|
CaringandReal -> RE: when a d/s relationship becomes pimp/prostitute (11/17/2009 5:36:13 AM)
|
quote:
ORIGINAL: AnnaOfAramis
quote:
She did something really stupid, and it's easy to get sucked into doing something for a man you believe loves you.
Greetings llyren,
What you said here is so true. I have been there and done that and (hopefully [8|] learned from it). Thankfully, my situation didn't get quite as bad as the OPs but it was going that direction, and I would have been in her place if I hadn't got out. The thing is, that (as I think I remember her pointing out early in the thread) that it happens little by little. The small increments trick you along. Also, going by her age, I would gather this was probably her first D/s experience (I also think she mentioned that it was- sorry I'm too tired to go back and reread, forgive me if I misquote). The thing I remember is that (it was also my first D/s experience) you really don't know what "normal" is anymore when you first enter the lifestyle. So much of one's preconceived ideas are challenged. Things that no longer phase one and so seem quite ordinary, to a newbie are very odd. When my dominant at that time first asked me to shave my pussy, I found it bizarre! Poly was unheard of. His infatuation with school girls worried me... then you get online and find out it's all quite common and your sense of red flags just gets all confused. Now you don't know whether he's a guy with a like for school girl fantasies or a pedophile. When you start questioning all the things that you used to take for granted as red flags, it is really hard to watch out for yourself. You read about what a slave should be, and he wants you to do things. At first they are small, so you do them no problem. Then they get harder, but still small enough not to be so huge that you freak out, so you tell yourself it's pushing your limits and that's normal. It's really really hard to distinguish the line between abuse and D/s when you are new. I was not even young- I was in my 30s when I was officially introduced to the lifestyle and I would have hoped had some life experience to guide me. But I didn't. I believed what I read about the ideal Master slave relationship. That a dominant would nurture and protect you and that when he said he loved me, he meant it. I thought we had something deep but I was just a play thing. I fell for it hook line and sinker. He did a lot of damage to my life and emotionally to me. Then it was hard to leave... why because leaving would have involved admitting that he didn't love me, that it was all a lie and that I'd been used and been stupid. Somehow, we just don't want to believe that. And when we have moments when we are close to believing it, and we confront him in words or in our journals, they usually find all the right things to say to smooth it over and leave you feeling like you were having some hormonal thing or some sub-drop thing, and you dismiss it again... this goes on and on and on over and over until finally some catalyst comes to change things hopefully and you finally say enough.
Stupid absolutely. Manipulated definitely. Abuse of power certainly. Predator... I think so in my case (based on some other facts I'm keeping to myself), and in the OP's case too. And I actually tend to be cautious about the use of that word because I have seen people bandy it around far too freely and damage reputations undeservedly. But when someone seeks out people precisely because they are naive and can be manipulated and then recklessly endangers them for their own gain, I think it is deserved. (I'm sure that definition needs tweaking, it's just a working definition at the moment, but you get the gist).
To the OP: hugs and I'm glad you got out. Learn from it, and be careful of who you choose in future... and take heart that there are real D/s relationships out there. Your and my experiences are not what it is supposed to be.
Well wishes,
anna
Solid Gold.
If I ran this place, I'd put this on a sticky at the top of the forum labeled "New Submissives Must Read This Before They Can Post."
My experience mirrors yours, starting in my 30s, master interested in school girls, pube-shaving a bizarre thing (this was done to me long before it became vanilla fashionable--women still wore bushes when I was enslaved)--except I lucked out. I ran into someone who was loving and caring and all grown up, not some heartless, selfish user.
But the point you make that is most important is the sad fact that many people new to bdsm have a very hard time "watching out for themselves," finding that line between use and abuse. As you said, it becomes very complicated when you want nothing more than to be used, to be of service to someone, and you see all this causal (and sometimes stupid and boasting) talk in forums like this that advocate extremities that work fine ONLY if you are with a very caring ethical dominant--otherwise they can be soul-destrying. You read this sort of stuff and you think, "well if I were a good submissive I would be caged 24/7, beaten beyond recognition, raped without protection, and lying in my own filth too!" Such a scenario can work, physically and emotionally, for all involved, but only if an extreme deal of care and work is put into it, mostly by the dominant. So you think, "If I were a really GOOD submissive, I would be capable of enduring things like this." You almost never think, "well, if he were a good master I would be able to do this and also love it." It's natural for submissives to blame themselves, to take on the responsibilities of the world. And some people, the predators of which you speak, use their awareness of this fact to selfish ends, rather than try to protect the submissive from herself.
What someone said earlier in this thread rang true to me. All too often in these chat communities, you hear "the dominant can do no wrong" pap. But real dominants are wrong a lot. And if they're relatively mature and healthy, they admit it. My former master did. He wanted to, in fact. It didn't change his quite extreme control over me; it was just another aspect of his control. He wanted to be able to freely admit to me when he felt he was wrong. So he did so, despite the discomfort it engendered in me. But the submissive is always to blame and the dominant can do no wrong IS the party line that is often preached around places like this and so you feel like an evil, cynical, and most unsubmissive person if you begin to question that idea, no matter how horrific your actual situation is.
New submissives enamoured of the lifestyle and overjoyed at finding a sexuality they can relate to aren't very discriminating when it comes to forum blah-blah-blah, the empty talk, and how it may differ from reality, the things people actually do. They believe the blah-blah-blah, all this crap that is written, is all true and real (I still do that myself sometimes. It's very hard to remember that people tend to claim a lot more for themselves in anonymous speech then they ever would or could back up with real deeds. I just accept what people say at face value...until I think about it later, away from the forum, and compare it to my real-life experiences and realize I'd swallowed the bait, once again.) If someone with a lot of experience, good experience, can still be fooled so easily (if not permanently), imagine how much harder it is for submissives brand new to bdsm who have no such rock-solid anvil of experience to know when a situation is rotton to the core. Like you said, their desire for it not to be so, their investment in the relationship, no matter how personally horrific it is, their desire to be a good submissive and to a smaller extent, their desire not to appear foolish in front of their peers, will keep them for a long time in some terrible situations. So many sub women I've known over the years went that route. I didn't understand this when I was owned but I understand it now. The alternative, lonliness and trying to control yourself all by yourself and no opputunity to serve or be of use, can feel unbearable--even worse than potential abuse and betrayal.
Yes, absolutely wonderful master-slave relationships do exist. But they will differ in many important ways from the "ideal" that is promoted, because they're individual relationships, not clones of some generic pattern that all must follow. The differences can be shocking sometimes, or make you very uncomfortable. But when the relationship is right, then no matter what the outside circumstances, at the core it FEELs ideal, they feel close to heaven, in fact, for both people involved. If that isn't there for you or if (and in the early stages of a relationship, this is more like what you will feel) you do not sense that it could ever be there, given who he is, then the submissive needs to start opening her mind up to a little self-questioning and exploration of "what if he wasn't there" or "what if he were a different person" scenarios. It's so hard to do that, though. It's such a relief to put down the burden of questioning, analysis, searching, and doubt and just believe that your master or dominant will take care of everything. But putting down that burden is not something that often comes right away, I mean it doesn't if it is genuine and not just the submissive trying to get some premature relief from stress. It's something usually that you "earn" through facing intital doubts, through sticking with situations that are hard or very challenging for you without running or abandoning the relationship, to seeing, after all that, that there is something very worthwhile there, very much worth working for and being your best for. But you do have to remember when you are new and exploring that things do not always work out in this ideal way, especially if you're a bit overeager and move too fast and indiscriminately. Unless someone is very very lucky, they need lots of time, months of time, to learn what their potential dominant is really like. And until you know him that well, until you know his core personality, it's awfully risky to make an absolute commitment to him. A smart dominant, one of the ones worth serving, will realize this of course, and will not pressure you to prematurely commit before you are ready, before you've had a chance to fully satisfy yourself that he is exactly what he seems to be.
Enough. I wanted to add something, but it's impossible to add something more useful than what Anna had already said. I hope a lot of new submissives read it and re-read it and also realize that it means something significant when other submissives, particularly ones with loads of positive experience in extreme relationships, also recognize it's worth and truth.
|
|
|
|
