Still With the Issues
May 14th,I almost resolved for New Year’s to sort out my sexual issues, but I’d have nothing to blog about.
Confession time (not that this isn’t always confessional time): what am I preoccupied with these days? The three-month’s-old scars on my thighs. I’m supposed to be talking about the lighthearted tribulations of sex work and the hotness in my bed, but the tags that keep coming up are feminism, consent and shame. Dominance was a real latecomer to the party (I guess I figured it went without saying?). I don’t have a submission tag that’s not appended with “or the lack thereof”.
I don’t want to glamorize pathology here. Mostly because I do not want this to be pathological. A while back I remember seeing some fetish club opening under the name “Paraphilia” and being horrified. Why? Why would you call it that?
I don’t always recommend people do as I write — not because I’m lucky or I’m superspecial, but because I don’t always know if I was smart or justified. I say people should always accept the risks of what their choices, but man, I am not ready to croak just yet.
Conversely, I don’t want to make myself sound like I’m so-oo scary because I do all this shit that I’m “mature” and “advanced” enough to handle. This does join the other 15 entries under my “young and confused” tag. I am usually only scary to myself.
My adventures in bed pale next to what I see in the “scene”. For every challenge I have, someone else is hanging from meathooks. Not that I think severity makes mine less important, as I certainly wouldn’t think that makes someone else’s less important, but — Oh, no, wait, I do think that makes mine less important.
And while we’re rating things that shouldn’t be rated, I think I do perceive what I do as scarier and more extreme than it is because of its immediacy and my insecurities. Sometimes I wish there was a scorekeeper that tells you when you’ve “leveled up” and are permitted to worry about your sanity.
Sex work hasn’t hurt me, but it doesn’t help much. Working as a pro-domme doesn’t give you many healthy role models for submission and masochism. You see people at their worst, their most desperate and self-loathing.
I’ve always been scared that everything bad that happens in my life happens because of my masochism. A jackass I once slept with said cruelly, You’re only happy when you’re miserable, and it has haunted me ever since. While I protest my agency, my autonomy, and my judgement, I worry that I really am an intentional victim. That I seek out controlling, jealous and emotionally abusive boyfriends. That when things go wrong in my life it’s because I’m a broken and fucked-up pervert. That I live to lose.
It’s really my deepest fear. Well, right up there with cattle prods, those slimy weeds in the bottom of ponds, and dying alone in the gutter with stray cats.
Which brings us to the basis of everything I write here. I know S&M is fantasy. It is fiction. It is adult game-playing and exploration. I know it can be healthy, even joyous, sexual expression. I know that no effort of mine can make it real.
But … still with the issues.
I’m not quite where I’d like to be.
May 16th, at 9:57 am
I have those same fears myself.
May 18th, at 5:10 am
Wow, profound. After months of reading Pro-Dommes’ self-promotion on Maxfisch,its nice to see one Domme who is candid.
May 18th, at 9:28 pm
Touching on possibly the least important part of this: why were you horrified by the club calling itself “paraphilia?’ I could see it being a bit of a mood killer, but horrifying?
May 18th, at 10:17 pm
“While I protest my agency, my autonomy, and my judgement, I worry that I really am an intentional victim.”
We don’t know each other, but regardless of that fact I can promise you that you do not seek out abuse. Most folks who have been in abusive relationships, especially more than one feel like that. As kinky folks, the rest of the world with their misunderstanding of both BDSM and partner abuse sees us as “asking for it”. We don’t. We ask for other things, things we like, things that scare us and turn us on, not to be abused unless that happens to be the word we use when we mean “used well by my friend over there”.
That’s all. If you’re interested check this out and link to it on your page if you’d like. http://www.thenetworklared.org/smvsabuse.htm
May 19th, at 10:50 pm
Boston Boy: In my understanding, paraphilia is to fetish as “deviant homosexuality” per the 1970’s DSM is to being gay. Fetish is the preference, paraphilia is the disorder.
Courtesy a quick Google search (emphasis mine):
May 20th, at 11:59 am
Huh. Looks like I was wrong about what paraphilia means. Yeah, that’s a crappy name.
May 21st, at 12:13 pm
“You’re only happy when you’re miserable.”
Yeah, I’ve heard that before. And, gosh, there are ways in which it’s true. I was a markedly unhappy teenager. I felt like I had to give up large parts of myself to move beyond that. There’s something terribly familiar and…comforting…about crying. Yet, I’m happy now. I have a nice stable life that I like. But I still want a guy to make me cry. There’s something about that deep catharsis that’s peaceful. It evens me out. It lets out all the little things I hold in every day. It makes me happy. I miss it when I don’t have it regularly.
And why not? It works for me. I feel remarkably good afterwords. Why not?