Different Loving: The World of Sexual Dominance and Submission (23 page)

[My wife] had never had specific [S&M] fantasies. She always liked power of some kind and didn’t have a way [to] express power. She grew up in a family that treated women as doormats. [For] people in our generation, women didn’t have any power. [S&M] became a way for her to enjoy and express herself.

There’s a lot of democracy within S&M. The outside world doesn’t understand that. The relationships are never static; they’re always in a state of change. I don’t think that any more dynamic a relationship can exist. It affects your personality and your outlook and your sense of adventure on a level a lot more than other stimuli. And I think that you’re always looking for a higher plane within it. A sense of adventure draws us to it in the first place, indicates that we’re never quite going to be satisfied with the status quo—we’re always going to look for something a little bit beyond. Our marriage grew considerably stronger through the [S&M] play.

I’m dominant, my husband is submissive. We’ve been married for 27 years. It’s more of a head game than a physical game with us. We also do spankings and bondage and things like that, but it’s more of a reversal of roles. My husband is very dominant in business, and in our sexual life we reverse these roles.

[My husband] assumed a [sexually] dominant role in the beginning. I was so new at it, I didn’t understand much about it. He was far more versed than I. When I was young it wasn’t a fantasy: I did not know what S&M was. I was never exposed to it. I [just] always wanted to be in charge. But I was afraid to express that side of myself.

It’s very humorous. My whole family was raised to be doormats; I along with them. All the women were very, very submissive, and the man of the house was the king: Whatever he said went. Even as a child I felt that the women of our family couldn’t express themselves openly without male dominance
reigning over us. I always wanted something better than what my family had. But I didn’t know how to express it.

[My husband] noticed this about me and wanted to bring it out without actually saying so. He wanted me to become more assertive and more aggressive in my own life and felt that if he got me involved in some kind of activity—not S&M—[it] would make me more assertive. I always had an interest in horseback riding, for instance. So he was all for that: He wanted me to take the lessons. I did and I became much more assertive and a lot more aggressive—and my curiosity got the best of me when I had one horse and 56 whips. My husband was buying all these whips! As if I had a very naughty horse! He liked the boots and the spurs and the whole nine yards. So he took a roundabout way to introduce me [to it], which I thought was quite clever on his part. He was always making comments like, “Gee, I’ve really been naughty. Maybe you ought to use one of those on me!” I picked up from there. I found that I really enjoy S&M, and then I started reading more about it and became a lot more comfortable with it.

I really enjoyed it [from the start]. I didn’t have any problem with it [although] I wasn’t comfortable talking to other people about it. I was afraid that they wouldn’t understand what my husband and I enjoyed so much. A lot of times we [heard], “Oh, that’s weird!” So we would drop the subject. But when we moved to Washington we were able to join a group called the Black Rose, which was wonderful. We read an ad in
The Washingtonian
when we were up here looking at real estate. Our vision [of] this group—at the time it was called People Exchanging Power, or PEP—was that it was probably a bunch of motorcycle people in leather jackets. This is what a lot of the magazines portray. We didn’t feel like we belonged in that [kind of] group. But when we went, there were doctors, lawyers, accountants, and people from all walks of life.

Actually, I got a discount for everybody in the group at an equestrian shop. [The shop] wanted to know if I belonged to an equine association. I said, “Well … PEP.” They said, “What’s that?” and I said, “People Exchanging Ponies.” So I got a 15 percent discount on all the whips I bought.

[Our S&M relationship] evolved. It didn’t happen overnight. Sometimes [my husband’s] behavior was very naughty. He was still insecure, feeling that I wouldn’t understand it if he didn’t behave in a certain way. I guess I grew a bit faster than he expected. He would stay out late with the boys or [have] too much to drink, and he expected to be reprimanded for this. So he was always pushing my buttons: “Aren’t you going to punish me now?” It got to the point where I said “Look, your behavior is beyond the
S&M issue. This is what you really enjoy, and I enjoy too, [so] we can cut out all this other stuff.” He basically woke up and said, “Yeah! What am I doing?” We’ve been much happier ever since.

The most exciting thing for me is my husband surrendering total power to me, being totally submissive and very vulnerable: total trust. That probably fits into the little-boy scenario. It’s very exciting [because] here’s a person giving total trust and [who has] faith in me to be able to mold him. It takes both of us away from the outside world. We’re in a little cocoon by ourselves. We feel secure with one another.

When we had a vanilla relationship, it felt very much like mutual masturbation. It was a sad state of affairs, and it really wasn’t enough. It didn’t make us feel secure. There’s nothing wrong with vanilla sex; we enjoyed [it], but we felt that we needed something more. The only way that we were able to do this was through S&M, because of the alternate high that we received through power play. Releasing all the power and the energy and honesty strips you of everything else. You face the real person.

My husband and I haven’t had experience—sexual experience—with other people. We do play with other people in S&M games but we don’t have intercourse with [others]. We save that for each other. A lot of people feel the same way we do, that intercourse is a very intimate act only to be shared by the one you’re with.

[Sometimes] when he comes home, I’ll have certain implements laid out on the bed, or he’ll dress a certain way and he’ll have a list to follow of things to do. I tell him to go directly to the bedroom and prepare himself properly, which means that he’s to [remove] his clothes and put on ladies’ underwear. And then when he comes back into the living room, I’ll tell him to kneel before me, and I explain to him what scenario I have in store for him that day. It may be a personal thing like [giving] me a bath and a complete body massage and attend[ing] to all my needs. If he doesn’t do everything properly, he’s placed across my lap and spanked.

I don’t have to reach physical climax of any kind, although a lot of times I do. Sometimes I won’t let him come until the next day. The excitement builds up that much more for both of us. The day that I decide we’re allowed to climax, we’ll have very little [S&M] play and a lot of sexual play. It’s very satisfying for us.

S&M has led me to being assertive and aggressive in my work. Before, I could never do this. If somebody said, “That’s too much money,” or “You’re a woman and you’re not capable of doing this type of work,” I would say, “Okay.” Now if they give me this argument, I can come back at them. I could never do that before. So it’s made me a much better businessperson.

We’re always learning, always doing different scenes, enacting different things. Sometimes they work, sometimes they don’t, but it’s not the type of thing [where] you say, “That’s it, I’m never going to learn anything else, I’m never going to evolve [beyond] this one scene.” When you’re involved in S&M, it opens up your eyes to a lot of differences. [S&M] makes you a more tolerant person.

Six

A
n inner child may live within us all, but the adult world of D&S is brimming with blatant scamps. Whether it’s in the role of a rambunctious teenager, a misbehaving schoolboy, or a terrible two-year-old, ageplay is perhaps the most ubiquitous and most sensitive form of D&S roleplaying.

Under this broad heading we draw together a spectrum of ageplayers and organize their interests into three categories:
adolescentilism
, where the submissive imagines him- or herself to be an adolescent or young adult;
juvenilism
, where the submissive imagines him- or herself to be a child of
roughly elementary-school age; and
autonepiophilia
(also known as
infantilism
or
adult babies
), where the submissive wishes to feel like an infant or toddler. Although activities and relationships vary, all ageplay depends on the basic premise that one partner assumes the role of a parentlike authority and that the submissive displays the persona of a youth or child.

We quote interviewees whose profiles appear in other chapters and feature profiles of:

Because so many couples develop a secret language comprised of childish endearments or phrases, because many adults refer to natural functions or body parts with puerile euphemisms, and because so many grown men and women collect teddy bears and toys, one might easily infer that clinging to some childhood behaviors is common. Ageplayers, however, eroticize childishness or youth. (Ageplay is distinct from pedophilia, where a real child is considered to be sexually desirable. Ageplay occurs uniquely between consenting adults.)

In ageplay one partner (the dominant) assumes the role of a parent and supervises, guides, and—among D&Sers—disciplines the submissive who expresses his or her inner child in real, mutually consensual terms.

Each person who seeks to erotically reinvent his or her childhood brings intensely personal and particular needs to the relationship. These needs often reflect one’s individual concept of nurturing or training. Some adolescentilists like to roleplay as lazy schoolboys who require harsh physical discipline (such as caning); for many infantilists, conversely, pain has no province.

But creating an aura of authenticity and sympathy is usually an important ingredient of all ageplay. Infantilists, for example, seek the tender, nurturing parent-baby dynamic.

To other ageplayers, particularly spanking and caning enthusiasts, concerned discipline by a just authority is a fundamental erotic pleasure. The axiom, “Spare the rod, spoil the child” has apparently been integrated into the psychosexual proclivities of many who crave to give or receive canings.