By Sensuous Sadie
SensuousSadie@aol.com
www.sensuoussadie.com

This series is the story of my relationship with Vladimir, who lives just over the Canadian border, not far north of my home in Burlington, Vermont. In addition to being my (now former) Dominant, Vladimir is a writer and editor himself and had full editorial control of this essay.

July 2006

This Series
My Promise to Vladimir 
That Old Monogamy Commitment Fandangle 
Caging my Submissive Spirit 
The Perils of Transparency 
A Very Short Love Affair
They say you should never sleep with your friends
An Ode to Master Xavier (and tell him not to get a swelled head over it either)
When Do Broken Hearts Heal? Not Soon Enough, If You Ask Me

Photos of Vladimir

They say you should never sleep with your friends. I've always wondered why they say this, because really – why not? If it doesn't work out, you can go back to being friends, right? Well, I guess it was my turn to find out. As you know, Vladimir and I were best friends before he asked me to be his Submissive, and now a month and a half later – we're back to friends. Or back to something anyhow. The truth is, I'm having a hell of a time finding my way back to our friendship. Back in the friendship days Vladimir used to come over for a weekend and we'd do things, then he'd go home. Frankly, I wouldn't think much about him in the meantime. You wonder what could have changed in that short a time, but in a way, everything has changed. You see, friendship by nature has a little emotional distance built in. But once you cleave unto another person emotionally, physically, and spiritually – things become intimate on a whole new level. I don't have to tell you that of course, but the question is: how do you recreate the emotional distance of a friendship once you've visited the heart?

Then too there are some special issues that come up on the context of the BDSM relationship. I have long felt that there are ways that BDSM in particular allows us to become more intimate in our relationships than we can in vanilla relationships. Whether or not you agree with me on this particular subject, let me tell you about one way that Vladimir taught me to be deeply intimate with him. I've hesitated to write about this for two reasons. One is that I don't usually write about my actual sexual practices because I want to keep some things just for me and my partner. The other is that one of the things we Submissive women often laugh about is the fact that there are so many Dominants out there who just want a Submissive so they can get a blow job whenever they want. Blow Job Doms we call them.

So when Vladimir started talking with me about how he wanted me to do blow jobs in a certain kind of way, I couldn't help but giggle. But he's not a Blow Job Dom – he really wanted me to try something different. Instead of your usual fellatio with intent toward orgasm, he taught me to let go of my driven self, and to relax into a slow, rhythmic, and time-intensive appreciation of his cock. His goal was not to get off, but to enjoy the very gentle and quiet pleasures of my mouth for long periods; a half hour, an hour, or even longer. I was quite sure I wouldn't be able to do this because I'm extremely goal oriented, and relaxing for long periods is not my style. To my surprise, I was able to utterly cleave unto him. I would often rest my head on his thigh and close my eyes to everything but the close feeling and scent of him. He sometimes wasn't even hard, but it wasn't about that at all. The world faded away and I totally focused on our breathing and the quiet, ineffable silence of our pleasure. It was a sexual meditation on each other, and a loving way to connect in the hush of the afternoon.

Even more importantly was that I felt that this service was a way to show my deep and abiding respect for his dominance, a physical manifestation of my love and submission. It is also true that I love to give this kind of service to my Dominant and we also did the usual more BDSM oriented blow jobs as well, but doing it in this special manner engaged us with each other in a unique way. I know that Vladimir not only recognized this deeply personal gift, but appreciated that he had not been truly given this gift, in this particular way, by any of his Submissives before. He truly appreciated how important it was to both of us, and so did I. These series of moments together were the defining experiences in my relationship with Vladimir, the thing that made it all worth it and the reason I don't regret having had this relationship.

Why do I tell you this? I tell you this because once you have experienced something as intensely intimate as this, it's very difficult to go back to being "just friends." I don't know how to forget this experience, or to stop wishing I could have it again, not just the physicality, but the intimacy and the unmistakable affection in his eyes.

Another part of our BDSM relationship that has made the transition back to friendship more difficult is the Transparency that I was practicing with Vladimir. When I first told my vanilla friend Patricia about this she thought it was a great idea, because "total honesty is a very important thing in a relationship." But the fact is, transparency is far more than just honesty. Being honest presumes that you are doing some kind of gatekeeping about what you choose to tell your partner. Transparency means that you tell your partner everything about what you feel and need, which means that the vulnerability factor is ten times higher. In my opinion, being this vulnerable with anyone puts a person at emotional risk; it certainly put me at risk which was not at all fun. Moreover, I'm not convinced that any human being, any Dominant should have the responsibility of having to handle of this level of emotional vulnerability in their Submissive. The reason I say this is because Dominants too are human and have their own emotional issues and concerns, and to expect them to be responsible for another person's emotions at this level may be unreasonable and impractical.

In a way, the fact that a friendship didn't successfully morph into a partnership tells us something – that something was rotten in beantown. And in a way, I have a sense that as much as I'd like to still love Vladimir, my love may have been burned out by the ring of fire. To have opened up my heart and body to my best friend and to have it rejected in less than a month has left me as closed and tight as a clam. What possible friendship could be possible after this? How could I ever trust anything he said after this? How could I ever open up and share my feelings, knowing that they wouldn't be safe with him? Even "just friends" requires trust and a willingness to share how you feel. Although I don't regret that I took this risk with Vladimir, I do regret with all my heart that taking the risk may have caused the loss of our friendship. I can only hope that one day we'll be able to get past this painful episode and create something new, something only a friendship can tell.

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Sensuous Sadie is the author of It's Not About the Whip: Love, Sex, and Spirituality in the BDSM Scene. Read an excerpt at http://www.trafford.com/robots/03-0551.html. She is the founder and leader (1999 - 2001) of Rose & Thorn, Vermont's first BDSM group. Comments, compliments and complaints, as well as requests for reprinting can be addressed to her at SensuousSadie@aol.com or visit her website at www.sensuoussadie.com. Sadie believes the universe is abundant, and that sharing information freely is part of this abundance, so she allows reprints of her writing in most venues.

Copyright 2006 Sadie Sez Publications