O Self

Post Mortum Of My Relationships To This Date

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So various things happened to me over the last month or two, which has strangled updates down to a trickle.  In the first place work decided to be a pain in the butt and then laid me off. Then stuff happened regarding Strong and other… stuff.

It makes me introspective about my life choices, especially in light of what i’m watching other people go through. I am of the philosophy that two people in a relationship both play a role in creating the dynamic you play out, which is not the same as shared culpability should one person abuse the other, but the dissolutions and breakups we have, and the errors we make are still valuable lessons.

Some people like the high school boys I dated, were just nice boys- the first one I was maturing from girl to woman still, and too loopy for a relationship, while the long term high school boyfriend was sweet, but the take away there I got was not to date anyone dumber than you, because you had to respect someone you’re with. Nocturnal was an exercise in working out what I should and shouldn’t tolerate. In hindsight, if you aren’t used to being respected, you can mistake neediness for being important.

With Strong and why we broke up: As far as my perspective on the situation, not all relationships are stable or meant to last, and I went into it with the suspicion that our gulf in ages meant that we were in different places but more to the point, his tendency to precisely box everything off to control it was going to fight our D/s connection, while his communication style didn’t allow for candid admission of failure. To be exact I was his training dom, a safe woman who wouldn’t gut him in the process of him finally getting to feel loved and wanted for his vulnerabilities.

As far as my part in our breakup, since I am, shall we say, not a fan of conflict, there was little I could do in this circumstance beyond letting it be as it would be. I’d like to think I’m still a net positive on his life. And and I forecasted, from our initial connection where I crawled into his head, that was unsustainable, and he got himself increasingly walled off to the point where, as of the end of June, I was dealing with manufacturing my own happiness again. Which is to say, a very gentle  and lucky way to find yourself breaking ties with someone.

For a brief few months before that, Strong had the rare gift of being able to have more impact on my happiness than I could have on it independently, and then I went back to making me happy. I dissolved our D/s agreement when I was no longer helping him, but also as a confirmation that I had learned some of the lessons I was supposed to learn from the Ex.

The Ex is one of those cases where it can be hard to talk about it because of how embarrassed and ashamed that sort of banal awful makes you feel when you survive it. It can be completely inexplicable- how did I let someone treat me like an idiot domestic servant, deny me sleep to the point of contributing to academic issues with my education and exacerbating my emotional health problems, while letting them so terrorize me that I completely unable to resist them? They are not, what you’d describe, as intimidating.

Well, the profoundly fucked up childhood I grew up with sure as heck did not help. Let’s be honest, when you learn your relationship models from a situation with abuse and enablers, it makes it much easier to ignore the what-the-fuck-are-we-doing?! feelings the insanity of an abusive dynamic engenders until you are enmeshed. That’s a hard other thing to talk about, because I don’t want sympathy for the shit that occurred at this juncture, and I’m leery of being treated like I’m dangerously crazy because I survived it- or not being taken seriously because someone hurt me.

The Ex was, to be honest about things, not all bad, but he was a horrible match for my own anxieties and vulnerabilities. If, in a love match, you can feel like you found a key for your lock, the Ex and I meshed his issues and controlling streak with my yielding , appeasing approach. Yes, while a dom (TM), generally speaking I tend to take stuff that’s not in my control and let it slide. I’m not one of those True Leaders people like to brag about being.

If you’re going to get all metaphorical about stuff, I’m a water person. I don’t make walls, I flow around stuff and find my own level. I can certainly be disturbed, but just as much as I can get all choppy and disturbed on the surface, but I can also take in and soak things pretty well.

Strong was an earth person, who put walls up absolutely everywhere, and locks people into them. The Ex? Fire, maybe? At once burning bright, but so fragile, needing to be sheltered and to consume constantly to survive. All appetites and needs, which was fascinating to my dominant/nurturing streak, but no brakes on the devouring aspect.

Wow, this is getting long. I’ll continue after the jump.

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Myself, and Moving On

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Pretty, pretty...

Let’s talk about my love life, these days, shall we?

My nails bite into his back, but he takes them, sharp as they are, and he is unbreakable. His skin in thick, the muscle underneath taut to the point of hardness. I stab and press and nothing makes him yield, but gradually, with my strength into it, I feel the start of a pliancy. He’s tough, and there’s a challenge there, beyond simply getting a reaction, to help melt away the wiry solidity into something completely supple.

I’m white as a snowdrop against the sallow-sand colour of his skin, my body soft where he is hard and rough. Our bodies slide together in a way that meets and balances, although he is taller, I can lift him without excessive effort, not just because of his lightness but because I’ve always been fairly strong for a woman. My head fits well against his chest, nestled against his shoulder, and my arms around him, seatbelt-safe. His hands, casually playing around my waist, find the exact place on my spine where the muscles and bone carry things too heavily, pressing until the always-ache I’ve learned to ignore lets go.

I lean over the foot of his bed, stretching, and watch his slender, straight legs, upside down. I like to look at the ratio between the spareness of his body and the breadth of his shoulders. I like the way his eyes are hooded and long lashed, and the delicate sculpting of his nose. I like the gravel in his voice, and the way he looks at me, sometimes wanting, sometimes with a hesitant vulnerability like he’s not sure quite what he’s doing, but most times just hard to read as he’s usually pretty closed off. That, in itself, is a challenge, since I’m used to being the one knocking reactions out of people.

We try little bedroom games, what works and what doesn’t, but just as much, we talk about all the things that tell who you are, a few pieces every time, and twine up together, in a lock-knot of limbs.

I am happy, although it’s very much a situation built on shifting silt, as mercurial as one might expect given the circumstances. It’s not a safe and stable meeting, and I don’t feel sure footed with him, at once sharing myself with as much flayed honesty as I can and on the other hand, keeping some restrictions on the impulsivity and carnal impishness that defines me. We are not sure what we are doing, not sure what I am, other than that I am there and present at this moment, where I can help.

So I make myself into the safe, accepting stillness that I learned how to be a long time ago, and I tell him that for now, I’m in charge, until the storm has passed us by. On the balance, the trade off is knowing him with nothing in the way of illusions, in the rawness of a crisis, and finding nothing lacking in him or his response to it. So there’s that.

Love Me Properly

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So Strong and I had a candid post mortum tonight about the failure of our relationship and I made sure to be honest about where life has taken me. I am in an odd dilemma, to be loved, by many, but not quite in the way that I wish.

I find myself playing with hearts, accidentally. Perhaps spurred by Strong’s instance that I look elsewhere to get my needs met, my deck is overloaded with people who I’m afraid of hurting, with one wildcard that has to play himself. Tease and denial comes easily with dominance, and yet when it comes with suitors, excessive insistence of my glory sends me scattering. I hate the idea of having victims who aren’t willingly tying themselves to the post, but are doing it for desire for something more. Maybe that’s part of what makes me deeply suspicious of acts of service, more so than I should be?

And I had my heart taken, accidentally, as if it were book picked up by error, but then the borrower had become engrossed in reading what he found. Unfortunately that’s a situation that’s providing my least favourite thing in interpersonal relationships: waiting on someone else’s will and willpower. I am not, but nature, good at that kind of patience. Trust is not a natural part of my makeup, least of all trust and faith and others (not with my independence levels), nor do I like passivity. But, regardless, the situation the gentleman has is something where if I try to intervene I’m in the wrong. I can’t lift a single finger, not to push or to beckon.

It makes me think about love as it should be, for me. I’ve never been about being impressed with expensive gifts. The Ex, the one I spent six years with, compared my needs to being that of a pet rock- I never made demands, not for jewellery, flowers or fancy dinners (I like eating, but I’m not good at taking)- and honestly, I was an expert at self sacrificing care taking for him. And yet, my way of love has been about doing on the small scale. That doesn’t really fit stereotypical D/s femdom well- my ‘tribute’ wishlist is a joke loaded with beef jerky.

And yet, I bought myself tea roses this week, my favourite. Strong charmed me with unexpected chocolates, once upon a time, and once, a boy charmed me, by passing me a cheap chocolate egg. Compliments get me blushing. Somewhere is a chink in that armour. I want the romance, I just don’t want to feel it’s a big deal.

To love my properly, it seems, takes courage, self confidence, occasional capacity to cruelty, and yet acts of kindness. I need someone who can yield to me where I want it, but stand for me and with me when I need it. If that ends in me being a spinster maiden aunt in the end, so be it.

(amendment)

Shut up Tashi. 😛

On The Single Life- Or Why I Don’t Think Online Dating Is For Me

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So things ended with Strong. Sadness documented in other posts.

We never had monogamy, but I never got further than play with friends and a spot of light molestation. It didn’t feel right, up until it was basically over with Strong, and at that point the relationship falling apart just meant I felt frustrated and neglected. And small amounts of drama occurred which I will explain later.

Somewhere along the way I acquired one of those online dating profiles. Under the general theory that I’m a tough cookie who won’t let a little setback having to break up with someone after many patient months get me down, I busily answered questions (allowing them to conclude I was much more kinky than the average, as well as independent and not very romantic, not sure how I feel about that last part) and took some flattering selfies. From there I set out to tentatively find out what exactly the boys were like out there with an eye to being open minded. My head’s a little messed up by stuff, but it couldn’t hurt, right?

For an extra oomph I seeded my profile with hints of my precise brand of kinkiness, and set about with the rating of profiles that okcupid gently nudges you to do. And lo and behold I got a message.

“Is your name [Pearl]?”

Okay. There’s no way that is going to end well. And no, it did not…

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Well, fuck. (Breakups)

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So, Strong and I broke up. No story this Friday, just a post mortum.

Leaving most personal details out of it, it just wasn’t working anymore, which makes me incredibly sad. More so since I didn’t stop caring about the poor bastard, we just lost the mutual connection. Somewhere along the way, it died.

Ferns basically has the crux of the challenge for dominants, that without submission there is nothing. You can have a relationship, but it’s a stunted one with an under current of frustration. Breaking up with him meant leaving the hope that if I was just a bit more patient he’d come back to me.

But there’s that bugger chemistry. When you feel like submission is being handed out like a cookie, and the person is too busy giving you what they think they want, you stop feeling that glow of empowerment. To describe the situation, of course, doesn’t give Strong a fair chance to defend himself. He tried to be what he thought I wanted to the best of his ability.

But the problem may also be a matter of style. Submission, for me, is seduced out or ripped out. I find I tend to be drawn to the switch-y ones, in part because of my masochism, but also because of that sense of victory. Ha. I bet I probably sound like a cliché. Every dominant likes to think they’re special and that their submissive does not fall easily.

(Well, actually I’m not so sure about that, since I fake ‘submissive’ really well and I do not act fighty)

But for me, a guy who is all service and obedience from the start makes me feel like I’ve been asked to scale a sheer wall of glass. When I met Strong, he was emphatically not in a submissive position. The chemistry grew up around his desire just for me and we created something that was unique to us.

And yet there’s the gulf that often comes up between expectation of how a sub should act and  what the dom wants. In his case, I think he choked, and got too focused on being the perfect boyfriend. We always had a problem that way, for example I would provide a rule I wanted to put into place and he would take it and run with it and turn it into something his. Which makes it not about me, but about doing things his way.

On the other hand some of this is normal. I may have been too demanding and distance is bloody hard. And I really need to feel like I have the person’s full attention when I want it, which may be pretty hard to pull off all the time.

Regardless, he was, in many ways, extremely good for me and I don’t regret that he was part of my life. He came in as a friend, and I hope we’ll stay that way after we’ve had a chance to lick our respective wounds.

My Daily Life, Pride and Search Hits on My Awesome Femdom Blog!

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Self referential Saturday time. After the phenomenal fun I have with amateur investigative reporting, this is a much more quiet weekend, among many reasons because I have a sinus infection. What have I been up to? Well, most recently I just put banana bread in the oven. Drool subs.

I’m increasingly losing patience with my job. Despite my blog hits growing, obviously this is not ever going to pay off as anything other than a labour of love (I played around with adding a “call it anything but tribute!” tip jar, but I’m still undecided.) I’d really like something that was a better work environment as far as people culture- the work itself would be okay if I had better instructions. So there’s that.

On the other hand on the blogging front… I get really proud to get hits like “femmedomme society site legit” (hint, no) and “easy-going femdom” (preen!). “Feminist femdom stories” is another good one, although I am slightly suspicious this is about female supremacy fantasies of irate radfems castrating. But since getting the sitemaps thing sorted out, Google’s webmaster tools inform me that things are actually getting indexed. Hurrah for my femdom blog being read!

Mind you, you can’t win ’em all. I’m still going on strong for versions of “Vampire Rape Porn”, but I also have attracted “horny women with animals”. I don’t own any animals, nor have I ever wanted to fuck one. I suppose that happens when you write about sexuality including sex research into female animals people are going to get confused.

I’m also having a hell of a time finding porn to review. I mean I can find a lot of stuff I clearly don’t like. On the femdom erotica front, it’s not hard to find Wicked Wanda stories or amateur products. My challenge is that I want to write a review of something *good*. I don’t want to be the blog that you go to to hear the creative dreams of others be trashed. Suggestions?

Me & My Sexual Assaults

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Under Canadian law I’ve actually been sexually assaulted several times.

1) In middle school, a male peer decided my ass provided too great a temptation and held onto and forcibly humped me. I reacted by bursting into tears and never really understood why I wanted to make it a secret until becoming an adult.

2) My ass again provided too much temptation to my deranged grandmother. Groped. I generally see this as part of her ickiness.

3) And again, while bending to look at a counter of pastries. Difficult because stealth gropes can be brushed off as an accident. The worst part was having the conviction that I had been groped by no proof other than feeling it.

4) At a college dance, I say hello to a stranger, who proceeded to grab my ass. I forcibly remove his hand and get told “Don’t be an asshole!”

5) In the scene, a well known rope top decided that since in his demonstration of pressure points that since none of the other ones worked on me, he’d demonstrate on my nipple. He teaches an anti-rape class. I was… not happy. This was one of several incidents.

6) A male in the scene, as part of a hug, put a hand on my ass, justifying it that I’d been at a nude beach with him. Hand removed. Stammering self justifications from a man who was a literal peer of my father.

7) While on the metro, I smiled at a young man with  a passing resemblance to my gentleman. He proceeded to bump his crotch against me.

Rape victim, no. Nobody has ever forcibly penetrated me. I don’t like the term “survivor” either, which is supposed to make me feel empowered, but ends up making it feel like a bigger deal than it was, as my life was never threatened. It had an impact on me. I was victimized repeatedly by people who could not respect my bodily autonomy. But I never was torn or bled. It just… is tiring.

Up until very recently I didn’t see it as more than frustrating human social interactions, an assault the way that poking is an assault that you are unlikely to get a conviction on. It was actually weirdly embarrassing when I finally looked up what was against the law in Canada, to realize that I was actually sitting on a pile of legal violations. Like when you discover that the person you thought hated you had your back all along. And yet I feel, for some reason, like if I tell people this was sexual assault it’ll somehow be used as proof of how unreasonable I am for not wanting to get my body touched in a sexual fashion.

If I had a purpose in talking about this it is because the fact that I feel I should keep it to myself if the biggest stain these assaults have. Seriously, if people walked on my feet deliberately I’d be twittering that shit in rant caps. But it’s taken me this long to actually, at 27, say “Hi, I’m Pearl and these are the ways people sexually assaulted me.”

Hi, I’m Pearl. I’m legally a sexual assault victim.

Hi, I’m Pearl. Men and one woman has touched my body sexually, without my consent.

Hi, I’m Pearl. I can’t enjoy my buttocks as much as I’d like because other people treated it like collective property.

Hi, I’m Pearl. I have so little trust in society that I brushed off twisting my nipple as a “miscommunication” and took for granted he should have thought he had consent.

Hi, I’m Pearl. I don’t smile at strange men anymore as easily because I can’t tell when one is going to rub up against me.

Hi, I’m Pearl. And a part of me thinks that by writing this people won’t take me and my feelings seriously.

Hi, I’m Pearl. I know damn well I’m not alone.

 

How Miss Pearl Ended Up In The Middle Of A Findom Circle Jerk

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If half the stuff strange male subs promised was true, I’d be an MP right now with a swimming pool full of money. Long term readers know, I’ve made no secret of my lack of faith in findom. As a dominant female I get a regular trickle of stupid offers, and these always come with strings, usually that they get a great deal of control on what the money involves and what you can spend it on. I feel similarly about the men who offer “free” service acts. And today was just another example of that.

Sometimes I hang out on the collarme video chat. It’s not a frequent habit because it generally involves a string of turning nice and not so nice men down, usually with very explicit requests. On the other hand, or about the same reason, the website is also a source of comedy gold.

So, this morning, I got a guy proposing that he wanted me to pimp him out as a cam sub and sexual thrall to other people. He would “suck cock” and then collect money from his humiliation to give to me. A brilliant scheme, right? As usual, I turned him down, with the usual explanation that life didn’t really work that way.

But, since he was persisting in telling me about how he wanted it to be an active benefit to me. I told hi he wanted to have a wank, but it seemed time to do an experiment. I told him if he was so serious, he should consider an alternative proposal.

Get a shitty, part time franchise job. Work it for a month and donate every penny to he earned to his local domestic violence shelter. No rewards, no sexy pics or teases. No cocks, no sissy humiliation just doing something difficult and dull, and no reward of me saying “I spent this on sexy shoes!!!” or “My hung boyfriend and I bought dinner with this!”

Of course, from first proposal, as much as he ell over himself to agree, he seemed unable to handle that the money would not go to me. I kept telling him, repeatedly, the deal was not about what he wanted, but about what I told him to do. And then he said fine and that he would do it. He’d go find a job. And I said, fairly, I’d be seriously impressed if he could actually pull that off. Maybe I was about to be proved wrong!

Two minutes later another guy is messaging me- he’ll give the guy a job. Sucking cock, of course! But he wants to give the money to me. No, I remind him, I don’t want the money. And then another guy got on board with this! Loads of strange sub men trying to give me money for sucking each other’s cocks!

The guys wanted to hire each other for sexual services, as long as they could keep pushing that they wanted the money to go to me. At this point the chat moderator told me to knock it off because they only want findom transactions to take place in private. Which was not my point, but my point had long since been discarded by any of the people, including the enterprising bloke who wanted 30 minutes alone with my feet.

But I was let feeling that my participation was completely unnecessary. After all, these guys didn’t need me to “humiliate” each other, didn’t care one bit about what I want or said. Apparently they needed my presence to kick off their little party, but once they got off and rolling, for all I know they’re still doing it.

Which gets to the crux of why I think findom is silly. I think there are a few “whales” that make it a worthwhile concept, but I’ve never actually encountered a findom who didn’t work her ass off as a fantasy fulfillment object to squeeze out every penny. There is, after all, no such thing as a free lunch.

Daily Femdom Life and My D/s Neighbour Couple & Cuckolding

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I’m house sitting. It’s a welcome vacation, for a person who likes to get a change of scenery from time to time. I tell people I like travel and they think I mean exotic locations and museums, and I have a passport stamped with a dozen far flung places.

I mean I like hotels and mass transit, and airports and bus stations. And staying in the Cuckolds’ house. I talked about them before, I think, Professor Sub and his fiancée. They’re making the most of the waning summer, and seeing as we’re a close commute now, the male and sub half of the couple has given me custody of their apartment and cherished pet while they jetted off for three days holiday.

It’s nice, the normality of this. To care for their pet, and smirk at the subtext in the pictures in their hall. To come over in a bad mood and be plied with a Caesar, and break into an impromptu tutorial on face slapping. Single submissive men, life ain’t fair. My friend has two women slapping that smug look off his face.

I really am close friends a sissy cuckold and his hot wife. Although the cuckold part is being hampered, at least a little bit, by the teeny, weeny little detail that finding a “bull” is easier said than done.

They’re not the only couple with that problem in my life. The Mr Sub and Ballbuster are also looking for a bull and hitting the same wall- how do you find someone you feel safe and comfortable with, that you also feel attracted to, to make into a fuck buddy in a way that both parts of the couple can get off on it?

Strong keeps trying to encourage me to get laid for other reasons, and it again hits the same problem, although he doesn’t want me to cuckold him (or if he does he’s not admitting it) as much as a desire which borders on martyrdom to help me achieve sexual fulfillment.  There is a paucity of nice, respectful no strings men. Add that if you’re a dom woman you often don’t want the classic aggressive Bull anywhere near your bed, and you’re going to end up just like all those M/f couples looking for their unicorn-girl to finish their family.

But I guess this is also living the BDSM “lifestyle” at its best. So there’s that.

Why I Make A Big Deal About Not Being A Pro Femdom

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Last time I talked at length about how the pro femdoms are an important part of the scene and that they weren’t an inherently bad thing. This time I’m going to talk more about a problem: conflating what professional dominants and non-professional dominants are as if it were identical.

We need to stop acting like there is no difference between sex work femdom and fun femdom. And we need to stop pretending that clients are the same thing as sub boyfriends/girlfriends and husbands/wives.

Prodoms are to lifestyle as porn is to real people sex. Yes, many women who work as pros are just as much a dominant as I am. They are as capable of dominating as I am. I’m not better than them. But right now there is a serious problem between confusing the standards of their work with my dominance and it needs to stop.

Prodoms, if they’re any good, deserve their self title as experts. Many of them are good sex educators. I would turn to them in a heart beat for advice on topping techniques- and they’re a good source of how tos on safe ties and walloping people. I might, tentatively ask them about weird sub behaviour, like aftercare need variances.

But they really can’t represent me accurately any more than I can say I can speak for them as sex workers just because we both spank or fuck. And the conflation is causing problems.

Like, for example, prodoms face industry competition of errm, full service sex workers (generally sneered at as “hookers with whips”) who dilute their brand and encourage customers who want sex and dominance to demand both, or who offer less competent ‘budget’ approaches to dominance and fetish. They tend to have a degree of professional interest in protecting the parameters of what is and isn’t dominance. For example, as sex workers, the Gordian loops of the law in many areas often allow for fetishism, but smack down on people who move into more common sexual practices. And prodoms are very particular about minimal price controls- this is their livelihoods and they feel about their right to a salary the same as any working person. But this conversation is extremely alienating to non-pros. You see I’m kind of everything they talk about despising in a dominant.

I fuck, suck, snuggle and do things at the cost of a man’s love and submission, basically a price they can’t beat. I want dominance to be indistinguishable from fucking, because for me, it is. And I don’t want to be an expert. I don’t want to spend thousands of dollars on tools and equipment and for men to want me because I am teh expert. I don’t want to have subs expect me to know them in an instant and decide my dominance based on that (are you fucking kidding me?).  They are supposed to love me because I am Pearl, not just because I am Miss. But being a professional is about convincing people to pay you by the skill under which you embody being the Mistress. You might put your own spin on it- you could even be a hairy legged, queer femdom and there’s a niche for male pros who generally serve male clients. But at the end of the day, even if the person also does it at a hobby, it’s a job.

And It’s incredibly hurtful and tone deaf to be told that my sexuality exists to give subs fuzzy feelings, and I’m good if I can and am fucking up if I’m anything other than dominance embodied. Not as in “good lover”, but the whole of my sexuality has been hijacked into something that gets men off and measured in terms of how much a (random) man will pay for it and my skill in opening up a random dude’s head. It’s been so tainted with the expectations of being a good pro that it kept me from self IDing as a dominant until my early 20s. Because I can be a fantasy object,  but that’s uh… the sort of shit you’d have to pay me to do, and not really a job I want anymore than I want to be client support at a call centre. Because pro-dom client pleasing has zero to do with my sexuality.

And the typical guys, even the polite ones, trying to send out client requests to me also have zero to do with my sexuality.

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