Share your advice for this reader in the comments section below…
Dear Em & Lo,
I recently started dating a wonderful man. He’s smart, and interesting, and handsome and the sex has been delightful.
But not outstanding. But we’ve been working a fairly brisk learning curve and we can’t seem to get enough of each other anyway, and I’m stupidly happy in his arms so everything should be coming up roses, right?
Except for the GIANT black-leather-studded elephant in the room, which is his propensity towards BDSM. He hasn’t really trotted it out to me in a big way, but I know that I am decidedly NOT into whatever he’s into, eg: humiliation, manipulation, extreme bondage, violent spankings, etc. He’s brought it up a few times as something that he engages in as a significant part of his sexuality.
I’m definitely not that girl. I can’t imaging enjoying anything about it. I’m the type to be playful in bed, or silly, or just rut like an animal. But always as an equal to my partner. I don’t want to dominate OR be submissive as a defined and absolute role. Humiliation and manipulation, feeling powerless or at someone’s mercy…well, the thought of it frankly terrifies the hell out of me. And being scared does NOT turn me on. I might be the only woman in the world who doesn’t have a rape fantasy.
I suppose it bears mention that I have a history of manipulation and abuse in my childhood. So having gone through many years and many thousands of dollars of therapy, I’m loathe to have someone assert control over me all over again.
So…is this doomed? The more I think about how this is an integral part of his sexuality, the more upset I get and want to run away. We’ve been having pretty much vanilla sex, and it’s good. But it’s not great. Not for either of us. For me, I think, it’s because I’m perpetually wondering if he’s going to do something that makes me ill at ease, or put me in a position where I will feel scared or somehow terrorized. And I know that’s what he wants, and that by my unwillingness to engage in BDSM, I’m robbing him of his desires. I mean, hell, it’s the only porn he has.
Should I break up with him? I’m definitely not the girl who will satisfy this for him.
— Vanilla Girl
What should Vanilla Girl do? Share your suggestions in the comments section below.
I know this is an old post, but for anyone reading this who is in this situation, the answer is yes – you should break it off because it is not going to work in the long term.
Even now, at the beginning of the relationship when your desires to make each other happy are at their strongest, you are not wanting to engage in this kind of thing with him. As your relationship grows and gets more mature, your willingness to tolerate is going to get weaker and weaker, and eventually you are going to end up telling him that you want nothing to do with it.
On his side – these desires are obviously very strong and represent a need that is going to need to be fulfilled. If you get married and then one day, a few years later, you tell him that you hate it and that you want nothing to do with it, he is going to feel abandoned by you. And if you have not already told him that you do not like this stuff, he is going to feel that you deceived and misled him (and he would be right).
There is certainly nothing wrong with either of you – you just aren’t designed to fulfill each others needs and are not going to be compatible in the long term. If you get married you are both going to end up resentful of each other and you will be misereable.
Jim.. I have a similar situation. I love my wife and would also never leave her. When we first met and got married, sex was GREAT, OFTEN, sometimes kinky. Then she realized she was an alcoholic and stopped drinking. She said the drinking is what made her lose control. Sex just kinda went downhill for a while then we saw a marriage counselor and helped her get some of that kink back. Then she started taking hormones and things were GREAT again. But.. now she stopped because apparently she was taking too much and had to back off. So instead of backing off, she slowed and stopped. Now, we don’t have sex. I feel like I have a roomate than a lover/wife/friend. I feel sex is a critical part of a relationship. I am currently out of town and I am craving sex and am frustrated. Hopefully my marriage is not doomed but I am very frustrated and unhappy.
I cant say if a relationship is completely doomed however, my wife has never been anything but vanilla. As the years have past I have slowly introduced her various things and while she now seems to enjoy being tied and teased she has no interest in reversing the roles. This leaves me feeling less than satisfied. She leaves me feeling embarrassed by asking which I find to be quite hard to swallow. So now by her getting everything she needs and wants I am still left with this hole that needs to be filled. I cant imagine ever leaving my wife and would never cheat on her. So is the relationship doomed? No, I will spend my life being unsatisfied but still with a good woman.
I am a submissive, with a man who cannot Dom me… and just feels like he cannot see me as a submissive. Our relationship started very vanilla, with the hopes of moving into a D/s dynamic, but over a year later i’m miserable. i am missing that part of me more and more everyday.
If he is a dominant… If i were you, i would ask him to play lightly with you. Maybe just try it out. If he is a good Dom he would NEVER go too far with you intentionally. Remember, he knows you have never tried this kind of thing. Its all a learning process for you, and him to learn what you like AND won’t take. My first partner introduced me to this, and i did not even know it all existed! i too was terrified, but it was fun. Started light and went from there. Many times it is just a mind matter, right and wrong. Once you can break through that, you never know.
If he is a submissive, Maybe try it out, and see the pleasure your demands bring him. You might like it after all.
And if all this fails….
If you two aren’t particularly attached to one another, i would end it. This lifestyle is very hard to forget, and nothing but an internal change will make it truly go away. Forcing yourself to be vanilla, after time, will just make it worse. Talk with him about everything and explain why you think this is best. Maybe you two can remain good friends.
bondaries? boundaries change over a lifetime. What might be not so appealing now may be appealing later. I read a few books by David xzenre lately and found out that boundaries to in deed alter through ones life. I think at this moment you are in two different zones work on finding a middle.
I too know that this is a very old post and I am currently in a relationship where my partner likes to have handcuffs, gags, blindfolds, rope, duct tape and whatever else used during sex.
He also watches videos on bondage (which doesn’t bother me as I don’t have to participate in it) and I have recently caught him chatting up a gay male friend in a sexual way about this subject.
I have tried some of the soft core stuff mostly to please him but I am finding that I am really NOT comfortable with any of it at all, it feels weird to me and to be honest I miss the vanilla sex which two exes from previous serious relationships were into and as much as I love my current partner I don’t see my relationship lasting much longer if I don’t say something and set out boundaries now.
OP: As a woman I would advise you to speak with your partner about it, be honest about how this makes you feel and do what is right for YOU and if that means parting company with this guy then so be it!
^ I feel you man. I’ll pretty much try anything as long as it doesn’t involve blood, poo, or CBT. It’s an utter disappointment to discover that your partner doesn’t feel the same way.
I would like to point out also, that I, in no way, condone abusive relationships, and I don’t classify having someone beat the crap out of you as being FUN (unless that’s what you desire)
It’s fascinating to read so many responses from people who are just not interested in variation in their sex lives! I am up for ANYTHING my lover might suggest, not just BDSM or DS (reversed roles would be fine!), or licking whipped cream off her kneecaps…..whatever! ALL sex between people who love each other is emotional fulfilment! Vanilla sex is great, I might not enjoy certain positions that are demanded of me all that much ( especially the semi-missionary, weird angle to the right thing, that while giving my lover intense pleasure, is akin to doing one handed push ups for me!) , but ultimately, my real pleasure is in giving pleasure! I have dominanant fantasies, but the torture I envisage is not inflicting pain (although a light smack on the butt at the right time can cause some intensely pleasurable reactions!)but in stimulating my poor helpless subject to the edge of climax over and over again to the point of her begging for release…..and then letting her have it!I myself enjoy, occasionally, being denied for days,then finally being “allowed” relief, teased, let us say, to the point of insanity….being “forced” to pleasure her with no reward!For days!Yay!
The point I’m trying to make here (and I could go on and on with a myriad of variations) is that sex can be FUN, people! It’s playtime for adults, and the more FUN you have with your partner, the more you enjoy being with them and the happier you are all round!
And yet I find myself with a vanilla lover, constantly craving sex that is “emotional fulfilment and reaffirmation and closeness and security and romance” which is fine,like I said, I’m up for anything and I can enjoy being that lover. But I see this attitude throughout so many of the posts above,an attitude that if sex is somehow dressed up, or role played or involves having fantasies acted out, then it’s just not love!And the sheer meanness of a lover whose attitude is “we are going to do it my way or not at all”…..how is that love? Haven’t you ever gone to the movies to see a show that you thought was the crappest show on earth just because your lover wanted to see it? Haven’t you ever gone to the work function/Christmas party from hell, or sat through the visit to old Aunt Whatshername or a myriad of other tortures….shopping for instance? Yes the experience is harrowing at the time, but isn’t the aftermath wonderful? You can see how much your lover has appreciated what you have done for them, and in all these shared experiences is LOVE……why then is the bedroom (or wherever!) suddenly this different ball game? Why isn’t the reaction “the poor bastard sat through Aunt Whatsisname for 6 hours, I’m going to take him home and smack his butt all night cos that’s what HE’D like”? (for example ha ha!) It beats the shit out of me! Why is it so segregated? Why is sex so different to any other aspect of being in a relationship? I’m not speaking from the perspective of “oh I did this for you, so you should do this for me” but from the perspective that “I will do this because it will make you happy, and I would hope that you too would be looking for things to do that you KNOW would make ME happy!I have told you my fantasies, I have shared with you my kinks and desires, you KNOW what I like…..I SHOULDN’T have to ASK.( I saw you admire that dress, so I bought it for you!) Look at the smile on my face afterwards…..can you feel the LOVE now? I’m happy and I appreciate what you have done!
Is it not possible for some of you people to derive pleasure from GIVING pleasure?! Ok, lets see…..we’ll do it your way every third time!Two to One, what have you got to lose…..and maybe you’d see how much you have to gain!
You are by no means the only woman in the world without rape fantasies. If BDSM is his primary outlet and it’s not yours, it’s better to end it amicably and each of you get your needs met with other partners. Because if you are, as you put it, not the girl for him, then he is also not the guy for you.
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I’ve been reading all of these responses. I’ve been married for 13 years. I have always suspicioned that my husband had a “dark side” but it had never been addressed. Enter the 50 Shades of Grey series….I read the books and the more I read the more I realized that he could very well be “that guy.” He has always wanted me to dress up in various costumes but I never felt comfortable with that. It makes me feel like he wants me to be someone that I am not. Within the last six months he has admitted to me that he is a sadist and has been in a BDSM relationship in the past. He has purchased crops, whips, a cat of nine tails, ball gags, blindfolds, wrist and ankle braces, has all sorts of cords and ropes for bondage. I’ve tried a few things and have ended up feeling humiliated and left with some bruises. Honestly I don’t trust him in this area. When he gets into that “zone” it’s like he becomes another person. We are currently seperated, not just because of this issue but others as well. I’m not totally vanilla but I am certainly not into things to the extreme that he is. I feel like it’s not fair of him to ask me to do things I’m uncomfortable with, on the other hand it’s not fair of me to ask him to do without something that he seems to enjoy. I guess I just don’t understand why it took 13 years for him to show this side of himself to me, or maybe it was there all along and I just didn’t see it, or didn’t want to see it. I don’t want to see my marriage end, we
“I feel like it’s not fair of him to ask me to do things I’m uncomfortable with, on the other hand it’s not fair of me to ask him to do without something that he seems to enjoy.” WOW. That’s a gigantic admission coming from…a woman. I salute you. Good job seeing the “big picture”– 98% of your sisters could care less about anything other than themselves, extorting money, and their simmering hatred of men.
Thank you everyone for you thoughts here, I have been going though this for a long time now. my husband and I have been together for 13 years. the first 5 we were ok, and sex was ok although never really great. but we had so many other things going for us that I over looked it. after 5 years he started to let me know how much he wanted to be a sub. I tried this, many times and all it made me feel was bored and stressed. trying to be a dom when your heart is not in it, is very stressfull. I told him many times that I really didnt enjoy any of this, but he couldnt or wouldnt hear me. This was his dream I guess. after a few years of this I just gave up and stop trying. now I feel disconnected with him sexually. even when he tries to please me, I feel he is faking it. right now I am at a crossroad. leave my husband because I am not sexually satified or continue to live without. I love him and in many ways he is a good husband, but the sex was never good and now its a chore for me like doing dishes. I have always enjoyed sex and even a little spice but now Im completely cold. This is breaking my heart just writing it. I cant talk to anyone about it, but I dont even look at him the same now.
I’ve been in a 5 year relationship with someone who is a submissive. Unfortunately as much as there is love and respect in the relationship and even with all my efforts in trying out various kinky things, I think we’re pretty much heading for a break up. I liked the kinky stuff but he just wanted much more extreme humiliation and there was only so much I could do. At the back of my mind, I always felt the relationship was doomed even though he tried to reassure me many times. It’s really, really hard and I really feel for the women who have been in the same situation. It’s a feeling of never being enough for someone that really gets me.
Relationships like this should come with a warning. Experimental sex life is fine but a constant compulsion for harder stuff needs to be avoided if you’re not into it.
Also you have to be careful if you’ve suffered abuse before, I had just come out of an abusive relationship and when I was trying out things with my submissive boyfriend, it would freak me out if we went too fast.
Next time I meet someone I will be asking the question about whether they are into BDSM (probably on the first date)
I was in an almost 2 year relationship with a very loving boyfriend. I was aware of his fondness for BDSM, but had no idea how strong his need to be submissive was. When we broke up for a couple of months, he met a woman who is a Dom, as well as very successful and intellectual. He and I got back together at one point, and I was more than willing to try things kinkier than my normal ‘vanilla’ self, but I think that he could sense my hesitation. Not long after we got back together, things went South and he ended up leaving me for her. I am beyond devastated abd am finding it difficult to love forward, as I loved him more than anything, but I realize that this fundamental sexual difference between us was too large. Love did not conquer all.