Advice from a Parent

July 14, 2014 by
Photo by Becca A. Lewis

Photo by Becca A. Lewis

Community is one of the most important things.  It is impossible to get through life without support from anyone, and it seems the healthier you are, the more you can reach out to those close to you for help.  I reached out to my father recently about love and relationship.  I reached out because relationship is hard and sometimes I feel blind.  I know where I come from and this was an opportunity to know myself better too.  Have a read if you like, I thought his response was apt and beautiful.

To Breath and Being,
~ Karin

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Hey Dad,

I have a lot of questions about love and relationship right now… I don’t know how to make it work. I don’t know how to not feel like an animal trapped willing to gnaw off a foot to escape.

Have you figured it out? What helps you when you love and can’t make it work? Do you try? Do you just not let yourself love?

I love you,
-Karin

###

Hey K,

Was sad to read your e-mail, particularly as I can relate all too well. I’m afraid it must have some genetic propensity… or is a cruel atavistic curse. In the past I have discussed this very thing with my sister who struggles with the same lexicon.

I wish I had some answers, but I don’t. I do think it has much to do with our inability to love and forgive ourselves, and (speaking for myself) I can touch that reality sometimes, but holding on to it is the issue. My sister, I think, is trying to make peace by not trying anymore – which I can understand, but seems sad in the end. In clearer moments I have been able to recognize it as an issue of self-punishment, but that is a very complex revelation when two are involved (there is a sharing of dysfunction from both parties and when and where does my positive independence start to turn into its negative shadow?).

I have sometimes found surrendering to the reality more therapeutic than fighting. These are the cards I’ve been dealt, what can I do? I think my expectations have diminished over time, which is not necessarily a bad thing. But overall, it is a conundrum too complex to figure out, so I’m forced to live in the moment, with what I’ve got.

I truly do believe, however, that if I could love and forgive myself more fully, there would be dimensional changes. That I realize is a never-ending process of layer by layer emotional onion skin healing.

I find talking about it with others helpful – any emotional release is a potential onion skin. Being honest with yourself is key, but beating yourself up over circumstances isn’t proactive either. Nonetheless, I think there is an important distinction between wrestling with yourself and beating yourself up.

I’m sorry I don’t have anything more constructive. And I’m so very sorry you are dealing with this as I know how painful it is. Know that I love you dearly, and am here if you want to converse about it more. Sometimes two blind mice are better than one when navigating something like this.

All my love,
dad

###

If you like my blog, please check out my Patreon Page and consider supporting me, or just click here: Support the Artist

~Thank you.

Be an ABCs contributor:  Do you have a story or perspective to share about kink or would you like to promote a kinky event?  Email Karin directly at: Karin @ ABCsOfKink . com or fill out the as-anonymous-as-you-want-it-to-be feedback form below and you could see your writing published as a part of Wednesday’s “Perspectives on Kink: Conversations with the Community” blog on this site.  Don’t know what to write about?  Consider answering some of the Survey Questions I posted recently.  Happy writing, and thanks!

Filed Under: Brain on Download Blog Tagged With: , , ,

Kinky Bitch Date Night

July 9, 2014 by
Photo by Phode

Photo by Phode

Otherwise known as Tuesday nights (I like to keep it classy with my partners)…

Kinky Bitch Date Night was created as a way to address the problem of follow through in my current relationship.  We are great at dreaming with one another, negotiating is becoming easier, and we’re awesome at talking about sex but actually DOING the things we were talking about was becoming an ongoing issue that we both felt stressed out about.  Feelings sometimes got hurt, both of us were afraid to or confused about how to step forward and make the shit happen, there was a whole lotta worry that the other person wasn’t into these ideas and too much timidity on both our ends…  So we talked it over and decided that if deadlines could help kink happen more regularly, then deadlines and regularly scheduled playtime we would embrace!

To give this some context, my partner and I play at building a relationship that has a D/s dynamic to it.  We both really enjoy that type of play, though we are both short on experience in that department.  My parter is not an experienced Dominant.  I am more experienced bottoming/submitting in pick-up play, but this is not the same as being involved in an ongoing D/s relationship.  Kink is new territory for him all around, and new territory for me in the realm of going steady.  He is trying, sometimes failing, and definitely growing a lot as he figures out what it means to Dominate rather than Top a scene (or even build a scene for that matter).  Internalized stress for both of us about how we measure up to these roles has been a problem – even keeping in mind that there is no “right way” to do kink.  We are building a road to our kink life, and for now it’s still a bumpy unpaved one…

Kinky Bitch Date Night has been quite a ride so far.  I think that it’s really hard to follow through with play desires even when a schedule is set; sometimes because there is a schedule set angst levels about moving forward can also grow higher.  Planning to play has caused strife for sure, but we’ve gotten some pretty awesome scenes off the ground because of it.  I think the growing pains are worth it.

We have had a lot of conversations about scene set-up, boundaries, clear negotiation, realistically focusing on what exactly we’re doing that week… and also on personal fears, our (in)ability to connect in any moment, shut-down mode, preparedness, meaning making about what is going to happen, and why…

Kink is hard.  Community is important and finding it has been vital to our happiness and continued growth.  Repression is one of the hardest habits to walk away from and is pervasive in its reach.  I believe though that a personal realization of freedom and confidence, even/especially after hard battle waged, is absolutely worth the win.

I’m interested in knowing if you have gone through similar or different growing pains in the realization of your kink or relationships roles?  Please write me with your thoughts on the subject.

To Breath and Being, ~ Karin

If you like my blog, please check out my Patreon Page and consider supporting me, or just click here: Support the Artist

~Thank you.

###

Be an ABCs contributor:  Do you have a story or perspective to share about kink or would you like to promote a kinky event?  Email Karin directly at: Karin @ ABCsOfKink . com or fill out the as-anonymous-as-you-want-it-to-be feedback form below and you could see your writing published as a part of Wednesday’s “Perspectives on Kink: Conversations with the Community” blog on this site.  Don’t know what to write about?  Consider answering some of the Survey Questions I posted recently.  Happy writing, and thanks!

Filed Under: Brain on Download Blog Tagged With: , , ,

Made of The Nothing

July 7, 2014 by
Photo by cjohnson7 from Rochester, Minnesota

Photo by cjohnson7 from Rochester, Minnesota

From the center of my paranoia rises a smoke signal urging me to quest on in spite of the screeching halt some part of me has decided on.

Our landscape changes in an instant.  I envision new mechanisms for safety: intuitively I fashion tools then used to disconnect my body from the rushing stream of threat perceived at every angle.  A strange island results: quiet, small as a heartbeat, porcelain and protected from mainland ailments, I am under glass, in a teapot; I am Princess on pillows made of The Nothing.  Screaming Gods of chaos manipulate the universe around, but static and lightening won’t land here.  I am blind behind glassy eyes.  This is holding on.

One day after this storm has passed, a breath test against mirror indicates to my Brain I’ve pulled through.  Nothing feels alive.  Driftwood branches are lodged inside my limbs, soggy wet sand weighs muscle down, and dead fish color my complexion.  After what seems like years of nothing but breathing, heavy heaving of my ribcage against the earth, slowly I feel the dome over me lift.  Cool air rushes in (relief), even as I mourn that escape of heat.  My fingers tingle and blood rushes back, nerve endings begin connecting, I am cut up stinging all the way to bone in seconds.  Hours later sleep complete with dreams nurse these wounds from intensive care status, I am allowed to leave hospital having only unsightly scars soon enough.  Love massages knots slowly out back at home, and oil from our sex renders stiff joints flexible.

The language of pain awoken by Monster Misunderstanding is primary; no one is free from its storytelling.

We each have a relationship with our closet – that place we keep our clothes: woven bits of coverage allowing our naked shape to be unclear to one another and offering a mask for hiding behind all at once.

My body is uncovered now and I step toward you.  There are scars on my feet but I forget they are ugly only underneath, I don’t consider that you cannot see where the jagged purple lines extend to, leading back through my life.

I stand on coals for you.  Hot fire.  Deep pain.  Good days you catch me when I fall trying.  My act is unnecessary, but it’s how I know to be, I want to make you see.

Later we lay down touching each other in the dark.  I wonder at the inconsistencies my fingers brush over.  Can one truly accept the unending mystery of another?

To Breath and Being,
~ Karin

If you like my blog, please check out my Patreon Page and consider supporting me, or just click here: Support the Artist

~Thank you.

###

Be an ABCs contributor:  Do you have a story or perspective to share about kink or would you like to promote a kinky event?  Email Karin directly at: Karin @ ABCsOfKink . com or fill out the as-anonymous-as-you-want-it-to-be feedback form below and you could see your writing published as a part of Wednesday’s “Perspectives on Kink: Conversations with the Community” blog on this site.  Don’t know what to write about?  Consider answering some of the Survey Questions I posted recently.  Happy writing, and thanks!

Filed Under: Brain on Download Blog Tagged With: , , , ,
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