Special Words
October 4th, 2012
We talk to each other every day. We communicate with people on many levels. We show our love and appreciation through both action and words. We say ‘I love you’ as often as we can. Sometimes, we say it so often, or so casually, that it loses its power. We even say it as a reflex when someone else says it. Other times, we get it right. We say it at the moment it is needed most, or by looking into their eyes and really meaning every word. We say it by our actions, a hug of support, a tender kiss, or by making a masochist cry.
A lot of people speak without thinking. Responding on reflex can get you through life, but we were given brains for a reason. Filtering our thoughts, really thinking about a question, being conscious of our replies, will get us a lot further. Some people go by the three questions: ‘Is it true? Is it kind? Is it necessary?’ If you cannot answer at least two of these three with Yes, you probably don’t need to say it.
When you are in multiple relationships, it can be a hard balance to show everyone how special they are to you. When you’re having a threesome, sexual or just kinky play, it can be difficult for everyone to feel special, or unique. It takes careful thought, and a little extra effort, to give each person a little something just for that one.
Last night, he was hitting us both with the leather cocks. We have very different reactions, and processing mechanisms, but he was basically doing the same thing to each of us. What gave me a feeling of special was towards the end of the play, he looked at me and said “How is my pain slut doing?” This made me feel good on a couple levels. I always enjoy the possessiveness implied by “my” in phrases like that, I am his, and he is the only one I currently receive pain from, no one else. And “pain slut” was an acknowledgment of my enjoyment and arousal caused by the pain, which is very different than the engineer’s reaction. I’m not going to assume he necessarily meant all of that when he said it, but he knows me, and he often chooses his words to make me smile.
This morning was another example. As I was getting dressed and showing him the bruises, he looked at them and said “Now, those are big diamonds,” acknowledging one of my favorite Fetlife quotes: ‘Some girls get diamonds, my bruises are prettier.’ These bruises were his gifts to me, as my screams and moans, etc the night before, were my gifts to him. These are a particularly tender set of bruises, and I’ll enjoy them all the more. Most of mine don’t stay tender past a day, but these, I feel, will make me smile as I walk all through the weekend.
Be careful of words that you share with a partner. Just like the things that are personal to a relationship, words can be special, too. If there is a special nickname people use for each other, don’t assume you can use it, too. If you have a special call and response with a long-term partner, saying it to someone else can cause hurt feelings. If you are not sure, ask. Better to feel foolish than to trigger
A Bad Day
April 7th, 2011
I’m having a bad day. Work was fine, the cat didn’t attack me, the weather was gorgeous, no one got hurt or is deathly ill in my immediate life(though, for my good friends who do have that in their lives, I’m incredibly sorry and wish I could be there for them more than I currently am). I didn’t break the car or lose my phone or have drama explode. Nothing changed today. But I’m having a bad day.
It happens time to time. My body fights me. My immune system attacks (mostly) my joints. I have pain and swelling in various bits and pieces depending on the day, week, month, year. I used to take a lot of drugs. A couple years ago, about the time I started this blog, I was getting worse and my doc upped my injections. I snapped, I was tired of the drugs. Tired of the chemicals, tired of getting worse. I changed my diet. Massively. It didn’t cure me, like I hoped it would. But it controls it about as well as the drugs did.
Or at least that’s what I tell myself. I blame the flares on not sticking as strictly to the diet as I should. On not eating raw enough. On not eating alkaline enough. But then I also have two books with opposing opinions on what is and what is not alkalizing. On stress. On empathetic pain, sometimes. I take a naproxen every now and then. If I have a really bad flare, I take a couple prednisone. Rationalizing that one or two pills a week is better than four a day and two shots a week.
I haven’t been to my rheumatologist in a over a year at this point due to money and insurance concerns and the fact I’ve stopped taking the drugs. I’ve still got spare pain killers left from the refills I did a year and a half ago. Probably, they say they should be thrown out by now, but that’s not the point.
I’m having a bad day. My wrist hurts, my elbow is buggered, my ankle’s achey, and my shoulders are cranky. None of it’s debilitating, but it was all worse this morning before I took a naproxen. I knelt tonight, made it to 28 minutes before I got up, and was in tears a short while later. Not tears of physical pain. Physical pain hardly ever makes me cry by itself.
I’m a masochist. A pain slut. I enjoy pain, I get off on it. No, Midori would say, I get off on intense sensation. No one enjoys stubbing their toe accidentally. It’s the pain I can’t control that made today bad. It’s the frustration that got me up from kneeling before 30 minutes because I wanted to stop the pain I could stop, because I couldn’t stop the other pains. And honestly, some days, that’s what keeps me there the whole 30 minutes, because I’ve chosen to be there.
It’s why I’m a masochist. I enjoy control, I get off on power exchange. I get off on giving someone else the power to cause me pain. I get off on allowing myself to feel pain because I choose it. I get off on the adrenaline and the endorphins, too. But on a bad day, I want to get off by choosing pain instead of pain choosing me.
Beauty is Pain
December 9th, 2010
A lot on my mind this week, so I may end up with several posts, just going to start typing and see where I end up.
I had a couple random ideas last week. The first being around forced feminization. Wikipedia defines it as: when a man is forced to put on women’s clothes and instructed how to behave and talk Yes, I am a girl, yes, I previously owned skirts and dresses. But I only wore them for Very special occasions – weddings for the most part, once I got out of school, and the Renaissance Festivals. Currently, at his request, and because it is too cold for shorts in December, I wear skirts four days a week, not always the entire day, but two of those days, it is generally two different skirts or dresses.
I regularly have people bring me skirts and dresses to increase my “girlish” wardrobe. I am often teasingly scolded for my lack of stockings. At play parties, I am often told I need more appropriate footwear. One of the groups I’m involved with in town has caused me to buy more lingerie in two years than I have ever owned in my entire life. Last time my mother visited, I even let her take me shopping to buy multiple skirts, and bought a couple on my own at a thrift store, and I don’t even buy clothes for myself normally. As noted last week, skirts and other girl clothes are big items on my wish list this year.
I think Wikipedia would consider all this to be consensual feminization, but every now and then I pause and wonder. Wow, when did I become such a girl? And then I feel better about myself when I get an invitation to shopping event involving make-up, manicures, perfume and other such things, and I remember that I am not that much of a girlie girl. Nothing wrong with all those things, they are just not me. I’ll stick with dressing more like a girl, because it not only makes the men happy, but it also helps me feel good about myself and my body.
Second random thought was about masochism and sadism. Back to Wikipedia: Sadism is pleasure in infliction of pain or humiliation upon another person, while masochism is pleasure in receiving the pain. I went to a class taught by Midori earlier this year, where she discussed the term pain, and her preference for “intense stimulation” instead because pain can encompass so many things that are not pleasurable. But that is neither here nor there, my thoughts were running along the lines of what am I really? I identify as a pain slut, so masochist is obvious.
But I also top violet wand scenes, delight in watching him giving others intense sensations and find entertainment in my own intense sensations causing distress in others. Does this make me a sadist? The latter two are not me inflicting pain or sensation, just enjoying the results of someone else doing so. When I top electric scenes, I am not doing so to cause pain. I enjoy making people squirm and squeak, but usually I’m trying to ticklish spot. I do not go for the screaming and the expressions of pain. It is intense stimulation, I agree, but I’m doing it to teach and share my experiences and enjoyable stimulation. I do not get joy out of Causing pain and am hesitant to even try, though I can be enlisted as restraints, tickler or biter.
So, perhaps, I’m a voyeuristic sadist, enjoying watching the pain of others and occasionally being a tool to assist in the causing of the pain. I think part of that also comes from knowing how much I enjoy the sensation they are receiving. So it is a sympathetic or empathetic enjoyment, as well as enjoying the interactions for themselves and the people involved.
I think I will stop there for the moment. I have another topic to write about, but it is much bigger and more personal. So I’ll post this as it’s own post, and work on the next one separately. What are your thoughts on fashion, pain and enjoyment?
Big Week, Lots of Links and Labels
November 11th, 2010
As I posted yesterday, my first professionally published piece is available for sale. Also yesterday, Elysium Avenue reblogged my Consensual Non-Consent post.
Last week, after making my post here about drop, I found a new blog called Fearless Press and posted a few comments on a couple posts dealing with labels: The Beginning and What Did You Call Me? I last posted on labels in June of 2009. So, that’s the topic I want to make my own post on today. Labels in the kink community.
Most of my dealings with labels lately have been in reference to defining relationships as opposed to defining self. Who am I to my partner and what does that mean to us? The difficulty, as pointed out by Amethyst Wonder’s post is “that like most language, labels don’t mean the exact same thing in different people’s minds.” This is why communication is so important in relationships, to define the labels for yourselves. None of my relationships can be explained by a single word and truly be understood. We have to decide and discuss what it means to us personally, and to our other partners, as well.
Personal labels have become even more situational as I have grown and expanded my horizons in the kink community. They have become a way to explain what I’m doing, instead of who I am. I label as service top at the club where I do violet wand scenes. I label as a rope slut when talking about my love for and experience with rope. I label as a pain slut when I talk about physically intense scenes. I am all of these things, but none of them define me completely.
Submissive is the label I use most often, because it is the word I associate with my overall kinky nature. However, my submissiveness manifests in different ways with my different partners. I often find myself explaining these differences, the word is not a simple definition, but a starting place for discussion. I do not let other people tell me how a submissive should act, or that it is wrong to show different kinds of submission or different levels of submission to different partners.
Mako Allen commented that “Lao-tzu had it right. When you stop worrying about the kind of kinky person you should be, you can fully embrace the kinky person you actually are.” I enjoy what I do far too much to worry about what others think I should do. I also enjoy teaching and sharing, so labels give me a framework to start from. Then I expand that out, to share the richness of my life and my journey, to those who ask and are willing to listen.
Mental vs. Physical Drop
November 4th, 2010
Today I want to talk about drop.
About a year ago, I posted about Altered States and said that Pain Space “is the one that leads to drop most often.” A month or so later, after a post specifically about Sub Drop I commented that “I rarely have sub drop anymore over purely the physical parts of scenes, which used to happen after any Really Intense scene. Now it really does take a negative emotional trigger for me to drop.”
Earlier this week, I was talking to Lover (yes, he keeps that name for now, I’ll post about labels again soon) about drop from mental scenes as opposed to physical scenes. He was baffled that a relatively painless evening could cause faster and more massive drop than a very physically taxing scene. At first, I thought maybe it had to do with being a girl, I blame girly hormones for a lot of things. But then I thought maybe it was a disconnect in understanding between people who really enjoy pain and people who don’t. Let me explore my thoughts out loud.
My first year in the local community, I would have drop after big physical scenes, either just from the chemical drop after the high endorphins of the scene, or from a negative comment about how harsh the scene was, or just from being so worn out by the physically taxing nature of the scene. I did not do a lot of mental play during that first exploration, certainly not to the extent of some of the play I’ve done this year. I also was not a self-described pain slut in the beginning. I knew I liked some very specific types of pain(intense sensation), but have since discovered that while there are some types of implements I am not fond of, I will put up with them for the experience of the pain(intense sensation). Since I have come to grips with my enjoyment of pain, I have far less drop from physical scenes. If someone comments negatively on it, I am better able to laugh it off and explain how much I enjoyed it.
It is the mental side of things that I now find causes harder drop. Mental scars and bruises are a lot harder to see and are more intense than physical ones. I’m remembering a scene that I don’t think I have posted about before. There was crying from the pain during part of it, but the harder crying was caused by words. That is the case more often than not this past year. Yes, pain can trigger tears, but words and mental control strike deeper chords. While you can see the bruises and marks on the skin, sometimes you don’t know what all happened in your mind. A day later, a stray word, or a random thought, could bubble to the surface and bam, that’s it, you’re dropping from something that you did not consciously process at the time. The mind is a far trickier landscape than the body.
I think I strayed off my two theories quite a bit, let me see if I can bring it back around. On blaming it on being a girl – I’m not sure that holds any water at all. I think I had it at an angle of being more vulnerable mentally than the men I play with, but I think that is quite possibly a false basis for the claim. On being about enjoying pain versus not enjoying pain – I think this holds a bit more truth. Pain is easier for me to process now that I am more accepting of my enjoyment of it. It was not always that way, so I can understand how, for people not at ease with pain, why it would be harder to process and thus be a potential for more drop than more mental play they might be more at ease with.
What are your thoughts? What causes more drop for you? How do you deal with it?
Altered States
November 4th, 2009
Some people drink or do drugs to alter their states. Other people meditate or chant to alter their state. Some people do power moves or jump and shout to alter their state. Then there are those that use BDSM to alter their state.
First, though, I want to briefly talk about alcohol and BDSM, or at least SM, because that is relevant to my current experience. Big play parties that I go to, alcohol is forbidden anywhere near the play space. It dulls the senses and can lead to bad judgment and injury. But I volunteer at a club where people experiment with corporal and electric play, bottoming to the completely sober crew while often under the influence themselves. We are careful to gauge their level of intoxication, and even more careful to do no harm regardless. But I wonder about what it takes to get drunk and then want to do a scene. Some think they need the liquid courage, I guess. Some just don’t realize the danger. And I imagine some just don’t realize how drunk they are. Personally, I can’t imagine mixing alcohol with the sensation play we do. Occasional drunk sex, sure, but SM while dulled and out of control makes me shudder.
All that aside, the altered states provided by BDSM in and of itself are amazing. I’ve talked before about surrender. Other spaces I enjoy are rope space, sub space, pain space, service space. At least that’s how I can best name them today.
1) Rope space – I’ve talked a lot about rope, described scenes and fibers and all. The space that rope creates for me is one of warmth. No matter how cold the room is, the first run of rope on my body instantly creates warmth. If there is rope tied around me, I am warm. It is a soft space, my body gives in, relaxes. The tie might be restrictive, painful, gentle, or loose, but my body molds to it, making it part of me. I have to be careful of this when I’m doing suspension. I have to pay attention because I’m learning the ties. I have to be aware of my body so that I don’t sink to far into the ropes and hurt myself. But even then, I can find my rope space and enjoy it thoroughly.
2)Sub space – People use this term a lot, to mean different things. Today, to me, it is the space of being deep in a scene, letting go of my will in favor of his. It is a quiet state for me, when my mind goes still, and I am at peace. In this state, I can still say no, I can still safe word, but only when absolutely needed. I will not resist simply because I don’t want to do something. I will do my best to do whatever he wants me to. I will take whatever he gives until I cannot take anymore. This state sometimes turns into surrender, but not always.
3)Pain space – I am a picky pain slut. But when I am getting the pain I want, enjoying the pain I’m getting, I slip right into pain space. Pain space is an intense state for me. My body is buzzing and my heart is pounding. I am gasping or screaming or moaning. I lose my sense of the word and just exist in my body, in the sensation being given to me. I can feel him even if I cannot touch him. This is the hardest state for me to come out of once I’m there. It is the one that leads to drop most often.
4)Service space – This is my D/s space, the space that I find outside of scenes. The space that makes me feel warm and fuzzy when I’m helping, being useful, doing for others, but especially doing for him. I get a little bit of this in scenes when I’m Service Topping as well. When I am giving pleasure to others, and sharing with them or teaching them.
All these states are delicious to me. Not to mention Far more appealing that drunkenness or getting high.
Welcome
May 20th, 2009
After various poking and prodding, I have decided to start this blog. Thoughts of: Who am I to write a blog? What if no one reads it? Why would anyone care what I have to say? Have been overridden by Why shouldn’t I? What if I want to? Why not? So here I am, to take you on a ride through my world. Hang on tight, it’s bumpy, wild and sometimes very dark.
Who am I? I am called kinky, submissive, polyamorous, pain slut, rope slut, slave, brat, SAM, bottom, and service top. I am a writer, a gamer, and an explorer. I am on a journey to find my bliss, to find my muse, and to live life with no arbitrary restrictions.
What is this? This is where I will write about my journey. I will fill this space with musings, frustrations, reflections, rants and erotica.
Welcome to my world. Enjoy your visit.