Sexually submissive

I've changed sites. Click here to read this post at elodieonlove.com.

Brilliant post title, huh? OK, I suck at titles. But this has been rattling around in my brain for a while, and I can't seem to write anything else until I get it out.

Very recently -- within the past month -- I've discovered that I'm sexually submissive. "Discovered" is perhaps the wrong term; it's more like recognizing something that was always there, but I never really saw. Like suddenly realizing the rosebush on the way to work bears red flowers, when you always thought of them as pink. Or looking at a guy who you've been "just friends" with for a long time, to whom you were never attracted, and wanting to kiss him.

I've always liked a bit of roleplayed submission. I liked roleplayed dominance too -- not nearly as much, but it wasn't something I let myself think about. After all, I'm a feminist, and feminists need to be in charge of their sex lives all the time, right? Certainly not let some man tell them what to do. Certainly not WANT to let some man tell them what to do. And, of all things, not want to give sexual power over them to some man.

Well, I didn't want "some man" to have sexual power over me. I never trusted anyone enough to even think about it. Then I met K. We moved in together over four years ago, but thanks to stressful life circumstances, personal demons, and my near-dead sex drive, our sex life was pretty much nonexistent for a long time. I still don't know why he stuck around for so long. But when I went off the pill last year, after he got a vasectomy, things started to change. My sex drive started to return, stronger than ever. I was happy, K was thrilled, everything seemed to be working out.

I got into sex toys, and looked at bondage gear on sex toy sites. Restraints and blindfolds appealed to me: the light bondage stuff that doesn't really bother most people. For some reason, I kept going back to floggers. "That's not me," I'd think. "I'm just curious." I would read reviews of them, and I finally admitted: I didn't want to wield them, I wanted them wielded on me. Specifically, I wanted K to wield them on me. It wasn't about the pain, though I found that I enjoyed that too, it was about giving him power over me. Luckily, he's dominant -- something he kept from me for a long time, afraid I'd condemn him for it.

That was it. Since then, I've known who I am. My sexual imagination has been released. I'm not submissive except sexually, and I still like roleplaying the top sometimes, but it's just roleplaying. It doesn't go to my core like submission does.

I'm sure I'll write more about this later, but right now, K wants me to come to bed.

The Princess and the Pea

I've changed sites. Click here to read this post at elodieonlove.com.

Once upon a time, there was a prince who would marry only a real princess. One night, a young woman came to the door during a storm, looking for shelter. The prince's mother put a pea under twenty mattresses and invited her to sleep on them. When asked the next morning how she had slept, the young woman answered, "terribly, there was a horrible rock under my mattresses and now I am black and blue." The prince married the young woman, believing only a princess could be so sensitive. The full story, by Hans Christian Anderson, is here.

This story has obvious classist, sexist, and just plain weird problems, not to mention the fact that sleeping on twenty mattresses sounds kind of dangerous. And, of course, there are blatant sexual overtones. But I didn't think of that when I was a little girl. I liked to imagine that the young woman was a scullery maid or shepherdess, and that her true value lay in her sensitivity. Yeah, I know, also deeply problematic. But I identified with this girl. Phrases such as "you can't actually feel that" and "that can't actually hurt" were common in my child and teenage years.

There are serious upsides to being so physically sensitive. I love feeling things with different textures: cloth, wood, glass, plants, cats... Maybe it has something to do with why I love sex so much and orgasm so readily.

This sensitivity means I like sex toys that others might find "too small", or "too weak". 1 inch diameter? Great! Low, soft, rumbling vibrations? Excellent! What's the opposite of a "size queen"? Maybe a princess.