Category: Life with Belle

Stuff that really happened to Thumper and/or Belle Fille

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Two things a-poppin’

I was all set to tell the tale of the long holiday weekend and the forgotten key when two things popped up in comments that I wanted to hash out.

First is a question asked in a more lengthy comment by reader SunLocked:

As for the price: I think you should first decide on why you write the book – is it to make money or is it to give advice to those seeking it…?

That’s an excellent question.

It seems as though if all I cared about was advice, then this blog is it. Anyone willing to wade through the years of posts will undoubtedly find almost anything they need to know on the subject (at least is it pertains to my experiences). However, way back when I first introduced the purpose of this blog, it wasn’t so much I was thinking of advising others as much as I wanted a place to sound out ideas and even solicit others’ advice. That’s still the point, I suppose, though along the way my experiences rolled up into a big enough ball that I became an advisor, not the advisee. I think of the book concept as a declaration of where we’ve found ourselves. The opposite of the rambling and often inconsistent and contradictory play-by-play of the journey that is the blog. Told from a position of experience looking back, not from inexperience looking forward. Hell, when I started writing this I still hadn’t ever had anything locked onto to me and had barely been denied any orgasms at all (Oooo, he went three whole days without coming!).

Also, while this blog seems to be fairly well-known among a certain subset of netizens (yes, I did just use that word), I think that having a title listed in the various places one goes to find books can introduce a whole new group of people who otherwise would never find me because the internet is a scary place filled with some scary things (even my own site). When I think back on how we started, one of the first things we did was buy Male Chastity: A Guide for Keyholders. For Belle especially, this was a much easier introduction than most of what was available on the web then (with the notable exception of Tom’s blog from which I sent her many links). There was no Keyheld back then (or, for that matter, She-Held) and, even if there were, even those sites are more advanced than I’m thinking would have been right to share with Belle at the time.

With regard to the money thing, I’m not looking to make a lot off this. I’d like to get something in exchange for my efforts, but I already make a pretty good living and don’t really need the income (though more’s always better, right?). I don’t criticize Sarah Jameson her cottage industry, though that approach isn’t right for me. The more this feels like a job, the less I want to do it (which is the biggest threat to ever completing the book).

Billus chimed in with a thoughtful comment but said in the midst of it…

Tom’s site has more or less self-destructed, for reasons known only to him.

Which garnered a response from Tom to the effect that time has marched on and, like I’ve found, his blog is not what it was because he’s not what he was. Billus replied back that he’s lost interest in where Tom’s taken the blog, but it’s no skin off his nose.

The reason I highlight this (besides thinking that “self-destruct” is a tad harsh) is that I started this blog with an eye towards Tom’s and have thought that its evolution might also be influenced by his. I like to write. I like to write here. So what if someday I start to write about things other than those found in the chastity ghetto repertoire? These are, after all, personal blogs, right? What’s to stop me from talking about politics (man, I’d really like to) or media or whatever the fuck? Except that it may lead to fewer people reading it.

And that’s such a rub for me. No, I shouldn’t care about how many people read my words, but as a person who writes, I can tell you it’s a lot more rewarding when someone’s reading you than not. I have another blog written under my real name. If I get a dozen eyeballs a day (thirteen if one’s a pirate), I’m lucky. That lack of attention makes it hard for me to write there, though I know that more writing is what I need to do in order to get the eyeballs. In either event, as its popularity has grown, I’ve come to think of Denying Thumper as something like a channel. HGTV doesn’t show baseball games and ESPN doesn’t talk about kitchen make-overs and DT doesn’t compare and constrast UK Top Gear to US Top Gear (short story, US Top Gear sucks). But, of course, this isn’t a channel. It’s my personal blog, as I said. So why not write what I want? Sooner or later, it feels like I will have to expand the content here if I’m going to keep it going. Some of you may think of that as a kind of self-destruction, but where are the lines between your expectations of what I’m supposed to write about and what I really want to write about?

Anyway, it’s an interesting conundrum I’ve been pondering and one Billus’ comments bubbled to the surface.

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The book

I’ve decided to write a book about male chastity and orgasm denial. There, I said it.

I have hesitated to embark on this endeavor for a couple of reasons. One, I like to start things but I don’t always like to finish them (for example). I figured if I ever told you people about the book I’d have to deal with the occasional, “How’s the book going?” thing which, while an innocent enough question, is a poisonous thing for a habitual procrastinator to hear. Second, I have a problem with the idea of writing the guide to this stuff. I have a very deep yet narrow experience set and I don’t think it’s necessarily applicable to everyone else looking to explore this kink. I’ve never really felt entirely comfortable being thought of as an authority, though I’ve kinda let go of that by asserting in the introduction exactly that: My experiences are my own, my opinions are my own, take them for what they’re worth (which is apparently whatever the book ends up costing), maybe it’ll work for you, maybe it won’t.

I expect I’ll release it as a Kindle book. Maybe iBooks, too. Maybe even as a Lulu print-on-demand thing. Minimally, it’ll be on Kindle. One of many questions I may have for you, my readers, as this goes along is how much you think I should sell it for? I have a price in my head, but I’m looking for some other opinions.

The next thing I want to ask, as I get into the planning and structuring of it, is what kinds of things would you want to see in it? I assume there’ll be all the practical gearhead chastity nerdery stuff that I’ve already regurgitated all over the blog, but what else? Again, I have my own ideas about this, but I think now’s a better time to ask for input than after I’m almost done with it.

Finally, there’s how this will relate to the blog. I expect a couple of things. One, I probably won’t be updating it quite as often while writing since all my energy for that will be going into the book (I guess that all depends on how my room full of monkeys with typewriters experiment goes and how how many monkeys I can procure). Who knows, though. Second, I will never (ever) make this blog nothing but a front-end sales pitch to the book. Promise. I’ll probably have some kind of element that promotes the book here, but I don’t see this being a giant hand reaching into your bank account. Third, it’s entirely possible that laying this giant thing onto the world will end up being some kind of dénouement for the blog. I’m already sometimes feeling like my tank is running low and there’s just not a ton of reasons for me to do this, but then again, I can’t imagine not doing it. I’ve tried blogging elsewhere about other subjects, but so far, I can’t stop doing this. I don’t say this to encourage a bunch of “BUT WE LOVE YOU!!” kind of comments, so please, don’t. I’m just sayin’ I can’t know how I’ll feel about blogging on this particular subject once the opus has landed. If it ever lands, of course. Blogging, in general, is a better way for someone like me to write in that I don’t like the idea of a big commitment, don’t want to plan much, and would rather say whatever I want whenever I want to, not according to some master layout.

Finally finally, has anyone reading this written a book on a subject like this? Or any subject, I guess. Any pointers? How did you approach it? What would you do differently if you had it to do over?

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The Line

I may have mentioned before, but the kids were away from home last week. That led to one off-the-hook day spent mostly in bed and me mostly in her and us fucking like crazy teenagers, over and over. I never came, but she let me ruin one with my hand when it was all over just to let the massive pent-up quantity of ejaculate out and relieve my poor achy balls. Three or four huge squirts leapt unaided onto my stomach. Still horny, though. Always that.

The balance of the week was spent doing romantic datey things since Belle was pretty well fucked out. Several meals out, culminating on Saturday with hours of free time spent at a rooftop restaurant drinking cocktails, munching, and waiting for our Blue Jasmine start time to roll around while we talked and talked. We came around to the topic of fantasies.

At first, it wasn’t about our fantasies. We were talking about a friend and their fantasy and how their partner was interpreting that and how it fit into the partner’s fantasies (or didn’t). It’s not my tale to tell, so I won’t, but the concept of The Line came up. That is, some fantasies can only work in your head, either because they’re impossible (fucking a centaur is Dan Savage’s favorite example) or because, while they’re superhot, you just can’t actually do them without seriously damaging yourself or your partner emotionally (or some innocent victim). Others you can do. For us, chastity and denial are some of those. I found it (it’s always the guy who does, right?) and she was willing to indulge me and, hey presto, now it’s an integral thing for us.

I declared that I know precisely where my Line is. What’s on the “nope, never going to happen” side and the “sweet baby jeebus, that would be sofuckinghot” side. Such as my fantasy of her fucking other guys. How could I possibly want that, she wanted to know. Surely, that’s on the never going to happen side? No, not at all. I have this really unreasonably potent humiliation/inferiority/unfairness kink. For example, she gets to come whenever and however she wants and I never do. Even when I’m locked and loaded and have been fucking her for twenty minutes and all it’ll take is an extra thrust and a half to fill her up, I don’t get to because…well, just because. Sorry. It’s not a huge jump from that, in my mind, to her getting off however she wants, or with whomever she wants. Preferably, another person who fucks better than me. Preferably, a person who fucks so much better than me that she chooses (either with or without his consultation) not to fuck me.

And, yeah, I get that, on the one hand, the mind reels at the concept. Who in the fuck would want that?! I mean, really want it? Well, me, I guess. And I feel pretty sure that it would push my buttons. The thing is, I’m really confident that Belle and I are inseparable. We will be together for the rest of our lives. No studly fucker will change that. So, while I’d burn with jealousy that he got to do what I wanted to but wasn’t allowed, while there may be times when it’s hard and I would struggle, I know that I’ll always have her. It’s the ultimate form of denial but with no chance of abandonment.

The other “problems” with this is the fact that, if I may say so myself, I’m really good in bed. Premature ejacualtion issues aside (understandable for a guy who only comes, on average, twice a year), I know what I’m doing and Belle really digs me. Also, Belle connects sex with a deeper emotional attachment. She’s not just going to fuck any guy. Getting to a point where she would would be a long process. Not one she seems interested in expending any energy towards. I get that. This is a case where our lines seemingly bisect and, I presume, nothing will ever happen.

The other fantasy of mine we discussed was the one recently brought up here on the blog of me being fucked and used by one (or two) guys. I only brought it up because we were talking fantasies and Belle, surprisingly, said she didn’t think that would bother her. Not nearly as much as me being with another woman (which I have essentially zero interest in). She said she thinks of me getting fucked by a guy as not much different than me masturbating or playing with a sex toy. And I agree. Emotionally and with regard to how much of threat it would be to our relationship, it’s about the same. Guys for me have always been about sex. I have a very close friendship with one of the guys I was with when younger, but there was never enough emotional heat there to combust into romantic love. I’ve never been able to do that with guys.

Anyway, I was surprised to hear her make that “guy on guy sex is like masturbation” comparison because she’s said in the past (quite recently, actually) that she’d have a hard time sharing me. In any event, I’ve found that the worst sexual experiences of my life were with people I didn’t know or care that much about (or even like, on one occasion) so I, too, would need to have some kind of connection with them that was something more than sexual and, like Belle, I’m not entirely sure I’d be willing to expend the energy to find and cultivate that kind of thing. Or, in the end, that she’d let me.

Belle has fantasies, too, but it’s kind of amorphous and about being with another woman. Nothing too specific. If she has more than that, she keeps them to herself (alas). I don’t know where another woman for her would fit on her Line, but it reminds me of this:

Sometimes, you don’t know where The Line is until it’s staring you in the face.

God, I love Garfunkel and Oats.

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Nonfiction

Even though he had lowered the shades in the room they shared before going to bed, enough light leaked in to cause his eyes to flutter open. Daylight. Morning. Saturday.

He stirred and stretched a bit and his hand found its way (as all men’s hands do, seemingly by themselves) to his crotch. Scratch. Squeeze. Hard, but not as hard what he usually found there. His other hand reached just as instinctively for his phone. 5:58. The alarm was set for 6:00 anyway, so he turned it off and snuck out of bed trying not to wake her up.

Six o’clock is too damned early to wake up on a Saturday but he had to go to the gym and meet his trainer. This early spot was really hers but she decided a while back she didn’t like waking up that early on a Saturday, either, and told him he had to take it. She’d have his 9:00 spot. Kiss on the cheek. Thanks.

He padded around the house, still naked, morning wood bobbing around in front of him like an eager dog at the end of a leash. He tried to ignore it. Speaking of which, the dog would want to go out soon. Grab a Diet Coke. Get the sandwich in the microwave.

He didn’t like getting up that early but liked this early morning stillness. Like it being quiet. Liked being able to be naked around the house. Liked the kids being away so he didn’t have to cover himself. She let him close the blinds on the huge fishbowl-like windows in front of their home. The ones that let all the people see in and observe their every move, if they wanted to. He opened the door and grabbed the paper. Just a flash of nakedness, but no one to see it. Minor thrill.

Eat. Drink. Read. The dog came out. Back in their room (occasionally referred to as her room), he looked at her still sleeping and quietly grabbed his workout clothes. Sleeveless Nike shirt, light and airy. Under Armour compression underwear. Baggy Nike shorts. Branding mismatch. Ankle socks. Swiss shoes. Into the bathroom to pull everything on. Out the door with the dog. Walk.

Back in the house, he checked his watch. 7:16 now. Fourteen minutes. Need to go. He put his water bottle in his bag, found his keys.

He heard a stretchy groan from the back of the house. A mumbled call. She’s up. Go see her.

“Good morning,” she said, warm and sleepy. Covers up in the morning coolness, bit of nipple showing on the right side.

He climbed into bed and hugged her. Kissed her.

“Hi,” he said.

More kissing. More hugging. Holding her close though the covers.

She didn’t usually sleep naked. Not like him. But she was this morning. Naked and warm and smelling and tasting like her. His hips started to grind into her leg, though his clothes, through the bedding. He could feel himself start to harden. Push against the compression of his Under Armor. He pulled the comforter down a bit and put her nipple in his mouth.

“Mmmm. You don’t have time,” she said softly.

“There’s time,” he replied.

Mouth on nipple, mouth on mouth, one hand on nipple, one hand moving over her body, drifting south. Finding her neatly kept hairy patch. Slipping his finger over her folds. Mouth back on nipple, finger gyrating.

She moaned appreciatively. Her eyes closed and her lips parted and she felt his touch. His hardness was feeling distorted. Squished by the stretchy fabric. Compressed. But nothing he wasn’t familiar with. He’d had it worse. Much worse.

“You need to go,” she complained half-heartedly.

“I need to do this.”

Her back arched a little more, her legs parted a little more, he reached into a wetter, hotter part of her. Slick. Sexy. Her.

Her hips started to move. That’s a good sign, he thought. Fucking hell, he wanted her. But he wanted to feel her come more. He wanted to start her day with this. The rubbery soles of his sneakers caught on the fabric of the bed covering as he wrapped his legs around hers, pressed his needy sex into her. She pulled the covers down. Exposed herself to him. Allowed him full view of his alter.

He felt her rhythm quicken. Her breathing. Her heartbeat. Her pussy silky under his long fingers. More moaning.

She came. Now it was his turn to moan. More like a groan. Her passion in harmony with his desire.

He kissed her again. God, her taste. Her lips. So soft. So perfectly kissable.

“Thank you,” they both said.

“7:28,” she said.

He hopped out of bed, sprinted to his gear, into his truck, down to the gym. Barely late.

On the exercise bike warming up, he could still feel the hard-on in his shorts.

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Hacking

The other day, I was IMing with Dev (formerly of Devastating Yet Inconsequential) and the notion of chastity and orgasm control being a kind of life hack came up. According to the Wikipedia, a life hack is “any productivity trick, shortcut, skill, or novelty method to increase productivity and efficiency.” Seems to me that denial and chastity definitely do not increase the “productivity” of a very specific thing, but work with me here.

Cast your minds back to the beginning of our journey into the life of male orgasm control. We, Belle and I, had been through a hard time in our relationship resulting from the fact that we had pretty much stopped having sex. I went outside our marriage to find the kind of intimacy I wasn’t getting at home. I suppose it would be an easy thing to then draw a line and say I cheated, therefore I ended up in a chastity device and, as punishment, rarely get to have any orgasms. But that’s all wrong and kind of backwards.

Our problem wasn’t that I cheated (though, yeah, that was a problem all right), it was that we weren’t connected to one another sexually. I loved Belle. Never stopped loving her. Never wanted to leave her. I’ve never wanted to be anywhere but with her from the moment I realized I loved her. But we were not intimate with one another anymore, emotionally or physically. We were roommates running a live-in day care center. As I suggested yesterday, kink of any kind, when successfully executed, is the result of and the catalyst for emotional and physical intimacy. It’s only done well after a lot of communication and honesty with one another. The fact that we have kink in our relationship now is because we were open, communicated, and all that. The kink helps keep us that way, but kink is definitely the egg in this model, not the chicken.

The hack part, for me, is the denial aspect. Remember, my problem was that Belle and I had disconnected sexually. I relied on myself for pretty much all my sexual satisfaction and I resented it. She didn’t seem to care. I craved intimacy with another person, not just my hand or a sex toy. By slaving my orgasm to Belle (using the non-D/s definition of “slave” — a component controlled by another machine or component), we have essentially produced a situation where we cannot ever find ourselves in a disconnected place again. This isn’t about quantity of sex, mind you. We don’t have sex as often as I’d like. We have sex as often as she likes. But it forces the issue of emotional and physical intimacy. She controls when I come. She controls pretty much all my sexual activity. One of my primary sexual releases is her orgasm. We can’t move too far outside of one another’s orbits before the issue becomes evident and then it can only be corrected together, not by me slinking off to the bathroom after she falls asleep to jack off in the sink. I used to worry that we’d slip back to the old way. The disconnected way. In exchange for her controlling my orgasms and access to sex, I got security.

Sexually, we are one. That’s deeply intimate. It’s hard to get more intimate than that.

Another part of the hack is how it fucks with my hormones. I’m about to be 46 and, in the greater scheme, that’s not that old, but biologically, shit’s not as easy as it once was. Even if I wasn’t being denied orgasm, it would take me a lot longer to bounce back from one than it used to. When I was 17, I could fuck four or five times in a day and come each time. (I recall one day in particular when I did something like that and the last orgasm, which was maybe the sixth or so, was dry and hurt like a motherfucker…but I digress.) By not coming and leaving all those hormones in me, I feel as close to 17 as I’m likely to get again. Yes, the trade-off is huge. I rarely get to feel the awesome five to ten seconds of real, uninterrupted, unqualified orgasmic rush. But in exchange, I feel like a total raging sex god. Sometimes. At least when we get to fuck (and there’s been an awful lot of that this past week since the kids have been away).

I’m not saying we’ve discovered the key to marital bliss. We’ve discovered a key to marital bliss. And we’re hardly the first to use some flavor of male orgasm continence. I don’t know how what we do would work for a guy who didn’t want to be dominated or wasn’t all that into the bondage aspect of chastity or was just too wrapped up in his own masculine bullshit to even consider limiting how often he came. But it is a hack of the male sexual circuitry and it does work. At least for us.

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Furnaces going cold

Back in 2009, Ranat on Beyond the Hills posted a list of all the blogs written by submissive or switch guys she could find. That, in and of itself, created a vibrant conversation (as you can see in the comments).

Flash forward to now. Ranat has apparently abandoned her blog. The last post was from April…of 2012. The one before that was posted in September of 2011. The most recent comments appear to be from spammers. Except this one, left by the inimitable Tom, from just the other day:

So, here we are, 4 years after, and I just happened to be searching for FLR-type blogs, preferably ones run by women. I Googled into this discussion, and realized that most of the blogs you’ve listed are long dead — except, interestingly, for the ones that you’ve noted as being non-traditional.

But the bigger point is that 3/4 of those blogs are dead, and yet I haven’t found any decent replacement blogs that aren’t more of the same.

He said that on a dead blog. Ironic.

The thing is…blogging is hard. It’s hard even when you’re not blogging about your life and your failures (as so many FLR blogs end up being about since they’re often written by guys in relationships with women uninterested in being the F in an LR). Also, even though it’s just four years ago, the internet is a very different place now. There’s Facebook (which, of course, there was four years ago, but it’s SO MUCH BIGGER now). There’s Twitter (also, around four years ago and, also, bigger now than then). A metric crap ton of the conversation that used to happen in blog comments happens on Twitter  and, I admit, I feel a little left out because browsing Twitter is like drinking out of a fire hose. Be that as it may, it certainly is true that blogs (like this one, I suppose) seem to flame out. Just the other day Belle was saying how it seems like the people who comment on this blog seem to be all different than in the “old days.” It’s true.

It’s somewhat depressing. You “meet” these people, in a way (and sometimes, you actually do meet them), you enter into their lives through their writing, you follow their ups and downs, and then, one day, they’re gone. It doesn’t always happen at once. They just post less often, they comment less often (the only way you know they’re reading your stuff), and then…nothing. They go quiet. They disappear. Many of the links on my own (infrequently attended) blogroll are defunct.

Of course, these are blogs about personal things. People change. They evolve and grow and move on. I think a lot of people blog for very specific reasons. Like, blogging helps people (like me) process and think and learn about themselves or get through a difficult time in their lives. In many cases, once the need for them is done, they’re abandoned and go to seed or are imploded by their owners. And for those of us “left behind” it can be hard. I said over on Ranat’s old post that it’s weird to be having a discussion on a blog that’s been left for dead. Like going to your high school best friend’s parent’s house and hanging out by the pool like in the old days even though your friend doesn’t live there anymore and the pool’s empty and the house is boarded up.

I said that to a new blogger on the scene who calls himself Schnoff. He’s only got the two posts so far, but I like his stuff a lot. I like that he’s gay if only because there are so few voices speaking from that perspective on this topic that I know of (and, as I’ve said, I find gay guys playing with chastity and denial totally hot). Will he last? I can’t say. There have been other exciting new voices who open up and then disappear just as quickly. I hope he sticks around.

And then there’s this blog. In a way, I still feel a bit like the new kid, though I know I’m not. I’m veritably venerable at this point. I admit that my fire to blog waxes and wanes and I’m finding myself, for whatever reason, disinclined to give the kind of blow by blow accounts of our sex life as I once did. I feel like I’m in some kind of metamorphosis state, though it could just as easily be a kind of torpor I’ll snap out of at some point. What is the point of Denying Thumper anymore? It’s not here for the reasons that started it, that’s for sure. Sometimes I think it’s inertia. That act of blogging and writing begets more blogging and writing. Let it go cold, and it dies. Maybe that’s what happened to some of those old bloggers. They let their furnaces go cold.

No, I’m not announcing anything. I’m still doing this. I’m not going to go cold. In a way, I feel like a dinosaur. Not old, but doing an old-feeling thing. Like a cold-blooded creature that needs to keep active to survive while a bunch of warm-blooded newbies skitter around my feet.

I guess what I’m saying is I know where Tom’s coming from. I feel it, too.

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Mailbag

Reader sg4esubby reached out via the FetLife and had many nice things to say as well as a question for me:

My first question is how has the introduction of chastity affected your day to day relationship dynamic as well as its long term dynamic?

Gah! I mean…whew. That’s, like, the biggest question you could ask. My only response can be this entire blog has been an attempt to answer it. In short, the increased emotional and physical intimacy that the overlay of chastity and orgasm denial has allowed has made my relationship with Belle perhaps stronger than it’s ever been. We’ve been married coming up on sixteen years and I’ve never been more into her (and her into me, I think).

But notice what I said there. “The increased emotional and physical intimacy that the overlay of chastity and orgasm denial has allowed…” That’s the secret. A clear and honest exchange of what we want and how we feel has led directly to where we are today. Of course, I think there’s a lot of special elements that denial adds into the mix, but it’s that openness and communication that’s really made our relationship better.

He went on to ask…

The second question is actually more geared toward your wife should she have the time to offer a response. We’re both curious as to her experience adjusting to controlling your orgasms and discovering the changes that took place as a result of that new control. Be it a more submissive husband or a more pestering annoying husband or anything else that she experienced.

Again, super broad question. Unfortunately, Belle’s not kept a parallel blog along the way so all you have is my take on it. Belle’s not usually been eager to contribute here and I’m not sure where she’d even start on this. Maybe if you could break it down into more bite-sized bits.

An anonymous source inquired:

Dear Sir,
I’m sorry for using this way of contacting you in this matter but I have to admit I find myself unable to register onto chastityforums. I must have been trying for like twenty minutes but I’ve been unable to find the bunny’s name.

Can you offer any advice?

Nope. Assuming you’re trying to find out my real name. I don’t put that out there. This is mostly out of consideration for Belle.

I misunderstood. It’s apparently in reference to a security question I set up on the Chastity Forums a long time ago and forgot about. The answer, of course, is “Thumper.”

Jesse asked:

Hi, I have a question about effects of chastity.  There seems to be a lot of conflicting information on the topic online so I figured I would contact someone personally who has first-hand experience.  Have you noticed the size of erections diminishing or the ability to achieve an erection after being in chastity?

This is a total urban legend. I’ve been locked up maybe 70% of the time (or more) for the past several years. I’ve had thousands of erections compressed and constrained by various tubes and cages. The penis is the same size erect now as it’s ever been.

You don’t say if you want it to be true or not. Most of the people I’ve seen discuss this online actually do want it to be true (or are happily claiming it is). I get that. I really do. But, fortunately or unfortunately (depending on your thing), penises are what they are and seem very difficult to change in either direction.

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Rolling a twenty

the big twentyI clearly remember the first time I played Dungeons & Dragons. It was the summer between sixth and seventh grade and I was over at my friend Steve’s house and he and a few other friends were about to start a session and one of them loaned me a character to play with. I had no idea what I was doing, but I loved the fact that this game (right at the dawn of home video gaming — not even sure the 2600 was out yet) required someone to tell the story we were in and all we had was some paper, pencils, and colorful dice, along with our imaginations, to be able to enjoy it. And, of course, our destinies weren’t fixed since we had to keep making decisions along the way.

Decisions such as mine to try and pick a lock on a door with this other dude’s character. I guess I was playing a thief, but not a very good one, because the lock was booby-trapped and the character was poisoned. I had to roll an icosahedron (fancy word for a twenty-sided die) and get a 20. Rolling a twenty is a very difficult thing to do since, obviously, you only have a one in twenty chance of doing it. I remember how all the other kids leaned over me to see what I rolled (and how the Dungeon Master in particular had a gleam in his obviously sadistic eye) and how the dude whose thief I was playing was especially sweating it (since once that character was dead, it was dead…for the most part). I, as I said, had no idea what was going on except all of a sudden I was expected to do this thing that everyone told me was just not done.

But I did it. Twenty.

And I was hooked. I played pretty faithfully well into high school, made a bunch of my own characters, bought little lead figures, all the various books (which I still have), multi-colored dice, and even played the role of Dungeon Master myself from time to time. I remember going home that night and enthusing to my mom about this awesome new game and the monsters in it and the weapons (like the vorpal blade — I specifically recall telling her about the vorpal blade) and how I suddenly knew what I was going to be doing for the rest of the summer (besides watching Price is Right). She gave me a lot of those “yes, dear”s and “uh-huh”s that moms are occasionally required to give their excited kids (whereas my dad eventually told me how D&D was a tool of the Devil, but that’s another story).

I also remember two girls named Anne and Pam. They were best friends and had attached themselves to the circle of guys I was hanging out with. We’d get together to play D&D at one or another’s houses while our parents were at work and Anne and Pam would always seem to be around so they got sucked in. Not that they wanted to. I have to admit I have no idea what they would have rather been doing since I was a self-absorbed teenage boy and they were outnumbered by a bunch of others just like me, but for some reason they decided to half-heartedly play along (we also played a lot of Diplomacy which they also soldiered through without enthusiasm, but I’m not going to talk about that because I’m trying to make a point here).

And the other day it occurred to me how much kink is like Dungeons & Dragons. I suppose I cannot be the first person to make this connection, but they both involve fantasy sessions where one person is in charge and others willingly submit to their authority. They both are replete with rules and traps and interpersonal dynamics that are only clear to those with experience or a willing guide. They both have friggin’ costumes and personas their players use to escape from the mundane world. Really, it seems to me, the same source of energy that feeds one’s involvement in a game as deep as D&D is where kinksters go to energize for their play sessions.

And, of course, there are adult, real-life versions of Anne and Pam involved. Namely, for me and those like me and many reading this blog, I’m talking about our spouses. My mom didn’t need to get all that into D&D to appreciate how much I liked it. She was on the outside. Our wives, though, (or partners or whatever you have), like Anne and Pam, do. And there’s no reason to think they’ll be any more enthusiastic about it than Anne and Pam were. Except Anne and Pam could have just walked away (they did, eventually) whereas our spouses don’t have that as such an easy option. To them, we’ve suddenly discovered a vast and compelling obsession with a complicated game they previously had no interest in playing (or maybe that it even existed) and, worse part is, the rules are obtuse, unclear, and often being generated on the fly by their suddenly enthused partner.

Imagine that from their perspective.

No, really.

If you’re lucky (like I am), your partner is willing to learn the rules (or, more correctly, establish them with you). If you’re not, they aren’t. But in either event, rushing into it and trying to go from Vanillaville to a fantasy sex slave cuckold in permanent chastity has about as much chance of success as my rolling a perfect twenty almost thirty years ago. It could happen, but nobody can remember seeing it for themselves.

So anyway, think about that. Think about how much guys like us expect our partners to digest and change and how impatient we generally are about it because we’ve just found this awesome new game! No, really, you’re going to love it! Really! There are no Player’s Handbooks (well, there are some that try to be, but the rules aren’t so well defined). There are no Monster Manuals. This shit is complicated and often unexpected with its arrival in a relationship. At least from their perspective.

You can drop a guy into a D&D session without guidance or warning and tell him to roll a twenty and it’ll be OK. You can’t do that with the person you share your life with. You need to go more slowly.

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Stress balls

So I have a bunch of stress about stuff right now totally not related to my sex life (and really, it’s not life and death stuff, just really bugging me) and it’s so bad that last night, with the kids away at camp and Belle offering up some “personal time” in the bedroom, I was unable to keep my shit together enough to let it happen.

First thing we did was talk about the stressful shit. Then we talked about my orgasm. Not a specific orgasm. Like, my entire ability to do it. Since the unexpected release earlier in the month, I’ve been wondering what’s up with the previously established schedule that indicated I needed to wait until July, 2014 to come. So, after the stressful shit discussion, I asked her what her plans were. I didn’t mean for it to be a big deal, I was just trying to change the subject to something a little sexier. And I failed.

I am not, as Belle suggested, upset over the last time I came and it hasn’t been bothering me. It was enjoyable and it’s over and I don’t regret it. She says it happened because she has to be able to decide when that happens. I don’t challenge that. I want her to control it and so does she. But, if the deal is I have to wait until a certain date but then she makes me go ahead of schedule, then we’re not waiting for the date. I cannot count on not being able to come before then as it may happen at any time. She seems to be thinking that if there are any limits on her control over me coming (even limits she herself has imposed) then she’s not in total control. There is a certain logic to that, but, as I said, that means the date thing is out the window.

At this point, I honestly don’t care. Experience suggests I’m a better little rabbit when we’re using a schedule. It allows me to more freely want the orgasm if I know she’ll deny me because of where we are on the calendar. When we’re not using a schedule, I end up doing other things she doesn’t like (like keeping track of how long its been). Also, I get all angsty wondering if now’s the time or if I have to wait. That said, I’m fine if she wants to go back to trying it that way. It’s been more than a year since that was how it worked. In something like 15 months, I only came three or four times. Perhaps it’ll work differently now. I don’t know and I’m not trying to tell her how to do it. I must be willing to do whatever she wants. That’s how this shit works.

So the conversation got tense. She got defensive, I got defensive. It wasn’t an argument, but I still ended up feeling very down and exactly like a fucked up, overly complicated, pain in the ass, needy sub. I haven’t felt that way in a long time. And we didn’t have sex.

I suggested that perhaps, with all the stress, we just take a break from the whole denial thing. Or scale it back. Maybe I only come when I’m with her but otherwise I’m not being denied. Just controlled. If there’s a silver lining, it’s that she rejected that out of hand. She has no interest whatsoever is being “normal.” Not ever again, she said.

A complicating factor in this is that she let me out two days ago and let me play with myself all I wanted the night before last. It was a lot of fun and I had a hell of a time falling asleep, but it left me with achy, full balls and, as we “discussed” the current state of affairs, I really, really wanted to come. Not in a sexy way, per se, more in a “fucking hell, my balls are blue and they hurt and they feel all swolleny and ow” kind of way. There’s always that hormonal overlay for the denied part of the equation, I suppose.

I wonder if I didn’t have an unintended hand (so to speak) in Belle’s experimental release. I have recently got in the habit of telling her how badly I wanted to come when she let me fuck her and even asking if I could knowing she’d say no. Telling her that I wanted it, letting myself want it, and hearing her say no is, really, the pinnacle for me. But I think that may have swayed her somehow. That hearing me say it meant she had pushed my denial too far or something. When really, it was the opposite.

So anyway, I await word on how we move forward. And maybe if we can have make up sex tonight. Not “make-up” as in after a fight, but make up as in the game got rained out and now we need to schedule a double header. A double header. That would be cool, actually…