BDSM Trigger and a Newly Found Boundary

I had a complicated afternoon today, which was mostly not fun but also very informative.

I did some BDSM play with a new partner with whom my chemistry had very much lent itself to a dominant/submissive dynamic.

The fucked up thing about that, which I realized today, is that the reason I've felt so submissive to him is that he reminds me of my dad. Bear with me here, and I'll explain. I'd been sort of confused as to why I was so responsive to him. He's a nice enough guy, but I'm not really attracted to him at all. He's had a very active sex life, so he's clearly attractive enough, just not to me.

Despite that, I found myself still talking to him and wanting to play with him. I liked the way he talked about BDSM, and there was something about his verbal manner, especially when he was being dominant, that appealed to me. He very easily and instantly brought out the submission in me. I wasn't sure how the sex was going to go, since his looks are an actual turn off for me, but I went ahead with it anyway. I figured if I had this unexplained pull towards him, especially in a more submissive way than I'd thus far experienced, it was worth seeing through.

Well, this afternoon the sex wasn't working so well for me. I wasn't able to overcome my dislike of his physical appearance and mannerisms, and the thoughts circling my head were distracting and unsexy. So I told him so. (I'd been pretty honest about my conflicted feelings towards him all along.)

We were having a very awkward conversation about it, and I was feeling very embarrassed that I hadn't known my own mind better beforehand, that I hadn't known I wouldn't be able to overcome my lack of attraction to him. I was, therefore, covering my face a lot when we were talking, which is something I do when I feel very uncomfortable, scared, or too emotional.

In an attempt to bring our D/s dynamics into the conversation (which we'd been doing a little, to see if it helped my lack of interest issue), he stood above where I was sitting, grabbed me by the hair and very sternly told me not to cover my face while he was talking to me. This was a fairly minor thing, something that many doms would do. And yet, it very suddenly triggered some heavy emotions for me and I started crying.

When I was little, my father used to lose his temper in a very scary way, usually over little things. He never hit me or my sister, at least that I remember (although I maybe, very vaguely, have a memory I'm not sure is real of being spanked once in anger by my father). But he is 6'4"and big. He would loom over me and yell very loudly, right in my face, would put me down in vaguely awful ways when he was mad, and would move my body around in ways I didn't want. My memories of these things are really fleeting, but I remember him once picking me up off the floor by my arms and shoving me onto our guest room bed to yell at me into my face. It was terrifying.

Most relevant to this post, he would pull my hands away from my face if I was trying to hide from him (because I was scared or later because I didn't want him to see me uncontrollably cry) and he would make me look at him in the eye as he was yelling at me.

Something about the way my partner today grabbed me and stood over me and ordered me to look him in the eye made me lose it. It also made me realize how similar his mannerisms were to my dad's when he was being dominant, how there were similarities in his tone and body language and even the words he used. And here I was, in a state in which I could easily have just broken down sobbing and needed to process this memory from my childhood, with someone there who I didn't know well, didn't really want to be a sexual partner with, and with whom I was already having a very awkward conversation.

I held back on the emotional fireworks until after he left (and he did leave not too long after that). But it's really weird to realize that at least a big chunk of my interest in D/s comes from my history with my father. Like, the mysterious element that drew me to this guy was that he reminds me of my father. (Ew.) That's why I felt submissive to him. I've got mother-fucking daddy issues. Goddammit.

Also, it is now clear to me that while I can play with spanking and bondage and hair pulling and forceful oral and whatever other physical SM stuff I like with casual partners, I definitely should not do D/s or other role playing stuff unless it's with somebody I already deeply trust and care about. Because it sucked to have to process what came up today by myself. And I wouldn't have been able to do so with this partner I didn't know well.

So, I guess we'll call this Another Fucking Growth Opportunity and set a new boundary for casual play. And I'll be more cautious moving forward. It was a rough afternoon, but I guess in the end it's good to know. Sigh.

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