them about their day, and they also want to feel like they're bestowing knowledge upon
me about the world. One of the men I see will always talk about his opinions about
money. He has complicated feelings about himself having money because he doesn't
come from money, so he's trying to work those out. But he also keeps telling me in a very
serious voice that money will not make me happy, that nothing I can buy will make me
happy. I tell him that I can buy security and he says yes, that is one thing I can buy.
Other men seem to be having issues with their age. One mentioned that he's just turned
40, and that's really bugging him. Then he flaked out on me a couple times -- I don't think
he was completely okay with his own decision to be seeing me. But anyway, often,
another thing these men seem to get out of it is access to someone who has a bunch of
youthful energy and optimism and just plain new ideas. A lot of them have mentioned
feeling stuck, or bored, or cynical, or intellectually constrained. So in this sense sex is
only one thing I'm offering them -- I'm also offering them optimism, hope, energy, and so
on. Firstly, the sex is good in and of itself, as most of them aren't getting laid otherwise.
But the sex is also a symbol of them getting access to my youthful energy or whatever.
I think the archetypal image of a mistress involves a woman being "kept" so that she
doesn't have to work, so that she can be available for sex basically whenever. But I don't
think this is what the men I see want. I am more valuable to them because I have other
work that I am seriously invested in, and am having sex with them anyway. Again, these
men are interested in a woman who they see as more "equal" to them -- in this case,
defined by earnings potential -- and they seem gratified by the idea that they could help
me enter their income bracket someday. This is, of course, still kind of patronizing; like I
said, they keep using words like "mentor." It's also presumptuous. But I think a lot of
them being patronizing and presumptuous can probably be attributed to age and wealth,
and only some of it to gender.
I think I've learned more about class and money than I have about gender. It turns out
there are people to whom $1,000 versus $3,000 doesn't matter that much, and I finally
understand that on a visceral level. $1,000 doesn't mean the same thing to me as it does to
most of them. I knew this, but now I really know it.
Another thing I've been struck by is exactly how much romantic relationships are worth.
I've had several clients tell me they don't feel wealthy, and they feel like they worry about
money a lot. I think they were sincere. Of course, my first thought was: don't you think
that your $2,000-per-month prostitute is part of the budget that could be trimmed? But I
think that maybe it's not, actually. I think they think that investing a lot of money in me is
a good investment for them if it gives them a release valve so they can deal with the rest
of their lives. They're probably right.
Clarisse Thorn: You mentioned that you feel powerful in your relationships with
these men. But there are issues of your safety, right?
Olivia: I think there are issues of safety anytime a person meets someone they don't really
know, especially if they plan to spend time in private. And especially if you're dealing
with topics as sensitive as sex or money. There may be more issues of safety with this
because some people really do believe that money can buy them anything. But for the
most part, when I meet people they seem very respectful.
Things I do to increase my safety are that I tell my husband and my friends where I'm
going to be, I tell them exactly where I am. I'll do things like take down a client's license
plate number and text it to my husband. I've been thinking maybe I should look at each
client's driver's license too, and text the client's name and driver's license number to my
husband. I think some clients might feel threatened by that, though.
The most important thing for my safety is that I'm willing and able to walk away from
situations. I'm not desperate -- I won't starve or die if I don't do this work. I meet all my
clients in public first for a meal, and if someone sketches me out, I leave. I'm not so
desperate that I'll get into a situation that scares me.
I guess I am at risk if I meet a really crazy person who wants to chop me up and put me in
a dumpster. But I could meet a person like that during a normal night at a bar, too.
The major risks that I see include that I might catch an STD -- but I use protection. I
might end up alone with someone who believes that the money he's paying actually gives
him the entitlement to do whatever he wants to my body, but I've never encountered
anyone like that. The thing is, as I said before, I haven't met anyone who I think would
actually describe themselves as paying for sex. The terms on which I continue to see
these men are probably less explicitly negotiated than an escort's terms would be. I don't
have flat rates, for example.
I've heard escorts complaining that people who use sugar baby sites are unprofessional,
and I think that from an escort's perspective they probably are.
Clarisse Thorn: If people are unwilling to actually talk about sex for money, it must
be hard to negotiate your encounters. Do you have a set of steps for negotiation?
Olivia: I haven't been doing this for very long. It's varied so far. Usually, I meet them for
some kind of meal, and we chat. We have a perfunctory conversation, like -- "How was
your day?" Then one of us will say something like, "Tell me a bit more about what you're
looking for. Why are you on the site?"
Then we'll explain our deal to each other. Like, he might say: "I'm divorced, I'm looking
for companionship." At some point, money comes up. I am always extremely vague
when I talk about money. I've found a good deal of variation in how squeamish people
are about money.
For example, one client was saying that he wanted to get married again, but not yet. I
said, "Huh, well, if you're interested in a more emotional relationship, how do you feel
about involving money?" The way he explained it to me was that people are attracted to
each other for all kinds of reasons, probably including money, so why not be up front
about the fact that money is attractive. He seemed almost confused about why I asked.
With that guy, I ended up sleeping with him before we even talked about money -- which
was a huge risk, but I thought it might work, and it did. We had the money conversation
immediately after we had sex -- at some point when we were taking a break, I asked what
he was looking for more specifically from this relationship, and he said that he wanted to
see me again, maybe once a week. I think I asked him his preference for a monthly
allowance as opposed to every time we meet, and he said he'd rather do something
monthly. Then when we were getting dressed, he pulled out $1,000 cash and handed it to
me, and said, "I'll give you the balance next time we see each other."
With other people I can be more straightforward. Maybe they aren't sure how to set up
the relationship, so maybe I talk about another client, like: "I have another client I see 3
times per month for $3,000," and they might say, "That sounds good." But some guys
will just negotiate it per encounter. One guy brought it up very quickly after we'd
exchanged some emails. He said that he prefers to do a "per meet" of $300 -- he called it
a "per meet" -- I told him that was too low and quoted him $1,000, and he said he'd meet
me in the middle. Another guy told me that he would just slip $400 into my purse when
he saw me, and that's exactly what he did.
I have one client I've never explicitly discussed money with at all. I had lunch with him,
and we didn't negotiate anything, though we talked a little bit about our reasons for being
on the site. The next time I saw him -- we were deciding where to meet, and he asked if
he should get us a room. I said that I would like that, so I met him and we had sex. He
knew it was my birthday soon, so as we were getting dressed, he said, "I know we haven't
talked about money, so I got you some birthday spending money," and he handed me an
envelope with $400. The next time I saw him, he asked about my plans for the evening. I
said I was having dinner with a friend, and he handed me $400 in an envelope and said,
"Maybe this will help pay for it." I'm lucky that I'm willing to accept $400 -- it's my
lower bound, but I'm willing to accept it. Imagine if I hadn't been willing to take $400 --
that would be super awkward. Probably I should have negotiated that situation more
clearly, but it worked out okay.
I've heard about situations where unclear negotiations did not work out okay. There was a
New York Times Magazine article about the site published in 2009. In that article, there
were some examples of unclear negotiations that didn't work out well. But it sounded like
that woman didn't really know what she wanted, and didn't really enjoy the work. But I
do. And I know other women who do, too.
I have a new client who paid me $3,000 up front to see me 3 times a month. But I haven't
heard from him since our first meeting. If I were his girlfriend, I'd call him, but he asked
me not to call him. So I don't really know what the deal with that one is. Maybe he's
gonna flake out on me, but he already gave me $3,000, so that would be weird.
Clarisse Thorn: So, your husband. You mentioned him briefly. How does your
husband feel about this?
Olivia: He does not seem particularly threatened. We already have an open relationship. I
think he sometimes feels very visceral jealousy, but that's just like any other time one of
us has sex with somebody else. We just have to talk about it.
Part of the deal here is that I'm doing this because I'm broke. My husband really wants to
be able to support me financially, but he can't right now, so I'm supporting both us doing
this. I think that's a real blow to his ego. To the extent that he gets bothered, I think it's
because I'm allowing other men to support me and give me money; he doesn't care about
the sex. Even though I see this as work, he sees this as "here's this rich successful guy
who just gave my wife a bunch of money, and she slept with him -- so probably she's
attracted to him."
I am kind of attracted to my clients, and I kind of get off on making them happy, and I
happen to think that the age difference is kind of hot. I like having sex with them; it's not
unpleasant. I like hearing about these guys' life stories. I think it's interesting. But these
guys would never be a threat to my husband. I would never be sleeping with any of them
except for the money. And I love my husband. I'm always very up front about the fact
that I'm married and I love my husband. My clients accept that.
* * *
This can be found on the Internet at:
and
http://clarissethorn.com/blog/2012/01/05/one-blurred-edge-of-sex-work-interview-witha-sugar-baby-part-1/
http://clarissethorn.com/blog/2012/01/09/one-blurred-edge-of-sex-work-interview-witha-sugar-baby-part-2/
* * *
* * *
* * *
SEX WORK:
[theory] A Sugar Baby Leaves The Business
I published this in 2012; it continues Olivia's story. Thanks again to Olivia for being so
incredibly generous with her time and her thoughts.
* * *
A Sugar Baby Leaves The Business
Previously on Role/Reboot, we ran an interview with my friend Olivia, a 25-year-old
graduate student who had just started having sex for money through a "sugar baby"
website called SeekingArrangement.com. In the interview, Olivia covered a lot of topics.
She mentioned that she usually feels powerful in her relationships with her clients. As she
put it, "When I show up, I don't feel like -- here is this rich, powerful person who is about
to bestow wealth upon me. I feel like -- here is this person who is a bit sad and lonely,
and maybe I can make their day better." Olivia also noted that her negotiations can be
delicate, because some men are quite squeamish while talking about money. And she
explained that she's married -- but it was already an open relationship, and she doesn't see
having sex for money as different from the other kinds of sex that she and her husband
were already having with other people. To deal with it, they're sure to communicate
clearly. As Olivia said, "We just have to talk about it."
In the months since that interview, Olivia and I have hung out occasionally to talk about
her experience with sex work. She's traveled across the city to meet me, and often bought
me coffee; non-judgmental social support for sex workers can be rare, and I've seen more
of her since she started the job. Although she really enjoyed the work at first, there were
tough times too, especially after the novelty wore off. Recently, Olivia decided to stop
seeing clients. We talked it through and she gave me permission to write about it. (She
also reviewed this article pre-publication.)
Obviously, there were logistical complexities from the beginning. Taxes were a
nightmare. Olivia wanted to pay them, but it's not the easiest proposition. Then there was
the question of paying off her debts. Some were simple enough, but then there were loans
co-signed by her parents, and there was no way she could make any headway on those
loans without talking to her parents... so Olivia had to maintain the fiction that she
couldn't pay.
That was nothing compared to the complexities of feelings and communication, though.
I've already shown you how hard it was, sometimes, for Olivia to talk about money with
her clients. There are other, subtler problems that are hard to handle with empathy: for
example, creating the Girlfriend Experience persona.
I've talked to sex workers who enjoy creating a "sexy dreamgirl shell" on behalf of their
clients. One of them said to me: "I create that persona for my boyfriends anyway. It's nice
to be paid for it." But as a feminist sex writer who's spent years working to understand
my own sexual authenticity, this freaks me out a bit. I think it would feel terribly toxic
and inauthentic for me.
It often felt inauthentic to Olivia, for sure, and that got harder and harder. "These men are
very invested in believing that I'm super into this," she told me once. "I have to keep up
the front, and make them feel like I'm interested all the time. It's literally my job to do
that. When they tell me how happy I am, or when they inform me that I'm enjoying
myself, I can't really contradict them, even if it's not true. Some of them use words like
'magical' to describe me, but the person they're describing is not really me. Sometimes I
think these guys pay me because in a non-professional relationship, a woman might push
back when he says those things. She might contradict his idea of her too much."
In fairness, Olivia naturally fits one glam stereotype of the middle-class sex worker: the
sexually adventurous young student. It's such a widely-promoted stereotype that
experienced sex worker activists speak derisively about it, and some escorts lie and say
that they fit the profile when they don't. Presumably, clients enjoy believing that a girl is
a sexually adventurous college student because it capitalizes on images of "sexy coeds" --
and convinces the client that she's not being emotionally harmed by the work. (I've often
thought that it's way past time for "fair trade prostitution," where sex trade ethics are
made into a competitive advantage. I've also thought that the most feminist thing I could
ever do would be to open a brothel where all the sex workers are treated well. Too bad it's
illegal.)
Of course, SeekingArrangement.com actively encourages the idea that a "real
relationship" can emerge from these arrangements. (In our previous interview, Olivia
pointed out the SeekingArrangement blog post "Sugar Baby & Sugar Daddy: The
Modern Day Princess & Prince?" Another interesting one is called "Sugar Babies Do Fall
In Love.") While some guys on the site really do just want to pay for straight-up sex,
some become emotionally invested in the women whose company they buy. And we can
tell from Olivia's experiences negotiating payment that a lot of guys don't like thinking
about how they're paying for it.
Bottom line: more than one of Olivia's clients were into her for real, and she felt more
and more uncomfortable about it as time passed. One man took a surreptitious photo of
her and hung it on the center of his otherwise-bare refrigerator. Another client made faux-
offhand wistful comments such as, "If you weren't already married, haha...."
Olivia asked my advice on one of these guys, who was clearly falling in love with her
from the start. She mentioned that she'd already talked to another sex worker about it.
The other worker's reaction was, essentially, "What problem?" As Olivia put it: "She told
me that the guy is basically a locked-in regular now, so what am I so bothered about?"
But after a while, Olivia couldn't take how guilty and anxious she felt around this guy,
what with the feelings she couldn't return. She stopped responding to his messages, but
didn't tell him clearly that it was over because trying to phrase the email felt so awful.
"I was so unprofessional about it," she said. "In the end, he sent me this incredibly sweet
note asking what he'd done to hurt me so badly. So my husband helped me write a 'it's not
you, it's me' breakup email. I still feel bad."
Another facet of emotional difficulty arose when Olivia's husband started taking a
medication that decreased his libido. This put the couple in the odd position of Olivia
having sex with other men, but not her husband -- with her husband's full knowledge and
consent. Although her husband tried to reassure her, she began feeling less secure and
stable at home. And sex work is stressful enough that home security can really, really
matter. Indeed, at one point Olivia mentioned: "One of my friends is tempted to get into
sex work. But she says she doesn't think she can deal with it, emotionally, unless she has
a partner at home who loves her and will back her up. So I'm not supposed to let her have
sex for money until she's in a good solid relationship."
Finally, as Olivia fielded other life stresses, she flatly realized that she couldn't have
anything extra going on. What with all the above conversations, we saw signs that the
change was coming, but when it arrived it was both sudden and intense. "One day I just
knew I had to stop," she told me. "It's bad, because we're behind on rent now, but I had to
stop. My husband pointed out, gently, that we need the money. But of course he accepted
it when I said I was done. Anyway, I managed to line up a good temp job, so we're okay
for now."
I tried to show in the original interview that Olivia is very privileged compared to most
sex workers. She's got race privilege for her whiteness, class privilege from her
background; she's pretty and young and "valuable," and has tons of education to boot.
She doesn't have a drug habit or some other truly debilitating issue. Although she's under
some financial stress, she's not desperate.
And that leads me to this question:
If even a woman like Olivia -- who was well-treated and made a lot of money and didn't
feel trapped; whose life sounded like the glam fantasy of today's high-end call girl -- if
even a woman like Olivia eventually needed a break from sex for money, then what
could this imply about the experience of less privileged women? I've got a bunch of sex
worker friends, and I would never say that a woman can't be a 100% consenting adult sex
worker who enjoys her job. But what I'm trying to get at, here, is that even on the "high
end," sex work can be incredibly demanding. Even when sex work is as pleasant as it
possibly can be, it's often very hard.
I'd like to see more conversations that acknowledge the reality of sex work as
emotionally intense and challenging, a job that can be bad for many people at many times
in their lives -- without letting go of the fact that some people can and do freely consent
to the job. (The sex worker Mistress Matisse has written a fair bit on sex work and
emotional labor. And male sex workers don't always have an easy time; the porn star
Tyler Knight has written about some of his more difficult moments, too.)
The point is not "sex work is bad and should be banned" -- but nor is it "sex work is
glamorous and fun!" The point is, sex work is often hard work, even for people who are
not mistreated or abused. As such, it deserves both respect (from outsiders) and openeyed
caution (from those who consider taking it up).
Olivia's not sure she's done with sex work for good. "The door is still open for future
involvement," she told me, last time we met for coffee. "If I do go back, I think I may try
for straight-up escorting, but I'm not really sure...." Presumably, working as an escort
rather than being a "sugar baby" might evade some of these confusing, strangelynegotiated
situations. Would it evade all of them? It's hard to say.
Regardless, I wish her luck.
* * *
After June 1, 2012, this can be found on the Internet at:
http://clarissethorn.com/blog/2012/06/01/a-sugar-baby-leaves-the-business/
* * *
* * *
* * *
Section 2 Study Guide
This section was intended mostly to highlight various "other" perspectives that I feel are
significant to sex and/or activism.
* * *
1. Do you see your sexual identity as placing you in a community, or is it more private?
Or is it a little bit of both?
1a. If you identify as part of a sex community, then are there ways you can contribute to
that community? (For example, if you had evidence that abusive relationships were a
problem in your community, what could you do about it?)
* * *
2. What kind of educational needs do you perceive around sexuality? Is there a way you
could contribute to positive sex education?
2a. Does your community have specific or unique needs around sex education?
2b. If you have children, how do you plan to educate them about sex? Specifically, how
do you plan to tell them about the stereotypes and limitations affecting the different
groups described in this section?
* * *
3. How do you look out for and support other members of your community, especially
when it comes to sex?
* * *
4. What lessons from your sexuality do you think are applicable to people who don't
share your sexual tastes?
4a. Are there pieces from this section that feel relevant to you, even if they aren't talking
about your experience or preferences?
* * *
5. What are the overarching patterns that you see within the pieces in this section? How
are these disparate topics relevant to each other?
5a. If some of these pieces are about people you have trouble relating to, then can you
think of ways you could relate better to those people?
* * *
* * *
* * *
SECTION 3:
Making It Complicated
In which we really get into it.
* * *
When I think of this section, I think of:
People's ability to understand their own emotional and physical experiences and
sensations is limited by what is safe to ask or know, what systems of interpretation they
have received for screening that raw material, and whether they find it possible to
connect with anyone who thinks differently about these matters.
~ Pat Califia
* * *
* * *
* * *
RELATIONSHIPS:
[storytime] Chemistry
I wrote this in late 2011, while I was finishing up the first draft of my awesome book
Confessions of a Pickup Artist Chaser. I was still processing a lot of stuff I'd learned
about pickup artist tactics and pickup artist attitudes, and that's reflected in this piece.
But there's a lot more to it, from working out some stuff about polyamory to my feelings
about marriage. A lot of these thoughts are developed further in Confessions.
* * *
Chemistry
It's a long story and a short one, but I guess all of them are.
I'm 27. It's about that age: A lot of my compatriots are getting married lately -- most
monogamously, some to a primary polyamorous partner. I myself have a stack of
relationships in my past. Some were monogamous, some polyamorous. Some have been
on-and-off, some short-term, some long-term (5 or 6 years was the longest). Lately I've
been processing some tough questions about polyamory, but I'd like to stick with it.
And I've been thinking a lot about what I want in a primary polyamorous partner. The
kind of guy I could marry. I wonder if I'll ever get to that point. I wonder if I'd know him
if I saw him.
* * *
I met Mr. Ambition at one of the aforementioned weddings. Several people
recommended that I talk to him, and we liked each other right away. Mutual friends used
words like "zealot" to describe him; let's just say he's got an intense history of dedicated
activism. Charisma, integrity, and pure energy pour off him. His words are almost always
articulate and challenging. He can socially dominate a room without thinking. He works a
challenging job ten hours per day; exercises two hours; socializes several hours; sleeps
and eats when he can. He gives hugs easily, laughs easily, hands out compliments like
candy.
Mr. Ambition is most definitely not a neutral personality. Of course, neither am I.
At the time, I was just coming out of the worst stage of my research on pickup artists -- a
subculture of men who trade tips on how to seduce women. Also, I'd just had one of those
breakups where I was too busy feeling stupid to properly understand how hurt I was.
(Don't you hate those?) You can read all about those Dramatic Events in my upcoming
book Confessions of a Pickup Artist Chaser. In the meantime, suffice to say that I felt...
flattened.
Arguably, I should have had a sign taped to my forehead that read: "Emotionally
Unavailable."
I went to dinner with Mr. Ambition later that week. At the end of the meal, he sat back
and looked at me. "You're so authentic," he said.
"I haven't felt very authentic lately," I said frankly, but his words felt good. Like a balm.
Like I was healing.
* * *
We got along excellently, had a lot in common, etc. Typical this-relationship-starts-well
stuff. One evening, after we'd been out to eat in a big philosophical group, Mr. Ambition
noted the hotness of my intense theoretical bent. "When you were discussing social
justice and ethics tonight," he said, "I wanted to reach across the table and grab you."
He mentioned marriage within weeks. "This has never happened before," he told me.
"I've never dated someone I thought I could actually marry." Whoa, tiger, I thought, but I
had to admit that he hit a lot of my Ideal Characteristics as well. Intelligence, drive,
charisma, and morality: it's hard to argue with that.
Our sexual chemistry was okay, but not climb-the-walls stellar. We'll develop that, I told
myself. He's less sexually experienced than I am, and we'll learn each other just fine.
Fortunately he's got some experience with polyamory, but in terms of S&M, he's another
of those vanilla-but-questioning guys (I never learn). When we did S&M, I had to
monitor the situation extra carefully because it was so new to him.
And for all his intelligence, it was really hard to talk to him about emotions. It wasn't that
he was cold or distant; on the contrary, he's one of the most fiery people I've ever met.
But he had a lot of difficulty explaining what was going on in his head. Indeed, he told
me that he had a lot of difficulty knowing what was going on in his head. He did things
like laugh when a friend hurt his feelings, then deny that he was hurt, even though I could
plainly see the stricken look behind his eyes.
I wasn't surprised that he was more physical than verbal about S&M. Very
straightforward: throwing me around, pulling my head back, digging his hands into my
skin. He's incredibly strong, and sometimes I called my safeword simply because his
strength scared me.
There was one particular S&M encounter... early in the evening, I called my safeword
because I wasn't sure he was into it.
"Red," I said, and he stopped. "Is this okay with you?" I asked, and he nodded.
"Yes," he said. "This is good. Let's keep going." His voice was low and slightly rough; a
marvel of certainty. He put his hands back on me instantly. My doubts disappeared.
We kept going. I watched my body, felt the lump building in my throat, monitored my
breath as it became harsh and fast.
"Red," I said, and he stopped. "You're going to break me," I said, "I'm going to cry. If
you don't want to deal with that, then stop."
This, by the way, is a difficult skill that I have learned: this ability to track my S&M
reactions so clearly. I would never have been able to do it seven years ago, and I still can't
do it during complicated S&M encounters. But now I can do it during simple ones. (Yes,
"simple" and "complicated" are in the eye of the beholder.)
I really hate stopping an S&M encounter right when I'm on the verge of tears. It's worse
than an interrupted orgasm. But I'd rather do that than break down crying and then deal
with a horrified partner.
"That's fine," said Mr. Ambition. So we kept going. I cried. He started talking, and I was
surprised by how harsh his words could be. That's more like it, I thought.
Some S&M encounters have a rhythm to them, a poetry: a beginning and an end that
become clear to the participants as they go along. This one didn't -- at least not to me. So
I didn't rely on him to bring it to a close. After a while, I safeworded out, and took a
breath to still my tears.
Mr. Ambition was quiet again. I was having trouble reading him. There was some energy
caught inside him, coiled like a dragon, but I couldn't tell if it was violence or something
else. I put a halt to my own emotional cycle and tried to focus on him. "How are you
feeling?" I asked, but he couldn't tell me. I asked a few more questions, and he just
couldn't answer. He just didn't know.
I never got another word from him on how he felt about that encounter. I wondered if I
was being too careful in how I asked about it; I wondered if he wanted me to push harder;
I wondered if I'd already pushed him too far.
I suspected there were some dramatic feelings trapped in Mr. Ambition. But I wasn't sure
I currently had the warmth to coax them out.
* * *
In the past, I've fallen in love so hard that I felt like the world was black-and-white when
I was away from my lover; I felt like I only saw color when I was with him. I have dated
men where the chemistry was so intense, so obvious, that it hung in the air between us
like smoke. I've had sex that felt like telepathy. It's pretty awesome when it works. And
it's easier to get that with some people than with others: some guys, I meet them and it's
like we speak the same language already.
With some guys, it's not instant, but it also doesn't take long to build our mutual
vocabulary.
And then I've dated guys where the learning curve -- both sexually and temperamentally
-- was much longer. It was less instinctive. But it was not impossible. So I know for a fact
that people can build chemistry. Sometimes it's just there, but sometimes you can create
it.
My relationship with Mr. Ambition was definitely polyamorous, but a few weeks in, I
decided I was really into him... and I started managing my incentives. There was another
guy I saw occasionally, with whom I had stronger instinctive chemistry. This other guy
agreed with me that we didn't want a Big Important Relationship. This other guy will
screw up my incentives if I hang out with him too much, I thought, and I limited my time
with him. I set rules with myself: I didn't call him, I didn't text him. I knew: If I let myself
get too intensely into this other guy, that could inhibit my ability to bond with Mr.
Ambition.
I told the other guy that once my relationship with Mr. Ambition was more stable, we
might be able to pursue something more intense. By the time we had the conversation, he
said he'd already been thinking similar thoughts. That he didn't want to distract me from
something that could be beautiful.
Similarly, there are one or two men in my life that I'm attracted to but don't want a sexual
connection with at all. So I try not to see them unless I feel inoculated: I don't hang out
with them unless I'm sure I can distract myself with my feelings about another man.
A lot of polyamorists say that "love is infinite," that we can love lots of people, etc. I
agree with this in theory -- but there's also a polyamorous saying that "While love may be
infinite, time is not." And hormones aren't infinite, either. I've learned my hormonal
reactions, I've seen myself get imprinted by people... I've seen myself develop feelings
and fantasies for one guy that made me 100% immune to another hot guy's charms.
Do I have perfect self-control? Absolutely not. That's why I'm trying to influence my own
choices so carefully. I know that choice plays a huge role when we build relationships.
Choosing to commit is arguably as big a relationship factor as instinctive chemistry.
... Arguably.
* * *
When I first got to college many moons ago, my roommate came from a family of
immigrants with a tradition of arranged marriages. She and I stayed up late one night,
perched on our dorm room mattresses, and I listened in fascination while she told me that
her father wanted her to marry a man of her father's choice, rather than her own.
"I'm not sure whether I'll do it," she said. I watched her wave a hand airily. I was
mesmerized by her casual acceptance of a custom that struck me as barbaric. "I mean,"
she said, "I'm cool with this guy that my dad's found for me. But I don't know if we're
that cool. On the other hand, I can't deny the advantages of arranged marriages."
"Advantages!" I cried. I was so young... (Okay, I'm still young.) "What do you mean,
advantages?!"
"Arranged marriages are more stable," she said. "Much more stable. I'm not sure I'd ever
want to marry for love. That shit goes up in smoke."
From what I understand, there have even been studies about this: that people in arranged
marriages report being quite happy, quite stable.
I've gotten the it's-not-passion-that-makes-a-successful-marriage message before, of
course -- often from super-white, super-American Americans. For example, there's that
infamous 2008 article "Marry Him: The Case For Settling For Mr. Good Enough." The
article is sure to send any woman roughly my age into a panic. It's made enough of an
impression that I still have conversations about it with other women my age -- almost
four years after its debut.
I don't like the Settling writer's attitude. She's written with horror and anger about S&M
in other venues, for example; and the whole Settling article has a generally conservative
bent. But she's articulating some real feelings and important thoughts, and while I don't
agree with all of them, I do agree with some. At one point, analyzing television, she notes
that:
While Rachel and her supposed soul mate, Ross, finally get together (for the umpteenth
time) in the finale of Friends, do we feel confident that she'll be happier with Ross than
she would have been had she settled down with Barry, the orthodontist, 10 years earlier?
She and Ross have passion but have never had long-term stability, and the fireworks she
experiences with him but not with Barry might actually turn out to be a liability, given
how many times their relationship has already gone up in flames. It's equally
questionable whether Sex and the City's Carrie Bradshaw, who cheated on her
kindhearted and generous boyfriend, Aidan, only to end up with the more exciting but
self-absorbed Mr. Big, will be better off in the framework of marriage and family. (Some
time after the breakup, when Carrie ran into Aidan on the street, he was carrying his
infant in a Baby Bjorn. Can anyone imagine Mr. Big walking around with a Bjorn?)
I've never watched Friends or Sex and the City, but I know the feeling.
Personally, I'm more of a novel girl. The other day, I found myself thinking of my longago
roommate and her thoughts on arranged marriage while I read Monica Ali's beautiful
book Brick Lane. Monica Ali is an immigrant to the United Kingdom, and the characters
in her novel all come to the UK from Bangladesh. Some of the characters accept
traditional arranged marriages, while others make "love marriages" instead -- often
defying their parents, their whole set of cultural norms, to do so. Towards the end of the
novel, one man reflects on the early days of his marriage:
We thought that the love would never run out. It was like a magic rice sack that you
could keep scooping into and never get to the bottom. It was a "love" marriage, you see.
What I did not know -- I was a young man -- is that there are two kinds of love. The kind
that starts off big and slowly wears away, that seems you can never use it up and then
one day is finished. And the kind that you don't notice at first, but which adds a little bit
to itself every day, like an oyster makes a pearl, grain by grain, a jewel from the sand.
As you can tell, this character is currently unhappy in his "love marriage." Of course, the
grass is always greener on the other side. What's the difference between the big love and
the pearl love? Can they even be compared? Is it like apples to oranges?
But couldn't all this be a false dichotomy? Who says it's about arrangement versus
randomness -- chemistry versus choice? Can we have both? Can we find the big love, and
nurture that so it develops into the pearl love, too?
My ultimate conclusion about the Art and Science of Flirting, from my "studies" of
pickup artists and also my entire life, is that flirting is all about strategic ambiguity.
Deliberate uncertainty. Manipulating ambiguity and uncertainty can contribute to many
intense feelings.
Some people learn this, and decide that the only way to have a relationship with
chemistry is to include a constant generous dollop of uncertainty about love, loyalty, or
something equally important. These people decide chemistry can only derive from little
pieces of confusion: tiny mismatches that lodge underneath the similarities that bring
people together, constantly unsettling, like a prickly burr. But I don't think that's what I
want.
And after all, S&M creates extraordinary feelings too, but plenty of people do S&M in
very controlled circumstances: pre-discussed, with safewords and so on. Arguably, S&M
is another form of mismatch, of contrast, of uncertainty -- but it's a form that can be
managed. So I know all about creating intense uncertain feelings in controlled
circumstances, and using those to contribute to stable and reliable loving relationships.
Don't I?
Eventually, my college roommate caused a gigantic blowup in her family by rejecting
arranged marriage. Her father didn't speak to her for a long, long time.
* * *
On my birthday, Mr. Ambition took me out to dinner. Then we went to watch fireflies by
the lake. As was inevitable for summer in Chicago, we ran into lots of people we knew.
One of those groups contained an on-again-off-again partner of mine: Richard, with
whom I have... shall we say, a complicated history. I respect Richard a lot, and I like him,
and I'm highly attracted to him... but I'm pathologically wary of him for reasons that will
become obvious.
We greeted our friends. "How are you doing?" Richard asked.
"Happy birthday to me, asshole," I teased. "How could you forget?"
Richard sighed. "Jeez," he said, "sorry I neglected to wish you a happy birthday within,
like, the first 15 seconds I saw you."
I paused, and took a moment to recalibrate: he wasn't reacting in his usual adversarial,
teasing-back manner. On the other hand, history has taught me not to fall for it when
Richard seems unexpectedly vulnerable.
"I'm sorry," I said. I kept my tone light-hearted, friendly. "You know I love you, right?"
"Do I?" Richard asked.
I tilted my head at him. Without thinking, I kissed my own fingers, then put my hand
gently against his face, as if I were about to stroke his cheek. Or slap him. I guess it was a
way of distancing myself and kissing him at the same time. I think he understood that I
intended it as an uncertain-but-intimate gesture. But I'm never sure, with Richard.
"Call me," I said.
"No," Richard said. "You call me."
Hours later, Mr. Ambition brought him up. We were having one of those sweet, intimate,
disjointed bedtime conversations. Mr. Ambition was lying back, half-covered by a sheet,
and I was admiring the play of light on his chest. "Richard really cares about you," he
said.
I stiffened, and sat up. "Maybe," I said. "But I can't trust Richard."
"His tone seemed wistful, when he saw you."
"I can't trust Richard," I repeated. "It's always a game with him. Sometimes I think that
we have a real emotional connection, but if I try to talk about it or give him emotional
feedback, he just ignores me."
"Maybe he isn't really ignoring you," argued Mr. Ambition. "Maybe every time you say
something, or give a little, it makes a tiny bit of difference. Maybe you just have to stay
open. Keep trying. These things build up."
"You don't understand," I snapped. "You don't know him! Maybe he really cares, but
even if he does, it doesn't matter! Things always end up the same. If I mention emotions,
or if I act warm to him, he'll ignore me for a while... and then he'll be cold to me again.
I'm telling you, I've been here before, with Richard. It's a trap."
Mr. Ambition didn't waver. "If you're strong enough," he said simply, "then you can walk
into a trap."
His words made my heart crack, my breath catch. Made me feel like I've forgotten
everything I knew about love.
When I was younger, I thought of my emotional strength like water: an embrace that
could make someone I loved feel lighter. Water is a slow, eroding force that pulls beauty
from the unexpected. Water makes wood into twisted driftwood sculptures; sharp glass
into opaque dim jewels; rocks into soft sand. Water will eventually reveal the heart of
everything it touches. If you let it.
I hadn't thought of myself that way in a long time. I felt like Mr. Ambition was calling
me out, reminding me of who I wanted to be. Maybe I protect myself better, these days.
But vulnerability is not always a bad thing.
I definitely could fall in love with this man, I realized.
"You're really amazing," I said, and threw myself on his chest.
He put his arms around me. "So are you," he said.
* * *
As a storyteller, I often look back on my relationships and pick out foreshadowing: the
omens. And by now, I recognize the omens even as they're happening... and sometimes I
change my behavior, but usually I don't. Perhaps this state is what they call maturity.
One night while we were out, Mr. Ambition sighed in an offhand way. He seemed tired,
out of sorts. "I just want someone to take me on an emotional journey," he remarked to
me. Then he added, "... No offense."
I mentioned this to a friend, later: "Mr. Ambition says he wants me to take him on an
emotional journey," I said.
"An 'emotional journey'? That shit gets old, though," said my friend. I laughed, and
agreed with him.
Another night, Mr. Ambition mentioned something about enjoying drama. I was with my
best girlfriend at the time; she and I looked at each other. "Careful what you wish for," I
said.
My friend said, "Yeah, I'm pretty sure Clarisse knows how to create arbitrary amounts of
drama at any time."
"But I'm pretty sure I don't want to," I said.
Later, when Mr. Ambition mentioned that he doesn't usually know how he's feeling, he
added: "My friends can often tell more about my own emotions than I can."
"So you basically outsource your emotional processing to your friends?" I asked.
He agreed.
Perhaps the worst omen was when Mr. Ambition told me, "I've never been hurt by love."
"Never?" I asked.
"Never," he said.
His certainty was so great that, in itself, it made me uneasy. Because I have definitely
been hurt by love. And my greatest wounds were dealt by men who seemed sure they
loved me. A man who seems sure might actually be sure, but he may simply fail to
understand himself.... So these days, it's always men who seem certain that make me
most uncertain.
There's another great quotation from that Monica Ali novel, Brick Lane. Here it is: "The
thing about getting older is you don't need everything to be possible anymore, you just
need some things to be certain."
* * *
I often felt like I was watching the relationship from a distance. I tried to resist thinking
of our relationship using cold, manipulative pickup artist terminology and tactics, but
sometimes I couldn't stop myself. I'd rather not talk about that.
I found more and more ways to manage my incentives. I noticed that one of my methods
was telling friends and parents that I liked Mr. Ambition a whole lot. I think it was even
true.
Most of all, I told myself that the lack of natural chemistry was a good thing, and not a
bad thing; the lack of natural chemistry was why this relationship could last.
I was quite calculating about it, really, and maybe that was why he broke up with me. On
the bright side, I kept my head during the breakup, which was nice, because I didn't keep
my head during my last breakup. With Mr. Ambition, I didn't feel like my self-control
slipped at all.
"We need to talk," Mr. Ambition said without preamble, when I met him in the foyer of
his apartment building. "I'm having some concerns about our relationship." Once we were
in his apartment, he said, "To be honest, I don't know how attracted I am to you."
I tried to measure his mien. I got the feeling, again, that energy was coiled tightly inside
him. Like a dragon. "Are you breaking up with me?" I asked.
"We're just having a conversation," he said quickly.
We talked about sex for a while. Chemistry. "I don't think I like S&M, to be honest," he
said. "I don't feel affected by it."
I thought: Are you sure? and You definitely looked affected by it, but it's both unethical
and unwise to question someone else's experience. So I just said, "You know I don't want
you to do anything you don't want to do. Have you felt pressured by me?"
"No, of course not," he said.
We talked some more. He ultimately said, "Look, are you totally satisfied with the sex
we're having?"
"I mean..." I said. "It's not the most intense sex I've ever had, but it'll keep getting better."
"I think we should just be friends," he said.
"... Okay," I said. "Um. Is there anything else you want to talk about?"
Mr. Ambition seemed agitated. He seemed barely able to hold still. "I've never dated
anyone that I respected like I respect you," he said. "Your charisma, your intelligence,
your morality. But... I don't know. I don't feel like we're very authentic with each other. I
don't feel like there's much warmth between us."
Maybe you're right, I thought. But either way, it's too late now. "Okay," I said. I thought
for a moment. "I'm sorry," I added. "I really wanted this to work out." For a moment,
tears startled my eyes, but I blinked them back.
"Are you all right?" he asked. He leaned forward. "Is there anything I can do for you?"
I looked at him and tried to think. I knew I was going to be very upset in maybe fifteen
minutes. He seemed hurt, and I wanted to say something that would comfort him. I
wondered if he wanted me to cry, and beg, and create drama; I wouldn't do that... but
maybe it would help if I asked for something simple.
But I couldn't come up with anything, and I wanted to leave. So after a pause, I said,
"You can let me go home and cry."
I said it as gently as I could. But Mr. Ambition seemed terribly distressed. "Ohhh," he
said, and screwed up his face. He leapt to his feet. "I'm sorry," he said.
"It's okay," I said. "Is there anything else?"
"Sometimes I think men just aren't capable of the kind of commitment women are," Mr.
Ambition said. He sounded defensive, even though I hadn't made any accusations. "Then
again, you're not like most women.... You're kind of a hardass. You probably have this
problem with a lot of the men you date, where you come across as kind of a hardass....
And to be honest, I don't think men really want to date women as smart as they are."
Jesus, I thought, you already broke up with me; can't you just let me go? Why do you
have to rip into me like this? I wondered how much of what he was saying was about me,
and how much was him trying to make sense of his own feelings. But even though I felt
sure that he was confused, his words sent an icy spike straight through me. "I don't think
men really want to date women as smart as they are...."
"I've worked really hard to become less argumentative," I said. "You should have seen
me when I was a teenager.... I don't know if I can tone myself down any more than I
already do." Even as I said it, I wondered why I was still talking to a guy who'd just said
that men don't want to date women as smart as they are. I felt like a bad feminist.
"Oh, you shouldn't tone yourself down!" said Mr. Ambition. "It makes you attractive....
Attractive intellectually, I mean."
I sighed. "Yes," I said. "Intellectually."
"I'm sorry," he said again.
"I'm going home," I said.
"We're still friends, right?" he asked.
"Yes, but give me some time to get over this," I said. "Probably about a month."
"What do you mean?" He came after me as I walked to the door. "Like, you don't want to
see me at all for a month? You don't want me to call you, or reach out to you, or
anything?"
I looked at him, again, for a long moment. I regretted his stricken expression. Again, I
spoke as gently as I could. "Maybe in a month."
He offered me a ride, which I declined. My fifteen-minute estimate was almost on target:
twenty minutes later, I stepped into my bedroom, leaned back against my door and burst
into tears.
* * *
I ran into Richard the next evening, and we spent the night together. Richard put a fair
amount of effort into convincing me to talk to Mr. Ambition.
"It sounds like he didn't actually mean to break up with you," said Richard. "It sounds
like the conversation got away from him. He didn't start that conversation intending to
break up with you; maybe he was looking for reassurance, and you approached his
questions too logically, and he concluded that you don't care. You really like him. It
seems like it's worth trying to make it work."
You may have noticed that both of these men tried hard to convince me that the other
man cared about me. I decline to analyze what that means about me and my current
approach to relationships.
However, I will say that I tried giving Richard more emotional feedback than I have in a
long time; I even told him I missed him the next time he went on vacation. And I did try
talking to Mr. Ambition again, and he acknowledged that he hadn't exactly intended to
break up with me.
But then Mr. Ambition and I had several of those encounters that I think of as "postbreakup
talks." I hate that shit. Every evening ended on a confusing, inconclusive note.
He kept saying that he was "confidently ambiguous." We weren't dating, we weren't not
dating. It reminded me of a phase I went through with a college ex-boyfriend, back in my
monogamous days: my ex and I spent several weeks post-breakup being "exclusive but
not together." So preposterous. People are so broken.
Mr. Ambition himself has described uncertainty as an "emotional amplifier"... but
sometimes it amplifies in the wrong direction. After a week or so, I got fed up and cut
things off. He asked when we would talk again, and I told him I didn't want to talk for a
while. A few days later, I broke my neck in a bicycle accident.
It's like a goddamn soap opera, isn't it? Sometimes I can't believe this stuff happens to
me.
* * *
Mr. Ambition showed up in my hospital room while no one else was around. I was no
longer afraid that I might die, but I was leaden with morphine, and anxious. I awaited the
neurosurgeons who would come install a big scary spinal brace, and I felt grateful and
glad to see Mr. Ambition. I hadn't been certain he would come, although if he'd had such
an accident, I would have moved Heaven and earth to go see him.
"I came as soon as our friends told me," he said. "There are so many people who love
you." He said my name, and spoke softly, and the words bruised my heart.
"Thank you," I said inadequately.
"I had to skip out on work to get here," he said, and sat next to my bed. "We're in the
middle of important negotiations. A billion-dollar deal."
"I'm sorry," I said. "Maybe you shouldn't have come."
He laughed. "Don't you think you're worth a billion dollars?"
"Probably not," I said.
He took my hand. "Is there anything I can get you?" he asked.
I wasn't allowed to eat or drink before the surgery. "Tell me a story," I requested.
Mr. Ambition retold a story from Dostoevsky's The Idiot. It was about a big-hearted man
who comes to a small community and befriends an outcast "fallen woman." The bighearted
man gains high status in the community, but when people find out that he's
friends with the marginalized sex worker, they become angry. Despite their
condemnation, the man stays steadfastly loyal to his friend, and by seeing the way he
cares about her, eventually the community accepts her too.
It was exactly the kind of story I expected to hear from him. I thought of the moment,
sitting in bed, where he'd said: "If you're strong enough, you can walk into a trap." The
moment when I'd realized that I could fall in love with him.
After Mr. Ambition finished the story, the doctors arrived with the brace. This
contraption involved using power tools to put four screws directly into my skull, which
stabilize seven pounds of metal. For realz. I was awake while they did it, too. Luckily I
got local anesthesia, so the screws didn't hurt while they were going in -- but I heard the
bone crunching, and I felt the pressure building. Also, my neck hurt a lot. It was
reasonably horrible.
Some of my friends said later that they arrived at the hospital and tried to get into my
room while the brace was being installed, and they couldn't get in, but they heard me
screaming. I don't remember screaming, so I deny everything.
I tried to talk normally while it was happening. I felt like the whole affair was probably
more taxing for the doctors than it was for me. I mean, at least I had morphine.
"I'm sorry," I said to one of the doctors. "People must say awful things to you while
you're doing this procedure."
"One woman told me how much she hated me," the doctor said tranquilly.
I tried not to cry, but I cried. Like I said: soap opera territory.
Mr. Ambition never let go of my hand.
* * *
Mr. Ambition visited me in the hospital for hours every day. He brought me all kinds of
awesome vegan smoothies. He met my parents, and got along well with them.
When she got a moment alone with me, my best girlfriend asked what was up with him.
"You guys broke up, didn't you? What's next?"
"I'm not sure," I said. "We haven't talked about it."
When I was able to go home, Mr. Ambition helped move me in. My air conditioner had
stopped working, which is not fun for August in Chicago, especially for a person wearing
a fur-lined brace. He promised to lend me a fan.
I can't turn my head, so when Mr. Ambition arrived with the fan, I didn't realize it was
him until he was standing right next to me. I was alone in my room, lying in bed, wearing
only the brace and my underwear while I answered text messages. This was not as sexy
as it sounds. Unless you're a medical device fetishist. In which case, I guess it was
exactly as sexy as it sounds.
The fan was quickly installed next to my bed. I felt awkward because I was half-naked
and wearing a complex brace. I felt awkward because I couldn't help with the fan. I also
felt awkward because I was racking up unpayable debt to a man who was, to all
appearances, my ex. I tried to cover my discomfort by answering some more texts; then I
looked up at Mr. Ambition. I couldn't read his expression.
I felt oddly expressionless, myself. I felt wrung out. I couldn't think of any words I
wanted to say.
Maybe that was our moment of truth: the moment had no chemistry at all.
I gave Mr. Ambition my hand. "Thank you so much for everything," I said.
"Of course," he said, squeezed my hand, and left.
* * *
After my accident, Richard sent me a quick email, then didn't contact me for over a
month. I remembered what Mr. Ambition had said -- encouraging me to send more
emotional signals -- so tried inviting Richard for dinner, and he didn't answer my text
messages. When I finally ran into Richard, I asked why he'd been ignoring me, and he
laughed. "I knew you'd accuse me of ignoring you," he said. I felt like I'd walked into a
trap.
I was hurt, obviously. I was surprised by how hurt I was. The problem with my youthful
water metaphor is that water is basically invulnerable, but I am not... and when I was
younger and more open, I had much more trouble setting important boundaries.
On the other hand, I had to admit that it was funny, too. I mean, it wasn't like I didn't see
this coming. I mean, my coming-out story includes a portrait of Richard at his most
difficult. One of the friends I share with Richard made a comment about leopards and
spots. Maybe my life is a soap opera, but it could also be a sitcom with the most amazing
characterization ever.
I enlisted a cold, brilliant, evil-hearted friend to help draft my final letter to Richard. The
letter was very short. Arguably, it was brutal. It read:
Economists recognize that the most robust relationships are formed through a plethora
of implicit agreements. Apparently, these agreements are not present, and probably won't
be. Cheers.
Economics arguments in the comments are encouraged. More importantly, readers may
feel free to steal that letter for use on whoever is trying to pull their chain.
* * *
I received a couple texts from Mr. Ambition, a few days after he gave me the fan. He said
there had been a death in his family. "But I don't want to talk about that, actually," he
wrote. "I just want to check in and see how you're doing."
I thought about how he laughed when he was hurt. I thought about how he'd once told me
that he wanted drama. I thought about his confusing reactions to S&M. I thought about
how he outsourced his emotional labor to his friends. I thought about all the emotion I'd
felt in him, coiled and caught and turned in on itself like a caged dragon.
I wondered if he wanted me to push him to talk.
"I'm so sorry," I texted back. "But I understand if you don't want to talk about it. I'm
doing fine."
He invited me to a social event a week later, but I declined. I didn't reach out to him for a
while after that, and he didn't reach out to me. I heard later that Mr. Ambition asked one
of my friends whether they thought he owed me anything.
My friend told him, quite accurately: "No, you don't owe her anything."
If anything, I owe him. I'm not sure what I owe him, but I'm sure I owe him something.
A billion dollars? Vegan smoothies?
Chemistry?
* * *
This post can be found on the Internet at:
http://clarissethorn.com/blog/2011/09/30/storytime-chemistry/
* * *
* * *
* * *
S&M:
[theory] Start From A Position of Strength
I wrote this post in 2011, and I wrote it carefully because I was worried that it might be
interpreted as putting too much responsibility for BDSM on the submissive partner's
shoulders. To be clear, I believe that both partners have responsibilities in a BDSM
situation, but I also believe that the dominant partner especially must be careful and
responsive. I hope that this is a theme in all my work. I really don't ever want to
encourage people to blame the victim. However, I think it's undeniable that submissive
partners need a sense of themselves, as well as internal strength and resources, to do
BDSM -- especially very intense BDSM. The goal of this post was to start figuring out
what that means.
* * *
A while back, I attended a workshop run by educator Sarah Sloane on the topic of BDSM
and abuse. Sarah centered her workshop on a maxim that I have hereby stolen: "Start
from a position of strength, and seek strength in the end."
I've been thinking about this a lot in terms of not just polyamory and BDSM, but sex in
general. All types of sexuality are more pleasurable for some people, and less pleasurable
for others; emotionally easier for some people, and more difficult for others. I have zero
interest in telling other people how they "should" or "shouldn't" deal with their sexuality,
as long as what they're doing is consensual. I want to say right now that nothing I'm about
to write is intended to tell others how they "should" or "shouldn't" do S&M; it's just my
own thoughts on how I might choose and process my experiences.
I can certainly consent to whatever, even if that thing is problematic or scary or difficult
or complicated -- I can consent. The thing is, if I want to get something amazing and
positive out of my experiences, I think it's good to start from a position of strength.
In some ways this is clear. For example, I think that being with a partner who genuinely
wants me to have a good experience, who really cares about me, and who wants to see
me again -- that's almost always a position of strength. Even if I have fairly intense, dark
S&M encounters with that person, I can feel confident that he'll treat me with respect;
that he'll give me space and lend me strength for emotional processing afterwards.
Also, knowing what I want is a position of strength; understanding how I feel is a
position of strength. Being able to recognize my emotional difficulties, hiccups, triggers
and landmines is a position of strength. Knowing for sure that I can call my safeword, if
necessary, is a position of strength. On a physical level, I prefer to do S&M when my
body is in good shape -- when I'm well-rested and I've eaten healthy food. That, too, is a
position of strength.
In some ways this can become murky. For example: I am rarely interested in one-night
stands. There are a number of reasons for this, but one reason is that -- especially as a
woman -- feeling like a "slut" can be scary, difficult cultural territory. And when I don't
feel good about myself, my interest in one-night stands is even lower -- because I know
that dealing with the difficult territory of "sluthood" will be harder with low self-esteem.
If I'm feeling happy, strong, competent, valuable, and loved by the world... then onenight
stands can easily be fun. If I doubt my worth, or if I doubt how much I deserve
love... then one-night stands can be self-destructive.
The same goes for relationships with people who don't care about me. If I'm sure that a
guy has no emotional interest in me, then having sex with that guy can be a dangerous
emotional proposition for me, and one that I need to feel strong for. This doesn't always
end up being true -- I've definitely had sexual encounters that left me emotionally
unaffected -- but sometimes it's hard to predict whether I'll want more emotional
investment from a given dude, so I try to keep it in mind for all encounters. (From a
polyamorous perspective, I've noticed that less-emotional sex is often easier to handle
when I'm already in a solid relationship with someone else.)
A couple I know in the local S&M community will sometimes have encounters that
absolutely blow my mind, because they seem so difficult and so psychological. Here is an
example: after the pair was married and child-free for many years, the wife realized that
she might want children after all. This was a problem for her husband, who married her
with the understanding that neither of them wanted kids. It became an ongoing
discussion. Then the husband -- who is also the sadistic, dominant partner -- asked her if
they could have an S&M encounter focused around the topic. She said it was okay.
So, as part of an S&M class that they taught together, the husband used her new feelings
about children to rip into her: during the S&M encounter, he told her that she was
probably too old to have children, that she'd waited too long. He added that she was too
flighty for kids; that she'd be a bad mother. He added that he had always made it clear
that he never wanted kids; that she was stupid for marrying someone who didn't want
kids, and that this problem was her own fault.
I was not present during this class, but I heard about it from some attendees, and it sounds
like it was really intense. He used a genuine and difficult sore spot to put his wife through
a psychological S&M wringer, with her consent.
These days, I feel very tempted towards encounters like that: encounters that can tear me
apart on a deep level, using important weaknesses and insecurities. I've also received
email from other people who want to arrange encounters like that, and who ask my
advice. An obvious problem is that such a relationship could easily slip into abusive
territory.
So I've thought about this a lot, and here's my conclusion: those kind of intense
psychological encounters obey the same maxim as other BDSM -- "Start from a position
of strength, and seek strength in the end."
Thus, before having such an intense psychological encounter, I should feel that the
encounter will ultimately -- through the pain and anxiety and tears -- make me feel more
supported, more capable, more powerful in the world. One angle on this is to trust my
partner a great deal, and be sure that he wants the best for me -- to be sure that in the end,
he wants me to be as strong as I started... or stronger.
It's possible that I might not need so much support from my partner, if I get support
elsewhere in my life: perhaps from friends, perhaps from a Kink Aware therapist, perhaps
from a great job or a solid diet and exercise plan, perhaps even from another partner. (Of
course, if I were planning to get extensive emotional processing support from other
people, then I would seek their consent beforehand.)
Still, it seems like the easiest way to get support would be to get it from my partner, who
would share more of the experience with me than anyone else. This would also build our
intimacy, which is usually a major factor in having intense S&M encounters in the first
place.
* * *
This can be found on the Internet at:
http://clarissethorn.com/blog/2011/07/20/slogan-start-from-a-position-of-strength/
* * *
* * *
* * *
S&M:
[storytime] Predicament Bondage
I wrote this in early 2011. Amusingly, after I wrote it, one of the top Google queries that
brings people to my blog became the phrase "predicament bondage." I think those folks
are probably looking for porn, and I wonder if my article disappoints them.
* * *
Predicament Bondage
Some people are masochists (who enjoy pain) but not submissives (who enjoy, well,
submitting). Some people are really into discipline (with lots of punishment) but not
bondage (rope, cages, etc). Some people are sadists (who enjoy inflicting sensations) but
not dominants (who enjoy being in control). Some people are switches, who find that
they can switch between roles -- they can be dominant or submissive; sadistic or
masochistic... I am an example of a definite switch.
Me, I get positively bored if someone takes a long time tying me up. For other people, 45
minutes of elaborate knotwork = really hot foreplay. I don't understand this, but that's
cool; plenty of people don't understand my preferences and we all coexist quite happily
anyway.
So yeah, "bondage" -- rope, cages, etc. -- is not so much my thing. But there's one phrase
I absolutely love: "predicament bondage." Predicament bondage is usually presented in a
very elaborate way: for example, a submissive might be tied up with ropes binding him
such that his arms are in pain -- but if he moves his arms then his legs will be in pain. It's
a predicament! And it's bondage! Whee! Predicament bondage!
However, it doesn't have to be elaborate to be predicament bondage. I'm not into rope
obstacle courses, but I started loving the phrase "predicament bondage" after a friend
went to a workshop run by Fetish Diva Midori and reported back. He said:
Midori had two pitchers of water, or maybe a pitcher and a glass. She told us, "This is
the simplest form of predicament bondage," and she had the demo submissive hold his
hands straight out at shoulder height. Then she placed the water in his hands. The
submissive had to keep holding the water; if he failed, he knew he would be failing
Midori. But there was never any threat of "Midori's wrath" if he failed her. In fact, she
spoke as if she was on his side, part of his team. In many ways, her sympathy for his
plight made it all the more cruel, because she was the one doing it to him.
She explained this. She knew that his sense of disappointment in "failing" her was worse
than anything she could actually do to him.
So, the predicament in that case was the submissive's increasing arm agony vs. his fear of
failing Midori. For me, that concept is infinitely hotter than a rope obstacle course.
Although for me, in practice, I'd also want the pain to be a bit more... um... personal.
* * *
The first time someone flogged me, I had no idea what he was going to do beforehand; he
and I had the strongest dominant/submissive dynamic I've ever felt, and I put myself in
his hands with almost-total trust. A night came around when I felt that itch under my
skin, the dark burn in the back of my mind... I knew I had to go see him. I wasn't hugely
experienced, but I knew exactly what that slow burn meant.
It was late. He was in bed, and I lay down next to him. "I think..." I said slowly, "I want
you to hurt me. A lot."
I felt him tense beside me.
"Why?" he asked.
I didn't look at him. "Why do you ask me questions when you already know the answer?"
"Sometimes I just want to hear you say it," he said, and stood up. "Take off your clothes
and get on your knees."
I caught my breath; did as he said. When I felt the ends of the flogger trail lightly down
my back, I wasn't even sure what the soft sensation meant, but I was already trembling
anyway. I am surprised by my memory of how much it hurt when he hit me. These days,
I don't think of floggers as especially painful, but then again, I seem to recall that he left
more marks than I'm used to. (I loved taking off my shirt and examining the bruises in the
mirror. I glowed for days, afterwards.) So maybe there was something particular about
what he did, or about his materials. Or maybe it's just that it was my first time.
He created the predicament when I started to cry and flinch around. It was very simple.
He leaned over me. "For the next three, keep your face down and your hands still," he
said. "Promise me."
"I can't," I said. "I can't promise." I said it frantically. I was terrified of failing him. "I
can't."
"You have to," he said gently. "So you will."
I cried harder. I sobbed so hard I couldn't speak. He stayed where he was, leaning over
me, and kept a merciless silence. "I promise," I finally said, when I could shape words.
My back was to him, I couldn't see his face, but I swear I felt him smile.
When he hit me again, I barely moved. After the count of three, he said he wanted to see
how much longer I could go, but the answer was that I couldn't -- I started to flinch
strongly again. Of course, he kept hitting me, if only for that. But at least I hadn't broken
my promise. Hadn't failed him.
* * *
I've heard about a game in which the submissive partner stands next to a wall, and holds
two coins against the wall -- one in each hand. The dominant then does, you know, some
stuff. On the submissive's part, dropping the coins spells failure. This sounds pretty hot,
and it's one way to make a concrete predicament. But during the above encounter -- my
first time being flogged -- I assure you that it was plenty hot enough without any coins.
With only my promise and my awareness to keep me in line.
Sometimes I can't obey the order, no matter how hard I try. My partner may order me not
to move, for example, when I can't help moving. If I were in the above scenario, with the
coins, I'm not confident that I wouldn't drop them. It's scary -- especially if I love him,
because then all the emotions are multiplied. But even if I'm not in love -- as long as he's
got me in the right mental space, then if I fail, I will say "I'm sorry" over and over. I'll be
terrified of his anger; I'll feel like I deserve punishment, and if he doesn't keep hurting me
I'll feel abandoned.
The more I fail, the more it hurts -- more than physical pain ever could. Slamming up
against my own limits makes me feel terribly inadequate. It's hot, but it's dangerous; it
can rip me apart. At times like that, I often need my partner to tell me after we're done: "I
still like you and think you're a good person."
And sometimes I need to hear that especially if I safeword out of the encounter, because
sometimes -- not always, but sometimes -- calling my safeword can feel like the worst
failure of all.
* * *
When I trace some of the weirdest and most random situations that get me hot, I see that
predicaments come up all the time. For example, I have a terrible tendency to try and
make out with a partner right before we're expected to be somewhere. I might be totally
cold 30 minutes before we have to leave, but 10 minutes before we have to leave, ding!
It's like a switch flips. We've got to leave, but I grab him and now he's turned on, oh no!
And now we're late! Whee!
One of my exes pointed out my tendency to make out with him while his car was stopped
at traffic lights that were about to turn green. "I know!" I said. "I don't really get why I do
that, myself." He responded, "Predicament bondage!"
* * *
Sometimes, when the pain is getting intense, I'll play a little game with my partners.
(Kind of a game, except it's also serious, or it feels serious at the time; usually, when I
start playing this game, I am not even close to coherent enough to ponder tactics; I'm
running on instinct.) I think of this game as the "aren't you scared of the neighbors" game.
In the "aren't you scared of the neighbors" game, I start making noise loud enough that I
might catch outsiders' attention. Part of me is hoping that my partner is worried about the
neighbors; that he'll relent, that I can use my tiny advantage to convince him to pull back.
That I can play for a moment of relief, a smidgen of mercy.
Of course, if I'm lucky, my partners will then just order me to be quiet while they hurt
me. Which creates a predicament! Because being quiet is actually not at all easy, and it
gets more difficult the more it hurts.
And then there's the distraction game. I don't always do BDSM with partners I'm sexually
attracted to; even with partners I'm sexually attracted to, I don't always feel sexual during
our BDSM encounters. But when I feel very attracted during a BDSM encounter, oh,
man. That's when I play the distraction game, which involves attempting to distract him
by turning him on. Again, I'm not really coherent enough to be planning strategy at times
like this; I'm more going on instinct; instinctively, it's like I'm trying to bargain. Maybe if
I can turn him on, he'll have sex with me instead of hurting me....
If I'm lucky, he'll recognize what I'm doing; he'll be pleased, amused even, but he won't
stop. One recent partner had me handcuffed to a car seat while he was hurting me. (Doing
this in his car was not my idea, but at least we weren't moving. Nor were we paused at a
traffic light.) I couldn't move too much, so I started licking his hand when he reached for
me. Kissing his palm, his fingers -- he groaned, and then he laughed.
"You are a switch," he said, "trying to control me even now." And he didn't stop.
* * *
"No," I breathed, a few months ago, during an encounter with someone who's really good
at this. "You don't get to say no," he replied, so I bit back the word. Had to fight against
my own desperate instinct to say it, over and over.
Later, he murmured, "It's so cute how you act like you don't want this," as he leaned in to
inflict dark bruises on my shoulder. His words almost brought me to tears. But I don't
want it. Do I? How can I want something that hurts like this? But I'm not stopping him --
did I really ask for this -- I must want it -- Forcing me to face up to my own consent: a
predicament?
I fought back when he hurt me, instinctively pushing him away. "Don't push me away,"
he instructed. "Put your arms around me," and I did. But we moved around, and moved
again, so I had my arms back -- and again, I couldn't seem to control my instinctive
struggling.
And so he stopped for a moment, held my arms in place, and laid down the law. He
knows I very much prefer some kinds of pain over other kinds of pain, so he told me this:
"If you want the kind of pain you like, you have to let me in close." Layer upon layer:
he's not just forcing me to take the pain; he's making me complicit. I think there were also
practical considerations, in that it was actually difficult for him to control how he hurt me
when I struggled a lot, but, still.... It was so hot it made me gasp.
I'm not sure, but I suspect that a few years ago, I might not have been able to handle that
level of complicitness: forcing me to acknowledge what I like. Back then, I was too
appalled by my own desires. Now, this level of complicitness adds another level of pain
-- emotional pain; mild pain that I can cope with -- which is awesome. But although
feeling complicit is a new tactic, it's part of an old game. It's merely another kind of
predicament.
Fundamentally, what's hot about predicament bondage isn't the mechanics of what my
partner says or does. It's not about the scenario or the equipment or the exact words. It's
knowing that he won't stop hurting me, no matter how I fight or beg or scream. It's
feeling that every moment, every action reinforces how much I'm in his power.
It's knowing there's no way out.
* * *
This can be found on the Internet at:
http://clarissethorn.com/blog/2011/01/07/storytime-predicament-bondage/
* * *
* * *
* * *
RELATIONSHIPS:
[theory] Relationship Tools: Monogamy, Polyamory, Competition, and
Jealousy
I wrote this in 2012, but it's the culmination of over a decade of thought. I came across
my first polyamory books when I was very young, and I remember that even though I was
inexperienced, I felt super frustrated by how most polyamorists discuss jealousy. They
were incredibly un-empathic about it; the advice always seemed to boil down to "Get
over it," with a dollop of "Stop being so selfish," and without any acknowledgment of
how painful and difficult jealousy can be for the person who's feeling it. But at the same
time, most monogamists aren't much better about this topic! Many monogamists
approach jealousy as something that requires no examination at all.
In this essay, I'm trying to come to a better understanding of all these dynamics. I also
seek to integrate them with BDSM theory, which I'm convinced has a much stronger
bearing on jealousy than most people will admit.
* * *
Relationship Tools: Monogamy, Polyamory, Competition, and Jealousy
Last year, I wrote a piece called "In Praise of Monogamy." I currently practice polyamory
in my relationships, but I spent years dating monogamously. I've noticed that when
people talk about monogamy, they usually either assume that it's the only way to go... or
they assume that it has to be thrown out the window entirely. I think that this either-or
approach is completely wrongheaded, so the goal of "In Praise of Monogamy" was to talk
about the advantages of monogamy in a more neutral, nuanced way. Different
relationship models are all tools in a toolbox, and some people are better with some tools
than others.
"In Praise of Monogamy" was probably one of my most successful articles ever -- it was
republished at a ton of websites, including high-profile venues like The Guardian.
Simultaneously, the article got a lot of really mixed comments. Some people felt that I
wasn't praising monogamy enough; others felt that I wasn't praising non-monogamy
enough; there were lots of other frustrations too. My big takeaway was that these
conversations don't happen enough, most people aren't used to having them, and it's
really hard to know where it start.
Jealousy is one obvious starting point, because people always bring it up in conversations
about non-monogamy. I talked a little bit about jealousy in "In Praise of Monogamy." If
you've recently read that piece, then feel free to skip to the end of the following italicized
excerpt:
Some people experience jealousy more than, or less than, or differently from other
people. Plenty of people in non-monogamous relationships experience jealousy -- and
plenty of non-monogamous people handle it just fine, through open-hearted
communication.
But there are also plenty of people who appear to lack the "jealousy chip."
And then there are plenty of people who experience so much jealousy, who feel that
jealousy is such a big part of their emotional makeup, that the best way to manage it is
simply through monogamy.
Personally, I used to get a lot more jealous than I do now. I think I'm less likely to get
jealous these days partly because I've gotten better at finding low-drama men. Jealousy
has a reputation for being an irrational emotion, and sometimes it genuinely is an
unreasonable, cruel power-grab. But I think jealousy is often quite rational, and often
arises in response to a genuine emotional threat... or deliberate manipulation.
There's another reason, though... I've also noticed that some switch in my brain has
flipped, and I've started to eroticize jealousy. I occasionally find myself fantasizing about
men I care about sleeping with other women, and sometimes the fantasy is hot because I
feel mildly jealous. I cannot explain how this happened. It surprised me the first time it
happened, believe me. What's really fascinating is that I think the same part of me that
eroticizes jealousy, is the part that used to make me feel sick at the thought of my partner
sleeping with someone else. S&M masochism: the gift that never stops giving!
I think it's important to note here that I didn't become less jealous because I felt like I
"should," or because I was told not to be jealous. In fact, I had an early boyfriend who
acted like I was a hysterical bitch every time I got jealous... and he made things much
worse. With him, I just felt awful when I got jealous; I couldn't get past it. I felt like he
was judging me for something I couldn't help; I felt like my mind was fragmenting as I
tried to force myself to "think better" without any outside support; and worst of all, I felt
like I couldn't rely on him to respect my feelings.
It was the men who treated my emotions like they were reasonable and understandable
who decreased my jealousy. It's much harder to be jealous when your partner is saying,
"I totally understand," than it is when your partner is saying, "What the hell is the matter
with you?" Maybe that's what makes monogamy such an effective jealousy-management
tactic: monogamy can be like a great big sign or sticker or button you can give to your
partner that says, "I respect your jealousy." Which is not to say that monogamy is always
effective for this -- we all know that monogamous people get jealous all the time! (Which
only adds to my point that monogamy might be viewed as just one of many tactics, rather
than an answer, when jealousy is a problem.)
Now, back to the current article. Jealousy is an incredibly hot-button topic, so I'm
nervous about this, but let's focus in on it a little more.
* * *
The Feeling of Jealousy
Jealousy and its cousin, competition, are both things that happen a lot in relationships.
Some people are so uncomfortable acknowledging this that they repress those feelings, or
ignore the behavior that goes along with them... but I've rarely seen that end well. I
believe that some people lack jealousy and competitive urges, but I've also seen a lot of
people who feel those things but can't admit it. Not even to themselves.
I dated a guy last year who told me at the start of our relationship that he never got
jealous. At first I took him at his word, but I quickly noticed that he changed the subject
aggressively when I mentioned past lovers. We had a mutual friend with whom I had a
lot of chemistry; when the three of us were together, my boyfriend acted uncomfortable
and irritable, and when I specifically acted in ways that made it obvious I was with him --
like by giving him Public Displays of Affection in front of the other guy -- he relaxed.
I sighed internally when I observed this, and I felt frustrated, but wasn't sure how to talk
about it without sounding like I was calling him a liar. Fortunately, he brought it up later.
"I think I do get jealous sometimes, and I just don't like to think about it because it makes
me feel like a bad person," he said, one night while we were making dinner. In that
moment, my respect for him skyrocketed. It's hard for people to keep track of themselves
like that, and to shift their self-image when confronted with new evidence.
Some people seem to interpret their lovers' jealousy as a sign of love. Hey, I'll admit that
I've had moments of being flattered or pleased when my boyfriends show signs of
jealousy -- or when they act a little competitive. Sometimes those things are scary,
though... or threatening... or frustrating, like in my example above. It's complicated!
However, I often see those dynamics play out in ways that the participants won't admit,
no matter how much evidence comes up. I think it gets especially complicated when
people experience jealousy as a sexual thing, a turn-on. Most people have a hard enough
time discussing their sexuality in the first place. When you add an ingredient as
controversial as jealousy, the potential discussions become that much more combustible.
When I was researching pickup artists for my awesome book Confessions of a Pickup
Artist Chaser, I found a number of discussions in that community that praise competitive
feelings because they're seen as making the relationship more fun. A lot of these guys say
competition among different lovers within open relationships is awesome because it
keeps everyone a little uncertain, and encourages them to be "on top of their game." This
contrasts drastically with most polyamorous perspectives; in my experience, poly folks
see jealousy and competition as things that should be compartmentalized and managed
very carefully, rather than encouraged or exalted. For polyamory theorists, a feeling of
safety is often the goal, as opposed to a feeling of competition.
And emotional safety is certainly a concern, because jealousy is one of the most intense
and overwhelming emotions out there. It's such a hard feeling to sit with and work
through. My worst experiences of jealousy felt like I was choking, like I couldn't breathe,
like I was sick to my stomach, like I was terribly obsessed, like I couldn't think of
anything but the jealousy and how much it hurt. And yet... I've occasionally felt jealousy
that was weak, almost nice, where I felt a little twinge of it and turned to my lover and
got reassured... and that made me feel more safe, more cared for, more loved.
The bottom line is that people experience jealousy and competitive urges in many
different ways. It's important to acknowledge that and honor it. I don't see it as
productive to frame things like "jealousy is bad," or "competition is awesome." I'd much
rather frame things like: "Jealousy and competition happen sometimes, and how do
we deal with them when they come up so that everyone involved feels comfortable
and happy?"
* * *
The Toolkit
I firmly believe that the primary tools for dealing with jealousy and competitive
urges are honesty, good faith and respect. If you're feeling jealous, then take a deep
breath. (I'm pretty sure that most relationship drama could be avoided if more people took
deep breaths.) Hopefully, you're dating someone who you like and trust (if you're not,
what's the point?). Remind yourself that this person, who you like and trust, probably is
operating in good faith and isn't trying to hurt you. Respect that this person has their own
desires, which won't always overlap perfectly with your own. Don't assume that your
partner is obliged to do everything you want -- but do be honest about what's hurting you,
so you can work it out together.
And, in turn: if your partner is jealous, respect that emotion. Remind yourself that this
person, who you like and trust, probably is operating in good faith and isn't trying to
control you. Be honest about how your partner's jealousy makes you feel, and think about
ways to reassure your partner while protecting your own needs and boundaries.
The most stable relationship formation for dealing with jealousy and competitive urges
appears to be monogamy. To be sure, I think people have plenty of other reasons for
choosing monogamy. But the relationship tool that seems to work most thoroughly, and
most often, and for the most people, is simply... being monogamous.
There are many ways of approaching non-monogamy, but the one I'm most familiar with
is polyamory. A lot of polyamorists, though not all, organize their relationships into
hierarchies: they have one or more "primary relationships," and then "secondary
relationships" and other relationships that don't make it to secondary level. Sometimes a
primary partner will have "veto power" -- i.e., if one partner wants to get a new partner,
then the primary partner can explicitly block that partner. This seems to help control a lot
of jealousy and competitive behavior.
Some poly folks say that they see hierarchies and veto power as "blunt instruments," and
that they prefer to negotiate every interaction case-by-case. This sounds fine to me as
long as it works for them, of course. But I would offer this: I think that blunt instruments
are sometimes the most useful tool for a given project. And in fact, blunt instruments are
more often useful than finer-tuned instruments. The whole idea of finer-tuned
instruments is that they're useful for precise circumstances... but they're also harder to
use, and more fragile. Some people don't have the time or inclination to create a whole
new toolkit for every individual relationship. Some people will settle for a slightly less
precise, perfect relationship in exchange for a more stable one. Sometimes it's simply
easier to use a blunter, but more universally effective tool.
I will also add that I have seen plenty of polyamorous relationships in which there were
unspoken hierarchies, and unspoken veto power. This resulted in maneuvering that
struck me as both underhanded and unnecessary. I've always felt that it would be better
for everyone involved if those dynamics were put out on the surface.
Finally, for people who like jealousy and competition.... If S&M has taught me anything,
it's that it's quite possible to play with pain and power within a safe, loving framework.
The key is to compartmentalize the whole process and discuss it openly. If people are into
competitive relationships, then okay. If people like jealousy, then okay. But in that case,
they really ought to look for partners who share those tastes, and to find ways that they
can deal with them openly and honestly.
In S&M, there's a huge emphasis on careful communication tactics -- safewords are the
most famous example, but there are plenty of others. There's also a huge emphasis on
talking about the S&M encounter and processing it together afterwards; we call this
aftercare. If jealousy and competitiveness can be understood as consensual games of pain
and power, then I think people who want to play those games would do well to learn
about S&M communication tactics. If you're going to have fun making your partner feel
an emotion as intense as jealousy, then you might consider giving your partner a
safeword.
* * *
This can be found on the Internet at:
http://clarissethorn.com/blog/2012/05/01/relationship-tools-monogamy-polyamorycompetition-and-jealousy/
* * *
* * *
* * *
EVOLUTION:
[storytime] You Don't Always Know What You're Thinking
I wrote this in late 2010. I have mixed feelings about it now. I think I made important
points, but I will also say this: if you don't have a clue what's going on in your head and
don't even know where to start, then that can be a bad sign. I think that when people are
unhappy, or dealing with situations that are more than they can handle, they often settle
into a kind of mental "fog" so they don't have to think about it. (The feminist writer
Autumn Whitefield-Madrano has a great article describing how this happens in abusive
relationships; she calls it "the fog of abuse.")
Yet at the same time, I do believe that we should consciously make space in ourselves for
new feelings to emerge, especially when we're pushing our limits. Self-awareness must
include allowing new feelings to emerge at their own pace.
* * *
You Don't Always Know What You're Thinking
In May 2010, I wrote a post called "Am I Evolving Away From Monogamy?" in which I
talked about my urge towards polyamory, and my confusion about that urge. I talked
about my previous dislike for polyamory, and I talked about how new it is for me to feel
like I want to be polyamorous. I talked quite a lot, really, but a week later, I started
feeling like I hadn't covered everything... or like I just wasn't correct about some things
I'd written.
But how could I be incorrect? I was, after all, writing about myself and my own feeings.
How could I be wrong about what I myself was thinking?
I guess I realized quickly that I'd claimed things about my past self that weren't quite true.
That didn't acknowledge my own complexity. For example, I wrote that although I've
toyed with polyamory in the past, my most recent poly leanings came up only because I
got my heart broken by a gentleman who I sometimes refer to as Mr. Inferno. I theorized
that perhaps I'm just scared of commitment. While it is certainly true that I'm not big on
commitment these days, I later recalled that actually -- at the beginning of my
relationship with Mr. Inferno, I had some doubts about being monogamous. I was
monogamous because he was very sure that was what he wanted, but I remember a point
when I thought about trying to negotiate something different.
Polyamorous people are stereotyped as being commitment-phobic. I know all about that
stereotype -- in fact, I have angrily defended my poly friends from it for years! (Even
when I was very fiercely monogamous, I got so mad when people who don't know
anything about polyamory said ignorant things about my poly friends!) Yet I have to
watch out for that stereotype's influence on me anyway. When I forgot that I'd considered
polyamory with Mr. Inferno, was I being influenced by that stereotype? Or was I just
missing Mr. Inferno a lot that day, and wishing I could talk to him, and maybe therefore
remembering him as more influential in my life than he actually was? Or... what?
I'm visiting my father right now; we went out to dinner the other night and talked about
relationships. I'm quite open about my parents about almost everything -- we don't talk
explicitly about our sex lives, but we do have detailed conversations about stuff like
polyamory. My dad is not at all attracted to polyamory, and we used to commiserate and
theorize about how we just didn't understand polyamory.
Now that I've decided to pursue poly, my dad is puzzled. "I know this is weird," I said to
him during dinner, "because we used to be on the exact same wavelength about this," and
he nodded. He asks questions, he tries to figure out where I'm coming from -- and they're
all questions that I have decent theoretical answers for. Answers include: "Well, of course
it's possible to love more than one person at a time. Mothers can love multiple children,
kids can love multiple parents, friends can love each other, so why wouldn't it be possible
for people to have sexual and emotional relationships with multiple people?" Or:
"Jealousy can be managed just fine, as long as partners are communicating well and
genuinely care about each others' feelings."
In fact, some of my answers are the same theoretical answers that he and I discussed
back when we were both steadfastly monogamous. Except this time, I'm giving him those
answers from the other side; and yet he can't relate any better to them, this time around.
* * *
I have always spent a very large amount of time obsessively analyzing my own
emotions, and often writing about them. This has been true since childhood. However,
one analytical skill I can always improve is this: knowing when to say, "I'm not sure how
I feel about that."
Another important skill is staying on top of the stories I tell about myself, the ideas and
memes and images and narratives that I'm trying to match myself to. It seems impossible
to track all the influences on my psyche, all the different social and cultural and even
biological forces. Where am I under all the programming? It's worth trying to figure it out
(even if I'll never know for sure).
I don't always know what I'm thinking. I don't believe that anyone always knows what
they're thinking. It's important to acknowledge this, because when people don't
acknowledge it, they often simply decide to be something that doesn't quite match up
with what they want. Sometimes this works fine -- if the pattern a person chooses to
impose on her self can function, then who cares if it's a perfect match? (I mean, arguably,
people are always imposing unmatched patterns on our thoughts and selves.) But
although this sometimes works fine, there are plenty of times when it doesn't work fine.
Or really at all.
I have a section in my sexual communication workshop for maxims -- little slogan-like
things. I recently added a new one that I really like: "You don't always know what you're
thinking."
* * *
I've been practicing BDSM for a while, now, and it has been amazing. I've had a lot of
very intense sexual experiences and I feel incredibly confident about my sexuality. I feel
very far away from my younger self, who realized that she was into BDSM and
completely freaked out. However, I used to keep a very detailed (albeit sporadic)
personal journal, and this allows me to look into the head of 20-year-old Clarisse. Here's
something I wrote only a couple of weeks after I met Richard, my first serious BDSM
partner:
On the surface I have a hard time understanding why this has shocked me so much -- the
fact that I wanted him to hurt me, the fact that even as I was facing down my demons and
crying and incoherent I wanted him to keep biting me, scratching me, bruising me, and
God, it was bad, but even now I wish it had been far worse... on some level I want to
have been physically scarred. He stopped finally because I started saying "no," and
couldn't formulate a coherent answer through my tears when he asked me if I was
serious. But, of course, although I was serious, I also didn't want him to stop. Of course.
Of course I wanted him to hear me saying no and keep going, to be protesting and
overridden. And the reason I couldn't formulate a coherent answer wasn't even that I
didn't know the answer was, "Yes, keep going." It was that I knew the answer was yes,
and when I faced it I started crying so hard I couldn't speak, and he... sensitively, I
guess... decided it was time to stop.
How cliche I am. (God, I'm sounding like some naive ingenue from a random de Sade
play or something, just discovering my sexuality or whatever.) How self-conscious. And
how humiliated and ashamed. Of all the things I think I expected from myself for this, if it
ever came true that this was what I wanted -- I never really actually expected to be
ashamed.
What I think is especially interesting about those paragraphs is that I felt a certain
recognition for my BDSM identity, I felt a certain inevitability about learning what I