for what to do when you're angry, while well meaning and probably exciting for him and possibly successful in the past with women who were already pre-disposed towards such a relationship, seems like it's going way too far, too fast.Your assessment that such a request/requirement from him when you're angry is likely to fail seems pretty much spot on. Perhaps, if you really want to try this, you might consider what YOU would want to do in such a situation and start from there, rather than starting with what he wants you to do (which is a fun idea, but not terribly realistic even for those of us who really really want to submit).

I certainly don't mean to discourage either of you -- only to caution you both to go very slowly and to pay utmost attention to your inner cautions as you feel your way through this. And I hope your partner is loving enough to be able to respect your need to go much more slowly than perhaps he'd like to.

I hope this gives both of you some food for thought. One other thing I'd mention is that your partner's willingness/ability to talk through your concerns with you is a good sign -- a heartbreaking number of people have the fantasy that DD will work without conversations just like the one you two are having right now. You're ahead of the game in that respect, for sure.

Warmest,
Viv