Kink Shame

My last post was a piece of erotica about humiliation punishment involving urine play, blood play, and vomit play. I love it! But it makes me feel ashamed. In the comments I received great feedback, to which I replied:

“Posting this online was very difficult for me, as I am still struggling with feelings of shame associated with some of my kinks … My feelings of shame are particularly bad at the moment. Last night hubby spanked my bum and gave me very mild bruises for the first time. He then had bad dreams about doing it, so has gone back to square one.”

In reply to this comment, Molly over at “Molly’s Daily Kiss” wrote a wonderful reply to me in an open letter. It is fabulous and if you ever experience feelings of shame, or you need a reminder why you shouldn’t, I suggest you pop over there and have a read.

By means of a thank you to Molly, and to explore the idea further, here is my reply.

Dear Molly, Dear Readers,

I have always been very heavily invested in sex. Even when I was a very small child I was obsessed with self-pleasure, although I didn’t know it was masturbation at the time. I would rub my poor, traumatized brown bear against me. My very favorite thing to do was to swing off door handles and rub the edge of the door between my legs. I had no idea what I was doing, but I knew I shouldn’t get caught! When I was about 7 I got found in bed naked with a female classmate by her parents. They didn’t allow me around her house again, I never knew why.

By the time I was in my early 20s I was having a lot of sex with lots of different people. But I was never monogamous. I thought I was a slut because of the number of people I would have sex with – and the frequency. I would have sex with one guy, go home and have sex with my partner because the first guy hadn’t satisfied me. Sometimes people did try kinky things with me but they always stopped experimenting far sooner than I wanted. Their responses to me varied. One lady said to me “God, you are such a bloke.” One guy kicked me out of his house because I asked him to rape me. I can cite a dozen examples of partners laughing at me, looking at me in disgust, or calling me a whore because of my fantasies and desires.

Then I met hubby and I fell in love with him months before we had sex. By the time we did, there was no way I was going to give up on him even though he had virtually no sex drive and not a kinky bone in his body. So, I gave up on sex, almost completely. I persuaded myself that my life history was because I was a slut, sick in the head, and addicted to sex. At the time, all of that helped to get me through virtual abstinence. Eventually I cracked though, how could I not? Nic and I went to sex therapists. We opened our marriage, I had a D/s relationship with James, and Nic? Well, all of this has helped Nic’s sexuality to blossom.

The downside is that my cravings have come back, my need for sex to be central to my life, to be part of my routine, to be kinky and fun and experimental and serious. Sex is central to my identity. Most of the time I do not feel shame for this. But I am ashamed of some of my kinks, of my desire for humiliation, of the things I am prepared to do when I am feeling submissive, of the excitement I feel when I am “forced” to do something which disgusts me. But I love it and nothing gives me greater sexual pleasure. Nothing!

I had never been ashamed of enjoying spankings. But then Nic spanked me and he had a bad dream. Then I felt shame. I felt shame because something I wanted gave the man I love pain.

Intellectually I know that I have nothing to be ashamed of, that I am very lucky to be able to explore my desires (intellectually, emotionally, and physically), that I have a husband who has never consciously rejected me for anything, that I have friends who don’t care what I do. But for me, that is the very worst thing; I know I have nothing to feel ashamed of, yet I still feel shame.

My priority has to be to learn how to manage my needs, my desires, and my kinks, while overcoming my feelings of shame, and not harming other people.

So, what now? Well, Molly, your advice has been fabulous! On another post on my blog you had already suggested The Loving Dominant by John and Libby Warren and Tristan Taormino’s The Ultimate Guide to Kink. I already had the latter. It is a wonderful book, but not suitable for total newbies I think. Besides, it does alienate me a little because of the lack of “filth” (“People who enjoy scat … are beyond the scope of this article,” page 229).

But, I did go out and buy The Loving Dominant. Perhaps fortuitously, it arrived in the post yesterday and I read most of it while Nic was at work. When he came home we had a very long, intense, and loving conversation. He admitted that he very much enjoyed spanking me. It turned him on. He also admitted that it turns him on to give me commands and it turns him on to be dominant. But that scares him, just like you said it might! He is scared of becoming an arsehole. He doesn’t want to bully me or hurt me or do any of the other things that men aren’t “supposed” to do. So, I made him read five lines from the Chapter “Are You a Loving Dominant?” These are those lines:

“Do you get as much pleasure or more from erotically exciting your partner as from your own enjoyment of the sexual act?
If this is true, you are likely to be a good dominant. The essence of this kind of play is to take another’s power and then use it for mutual pleasure. If you already seek to maximize your partner’s gratification, you have a mindset that will adapt well to BDSM.” (3^rd edition, page 5)

When Nic read this he smiled, looked at me, and said “But I’m like that.” I nodded and he went “Oh.”

We chatted some more and looked through the book a little. We agreed to try and open up a basic D/s component in our sex life and see where that takes us. I think part of my shame in recent months has been because I never really discussed it with Nic. All the while he was experiencing new and exciting things with me, I was feeling more shame as I needed yet more sex and more kinky times. What I really needed to do was to talk to him. Until recently, until he saw my reactions to his own Dominance, he never really understood just how much it meant to me, and how much fun it could give him. By bottling up my shame and his desires we caused ourselves unnecessary grief. I wonder how many people have the same!

Nic’s growing acceptance of himself, together with your kind words Molly, and the feedback I have had from others (publically and privately, you know who you are!), are helping me to get over my shame. It will be a long process, one closely bound up (if you pardon the pun) to exploring mine and Nic’s sexuality together, finding ways to explore my more unusual proclivities without pushing Nic too fast.

I will keep you posted! And next time I feel sex-negativity I will shout for help from the rooftops, possibly naked!

Thank you!

Emily
 

If you would like to continue the discussion, broaden it out, or share your experiences please do so, here in the comments, over at Molly’s blog, or on your own blog.