To answer this question honestly, I have to admit that I really didn’t know what I needed in a Dominant until I met Him.

When I first introduced the concept of BDSM into our relationship, He was very open minded. He never made me feel judged, or that my kink was a novelty. He was respectful, inquisitive, and kind. He did research and read as much as He could. During one of our first conversations about D/s, He said that He felt He would be more of a “loving, gentle Dominant.”

That struck me, as until my experience with Him, the Dominants I had encountered hadn’t been gentle. Certainly there was affection associated in my prior submissive experiences, but nothing like I received from Him.

I suppose it’s a matter of not knowing what I needed until I had it right in front of me. He gives me strength, guidance, care. He knows me best, especially what I am capable of. He knows what I want to experience, where my limits are. He gives me the stability and calm that I crave. He is a loving and capable partner in parenting, and I’ve come to value His input and opinion above all else.

He motivates me. Challenges me. Keeps me grounded while still giving me the opportunity to chase my dreams.

I had a list of qualities I wanted to find in a partner, and truly when I met Him, He far exceeded those expectations. In fact, I gave Him that list at one point. I wanted Him to know just how much the gift of His Dominance meant to me and how much I love Him.

In the past, we didn’t incorporate rituals so much into our relationship as I would like to.

One of our only rituals were to stand with my eyes down until He gave me permission to look up at Him, and to ask permission before touching Him. Another was to ask permission before I was allowed an orgasm. I was required to start the shower for Him, and to be sure His needs were met, but we weren’t very formal with these tasks.

In the future, I’d like for us to incorporate rituals that will help me to express my submission to Him even when we are in the company of our children or others who might not be so comfortable with our relationship.

I would like to find ways to express my submission throughout the day, with rituals revolving around caring for Him. The beauty of such rituals is that to an outside eye, such care and treatment of Him could just be considered traditional in nature and not necessarily affiliated with a BDSM dynamic.

In the future I would like to have small rituals throughout the day that will help express my love to Him in a respectful way, such as feeding Him first, readying His shower before bed, giving Him a massage each night, etc.

My submission to Him is entirely emotional. I wouldn’t be capable of so much, nor want so much more, if it wasn’t for the emotional connection submission gives us.

The emotional side of submission isn’t one that I need to look for. It is just, there.

When I am providing for His comfort, His health, His care, it brings me closer to Him. The bond between us feels strongest when I know He feels the effort I put into loving Him.

When I am feeling disconnected and need my submission to bring me back to Him, physically submitting to Him is the deepest way I can find myself back to Him. Pushing my limits, giving myself to Him in ways I’ve never given to anyone else, the satisfaction of knowing that I give Him what He has always wanted, all of that makes me feel emotionally connected to Him in the deepest of ways.

He isn’t one to emote or be very affectionate, but when He is most satisfied with my submission He shows me in ways that draw me closer to Him. Each experience together brands me deeply.

While I take pride in my submission and what I am able to accomplish for Him, I do find myself questioning things from time to time.

For the most part, I try to be aware of maintaining a healthy balance in our relationship. I don’t want to lose myself too deep into submission that I neglect who I am outside of our relationship as well. Service to Him means I must make Him proud, not only as His submissive, but as a mother, daughter, sister, aunt and friend. I must be capable of loving His children selflessly, as well as loving His family. Service to Him must incorporate service to our families as well.

The bigger question for me from time to time, is whether my service to Him is meeting my own needs.

While I feel closest to Him when I am fulfilling His needs, I do from time to time question whether my submission is meeting my own needs as well. I crave time together, even if it isn’t being physically intimate, and I’m unable to have that anymore. The distance creates a challenge that sometimes feels insurmountable.

In moments when I overthink and tend to see the negative, I am learning that I need to turn my thoughts to the positive. As long as I stay focused on meeting His needs, I should have faith that He will make my own feelings a priority as well.

Because my submission is service oriented, I don’t feel submissive without a Dominant. In the past, I’ve neglected my submissive tendencies as a single submissive. My submission is a gift and without a Dominant there is nowhere to direct my submission.

The level of submission I’ve been able to reach currently is due only to Him and His Dominance. Without that gift, I wouldn’t be capable of so much.

*.9

I feel most submissive in his presence, but there are certainly physical positions which make me feel the most submissive.

When He makes me kneel for Him.

When He wraps His hands around my throat when we are making love.

When He takes my ass.

When I stand before Him, waiting for Him to grant me permission to look at Him.

Ironically, it is in these moments where I feel the closest to Him as well.

In prior relationships certainly my submission fluctuated. Especially at the end of the relationships, when I felt the Dominant was not an equal partner and my desire to submit faded.

With Him, I feel that my submission only grows. I’m finding myself more content than ever before with my service to Him, and am looking forward to more complete service and submission to Him in the future.

I’ve learned that when my desire to submit wanes, it means that our relationship overall needs work. Taking a step back to figure out where my efforts should be focused has proven to be more successful than withdrawing my submission. When our relationship is strained, rather than retreat and expect Him to do the work, I have learned to give more of myself to Him. Inevitably this method of submission has proven to be the most successful in repairing damage of any sort, and bringing our relationship back on track.

I don’t want my submission to Him to fluctuate. I’m not truly submitting to Him if I allow my moods or hurt feelings to determine my level of submission. The gift of submission must be unconditional, which means my submission must be steady and constant.

When our relationship was struggling, I thought that learning from other submissives and Dominants would help me to find a solution.

All the experience did was prove to me that I was better off looking to Him for guidance and that networking wasn’t the best course for me.

I’ve found that with the other submissives I was speaking with, their level of service and submission was different to my own. Often, their own Dominants would require them to suffer acts of humiliation. Some shared with me how financially strained they were as their Dominants required more than they could provide. To me, most of their situations bordered on abusive.

The Dominants I spoke with all had issues with wanting to assert themselves too much into my life. One had the idea of adding me as his new submissive. Another would be demanding and throw tantrums if I wasn’t able to communicate with him constantly. Although I asserted myself from the very beginning and was clear that I would not allow another person to Dom me, in the end, none of them respected this.

Networking did nothing but encourage me to look only to my Dominant for guidance and input. My experience in networking enabled me to realize that our relationship is different than anything else. While traditional D/s in some senses, in others we are very unique. Allowing outside opinions to influence our relationship only had a negative impact on our bond. It was because of this that we decided to eliminate networking with other D/s couples.

While many vanilla’s assume a submissive loses their voice in their relationship, that isn’t always the truth.

The reality of the matter is that because our relationship centers on honestly and openness, there isn’t often a situation where I need to actively communicate needs or wants to Him.

The struggle for me is to have the patience and trust that He will make my own needs a priority as well as His own. Learning to have faith in Him and His long term plan for our relationship is sometimes a daily focus for me.

Luckily for Him, my needs are simple. I need Him. I need our children to be healthy and happy. I want to be successful professionally. I want Him to be proud of me and my service to Him. I want time with our loved ones. I want to be with Him so that I can properly serve Him fully 24/7. He is fully aware of my wants and needs, and having faith in Him means that some day I will have the things I hope for.

Recently, it’s become very apparent to me that He does listen carefully to me and is very much in tune with my mood and feelings. He thoughtfully provides reassurance when I need it, even without being asked. He makes it clear to me that He listens to me, and takes my dreams into consideration. While I don’t often show my appreciation to Him for this, it is something that makes me feel very cared for by Him. He thoughtfully communicates my value to Him in His actions. It just took me a long time to learn to listen to Him.

In spite of having been cheated on in multiple past relationships, during the end of my marriage I found myself carrying on an affair. I was never proud of it, and knew while doing so that I was only putting off the inevitable divorce. In spite of all the pain I had suffered in my past, I knowingly carried on a relationship that would bring the same devastation to my then husband.

Having been on both sides of the fence affords me a point of view that hopefully not many have experienced. The pain and devastation left behind after cheating is something I would never wish on anyone.

It is this unique view that has driven me to such a hard line on cheating.

Although my Dominant and I enjoy an open relationship and often play with others, I will not involve ourselves with someone who is cheating. Too often I have run into men who have an open play relationship outside of their marriage. Once I find out about this, I am quick to cut off any communication.

Nothing personal. Everyone is free to enjoy whatever relationships they choose to.

It is my opinion that I cannot honor my relationship with Him and afford it the value that it deserves if I cheapen it in any way with dishonesty and lies. He deserves better than that.

Allowing cheating to taint our relationship in any way will only serve to undermine our bond. For this reason alone, I protect my relationship with Him from being sullied by dishonesty.

This may mean that we pass up play opportunities with couples who we are physically very attracted to, but in the long run I care only for my bond with Him and the effect my decisions will have on our relationship.

So while you are free to choose to engage in any relationship you choose, I choose to honor my own relationship with complete honesty and protect it with such as well.