As I understand it, here's the pattern:
- Top-space. This is the normal, vanilla headspace where I live most of my life. Here, I am more independent and free-thinking, although I still submit to my husband at times.
- Relaxation. As an abuse survivor, it is hard for me to relax before sex. Even when I want sex. My tendency is to get tense. I try to take deep breaths and focus, but it isn't in my control. My Dom will often do things to help me relax, such as talking to me, reminding me to breathe and relax, or stroking me soothingly. If those still don't work, he can usually get me to relax by distracting me (making me focus on pleasing him, for instance) or making me feel physically controlled (by tying me up, handcuffing me, pinching my nipples, choking me, or forcing his fingers down my throat).
- Desire to Be Hurt. Once I am finally relaxed or distracted, I am often struck by an inexplicable desire for him to hurt me. I'm sure a psychologist would have a field day with this admission! But instead of desiring physical pleasure (which is, I guess, what society says I am "supposed" to feel after I relax and before sex), I long to be hurt. I wish he would choke me, or torture my nipples, or pull my hair. I want him to make me in service to him and I want him to demonstrate his power over me. I also want to know that he wants to hurt me.
- Being Hurt. If he hurts me, my pain will increase at first, and then decrease without explanation. Suddenly, my body releases endorphins and I descend into a much deeper relaxation than before. I start to float toward subspace, and hover just outside it.
- Being Pushed. I usually just need one more big shove at this point to put me into subspace. I'll hover there, expectant and longing. He can do many things to give me this "big push." He can talk to me, telling me how he owns me. This is more a mental domination. Or he can hurt me more, which is especially effective if he also tells me how much he enjoys hurting me and how much it turns him on, and if he forces me to explain to him how much I am hurting. This is both pain-based and mental domination. Either the dirty talk or the pain, in a large enough dose, will give me that big push I need to enter into full submission.
- Wanting Pleasure. In this level, I'm in subspace and I am greedy to experience everything he has to offer. I could lie there happily and take hours and hours of pain or pleasure (or both!). Here, pain no longer registers as pain and usually feels very sexual and pleasurable. I can take much higher doses of pain in this stage as well, and am often disappointed because he'll stop when "Topspace me" would be maxed out, but well before "Subspace me" is done.
- Wanting to Serve. Once my greedy submissive desires have been sated, I also want to serve him. I am still in subspace, but now I'm feeling how much I love him and how grateful I am for all that delicious pain and pleasure he's just given me. In this stage, I'll do completely un-"Topspace me" like things like beg to serve him sexually, draw him a bath, or make him lunch. Usually, he has to force me to do these things!
- Floating Down. Once we're done in the bedroom, I still feel submissive to him for several hours afterward. I stick to him like glue in public, get up to get him drinks or snacks, and worry a lot more about how he wants me to wear my hair, makeup, or clothes. Again, in Topspace, I'm more independent than this, so he thoroughly enjoys it!
- Subdrop. The sad epilogue of a truly great scene. After I come floating off of my subspace cloud, I long to re-start the process (which is easier to jumpstart from Stage 8 than Stage 1) and feel it again. If we don't have time or he is at work, I eventually get sad and mopey. I long to feel subspace again. Sometimes I'll get emotional and grouchy, or test him to try to get my "submissive high" again.
- Normal Topspace. Eventually, I go back to normal, which is basically Stage 1.
This pattern may be something other subs experience or it may not; it is, however, definitely the stages as I've noticed I go through them. It only really applies to sexual submission, as outside the bedroom I can easily get him lunch or do his laundry while still in top-space.
If there is a breakdown at some stage of the pattern (usually Stage 2, 3, or 4 are the places we get stalled), it's impossible for me to get into subspace or be that willing sexual submissive he wants me to be. It may be because of my history; an inability to relax before sex or feel pleasure without being dominated and hurt can definitely hijack the normal process of sexual arousal. Yet I know many kinksters who prefer sex with pain and/or domination, so I don't think it can be 100% attributed to an abusive past.
Either way, I'm not sure why I do TTWD, but this is what works for me.
4 comments:
Very interesting! Thanks for posting this. I think a lot of people will find the steps you have described as helpful and intriguing. Everyone is a little different, but I think a lot of submissives will be able to relate. I think this is also good for Dominants to know this cycle and be able to understand it. Very nice!
DV
This is a great post and gives good insight for Doms. Thank you for being self-aware and articulate enough to post this.
I am not like you, but I found your post very interesting because you know yourself so well.
Sound very familiar! I'm not sure if I experience stages as concretely as you, but I do recognice almost all of them. Seems really helpful to list them like this; they are so foggy in the moment. Could also help Wonderboy to know how dropping into subspace works and how he could use that knowledge... ;)
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