my father, my ex boyfriend and my fears

 A longtime reader and dear friend offered some valuable insight recently.

My experience is that when you have a pattern that keeps repeating itself, there is something deeper at play. Your narrative takes as a given that your kink is a good thing that should be indulged. Have you ever challenged that assumption? Other than a general need for “control” have you looked at what really drives the intensity of your desire for someone to submit to you?

(...). My “kink” is considered a form of “traumatic repetition,” which means I am trying to control the fear I had as a kid by recreating the traumatic situation as an adult.

I pondered his words for a while and I a realized that when it comes to my kink and sexuality, I am driven by fear much more than I had realized. 

The thing is, my fears are so deeply embedded in my heart/soul, it is pretty tricky for me to access the roots of these feelings. I don't have it all figured out yet. But I can share a couple of events with you that deeply formed who I am now.

I love men, but at the very same time I am often in fear of them. It feels as if I have to constantly please them. And if I dont please them, something bad happens.  (Another reader of the blog mentioned these aspects years ago. If you are reading this, yes, you were right.) For me, men are very unpredictable. And scary. And I know that I don't stand a chance against them when it comes to physical stuff. I saw my step dad slapping my mom in her face. I know that my biological dad once hired a guy to violently cut a woman's hair, in order to punish her. I experienced a drunk boyfriend violently ripping the car keys out of my hand when I had told him: "I am driving, you cant, you are too drunk." I know what it feels like to be helpless in the presence of somebody who is physically so much stronger than I am. 

I think one reason why sub men are so attractive to me is: I know men are physically stronger than I am. I know that men have the power to hurt me very much. Both physically and emotionally. And I know that men can be very easily triggered by something I do or say and in consequence yell at me and/or make my life more difficult. In business life that is perfectly fine with me. I have no problems dealing with loud or threatening men in court, for instance. But in my private life: I am scared very easily and often.

I can take care of myself. I am capable of fighting my own fights for myself. I don't need a provider. I am very able to take care of myself. And even when it comes to sexuality: I do know how to pleasure myself.

Letting my guard down and letting a man in my life and showing him my vulnerability didn't come easy for me at all. For a very long time the risk seemed so much higher than the potential gain. That's one of the reasons why I lived as a single woman till my mid thirties. It just did not feel safe to give myself in the hands of somebody who could hurt me that much.

Submissive men offer me the greatest gift possible. They are treating me nicely. They don't yell at me. they don't hurt me physically, they don't threaten me with physical harm, they actually care about me and my feelings. They are willingly and freely giving up the power that they have over me, in order to please me and make me happy. And they allow me to relax and to feel loved and valuable and seen. In being strong enough to making themselves vulnerable around me, these guys allow me to show them my vulnerability too. And in the beginning, I don't even need to show them my vulnerability much. They actually enjoy me being dominant and in charge. They allow me to feel good and do what I am good at and at the same time they don't bring me in a position where I am scared to do something wrong and piss the guy off in a bad way. I think it is safe to say that when I am doing kinky activities with a man, I have never ever actually hurt the man in a bad way. I value his gift to me way too much. Him understanding how thankful I am for the gift of his submission to me is one of my biggest goals.

Btw: I understand now that this is what connects me with James, one reader of my blog, in a very strange way. He (as a submissive man) experienced one of my biggest fears as a domme. The woman in his life didn't understand him correctly, the woman didn't get what he is actually craving and needing, and in doing the kinky things she did to him, she hurt him very much for real and caused him long-lasting and severe pain.

Intellectually I am very sure that I didn't cause any real pain to any man I ever interacted with. But there are parts in me who are convinced that I fucked up big time with a sub I had. And I am just not able to quiet these parts in me down.

You all read about the story with my ex boyfriend. The guy I dated from 2010 to 2014. The gist of it is: He was submissive. We were together for 4 years, I wanted to marry him and he ghosted me. In the last 6 years, since 2014,  he has refused all contact with me. And when I flew around half the globe in 2015 to meet him and to bring things to closure between us, he actually hid from me. He was totally shunning me. Still is.

The thing is: I never found closure with him. It is still a hurting and open wound and my internal self-talk in that matter is really bad. My brain says:  "He is fighting his own demons. His behavior says much more about him than about you." But my heart says: "Bullshit. You completely failed him. It is all your fault. If only you had behaved differently, if only you had acted differently, if only you were differently." I am deeply convinced that I must have somehow failed him. It feels like I somehow let him down big time and he is now punishing me by ending all contact with me for good. It feels like he doesn't think I am even worthy of one single word or one single minute of his time anymore. 

I have tried to find closure in the last 6 years, but could not. And I have reflected about it what's going on in me for all that time. I meditated about it. I prayed over it. I spoke with my shrink about it. I have begged him for closure, and pleaded with him, and tried to please him into helping me to get closure, but to no avail. All the years he has chosen to stay completely silent. He completely shut me out of his life.

And the horrible thing is: I cant hate him. I somehow think he must be justified in his strong reaction to me because I must have somehow treated him super badly and caused him terrible harm. I still get tears in my eyes just thinking about the fact that he chooses to cut me out of his life for good. And the aspect that is driving me crazy is: I have no fucking clue what I could have done to earn such a behavior/punishment from him. 

My best friend, who actually met the ex-boyfriend in person, told me a few days ago: 

"Tina, your reaction to the whole ex- boyfriend story is so strong, I doubt that the man is actually responsible for that strong reaction. He must have triggered deeper , more hidden parts in you. And my guess is that it is related to stuff you experienced with your father."

I knew immediately that my friend was right. My ex was or is a wonderful father to his kids. There is no doubt about it that he is great dad material. He is quite a bit older than I am, and I can totally see that he triggered feelings related to my father in me.

So I thought: Sigh, ok, let's look at my father.

To be continued.

America, subs and me

A reader asked me a while ago:  

I'm interested though in what you like about the US compared to Germany if you care to talk about it.

I pondered that question a long time. And the answer I gave myself surprised me quite a bit. The answer is: I like Germany much better than the USA. I am a bit reluctant to open that discussion. Here on my blog I am usually staying away from anything political as much as I can. Therefore please note: Here comes MY very personal opinion. I am not saying it is the objective truth, I am just saying it is my own anecdotal experience and my own  point of view.

I love the Americans, I really do. And always have.

How do you explain a feeling? It´s hard to do. And it´s even harder to explain why you feel what you feel.

• I have rarely met an American abroad that I did not like. I like that they are so easy to get in a conversation with, I like that they are so laid back. 
• I grew up in a city where the US Army had a base. And I remember, even as a young teenager, I always wanted to see/meet these cool men.
• I love the language. I started learning English in 7th grade and have never ceased to learn and love that language. In school and later in life I also learned Latin, French, Spanish, Swedish, even some Portuguese, but the only language that really was of interest to me was English. When I was in France a year ago, I could hardly speak a word French anymore, even though I used to be fluent in it. English has taken over in my brain :-)
• I remember, during the time when I dated the German guy, one evening we were watching YouTube together, and we were watching an English show. He suddenly said to me: "can we switch to something German , please". And I only thought: "What? I cannot watch only German tv and shows for the rest of my life. That's impossible". It was at exactly that moment that I realized: "he's not the one for me."
• During law school I worked in a Marriott hotel in Munich, there were many American guests, I loved every minute working there. It was just FUN talking with the Americans and they always tipped exorbitantly. ;-) They were always easy to recognize, with their polo shirts on, of course always neatly tugged in, and their sports shoes. :-)
• American English makes me feel good. It triggers feel good feelings in me. And it allows me to be more open and fearless and to see more of my own worth.

I received the following comment recently:

I think your husband was unfortunately right due to the way society is. Again, I don't know what the view of bdsm is in Germany but in the US I think he would be looked down on. I know I would be and its why I am in the closet. I don't post face pictures of myself even on vanilla dating sites making it hard to meet women. Someone told me bdsm in Europe is looked on like a hobby or interest for the most part.

Here its looked on unfavorably. Submissive women can fit in easier to society but definitely not sub men and dominant women have a hard time. Sub women would be looked at unfavorably if they say they enjoy having the man in charge or being punished. Being sub goes against American values of individuality, to serve another is not in keeping with the culture.

Yes, there is a difference between how bdsm is seen in Germany and in the US. I really do think that it is easier for German men to be openly submissive. I do think that the German society is indeed much more open and accepting to bdsm. I never had a problem with having my kink. My brother knows about it and doesnt care a bit, my mom knows about it and is fine with it. I am sure that my deceased father would be ok with it and my step father too. people might not share our kink, but they are fine with us having it.

I think the German society is still very much influenced, if not traumatized, by the events from 1933-1945. There is no doubt that we were "the bad ones". It is still hard to stomach what horrific things the Germans did. It is a huge guilt that the Germans have to carry. We grow up with the knowledge that our ancestors fucked up big time. And this knowledge is rubbed in our face over and over and over again. It never ends. It is always in the back of our minds. And the feeling of: "You are forgiven, everything is good again", just never comes.  (Just recently we were invited to have dinner (post pandemic of course) with a friend of my partner, and the friend said to my partner: "My wife is Jewish. I hope there won' t be a problem with your German wife?" )

In Germany, we learned to be open minded, to question our believes, to question our own actions and to accept that we are flawed people. 

And  I look in surprise and with a bit of envy on so many US men, who actually and honestly and really believe that they are living in the greatest country of the world. I shake my head in perplexity. Why do you believe that? What is it that makes the US so extraordinary in your opinion?  It must be pretty cool to have such a childlike and simple view of the world. I wonder often what it feels like to grow up with the believe of: "we are the greatest", instead of: "we fucked up big time."

In Germany, for decades, it was impossible to even think about uttering the words: we are the greatest.

And tell me, what exactly are these people who are so proud of the USA actually proud of? I really dont see many reasons that make the USA better or greater than so many other countries. 

Nobody here in the US gives a shit about environmental protection. Let's just keep using plastic and cans and let our children deal with cleaning it up.

Gas is cheap, why even looking into ways to use the car less?  Let's keep living as if climate change does not exist.

And all the hatred for the immigrants... I can tell you, immigrating is one of the hardest things I have ever done. And I am not coming from a place of war or drama. Btw: did you know that the American consulate, when handing out the green card, also hands out a flyer which states the immigrants rights in a domestic violence situation? Obviously there are a lot of Americans out there who beat their new wives up once they are in the country... 

The whole homeless situation in big cities is making me wanna cry. And all that so many people do is buying a Mc Donalds burger for a homeless person and thinking they did a great act...

Speaking about food: the quality of the food here is so much worse than in Europe. People in the US are obviously not used to cooking for themselves anymore.  In the food you can buy are tons of artificial ingredients added and I am not surprised that so many Americans suffer from diabetes. It is hard to eat healthy food here. The whole system is set up to make you buy fast food...

People are so financially unprotected and poor that they actually have to go to work despite being covid positive... I could go on and on. And I really do think  it is bewildering that people are actually PROUD to live in a country like this.

But hey, at least the lawn looks perfect, so that the neighbors think I got my shit under control....

Being sub goes against American values of individuality, to serve another is not in keeping with the culture.

The commenter is right. I do think that is very sad though.

We all have a need to be connected. We all have a need to help and support and uplift one another. We are social creatures. It seems strange to me that this is not valued much more.

blind spots and arousal templates

I am finally living in the US now. It is a very strange feeling, it feels almost unreal. A dream came true and I am still fascinated that it actually happened. So far I am pretty happy here.  :-)

With the US so divided, and both sides being so convinced that they are "the good ones", I thought a lot about blind spots. At the moment, even smart people really don't seem to see/understand the other side. And I have been thinking more than once: why on earth don't they see what I see? 

But no worries, I am not going to write about politics here. I am more interested in what I can learn for my own life and my own relationship.

I am wondering where my blind spots are and what I am not seeing.

Just as we have visual blind spots when looking at the road through our car mirrors, we also have psychological blind spots - aspects of our personalities that are hidden from our view. These might be annoying habits like interrupting or bragging, or they might be deeper fears or desires that are too threatening to acknowledge. Although it's generally not pleasant to confront these aspects of ourselves, doing so can be very useful when it comes to personal growth, and when it comes to improving our relationships with others - there is undoubtedly something we do that, unbeknownst to us, drives our significant others, roommates, or coworkers a little crazy. So how do you know what your blind spots are? (http://psych-your-mind.blogspot.com/2011/08/friday-fun-psychological-blind-spots.html)

I am not working (much) at the moment, but I am trying to grow as a person. I spend hours each day contemplating and thinking about my life so far, about my past, my failures and successes and where I wanna go from here.

Since you are all here for the kink, I wanna focus on the kink aspects.

I am a bit at loss when it comes to this thing we do. I am not sure what I am doing or what I am doing wrong, but there is no kink in my life anymore. At all. And the strange thing is: this has happened to me before and I have not figured out why. I am living a vanilla life, despite having strong dominant needs and cravings. I am masturbating to F/m stuff and at the same time try to submissively please my partner in the real world.

I literally had hundreds of submissive men courting me over the years, I know since I am a teenager that vanilla sex does not interest me at all, and all porn I ever got turned on on (? my English still sucks....) is D/s.

The questions I am cogitating about are: why don't I get what I am craving? why am I preventing myself from getting what I want? why do I create scenarios where I end up in a vanilla relationship?

The answers / the keys to these questions have to be in me. I am the master of my life. I am creating everything that happens in my life. And when I am having no kink in my life, despite blogging for 10 years about how important the kink is for me and how much it turns me on and how much I enjoy it, there needs to be something going on within me that is preventing me from getting what I want. There needs to be an aspect or elements that I am not seeing. I need to have a blindspot that I am not aware of.

Years ago I had a wonderful conversation with wdspoon and (if I recall correctly) he told me that he always found women who matched his needs. That was very interesting to me, because up until then I had heard many many men complaining about how hard it is to find a dominant woman. I never forgot that conversation because I realized that it is possible to get own needs met, despite how hard it seems and how unfavorable the statistic seems.

So why am I shooting myself in the foot when it comes to getting my sexual needs fulfilled?

One place that blind spots can be found is in strong reactions. An unusually strong negative or positive reaction or stance may suggest engagement in a process Freud called reaction formation. Reaction formation involves unconsciously transforming an unacceptable or undesirable impulse into its opposite. For example, according to this view, former New York governor Elliot Spitzer's efforts to crack down on prostitution when in office may have been a direct reaction to his own desire for and involvement with prostitutes.

I have seen the same reaction formation in many Christians. Ted Haggard for instance comes to mind. I am not so sure though if my D/s blindspot is in that area. I think I am pretty comfortable with my  D/s cravings. 

But recation formation is a possibility, of course. Maybe I am secretly submissive and dont wanna live these aspects?  I really did perceive my  vanilla submissive mom as very weak and I grew up thinking: A woman doesnt cry.  My mom was crying (over men ...) a lot and I made a promise to myself to not do that. Hence my nickname: the strong woman.

In one study (Morokoff, 1985), female participants high in sexual guilt deemed erotic imagery to be unacceptable and reported low arousal in response to it. Physiological measures revealed, however, that these same participants actually showed the highest levels of arousal. The same pattern was later found among homophobic men, who were more physiologically aroused by videos depicting homosexual intercourse than were non-homophobic men (Adams, Wright, & Lohr, 1996)  This tendency is not confined to sexuality. Harsh judgments of others' behavior may reveal a personal insecurity - for example, that highly ambitious co-worker may especially irritate you because of your own unexpressed ambitions. Blind spots in these cases need not be objectively negative traits, just traits that are experienced as personally shameful or unacceptable.

I think it is fair to say that I am actually a very strong and courageous person. And I do know that I can be very dominant in real life. (Just ask my sister, lol, she will tell you what a bitch I am and how dominant I am). But at the same time I am super insecure about myself. I don't value myself enough. I am my own very harsh critic. I don't give myself much credit for what I have achieved in life. I don't think I am worthy to be pampered. I am always focused on fulfilling other people's needs. Putting myself and my needs first in a relationship doesn't come easy to me. My shrink says that is a behavior that I learned when I was very very young and therefore it is quite difficult to change.

I am the most understanding person you can think of. I understand pretty much everything when it comes to human behavior. There is not much that can scare me away from a human being. I am a healer and I am proud of it. Healing people is easy for me. You can wake me up in the middle of the night, tell me that you are sad, or unhappy, or depressed, and I will be able to come up with 100 true reasons why I think you are amazing. And I will truly think that you are amazing. Supporting people in need is something I have been doing all my life.

I think I am doing to people what I wish people would do to me.

And my theory is: as far as the kink is concerned, in the beginning of a relationship, when all is new, I am fully and completely focused on the man. I want to understand him, I wanna know what he feels, I wanna know what works for him, I wanna know his dreams and  fears and hopes and arousal templates. I wanna know as much as I can. the more I know, the easier it gets for me to do my "magic" and make him feel good. 

And in the beginning, generally speaking, the men that enter my life are more than happy to give me what I want. They feel seen and cherished and special. And they are all that to me. I think that is why it is very easy for the men to submit to me during that phase. And I love every moment of it. I really do. It makes me feel amazing, vibrant, alive and happy. And turned on, of course, lol. I think: "bingo. how lucky I am " 

But then comes a point when all of a sudden the men start to withdraw again. We are still in a relationship, we still get along very well, we still think the other person is wonderful, but the men -for me completely out of the blue- stop submitting to me.

At this point I usually tell myself: keep calm, it will come back.

But I had to learn the hard way that the kink doesn't come back.

If I ask in a playful way: "hey, come on, let's do stuff..." I dont get what I want because the men just said no.

And I am sure as hell not gonna beg a man to pretty please let me dominate him.

There has never been any explanation, any talk , any conversation... the kink just stopped. I have no idea what the men were thinking, really no fucking clue. My best guess is: I came emotionally too close. I saw facets of them that they usually hide. I scared them away. 

I guess what I asked for was too much. Because in all honesty: The thing that turns me on the most is domestic discipline. Not playful dress up with leather and latex, not sexy high heels and a big scene, but real life, unspectacular but powerful D/s like me reaching over to him, putting my hand on his thigh and telling him: No you cant have a 3rd beer.   

I think the moment the guy says to me: "I am gonna have that 3rd beer anyway." It feels like something in me switches. I feel like: "Fuck, I have been so nice to you, why cant you just fucking give me what makes me happy and what I need? "

My problem is: In these situations I still think he is awesome, I still love him like crazy, I still think he is wonderful, but I also secretly start to grow anger inside. I am getting angry because I have no way to fulfill my own needs. how could I? I can not just non-consensually dominate a man. That's illegal and furthermore not how I roll. I need his submission freely given by him, and not non-consensually taken by me.

In a way, it feels like betrayal. I have invested so much in the man, and in return he does not give me what I crave the most: his submission. And to make it hurt even more, he is giving it to me for a while, only to then withhold it from me. I can tell you; That sucks big time.

I think I made one big mistake in the past: I more or less assumed that the submissive men I had contact with where strong and self confident enough to submit to me. But in hindsight I think the men only were strong enough to open up to me and let me get as far as I came because I am actually great at opening people up emotionally. I think the men that I met were generally super private and guarded and only allowed me to dominate them (for a while) because I really am good at making people feel safe. I can be the most non threatening motherlike person you can think of.

But: If the (former submissive) guy wants the vanilla version of a relationship with me , I expect him to take as good care of my needs as I took care of his when I was in the dominant position. And they rarely do. In my experience I am suddenly stuck in a vanilla relationship where the guy still expects me to bend over backwards for him, without him giving me the gift of his submission. And that is a very unpleasant situation for me to be in.

After hearing so many stories from submissive guys and reading so many stories of guys who dream of having a dominant girlfriend, it was pretty shocking to realize how few "submissive" men actually are wiling to put in the effort to give me what turns me on.

Just as extreme negative reactions to a trait in others might suggest the presence of that trait in oneself, extremely positive attitudes or behaviors may suggest a lack, or a feared lack, of a desired trait. Research shows that people who want to appear non-prejudiced may go to great lengths to demonstrate their generosity and positive attitudes towards a stigmatized group, especially when their sense of themselves as a non-prejudiced person is threatened. Other kinds of overly positive or rigid attitudes may also suggest underlying negativity, ambivalence, or doubt.

I really dont know where I stand. maybe I am more judgmental and egoistic than I think. And maybe I am asking for too much. Who knows?  As you can see, I dont have many answers, but still many questions :-)