Did you know that love can be expressed through BDSM?
For anyone raised on a diet of vanilla, heteronormative relating, it can be a difficult concept to grasp. How could someone hold the person they love over their lap and spank their tush till it turns red? Or use them as a human footstool? Or leave them on a leash in the kitchen while they prepare dinner only to serve it to them on the floor? And how can the person receiving that treatment enjoy it?
It's simple, really. Some people just like that.
And when it comes to giving, what's more beautiful than treating someone you love in the way they desire - especially when that desire asks them to reveal parts of themselves that are darker, more vulnerable, or harder to share?
To an outsider, these darker expressions of desire might seem at odds with love and intimacy. But within a consensual, considered scene, there can be a deep mutual offering of trust, communication, respect and honesty.
It takes a whole lot of care and attunement to deliver a spanking to your lover that transcends them deep into subspace. BDSM can be an offering as strong and true as an I love you - just using a slightly more robust delivery.
For my own fun (actually this was gruelling to write - full brain torture), I’ve created a taxonomy of how BDSM can be its own language of love - or dialect of devotion - if you will.
Let’s get into it:
1. Ritual & Servitude
For some people, service is an act of devotion. A way of saying that your comfort matters to me. A way to say “Let me take care of you.”
You've had a long day and your body is tired. I run the bath, dim the lights and wait patiently by the door for you to return. You step inside and I kneel to take your shoes off. As I stand, I lift you into my arms and carry you to the bathroom. I delicately peel away your clothes, kissing the soft skin revealed beneath them.
The best part of my day is welcoming you. Your ease is my reward.
2. Power & Surrender
To surrender is to say “I trust you with my power,” and to take power is to accept the responsibility for something you must take care of.
I feel my knees hinge towards my chest as the final knot slips into place. I know I'm not going anywhere. Even though I could tell her to stop or take my power back at any moment, I don't. She knows my limits but everything between them is hers. There is something beautiful in seeing what she chooses to do with that.
3. Degradation
To be held in your most exposed form is to be told “you can show me the parts of yourself you don't think are loveable, and it won’t change how I feel.”
There are things you have wanted to say out loud for years. Parts of yourself that you've hidden from the world, and desires that you're ashamed to admit, even to yourself.
With me you don't have to hide them. You can show me who you think you are, and I won't look at you differently. I will meet your gaze and smile.
4. Impact & Pain
To play with impact is to tune into your lover's experience, and to say “I can listen to your body when you're lost for words.”
I lower my hand to her pink skin, caressing it in gentle circles. Pausing while her breathing slows, waiting until her body relaxes again and tells me it's ready for more.
I know what she wants. I know the difference between her anticipation and her hesitation.
I lean down to whisper in her ear. “Just one more?” She nods and I raise my hand.
5. Control & Release
Sometimes freedom is the temporary absence of choices. To take control is to say “you don't have to do anything but be here.”
There's nothing you need to decide. Nothing you need to organise. Nothing you need to anticipate. All you need to do is listen to me. I've got this.
6. Possession
To be taken possession of is to feel chosen. To say “you belong here.”
The collar I wear reminds me that I am yours, and that nothing makes me feel more like I belong.
There is something comforting about being claimed by someone I have chosen to give myself to. When you clip it around my neck, I know I am still completely my own. And yet, I have chosen to be yours.
7. Praise
To be praised is to be rewarded for the effort you have made. It's a way of saying “I see you, and I want you to know it.”
He looks at me and the words “good girl” leave his lips. Blood rushes to my cheeks and I feel painfully exposed. He sees the way I move, the things I do - and even when I know I could have done better, his praise tells me it was enough. That I am enough.
8. Aftercare
Aftercare says “You’re safe here.”
I've opened myself up and bared my most vulnerable sides. As I float back down from this state, tender and raw, I land safely in the arms of my lover. Their tending to me reminds me I am safe, even in my fragililty.
BDSM can reach such intensity because it gives us space to express our most vulnerable parts. To access it we have to communicate and listen. We have to trust someone with the parts of ourselves that feel particularly tender, strange, shameful or exposed. And then we get to witness someone receive all of that without flinching.
Which sounds pretty damn intimate to me.
Mack Out.
xx
