From the Submissive Guide Newsletter 10-08-11
Sexual exploration and adventurousness can happen at any time in a couple’s life; and even more so once they are committed to living their lives together for a long time. One of the ways that I’ve seen couples explore their sexual selves is by adding an element of D/s to the marriage.
I know I was raised to understand that a man and wife were equals and no one person has more control. I struggled with that in my first marriage where I had to take control over a lot of things in order for anything to happen. But we aren’t going to talk about my bad marriage in this newsletter.
What I do want to talk about is how to incorporate elements of a power exchange relationship into your existing marriage without damaging what you have. It’s a new way to look at your marriage and for many it can breathe new life into a marriage.
Caveat: Adding D/s to a struggling marriage is never a good idea before you know why you are struggling to begin with. It can and often does make the situation worse. Please seek professional counseling to make sure you are both prepared for the changes that are going to occur.
Now that I’ve got all that scary stuff taken care of, let’s talk about a couple of happy people that want to explore a bit of kink in the bedroom or even change their relationship into a D/s one.
If you are the one that wants to be submissive the first thing you can do is start being obedient. There are a lot of things that occur in a normal day that sound like directions, requests or orders from your partner that you may not realize. If you currently question or challenge their requests, start actually obeying them. Also, if you notice that they are low on a beverage, for example, get them a refill (or ask them if they want one) before they have to ask or get up themselves. Taking care of their needs can help go a long way to making you feel submissive even if your partner isn’t into being overtly Dominant.
From the Dominant’s angle, try spending a day where you don’t do anything for yourself. If you normally get your own drinks or change the TV channel, have your partner do it. See if you enjoy asking and directing them to serve you. I could stir up some excitement. Try to incorporate some sexy fun in there too.
Now before you try something that you’ve never done before it’s always best to have information at your disposal.
Get All Your Information Together
Before you can begin to try anything kinky I always recommend that you both do reading on what it is you want to try. There are books, websites and forums you can go to and get ideas as well as suggestions for trying things out for yourself.
You might also want to consider joining the local BDSM community if you think it will help you. You’ll meet a lot of people who have experience that they can share with you so that your transition can be smoother and your understanding of what you want to do is fuller.
Talk To Your Partner
Sit down with your partner and see what they want to explore. I suggest you are both aware of the ideas going forward so that you can communicate how you feel about them as they happen. Talking will require you to be open about sex and your secret desires that you may not have talked about in the past.
Be compassionate about your partner’s thoughts and desires. It’s not easy to open up about your dark desires to someone even if you love them with all your heart.
Make Small Changes
Try to contain the excitement for a new direction in the relationship by making small changes and getting used to them before adding more. You’ll likely have more success this way and be able to customize your relationship so that it is perfect for both of you.
Finally…
Keep the communication lines open. Your marriage is strong because it has worked. With any changes you need to make sure you are still talking to each other about these changes and are open to scraping what doesn’t work and enhancing what does so that your new relationship is strong and it doesn’t negatively impact your marriage.
Thoughts to Ponder
- How far into BDSM are you willing to explore? How far is your partner willing to explore?
- What makes you nervous about your desires to add a little spice to your marriage?
- What obstacles do you see with adding a BDSM element to your marriage?
Links to Resources
- FetLife Group: BDSM in Marriage
- How a Little BDSM can Change Your Marriage (video)
- Adding a Little BDSM to a Vanilla Relationship
My name is lunaKM and I’m a full-time stay-at-home submissive in a D/s relationship.
I started blogging when I was exploring D/s online in 2003. I needed advice, mentors and helping hands. Since then I've made it my mission to help novice submissives understand themselves and the services they wish to provide. 
This is wonderful – thank you for this.
My Master and I met on collar me, as a submissive and a Dominant. I was fully trained, but when I got to him things seemed to slowly fall apart as far as the lifestyle goes. Almost four years later our marriage was crumbling around us. We still loved each other desperately but things were rocky. We have tried the lifestyle off and on. Finally I tried some new meds and realized that a lot of the problem was myself. We decided to give the lifestyle together another go, and our marriage has never been better. I am falling in love all over again. We are both so happy.
Like the Gor quote says “If you want a man to be more masculine, you must be more feminine, if you want a woman to be more feminine, you must be more masculine.”
If you want your man to be more dominant. Be more submissive. :)
It works in the transverse as well. If you want your partner to be more submissive than be more Dominant. Just as the world tries to live by the golden rule – do unto others.
It works in the transverse as well. If you want your partner to be more submissive then be more Dominant. Just as the world tries to live by the golden rule – do unto others.
Ugh, why can’t you be husband and wife and D/s…. I don’t understand this stuff. =( And I’m starting to panic because this D/s stuff is like taking over my life, and I want it like crazy, but I’m a college student and also have to balance out studying / working out. I tried explaining that to him; he tells me to study and stuff, but that he also wants me to think about this all the time, even obsessively. (he does care for my well-being; I just have a hard time pushing myself to study)
And it doesn’t help because I have no one in my life I can talk to about this, other than my bf (um, my dominant… guy). And I’m really really normal; you’d never know any of this stuff about me…. and my friends are so normal, and I can’t talk to them about it… I’m starting to feel very isolated and confused and panicked. =( I tried to almost talk about this with my mom (I’m 22) and she flipped out.
It really is scary because I want to serve, etc, but I want to also make sure I’ll be loved. And it would help a lot if I had a girl to talk to about this stuff, because I hate to bother my bf with all of my worries (although he is supportive). I just wish I had some normal people in my life to put these desires I have in perspective. I’ve been crying a lot and falling apart because I just can’t relate to any of my friends anymore because I can’t even share this huge aspect of my life with them.
And I need to know what’s to be expected… Can’t your husband be dominant, but still do sweet things for you? Can’t he still give you flowers randomly and chocolate for Valentine’s Day? (No we’re not married yet but may be sometime in the near future)
And I’m not wondering these things because I’m selfish / not submissive. It’s just that I want to know what other girls think of me, and I don’t know. I know how I feel intuitively, but I want to learn more about what other people think… But I’m too scared to google this stuff….. The only BDSM-y pictures I see are the ones he shows me because when I try to look it up myself, I see really scary stuff (needles?!) that upsets me… And I am very normal otherwise, but I have this very strong desire to give everything I have to 1 person, to give him complete control and let him know everything (physically and mentally). And it seems like most of the women involved in this are so much older or just different than me, and I don’t call him “master” because he doesn’t tell me to, but that doesn’t make me any less submissive to him.
I probably sound very immature right now, but it’s only because I feel so scared/alone because I have no one to talk to, and I feel so weird as compared to everyone else. If other people knew what was in my head, they would think I’m strange (with the exception of my bf, of course he understands). I might sound ignorant, but I know enough about my submissive nature (it’s innate, not something I have to google) to have what I think is a pretty good understanding of D/s, and from what he has told me he expects of me in the future.
Um, I guess I’m desperate for someone who knows a bit about all of this, to talk to. This isolation really sucks, and I’m so new to all of this, it would really help to have someone give me their perspective on things, so I can compare my own and have a bit more confidence in my decision to live out D/s (which believe me, is a dream come true).
You can be husband/wife and Dom/sub. It works just fine. My Master loves to surprise me with romantic things so that won’t change either. Just because you add D/s to your relationship doesn’t cancel out the person you were before that. You just have to figure out what the balance is for you.
If you can’t think about submission all the time then don’t. If the two of you can’t work out a balance between it then perhaps you need to renegotiate or find someone who will work for you.
It’s hard to find people to talk to. Have you tried looking for local groups to attend? What about websites like the Submissive Guide community or FetLife? There are people online you can talk to that are likely going through or have gone through exactly what you are feeling.
There is more to this comment than I can answer here, please feel free to contact me via email if you need more advice. Thanks.
To the 22 year old who is confused…I’m 20 and i am in the same boat as you. I really want to make my husband happy and do whatever he wants me to do but I’m confused and sometimes don’t know how. I love to take care of him and cater to him. SO I understand how you are feeling. I need help as well I really want to do this but I don’t know how. I don’t know how to start I guess. Any tips from anyone? Please.
My Master and I are not married and he prides himself on still being single seeing that all his friends have tied the knot. He never wants to get married. He says there is not any difference between being married or living together. It is the same except the man and woman have a marriage certificate. Anyone can put a ring on their finger and say they are “married”. No one will know the difference except those close to you. As for being a hubby/wife/dom/sub, some people already have that and do not realize it unless it is pointed out to them. One person in the relationship no matter what it is is always the Dom and the other the sub, but as with any relationship it is best to start slow and work at it. Getting comfortable with each other’s wants/needs.
There is a legal difference. Health insurance benefits, tax breaks, filing status and medical situation honoraries are things that only spouses get.
There’s no difference within the relationship I think is what you meant. For some people they are adopting a D/s style of relationship after a marriage already exists and that could mean making major changes to the way the interact with each other.
Just wondering, what are the differences between D/s and bdsm? I guess I thought they were different. Do they have to be mixed?
D/s is the relationship of a power exchange dynamic. It does not have to be mixed with BDSM. BDSM is the acronym for all the activities that participants can do to enhance sex and sensual play. BDSM has elements of D/s in it so that’s why it’s sometimes used interchangeably.
Wow. Thanks for that. I wish I’d read it a year ago. It would have saved my husband and I a lot of emotional pain!
We recently had a major blowout because we had been engaging in non-monogamous sex without acknowledging the emotional D/s dynamic inherent in our relationship. Fortunately we have pretty good communication, so we’ve managed to get to a better place.
(If any one is curious to read the details: http://emmanuelleundine.blogspot.com/2012/02/till-kink-do-us-part.html)
I literally just started being my husbands sub, like oh 48 hours ago. As you can tell I’m pretty eager. I’ve never been a big sexual type person, I liked normal/vanilla sex, but my sex drive has just always sucked! But I will say ever since starting this adventure I feel alive in my body, I feel my arousal all the time, especially when He is dominating me, sexually or not. I just want to touch Him all the time. I too feel like I’m falling in love with my husband all over again. It’s great, and I can’t wait for our next scene.