r/GentleDungeon

What it means to be mine is to be held to a higher standard. I don’t consider myself strict, but I do this for your own good. I want you to be put together, to be happy in your skin, to be smart and capable. There’s a reason that I feel this way though.

When others see a well organized desk or a clean countertop, they are impressed. I don’t. When I see those things, I think of how exciting it is to see them ruined through use. There’s something exciting about the organization, but there’s something beautiful about chaos from a life being lived.

When I see beautiful lipstick, a perfect wrinkle free outfit, and someone entirely in control of their words, I can’t help but let my imagination run wild. I imagine that lipstick lovingly left on my body, those clothes rumpled and pulled to the side as my sub’s world shatters in ecstasy, and the pride of reducing someone bright and eloquent into being a mindless little toy, babbling and begging while they writhe in need.

When I set rules, it doesn’t come from a place of negativity, it’s from wanting to see you soar so that I can be the only one who gets to watch you plummet into depravity. Your health is needed to submit, but your mind is where the fun begins.

Now be a good toy and follow my rules. Drink your water, make yourself look nice and pretty, and read your book so that I can make those pretty words and efforts fail you later tonight. This is my favourite version of care. Care that you succeed, and care that I can watch you break down into your basest parts as my lips drag you back to the brink of mind melting pleasure as many times as I need before you’re laid bare for me again.

And tell me, what are you doing tonight to make yourself worthy of your ruin? Soft and pleasurable torture doesn’t come to those who won’t take care of themselves for me. ❤️

TL;DR : my long-time wife in a years-long dead bedroom marriage sprung on me that she wants to have a domestic discipline relationship in order to have sex; I am repulsed by the idea, tried it anyways, it kinda worked but really didn’t as I am very vanilla, and I am not sure how to bridge the gap. Perhaps gentle BDSM is the answer?

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My wife and I have been together for about 16 years and have kids together. Except for the fact that our sex life has been pretty much non-existent for years, we have a good relationship overall;, not without its ups and downs like anyone else of course, but mostly it is supportive, open communication, loving, etc.

I am about as vanilla as it gets. When we first got together, she told me that she was into "very light BDSM" as a sub and that she had had that dynamic in one of her previous relationships but not the others. I made it clear that I was not into that stuff at all and she said that was fine and that we don't need to have that in our relationship. I was naive and young and had next to no clue about this whole thing. So we went ahead and at first sex was great (or so it seemed) but it started to become more and more rare, especially after the kids were born, which I attributed to her stress and various health issues over time. Even though this dead bedroom situation was eating me alive, I never pressured her and tried my best to invest in the relationship over the years as much as possible, for example using the love languages, but although it made the relationship better, it never improved the sex aspect. I was turned down so often that I stopped initiating almost completely. To be clear, when we had sex, the sex was only vanilla and I needed nothing more. I noticed that she would sometimes struggle with being present during sex and had to fantasize in order to orgasm, which was a challenge. I am of an egalitarian mindset; a generous lover, a make-sure-she-orgasms-4-times-before-I-do kinda guy, but not submissive or dominant. Just equal.

Anyways, fast forward after a few years of little to no sex, one day recently she sat me down and told me that there is something she had to tell me that she could not hold in any longer. She said that in order to feel any kind of sexual arousal, desire, or satisfaction, she needed us to have a full-time domestic discipline relationship, where I am the master or Head of Household, she is the sub or Taken in Hand, and I would punish her (mostly with spanking) for any transgressions of rules we would come up with for her behaviour. She said she had tried to put this side of her behind for years but finally realized she could not. She said it would make our relationship better because I could keep her attitude in check and it would make our sex lives great. I was stunned at the revelation, happy she trusted me enough to tell me, and dismayed that this was the case.

The problem is that I do not get aroused by spanking or control of others and take no pleasure in dominating or punishing; in fact, I am rather repulsed by it. Like it is a total boner killer. I would rather caress her body than hurt it. I don’t want to correct my wife with a hairbrush to the ass cheek for her having said something not nice, I want to talk about it. For me it relates to violence and being an asshole and goes against every instinct I have, against the very fiber of my being. I escaped a country at war as a kid and never wanted a relationship where there was domination or what I consider to be violence.

The gap here is substantial. My fantasies are to have sex on the kitchen table or being woken up by a blowjob; hers are of men completely dominating her and punishing her. I can be the sexual leader but not to the extreme level she is asking. This is more of a chasm than a gap.  

Just to say I have tried everything, I agreed to put my feelings aside and try. True to her words, a spanking turned her into a quivering, dripping wet, horny mess begging to be fucked hard. I was in a confusing state of being aroused by that but repulsed by what I had to do to get there and it was a total erection deflater and I hated every moment.  

We continued trying. The other problem that arose is that because I have no experience with this stuff, and she has no patience, it did not result in the kind of emotional container she desired; she wants a dominating man that does it very well, right now, and if I messed up she got mad and frustrated. Eg. I would spank her, she’d say it hurts, I’d check in if she is okay, and she’d get mad that I asked because I am supposed to know and call the shots and I am supposed to be the master and she can’t teach me this stuff because that would run counter to the whole idea of me being the Dom and that would be her leading when she wants to submit etc etc. She said she can’t handle the learning period. Let’s say I was able to drop my identity and get into it, how would I learn? Spanking other women?

I also found out that she is a brat. Which, being a noob, I didn’t handle too well. I thought she wanted to be kept in check, and she was constantly pushing back, which made a hard thing for me to do that much harder. Not to mention even the logistical difficulty of doing this when having kids.

So at this point, the whole thing is shelved because it started to create a lot of friction and frustration on her end, and there has not been any sex pretty much at all since this trial period which lasted a few weeks. It has been two years since then. The solution is so close, yet so far away. Like I have the key but it hurts to touch it. We are each in a sexual life sentence, not getting what we want and not able to give it to each other. I keep hoping that there is another way to handle this but I am not sure. I don’t want to break up my family and there has been no cheating on either side, and she said she does not want to outsource the domination to someone else.

There is a lot more I could write, but this is already long enough. I am not sure how to bridge the gap. In my research I came across the terms soft dom and gentle bdsm. I don't know much about it, but I thought perhaps that was more in line with something I could get behind? I would welcome any info on how I can learn more, what it is and if you think it can help in our scenario, and of course general suggestions and feedback.