Sensual Sadist

You might think we live a trouble-free life, at least on the kinky plane, and largely that is true. Richard is, by popular consensus, an ideal candidate for a submissive relationship who many women would probably kill to own. Recently we’ve reached a new plateau of awareness where we can sense and express our respective kinky energies even over chat (remember: we don’t actually do cyber and while I am capable of it, it feels a lot more like ‘acting’ to me than really doing it does).

He’s told me he may have recovered from the last of the bad effects of Charles and feels capable of relaxing into things without fear of rejection and I think it was this which made me feel I should go back over the few times when I felt a response from him was inappropriate or bad for our relationship.

In doing this I have to face two of my own demons: In criticizing or questioning people I’m intimate with I sometimes fear becoming an irrational tyrant. I wonder if my response might be because of some sore spot on my ego rather than any rational reason. I also have a fear that the other person is going to be revealed as a tyrant and that by questioning beyond the surface I will goad them into showing their true colours.

This isn’t to say in the least that I suspected Richard was a tyrant, this last concern was purely an amygdala-type thang. It’s funny that we are both emerging from abusive relationships of a sort and in a way our internal struggles are parallel.

There were perhaps three instances spread over time where I specifically didn’t like Richard’s response to something and it never got resolved properly. It’s obviously not a huge crime. I also know what Richard has been through recently and the strain it has put on him. It didn’t lower my love for Richard, but it left my dominant side ever-so-slightly unsure.

Going into details isn’t important. The main thing is that it’s important to be able to do any questioning between each-other that is required to restore total confidence. D/s in a loving relationship is like a dance in that you need implicit and unfaltering trust in your partner to do it.

Richard is a handful in that he is extremely independent, but that was not the problem (if anything it makes dominating him more fun). It turned out that after we talked about it, it seems the reactions I don’t like are coming from the time when Charles was the dominant force in his life. There are defensive mechanisms which occasionally still ‘kick in’ when they have no need to, giving me the irksome feeling that either Richard doesn’t trust me about something, or is exhibiting a rebellious streak.

Hearing this was key for me not particularly because it solves what happened those past times, but because I feel in the future I’ll be able to understand when it’s happening again and help him through it. Also, having to question Richard’s motives in a way that might hurt him was strange, but having done it, I feel it will be easier in future, and that I can do it without hurting him or even but instead possibly helping him.

I can hear some of you saying that of course I should be able to question, punish, shape and what-have-you my partner without a second thought but unfortunately this is not D/s land and as such we have to be understood as human beings… before we can effectively do the shaping and moulding with abandon.