Attachment and containment

 'It's not my job to supervise you,' he said to me. 'You know what to do, so just do it.'

Why is it that the submissive mind, or is it just my mind, wants to feel the firm presence of the dominant?

Because it feels safe. 

There's some ancient, primal, neanderthal part of my brain that wants to know that he notices.

- I put on my bracelet each morning. 

- I take the cocktail of vitamins he insists I take each day. 

- I ask for permission to eat something sweet or to have a glass of wine (I suggested this rule). 

- I turn down our bed each night.

- I refer to him as 'Sir' in play situations and when he is cross and wants to enforce my place.

- I advise when I am leaving the house, where I am going and when I will return.

- I wish him 'Good morning, Sir' each morning.

- I wait until he is ready to eat before I begin to eat.

All these things I do, that sit beside all the other many ways I serve and assist him, and of course, all the ways he serves and assists me in more overarching ways.

The goal is not to fight, but to discuss calmly what needs to be discussed. He has the ultimate say.

In his very late 60s, he is busier than ever. We were at dinner last night and I took the listening position as he got off his chest and processed all the myriads of things currently on his plate. I knew he needed to do that. 

In between, he told me off for getting flummoxed earlier. 'Just do what you know to do. I am not going to supervise you. But if you need it, the cane still sits in my cupboard. If you need a couple of stripes across your ass to get the message, I can do that.'

I momentarily put my hands over my face. We were sitting in a restaurant, and I didn't instinctively do that because I was embarrassed. I did it because I knew I hadn't behaved well.

It has come to my attention (I research stuff, as you may have gathered) that I have a somewhat 'disorganised attachment' style. I get anxious and I get fearful, and I don't necessarily always have control over those outcomes. My emotions can be felt very keenly, and I can't always self soothe my way out of them.

Containment helps. Knowing somatically that I am safe and that the fear is more in my head than it is real, is something I work on every day.

Yoga is my therapy. Bessel van der Kolk of 'The Body Keeps the Score' fame is entirely correct in my opinion. The trauma is held in the body and bodywork is needed to release it. I will be doing yoga until I simply can't do it anymore, I go to a trauma informed yoga studio. I wouldn't go anywhere else, and I practice the art of being at peace within myself, even when things get hard. This is the whole point of yoga.

Every day is a bit of a challenge at the same time as it is a blessing. 

Ceasefire

 I said to my husband this morning, "I feel like I have been through something, and I feel like I have come out the other side of whatever that was". It's hard to explain it further because I am not sure myself how to put words around a feeling I had that I had been asked to be something that I simply cannot be.

I tried. I really did. I had been asked, as a form of marital therapy, to become more of the person who initiates; more independent and autonomous. I felt a big fat loser for failing to become the aggressor, the more self-directed person - until - I remembered something that Deity had said to me more than a few times...

'Can a kitten suddenly transform to a tiger?' (He didn't say exactly that but that's a fair example of the things he would say to me.)

To digress a little, he would also say, "can a table have thoughts or feelings?' but that's another story for another day.

My husband has been wonderful over the past few weeks sitting with me, over a late dinner, or together on the couch, listening, listening and listening some more.

He could see I was confused, discombobulated, far outside the state I love best, equanimity.

No-one's patience is eternal and eventually he started making observations and asking questions. 

"Do you think you are regretting some behaviours and decisions?"

"Do you think you are being fair in your assessments?"

Honestly, we navigated a lot of territory, so I can't remember all that much of what he said and what I said, except that I felt a whole bucketful of shame for being me; some great qualities, some not so great qualities, like us all, but as well, a sense of shame for wanting what I want; union.

Lately, I had realized that I was bashing my head against a brick wall, the way someone might do when the frustration overwhelms. I came to see that was a useless exercise. My head was hurting, and I wasn't getting the result I wanted. The brick wall was still a brick wall. My head had had no effect on the brick wall, and it never would. Something had to change but it wouldn't be the brick wall.

Then, this morning, as I lay there in the dark, silent, it occurred to me. The revelation was this. I am sick of trying to be better than I am right now. Sure, we can all grow, bit by bit, but I don't want to fixate on this right now. 

Instead, why not focus on skills - to be a better cook, a better writer, a better gardener. Why not focus on that?

The moment I did decide to do this, it was as if my mind did a rejig, the way a washing machine will rejig to get the clothes balanced, and I began to feel calm and settled. It was almost as if all the 'parts' inside my head breathed a sigh of relief at once and said, 'Thank God, she's going to give herself a break. She's going to just be herself. Put down your weapons. It's a ceasefire.'

For the past few nights my husband has come to bed at the same time as me and he quietly massages parts of my body - arms, lower back, shoulders. It's a piece of heaven for me. I fall asleep like this, and I stay asleep until morning.

I want and I need, his solidity. When I have that, I feel submissive down to my bones. I feel me and I feel authentic. I feel whole... I feel wonderful.

Needing more or needing less

I bought myself the book titled 'Healing Developmental Trauma' by Laurence Heller. In this book, it explains the various responses to early developmental trauma. From memory there are five categories, and I feel confident in saying that I fall into the 'attunement' category. I have a longing for connection, to be attuned to someone else.

This falls in line with my submissive nature, I believe, and with my desire for a very strong connection with my mate, perhaps stronger than I am going to find in a vanilla marriage. I felt this as a young woman, well, as a teenager actually. I saw 'The Story of O' and resonated on a number of levels. It was profoundly arousing to me, absolutely, but it also felt like a slice of heaven to imagine having that deep sense of intimacy with someone else.

I think my husband's developmental trauma fits into the Trust category and whilst I hadn't thought about it like this before, he struggles to be dependent on someone, the opposite of my response to early developmental trauma. He lost his mother as a teenager, it was a shock, and it makes sense that the unconscious mind should decide that he cannot afford to need someone who could be taken away at a moment's notice, again.

So, he does depend on me for consistent support and simply being here, but it would seem from that chapter, he doesn't want to be so dependent on me as a deep D/s structure would require. Depth, in and of itself, maybe is something that he somatically resists. This chapter made sense to me as I know him and as I know his history. In this way, there is only so far we can go in a D/s dynamic. 

His (undiagnosed) ADHD is a factor as well. He needs a lot of time alone. He would say he needs the time because he has a relentless pile of work to get through, but it's more than that. I have noticed this need for as long as I have known him and that's almost 50 years.

I took quite a bit of time to consider this. What exactly would be the point of insisting this not be so? Can I, frustrated with the weather, stop the sun from bearing down this February, or insist that the Rain Gods do their job?

I did a flow yoga class last evening, not especially good, I thought, until Shavasana, when you lay like a corpse and absorb the benefits of your practice. I was calm, enjoying the heat of my body starting to reduce, when I noticed that thoughts were almost gone and instead there was a white light in front of my closed eyes, a bit like fog.

There is a person in my life that I thought about, someone close to the end of their life whose face came before me, putting the fog in the background, sort of encircling the face. My mind seemed to stop, and then the face dissolved into the fog; gone. 

It reminded me of a thought I have often had; that all our little worries dissolve into the past when we are gone. The worries were some sort of illusion, the world didn't need them and wouldn't be hanging onto them. In that moment, it felt like the needing more had also dissolved. At least, I had a taste of it.

Us

 For those who haven't read this e-journal before, let me recap the past year or so.

We engaged a sort of sex therapist with the idea that we wanted a more formal and satisfying D/s relationship. There was considerable derailment around whether we were codependent or not, blah, blah, blah. As opposed to providing a sense of calm and equanimity - always my goal - there was a long period of dishevelment and analysis, never a good thing.

There was a 10-week period around 15 months ago where I was in a no-man's land. That is, my submissive thoughts had been removed via hypnotic trance, and ultimately, they were returned with some more intensity. If you should ever find yourself wondering if this is a good idea, all I can say is, I do not recommend the process.

However, once the submission was returned with gusto, for a few weeks, it was a dream come true. My submission was attached to orgasm and obedience, and I revelled in it. We both did.

There was a day over (our) summer when things didn't go so well. He interrogated me about my thoughts and in the end, I expressed some fears around the status quo (unrelated to the relationship per se but rather around my sense of safety. He can tolerate miles more risk than me and that's what that was about).

This set us deeply off track in term of the oh so new intense dynamic. He simply stopped being sexually dominant.

It's hard to put in words the sense of loss. Having waited for so long for him to be this way, the rug was pulled from under my feet so soon after it had begun.

We both wore the responsibility of the failure. It's like we didn't know how to repair, we honestly didn't know what to do.

I started to talk about the Contract, a BDSM sort of Contract, one of fair substance and detail, finalising it and getting it signed. He sort of agreed but he actually did next to nothing (read nothing) to sort this. I would write a draft, and he would look at it and in more recent times, sometimes he would say something like, 'I don't see how you can have so much input into it, it doesn't feel right'. I would reply, 'So can you give your input?'

Maybe two months ago, he agreed to sit down and discuss it with me, and we took notes. It was a great session, but still something was holding him back. It remained incomplete and unsigned. He later shared that it felt like a business contract and as such required line by line analysis and he didn't have the time or inclination for it.

I started listening to Andrew and Dawn at Dom Sub Devotion and for the first time, it all made so much sense. Here was a man who had lived in a longish marriage who had come to his wife and asked for a power dynamic, like me.

Slowly, carefully, artfully, with deep respect and wisdom he had become the architect of their lives such that she could sink into her authenticity as he could sink into his. I was completely smitten.

So, I thought about all the elements of their power dynamic that I loved and in one sitting, one afternoon, whilst my husband was at work, I wrote us a new and short Contract. I think I wrote it in ten minutes because it simply flowed out of me.

I sent it in a text to my husband and when he saw his phone and read it, he sent me back a row of hearts. Later, he told me it was perfect.

In spite of all the mutterings about me being codependent to my husband, I am not. I am and always have been an independent gal, perfectly able to entertain and look after myself. I need love and I need attention, just like any submissively oriented girl. Bringing up four children, I often couldn't find time for myself. Yes, I was a devoted mother, but I am in a different era of my life and I can do self-care. I do have boundaries. 

I have, twice in my life, been subject to a form of love bombing. I used to berate myself for falling prey to this, but I have stopped doing that. I am probably no more and no less vulnerable to that sort of behaviour than any other girl who experienced some neglect as a child. I liked the adoration and when the devaluation started to take place, it took a little while for my brain to sort it, but sort it, it did.

That said, it feels authentic and pleasing to be in a D/s relationship. I enjoy being able to express my submissive nature. I'm perfectly okay with that.

I am happy to share the Contract here, for those who might resonate with a contract that has no BDSM notions and practices specifically laid out. We are in a long-term loving relationship and a consensual non-consensual relationship is what does it for us when all is well between us, as it is now.

Just before I do, I would like to share a recent happening when I, in my head, used the tenor of the Contract to remedy a situation.

We had had a very active period of time, interstate, and immersed in activities - fun, but exhausting. In the Uber on the way home I thought about what would be, a very late dinner. I suggested I send to my husband's text a list of ingredients and he was happy to make the run to the supermarket whilst I watered the garden after the heatwave.

By the time he returned, my tiredness had made me crochety. He isn't used to that, and he was doubly crotchety back. We ate the dinner, and I made my way to bed. We said good night to each other, but I knew he wasn't happy with me.

In the morning, he came to kiss me goodbye and as I put my arms around him, I said, "I am sorry." He said, "That means a lot to me." The dynamic was restored. This was good. I congratulated myself.

Inside, the feeling is different now. I am more at peace. Not all that much has changed on the surface, perhaps, but deep down, it feels far more real.

I require a sense of safety. There's been reason to be fearful in my life and it is a sense of safety I hanker for.

I also have taken from my childhood a bit of unworthiness, which is, quite frankly, an illusion. Sure, I could have achieved more, and maybe I will achieve more, but I have done fine. It's time to tell the self-judging part to back off. I am enough.

I plead guilty to having done my fair share of caretaking, but I have learned so much and put so much in place.

I honestly believe that my husband and I are in fact interdependent. We are there for each other. He has my back, and I have his back. We encourage each other in our individual pursuits, and we still love to spend time together. After 49 years together, I think that's not bad.

So, here's the Contract. I hope it helps someone.

CONTRACT BETWEEN VESTA and HER MAN

Henceforth from this date, C is the leader of this relationship and Vesta is the follower.

C will guide her as necessary and keep her safe, loved and cherished.

Vesta will accept his guidance and devote herself to him and the relationship.

In this way they both will experience polarity and the strongest sense of their own authenticity.

The dynamic will be experienced in moments of polarity as determined by C. Such moments, as determined by him and conveyed to her, would include the morning greeting, the wearing of a piece of jewellery symbolising their relationship, the turning down of the bed, for Vesta to wait to eat until he has his first bite of food, for Vesta to wait for him to open a car door, to order her meal at a restaurant.

C will determine how and when they will play together, and will decide on toys used, impact, pleasure, denial, instruction. Vesta will follow his lead in this, as in all things.

C, in seeking her authenticity, will enforce her expressing her full range of emotions and thoughts, in a respectful way, with final decisions as to direction and substance being determined by C.

This contract is written in expression of their enduring love, to death and beyond.

With love,

Dominant energy

 In one podcast I listen to relating to people in a D/s relationship, one couple found themselves living in different states for an extended period of time due to work commitments. She talked about strategies used to feel safe and loved. It's a few years ago now. I think she wears a night collar to tether her.

My husband and I did, at a few points in our lives together, live in different states, or even different countries, but that was a long time ago.

In the past year or even longer, we have lived almost in a twilight space. He has very long days, sometimes working in the house, but mostly he has left the house early and come home late.

We try hard to make that time late at night work to forge a connection. I start a meal, maybe go to yoga, come home and finish its preparation and then check in with him as to how far away he is.

Last night, we were eating the evening meal at 9.45 pm and I commented lightly that we were working our way towards a South American life where eating at that time was actually eating early.

He offered me a cup of tea after we ate, and we chatted about nothing all that particular whilst we drank the tea; then decided to finish watching a movie we had begun weeks ago, Fall Guy. It doesn't get much mindless than that and we had no mind left to think.

The expression of the dynamic between us right now doesn't have much of an overt show. I was told that I must wear one of the three pieces of jewellery that signify our agreement; one of two bracelets or a small necklace. It depends on the outfit. I had chosen the black and silver bracelet because it's safe to wear to yoga and won't clang or move too much.

If I were or were not in a power dynamic, I would make a well-balanced meal and one I know he would enjoy and suits his health issues. It gives me joy to present the meal to him and if he particularly enjoys it or if it is a new recipe, his compliments are generous.

I mostly clear the kitchen myself. He's dog tired these days after dinner and it's the least I can do.

He asked me, sitting on the couch, if there was something I would like him to do and I said, 'Would you like to rub my toes?' He said back, 'How about you rub my toes?'  I agreed and he lay himself down whilst I began to rub his feet and his toes.

He was very open about how much he was enjoying this and how long it had been since I had done something like this for him, and I registered it as the truth. He knows I adore to be touched and played with, and it is usually me getting that sort of attention from him. I made a mental note to be sure to attend to him in these ways much more regularly.

According to attachment style criteria I fall under the banner of an attunement attachment style. One develops as a child, if necessary, an attachment style to keep them safe. I struggle to ask to have my needs met, or at least I have over time. I think my needs are clear now. I state them with clarity now, but I don't always express them as calmly and respectfully as I should. Patience.

Attunement is not his survival attachment style. Yet, there are elements there. He struggles to tell me what he wants even though he tends to take what he feels he needs. If I were to answer the question, what does your husband need from you most, I would answer, 'plenty of time to himself'.

It won't change dramatically, but I think we might be heading down the path where we do have more time to create something more special together. Like one or two of the podcasts I listen to about couples who have created something quite sacred together, each new era in our lives is an opportunity for new creation. There is so much that is good about our union that I never give up on making the next body of time more special than the last one, no matter the obstacles.

The last thing I want is for our union to be akin to 'friends'. That is really taking a marriage straight to the bottom, at least for me. Well, that's one aspect. We are our best friends, for sure. I am his supporter, and he is mine. And we are very much in sync as parents and grandparents. 

Underlying everything is his masculine drive: to succeed, to protect, to set straight at times, and, more and more, to nurture. I do think he is beginning to see that I am a woman full of moving emotions, full of love, and he is starting to see what can be behind my upsets. 

For whatever reason, I am a little triggered when someone asks me where an item is. I think I try very hard to do the right thing by people and a missing item implies to me that I have misplaced the darn thing and inconvenienced them. I think that's the trigger.

I began to look for the thing. I just go into hyperdrive and it's far from the first time. He took me into a hug and said, 'It's not your fault. You didn't do anything wrong. You're a good girl.' 

Now, that's full marks for emotional intelligence, for meeting me in a low spot and bringing the vibration up.

I think this is a most dominant energy; to calm your girl; to be aware of what drives her and probably drives you both crazy. It's so much better than getting cross at her for not staying completely calm and undisturbed.

Women, women like me, want to feel safe in their bodies and being in a dominant energy, a dominant energy that says 'I've got you'; that's what we need.

I'll be entirely truthful here and say that I really would like something...firm. I'd like to feel his dominant presence with impact play such that he just pleased the hell out of himself. He's too tired to even think about it right now. This comes a close second.