Putting HER in Charge

PUTTING HER IN CHARGE

WHY I AM WRITING THIS ARTICLE

I get asked for a lot of advice of this type. So I decided to write a non-fiction, "how to."

This "how to" is not on female domination techniques. You won’t learn how to wield a whip, or pick out a good set of handcuffs from reading this article. You will learn how to talk about female dominant relationships. You will learn how to increase your chances of entering and sustaining a relationship with your woman in charge. The key, you can be assured, will be communications. In fact, if you filter out specific references to female domination, this should be a good book on how to talk about and enter any relationship.

WHAT IS FEMALE DOMINATION?

Female domination refers to relationships between couples where the female partner is sexually dominant. (Since I am heterosexual male, and am so blinded by this fact, this article is limited to discussing heterosexual femdom relationships. I don’t feel qualified to comment on lesbian relationships. Furthermore, I’ve never made use of the services of a professional dominatrix, so I will limit myself entirely to the discussion of female-male interpersonal relationships in which she is in charge.)

Female domination is not necessarily female supremacy which is more of a belief that women possess an inherent superiority based on gender. Nor is female domination matriarchy or gynarchy which refer to societies ruled by women. Female supremacists, gynarchists, and matriarchs however, may use female domination as an expression of their beliefs, or as a means to attain it.

IS FEMALE DOMINATION "KINKY?"

The answer to this question depends on who’s making the definitions. Many people conclude that if something is unusual or not well-discussed, that it is evil or perverted. In other words, "It’s not my kink, so it must be wrong." The purpose of this posting is not to make converts from non-believers. The purpose is to present female domination to open minds.

Female domination is just one of many ways to express a relationship. It is hardly a unique phenomenon given the amount of literature that addresses it, and the volume of traffic on newsgroups and bulletin boards. There are many practitioners and even more "wannabes."

There are several problems with deciding how common female domination is:

• Female domination is not tightly defined. There are many "versions" varying from simple game playing to full-time servitude. Unless the woman takes absolutely no initiative in the process at all, there is at least a minor element of female domination to it.

• Nobody’s ever asked! There are many scientific surveys on sex, but the most conclusive of them concentrate on the easy-to-measure facts of life such as number of orgasms, penis length, and frequency of intercourse. In other words, things that you can count and quantify.

Female domination is not well-talked-about, but neither are other types of personal and private practices. Men are from Mars and Women are from Venus. Rare are the couples who can talk about sex with each other. Most sex talk is between members of the same sex.

For men, sex talk typically takes the form of bragging. No male is willing to admit to being "pussy whipped." More than likely, he will boast, "She couldn’t keep her hands off me." Men tend to be their own worst enemies when it comes to sex. They set unrealistic "standards" for themselves.

For women, sex talk typically takes the form of discussing the feelings and circumstances surrounding sex. Women normally don’t discuss physical acts, although the newer generation of women are less inhibited about expressing things in more graphic terms. Many women live decades before they gain the confidence to talk about sexuality freely. Some don’t find their sexual identity until in their 40’s with their children raised and almost out of the house. It’s not unusual for a woman to start feeling "domme" later in life. On the other hand, some women claim to have been dominant since childhood!

Having said all this; THERE ARE MANY EXCEPTIONS! If you are one of the many fortunate people that can talk about this topic comfortably with the opposite sex, chances are good that you are already enjoying a rewarding relationship. For the rest of us, however, we need to know more about female domination before either gender can discuss it with more confidence.

The piece of advice offered here is one that applies beyond the realm of female domination:

• Unless you plan on running for political office where the opinions of others are relevant, do not let other people make up your mind for you. You have to live your life, and you have to live with the consequences of your decisions. Do what you think is best for you.

Nothing is important except what you (as a couple) think is important.

As a matter of practicality, it’s generally a good idea not to discuss your private life with people who aren’t involved in it. Female domination, like any other aspect of private relationships, isn’t something to display in public, or in front of minors, or to discuss at the office over coffee.

If you (as a couple) decide that female domination is not for you, then don’t push it. Take those pieces that fit and work with them. On the other hand, if the topic still intrigues you – explore! You can always decide that things you’ve tried don’t "work" for you.

Female domination runs a complete spectrum.

• On the" lowest" end female domination may be hard to distinguish from old-fashioned manners: standing up when a lady enters a room, offering her your seat, holding a door for her, or just addressing her as "ma’am." On the "high" end, the male is shackled, clamped, hooded, gagged, beaten, and whipped in a dungeon. Chances are good that your taste will fall someplace in between.

• Nor is female domination an all the time thing. While it is possible that there are a few 7x24 (7 days a week, 24 hours a day) female dominant relationships, it’s not a common scenario. Supporting a live-in slave in today’s economy is difficult at best. Given that you have to let him out of the house sometime, the time spent in the D/s relationship may vary. It could be as much as every private moment spent together to an occasional "play" session. Some partners even enjoy reversing roles.

IS FEMALE DOMINATION PURELY SEXUAL?

Female domination, like any other kind of sexuality, is a game played mostly in the mind. It’s the relationship – everything else is expression.

What is sexuality? Why do men get excited by dressing in women's clothes? It's only cloth. Do women get excited wearing men's clothes. Nowadays, it's very normal to see women wearing men's clothing. In the armed forces, mom does wear combat boots :-)

Is there anything inherently male or female in personality? As a child, I played with dolls (having an older sister has up and down sides :) Did that make me a sissy. I don't think so.

About the only thing I can think of that makes men and women different is their bodies. We are all products of our environment; and there is no more intimate environment than one's own body.

Our bodies limit the way we experience the rest of the world. If I were a dog, I would experience the world primarily through my sense of smell. If I were a burrowing mammal like a guinea pig, my ears would be my windows to the world since sound travels so well underground.

So we each see the world differently – all 6 billion of us has his or her view of it. That doesn't mean that we can't take a mental leap and imagine how others see the world. In many of my stories, I tell the story from a woman's point of view.

I want to know how the other 50% of the population lives. More than half my friends are women. I am sexually attracted to only a very small percentage of them. For the rest of them ... I simply enjoy their company. A man can have a relationship with a woman – yes, even a female dominant relationship with a woman – that is not sexual.

WHY ARE SOME MEN SUBMISSIVE?

There can be any number of reasons why some men are submissive. I’m not a psychiatrist, and I am sure that even they don’t know. Here are just some possibilities.

• He could be abdicating his responsibilities. Men are taught from age 1 that they are supposed to be responsible for everything. Sometimes it is nice to give up control and let someone else drive.

• It could be an age regression thing. Childhood is usually a pleasantly remembered time of life. It was also an age where mom provided all the love, decision making and discipline for you.

• It could be that he likes he excitement of the unknown. If the woman is in control of his actions, he may not know what she will do next, even though he obviously trusts her.

• It could be "liberal guilt." Men have been oppressing women since the dawn of time, and this is his way to make up for it.

• It could be Catholic Guilt (I have to spell guilt with a capital "G" here). Sex is dirty. Sex is sinful. Don’t do sex. The logical conclusion is: have someone else do sex to you. You can’t commit a sin if someone else makes you do it, can you?

• Having the female in charge is certainly a change in routine. It’s variety.

The male submissive probably doesn’t really know himself. All he does know is that it is something that excites him. That’s probably all his partner needs to know too.

ARE SUBMISSIVE MEN NATURALLY WHIMPISH?

I've had the good fortune of having good things happen to me early in my life. This good fortune gave me the strength to "take the hits" that came later. I am an extremely confident person. I need very little validation. This makes it easier for me to take risks and worry little about ridicule.

I don't need to act in the stereotypical male macho role. I can let my feminine side out without worrying about being thought of as a wimp.

Many dominant females absolutely detest whimpish, sniveling submissives. Where is the excitement in toasting a marshmallow? Taming a tiger is much more satisfying.

It takes a lot of stamina and emotional maturity to trust someone so much that you would hand over your most valuable asset – yourself – to her.

IS FEMALE DOMINATION FOR YOU?

Many fantasies about female domination are just that – fantasies. They have no basis in reality and are just plain impractical. These are the things you can think about and that turn you on immensely, but you have absolutely no real-world interest in carrying them out. There is nothing wrong with living a fantasy life with no intention of making it a real life.

There are a couple of approaches to this situation.

• Live with it. Think about it, masturbate to it, or do whatever you will in private.

• You can join a bulletin board and let your electronic persona live out your fantasies for you.

• You can write stories about female domination and let your characters do the living for you.

• If you are very fortunate, you’ll find a mate who is willing to talk with you about your fantasies.

Fantasies are a normal part of life, and unless they interfere with the normal conduct of our life, are perfectly harmless. Enjoy them without guilt.

However, you may have the urge to actually live out what your mind tells you is what you want to do. I cannot express the following enough:

SAFE and SANE and CONSENSUAL among ADULTS

Read the alt.sex.bondage FAQ for details of how to maintain a safe and sane BDSM relationship.

The bottom line (pun not intended) is: only you can make a judgment if female domination is right for you.

GETTING ESTABLISHED IN A FEMALE DOMINANT RELATIONSHIP

There are two ways to establish a relationship with a dominant female. You can find a dominant woman and build a relationship with her, or you can have an established relationship with a woman and convince her that dominating you is what she wants to do. In either case, the emphasis is on establishing and maintaining the relationship. The dominance comes second.

MEETING THE DOMME OF YOUR DREAMS

The first thing you need to understand about meeting a mistress is that in spite of theories to the contrary, mistresses are people, and they pretty much like the same things that most other people like. Among these things is respect.

I’m not talking about giving them the fawning, self-debasing awe that we see in personal ads – you know what I am talking about, "Most high mistress whose toe punk I am unworthy to sniff …" Praise of this kind can be taken to the extremes of hilarity, and is a fun game to play once established in a relationship.

I am talking about simple, common (I often wonder exactly how common) respect that all people deserve: respect for her intelligence, respect for her personality, and just plain old personal respect.

The second thing you need to understand about mistresses is that they are women (and I wonder if there isn’t a little girl in some of them). I imagine that they like to be treated like women.

Finally, they are dominant females.

They can also be a number of other things in between including mothers, gardeners, computer programmers, bicyclists, book readers, and sports fans – all the more levels on which you can relate to them.

The key is to relate to them first on a human level, then on a woman level and finally on a female dominant level. Try to envision them as real people. Ignore, for the moment, the image of a leather-clad beauty in spiked-heeled boots. Chances are that’s not what she’s wearing when she’s reading the net anyway. If you saw this woman dressed in normal clothing, and you met her in the supermarket, or on the tennis court, or coming out of an office building, how would you go about meeting her?

It’s unlikely that you’d immediately throw yourself on the floor in front of her and kiss her feet. Women tend to run away from people like that, or call the police, or both. Chances are you would look for an opening and use it. Something like: "I heard what you said about … and I am interested." or "That’s a great backhand you have."

So why would it be any different on the net? Why is it that some people think that just because a woman is dominant, she is some sort of a slut? A sexually aggressive woman is not necessarily a sexually free woman.

Yet most of the clueless subs on the net post articles or personals which are about as tasteful as walking up to a woman and asking her, "Wanna fuck?" This isn’t exactly a bad statement – later on in the relationship. As an opening line, however, generally it sucks.

Whatever happened to good old-fashioned courtship? Try treating a potential mistress as a person first, a woman second, and a dominant female third, and then if the response is good, as potential sexual partner. There’s no magic formula here. You are going to have to feel your way. Communications and human relation skills will get you a long way down the road.

This is not entirely an academic exercise for me as a male. I’ve written a number of stories from the dominant female point of view. Because of this, some of my readers assumed that I was a dominant female. I’ve been propositioned by a number of clueless subs, and I find it both humorous and disgusting. One of these days, I am going to string one of them along just for the sadistic pleasure of it.

Also, Ms. Amity sometimes tosses me some of the propositions she gets (in much the same fashion as a mother cat will throw her kittens a wounded mouse), and I have fun slow roasting these clueless suitors. (It’s more fun than flaming) Most I never hear from again, some apologize, some take offense, but hey, I have a job to do and I do it.

If you are going to attract a dominant female, you will have to offer her something – offer her the most important thing you have – you! If you are out for more than a temporary female dominant relationship, you’ll have to do more than just pay for it. Make her want you, make her want to dominate you. To do this, you have to make yourself a good sub.

MAKING THE DOMME OF YOUR DREAMS

One of the most common laments I see on the net is "My (wife/girlfriend) won’t dominate me. What can I do?

The short answer is that if she doesn’t want to dominate you, there is nothing you can do to make her dominate you. The best you can do is educating her to what female domination is, and why it is important to you. Then you can hope that she wants to dominate you.

More important than getting her to understand you is to understand her. What are her real objections to domination? Getting the answer out of her is going to take skill in communications.

COMMUNICATING WITH YOUR PARTNER

Talking about sex with your partner can be a very difficult thing. It takes a lot of confidence for a male to put his ego on the line and talk honestly about his lovemaking. If you can’t stand the answer, don’t ask the question. On the other hand, most (traditional) women are taught not to talk about sex with their partners.

I learned a fact in one of the many seminars I attended on communications -- In 40% of all disagreements there is no difference of opinion, there is merely a difference in understanding.

You will have to work on basic communications first so you can talk about sex with confidence. In his book, "The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People," Steven Covey advocates, "Seek first to understand then be understood."

Whenever we hear something with which we disagree, our normal reaction is, "Red Alert! Shields up. Arm photon torpedoes. Lock phasers on target." when what is really needed is "Open a hailing frequency."

The key to success in seeking to understand is the realization that

YOU DON’T HAVE TO AGREE,
YOU MERELY HAVE TO UNDERSTAND

Get your partner to buy into this concept and you’ll solve many of life’s problems. If nothing else, when you fight, you’ll be fighting about real issues.

Take understanding with a grain of salt. Normal people don’t go around trying to pick a fight with others. Those that do have bigger problems than communications and this problem is beyond the scope of this posting.

When most people tell you something you don’t want to hear, it’s usually because of something you’ve done, not because of who you are. In a lot of instances, their issue might not be with you at all, but you happen to be the "NAF" (nearest available flunky) in other words, you’re the first target they can find and they don’t care if you’re the wrong target.

In other words, even belligerent people want to communicate, and if you are patient and a willing to understand first, and wait for the hostilities to cease, then you can start to communicate.

Hopefully, you’re dealing with a cooperative partner when starting a femdom relationship.

Active communication is more than nodding your head and saying "uh-huh." Learn how to clarify and confirm.

If you know you don’t understand what the other person is saying, clarify!

Clarifying is asking them to tell you again using different words or examples. You should hear yourself saying things like, "I don’t understand ... Tell me more about ..." Asking questions takes some delicacy, you don’t want to come across as cross-examining your partner, or having them defend their position. "How can you come up with a hair-brained scheme like that?" is probably not a good question to ask.. "Wait a minute, I don’t understand what you mean by ..." is probably more appropriate.

If you think you understand what the other person is saying, confirm!

Confirming is telling them what they just said using different words or examples. You should hear yourself saying things like, "In other words ... What you’re saying is ..." Don’t try to interpret what they’re saying, and certainly don’t try to put words into their mouths -- try to express the sentiment from their point of view. Also don’t be patronizing. If someone says, "Looks; like rain," you don’t have to respond, "So what your saying is that the weather looks threatening?" Nodding and saying "uh-huh" is probably appropriate here.

Concentrate on values: Try to figure out what’s important to the other person. Translated into relationship terms, your partner may be hesitant to try domination because she doesn’t understand what it is. She loves you, and wants to please you (a value you share hopefully), but is afraid of the unknown. What’s important to her may be knowing what to do, and being able to back out without fear of hurting you.

One possible solution is to plan a very small "scene" that she can play easily. Tell her that if she stops mid-stream you won’t be offended, in fact, you’d be pleased that she even tried. Maybe she’ll feel silly and start giggling in the middle of it. Don’t let that spoil the mood. Laugh with her. Be supportive.

Concentrate on actions: If conflict arises, emphasize what the person did that upset you rather than the fact that you are upset with the person himself. I never told my children that they were stupid. Quite the contrary. I’ve heard myself say, "How can someone so smart do such as stupid thing?" It got them concentrating on the action rather than getting defensive about being called "stupid."

There’s a world of difference between telling your partner, "You’re not aggressive enough." and "I wish you’d act more aggressively."

Work on the win-win. There are two things in life that will frustrate you in life:

• losing, and
• thinking that you’ve won.

Many games people play are "zero sum." In a zero sum game, the amount won by one side exactly equals the amount lost by the other side. Most people understand this concept clearly. For example, if a player in a poker game wins a $100 pot, it is because the other players in the game have lost $100.

There are "negative sum" games where the sum of the losses exceeds the sum of the winnings. War is such a game. Both sides spend good manpower and money to destroy the lives, environment, and assets of the other side and manage to succeed to some degree. Nobody actually wins a war; one side merely loses less than the other.

Then there are "positive sum" games where the sum of the winnings exceeds the sum of the losses. I’ll let you use my mule (no great loss for me, but of great value to you) if I can have a portion of your crop (a great value to me, and no great loss to you).

Compromise is not the objective, consensus is. Compromises are very often zero-sum games. Although both sides win something, they also lose something, and losing causes resentment. The only way to be truly happy with a any kind of relationship (business or personal) is when both sides feel like they’ve gotten more out of it than they’ve put in.

Do what you both agree you can do. Never do what you don’t want to do regardless of the rewards. You’ll have to respect that this is your partner’s right as well.

IS IT ALL WHIPS AND CHAINS?

What turns a lot of women off to female domination is the misconception that they have to wear leather, bind their mate up in chains and inflict physical pain on him. This is a radical first step for most women. Let her ease into the role, guys.

Start by having her read a number of stories or postings featuring female domination. I’d start with stories that deal with the topic in a mild manner and perhaps not so graphically. I will unabashedly plug several candidate stories – pick one (or all) depending on your kink. All of them are available on http://www.thebarnyard.net

All of these are femdom lite (1/3 less bondage). All of them contain very few graphic depictions of sex. The most violent any of them get is an over-the-knee spanking administered by the woman on her partner. You may also want to try:

APPENDIX

The appendix is a collection of dialogues I have had with some of my correspondents. These conversations give some insight into other people’s thoughts on female domination.

I think the thing I like about a lot of your writings is that they contain a certain interplay of energy that I can strongly relate to. On the one hand, I can point out things about the sexual dynamic and situations of your stories I like a lot (i.e. I have always been a lot more interested in psychological interplay in d&s scenes than in the whole bondage/punishment angle). I also can relate to your sense of kink a lot better than with a lot of stuff floating on the net. :-)

As I mentioned in one of my stories, it's a "game played mostly in the mind." I had an interest in female domination for as long as I could remember, although it wasn't until I was in my 20's that I even knew the name for it.

Even then, I had difficulty understanding how a female dominant and her submissive male could relate. What's in a relationship where one person constantly inflicts pain on the other. It took me another 20 years to figure out that there are many levels of relationship.

I consider myself a light player. In other words, female domination is just one way I play and explore. I've been lucky enough to find a partner as curious as me, and willing to play at my level. We kid each other a lot. She calls me a "lousy sub" (guilty as charged) and I call her an "adequate domme." What we have as a relationship outside of the D&S is much more valuable than the play.

Beyond this, though, your writing seems to evoke for me a sense that I can best describe as "gender identity in free-fall", where gender and sexual polarities (male-female, dom-sub, rational-emotional, etc.) become hats to be freely exchanged, rather than hard-wired, unchangeable biological roles.

I like to play a mind-game: I pretend that I am an alien from another planet, and I observe earth's culture. Some of the things we take so much for granted as human beings are so arbitrary.

For example, we have a nudity taboo. I don't know why this is. My body isn't the greatest on the planet, but I am not ashamed of it. I know what women look like, and I'm sure they know what men look like. So why is nudity erotic (It isn't for me -- I like looking at human bodies, but they don't give me a hard-on. – Now what people can do with each others' bodies – that can be extremely erotic).

Anyway, something in reading your stories provided me with one of those "ah ha!" experiences. Lately, I suppose I've felt rather at odds with myself sexually. On the one hand, there is something about playing with different polarities, even in fantasy, that I have found to be very liberating and empowering.

I'm glad to have provided you with an "ah ha" experience. You mention liberation. Liberty is a very sacred word to me. I had the fortune to go through AF survival school. As part of my training, I spent several days as a POW. This experience taught me two lessons:

• They will not take me alive. I would rather rot in a festering jungle than to live in even the most benign captivity.
• They can only imprison my body. I maintain the freedom of my soul.

If you want to learn more about this experience read Victor Frankl’s "Man’s Search for Meaning" – it’s a short book about how a Jewish psychologist survived a Nazi concentration camp.

You will find that liberty is not being set free. It is setting yourself free.

On the other hand, I have been repeatedly frustrated in my attempts to communicate with others about such things, and as a result I've found myself wondering whether I should just try to give it all up and restrict myself to purely vanilla sexual urges. Even if it doesn't make me a bad person, I tell myself, the way I am wired sexually is just causing me lots of stress and isn't accomplishing anything positive.

Don't become a prisoner of your own will. Don't not do something for fear of what others may think of you. Worse yet don't not do something for fear of what you think others may think of you.

You can only be happy if you are whole. The whole world can be in conflict with you, and you can be happy. If you are in conflict with yourself, you are miserable.

When I read your stories, and your commentary thereupon, as well as posts by various people on alt.sex.femdom, I can see a certain shared ground which really inspires me.

You'll find the femdom community to be one of the most accepting and tolerant communities on the net.

While femdom may play a significant role in my fantasy life, I'm not really interested in pursuing it for its own sake in the real world.

There's nothing wrong with this. This is exactly the way I started.

What I like is the general sensation of "lets not make any assumptions about what nature and society have said is immutable - let's move things around and see what happens".

This is a lot like my alien experiment I mentioned above. Who's to say that the way the rest of the world is doing it is right?

Furthermore, and most inspiring, is the idea that such adventures may not just result in physical pleasure - there may be potential for real communication and self-discovery lurking in there somewhere.

I hope so. My journey has been a long one, but it isn't over yet. Like a 3-year-old child, I still find new things in the world every day.

Don't feel frustrated about having people understand you just yet. You merely haven't found the right audience.

Good luck on your journey.

In a world of net crap, I am utterly blown away by "dom of Jason".

Thank you for you encouraging words.

My wife and I just broke through to a halting dialogue about this topic, and I was lost as to how to steer into what I wanted without pushing her in ways she wouldn't want; to give her this story instead is a tremendous aid for us.

I didn't write Jason with this purpose in mind, but I get a lot of mail from men who tell me that this is the story that they show their women to introduce them to female domination.

If your wife took Jason well, I strongly suggest you download and have her read "Bedtime Stories" by Amity Harris and me. This story is a semi-fictitious account of how some mid-40ish women explore their femdom tendencies. There are few explicit sex scenes – these consist of a series of letters written by a male submissive. Most of the story is about the women discussing their reactions to these letters.

As is typical of my stories, there is very little bondage or pain.

Please email me at xxx@yyy.com when you add onto this (please!), and with comments if u have any. We are starting this for real and don't want to fuck it up.

Keep talking! Any relationship (femdom or otherwise) can be improved by talking. Maybe you will find that femdom is not your (plural as in the two of you) thing, but you may discover other interesting things about one another.

Look at femdom as a continuum, where one end is the woman who timidly asks, "Honey, do you want to ... you know?" (at least she's initiating sex :-) and on the other end of the spectrum is the leather-clad bitch with whips, chains and other devices.

Most people are somewhere in between. Femdom isn't a whole package, you don't have to take it all. You can play games part-time, you can role play you can even switch. Maybe all you need is to have her tie your wrists with a silk scarf while she "makes out" with you. Maybe you would like her to play spank you. Maybe you want her to dress you in women's clothes. Maybe you want age play (she's the school teacher, you're the student). You can pick and choose anything.

But talk first! Don't do until you are ready, and NEVER "force it." Talk about it while you're doing it - in the beginning, it may "ruin the mood," but in the long run, it will make the relationship more satisfying - neither of you can read the other's mind.

I suggest that when you get comfortable with talking about it, that you make a list: You (the male) can write down things in the following categories:

• Things I know I'd like you to do to me. -- They turn me on so much that I'd do them even if you weren’t around.

• Things I can do and would turn me on if I knew that they'd turn you on.

• Things that are neutral: they don't turn me on, but they don’t turn me off. (you'd be surprise how many of these move to the former category when the relationship gets going).

• Things I don't know about but am willing to try.

• Things I don't know about period.

• Things I definitely would not want to do.

Have your partner make up a similar list. "Things I'd really like to do to you ... Things that would turn me on only if they turned you on ... Things I'd be willing to try once and see if I'd like them ... Things I definitely will not do."

Consolidate the lists and talk about them. If some items are incompatible, forget them for the moment. You will probably have enough to start with - you will have to play a lot to learn a lot. You'll find that things will move around on each others’ list as you learn more about yourselves and each other.

I am a submissive husband married to a beautiful woman. I constantly have fantasies about being sexually used, abused, and humiliated by her.

Unfortunately, she is not open to kinky sex. She won't even let me lick her clean asshole because it is not "sanitary". How can I introduce her to the joys of bdsm for a dominant woman? Please e-mail your advice to me at xxx@yyy.com.

You might want to start with something less intense. Talk to her about your interests. Write them down. Tell her these aren't demands, but are just things that you find interesting.

The key is to communicate. Don't make a big deal out of the differences, and concentrate on those things you can agree on.

One of the things that really touched me when reading TPD was in the forward, when you talked about how Farnorth and yourself often corresponded with one another "as" Linda and Kim, and established a real rapport this way. For some reason, this made me think of something I read a while ago about Innuit & Siberian shamans. When they first come into their own as shamans, they begin dressing like women (assuming they are male), using female social/linguistic conventions, etc. This is all socially accepted and encouraged, and the individual plays an interesting dramatic role within the tribe as someone halfway between worlds.

I like to play with gender in my writing. It's only an extension of my real life where gender has little meaning. I might have more trouble identifying with a person of another race than I do with a person of the other gender.

There's an old joke, "If you ain't bi, you're missing half the action." Well, I seem to be 99 and 44/100% heterosexual, but I can see myself as a woman, or at least I can see the world more like a woman does than do most men. I consider this to be a big advantage when trying to relate with people.

I could put myself in Linda's sneakers :-) and I could accept this portly, middle-aged man from Alaska as the dainty and ultrafeminine Kim.

I am writing this note after having read a number of your stories on the net, to let you know how much I have enjoyed them. I had read a couple of them some time ago, but recently I was browsing on alt.sex.femdom and saw mention of your ftp archive in your .sig file. Of what I've read, my favorites are "Making of a Mistress" (which I first read a while ago) and "The Painter's Daughters" (which was new to me).

Thank you. MoaM was my childhood fantasy (from when I was about 6 years old) finally put into print (the first drafts were done when I was about 12), and finally published (in my mid-40's).

TPD was a really fun project working with Farnorth. Farnorth was the first person I "outed" to. It was comforting to know that other seemingly "normal" people had the same interests I did. They weren't sniveling perverts, in fact they seem more sane than most "normal" people.

Normal is the hump on the bell-shaped curve. The further you get from the norm, as a statistician would say, the more abnormal you become. Abnormal doesn't mean bad. It means exceptional.

Besides this isn't Mr. Grimsbly's Algebra class; this is life.