I used to think that people who participated in painful or power-play practices during sex were weird.

As far as I was concerned back then, BDSM, stood for Bloody Dumb, Sexually Messed-up and Vanilla was a flavour I cooked with and a smell I wore as a perfume.

I certainly wouldn’t have called myself narrow-minded, having had a few sexual partners with varying tastes. Nor was I was against sexual experimentation - I’m a firm believer of trying new things and opening my mind to new experiences - but when you enjoy sex as much as I do, I questioned why you would include something in that sexual practice, that might cause pain or discomfort.

In other words, ‘if it ain’t broke, why fix it?’

It wasn’t until a few years ago that I discovered the pleasure of including domination and role-playing into my bedroom. Something I thought I would never experiment with, and until I met K, I found the idea not only repulsive, but scary too.

K was a lovely man, softly spoken, intelligent and gentlemanly. We were fuck-buddies for some years, having fun with each other in between our partnerships. Sex was always great: laid back, light hearted, satisfying. It was so easy because there was no emotional tie between us, shagging K was like playing a great game of tennis: it kept us both in shape, was immense fun and left us both feeling refreshed at the end of it. (FYI, the tally was a 5:1 ratio of my orgasms to his, so I reckon I won most matches).

K had this habit of always calling me ‘Ma’am’. When we walked into a restaurant, he’d hold open the door for me, and say ‘after you, Ma’am’. When we were trying to decide what movie to go and see, he’d say ‘whatever you would like, Ma’am’. And when we were in bed, and I suggested we change position, he would say, ‘yes, Ma’am’.

At first I thought it was his North American politeness and his attempt to be charming (it worked on me that’s for sure). But later, after knowing him some years, it started to bug me a bit; I think I have a nice name; I like people to call me by it. Ma’am seemed so impersonal, so deferential, so pandering to authority. I began to feel uncomfortable about it and one night I decided I had to approach the matter before it got any worse: I refused to get intimate with K, until he explained himself.

After some nudging on my part K finally admitted to me that he had a ‘thing’ for dominating women (in fact, some months later he told me he visited professional dominatrixes regularly). He was turned on by my assertiveness and boldness and by calling me Ma’am, he had hoped I might 'pick up' on his cues and take the control over him in bed.

Well, I was surprised certainly. Firstly I had never thought of myself as particularly bold; I mean, people that know me would testify to my ability to be brutally honest and open, (even if it’s uncalled for), but dominating? I don’t know about that.

And secondly, dominate him in bed? Here was I, a feminist, a believer of equality in every realm, and a man wanted me to take all the control? I wasn’t quite sure about that. Too much freedom I think. Or maybe it was just the fear of the unknown. Either way I wasn’t very enthusiastic about it.

K pleaded with me to have a little trial run – test out and explore something new with him – and that if I didn’t like it, he’d eat my pussy all night as consolation.

Let’s just say I am easily swayed: I found myself, an hour later, sitting on his face, grinding my hips against his mouth. But that turned out to be all part of the experiment…

So we’re in my bedroom, and I’m about to ‘pretend’ to be dominant.

Let me tell you, I felt pretty stupid. K says to me to tell him what to do, whatever I want, he will do it. And I figure: what the fuck, may as well give it a try.

I pushed K back towards my bed and told him to lie back on it. K said ‘yes, Ma’am!’ and did as I requested.

Hmm, maybe there’s something in this, I think, as I motion for him to remove all his clothes. K eagerly pulls the remaining items off and lies on his front on the bed.

I could hear him breathing heavily, and he was lifting his arse off the bed slightly in anticipation.

I didn’t know what to do. I mean, he was there, naked, and I didn’t know what to do. I felt so inadequate.

K made it easier for me:

“Would you please spank me?”

I was stunned. “What?”

He looked up at me. “Please. With your hand. Slap my arse”

I felt embarrassed, stupid, childish.

But I did it anyway.

I crawled up over him, and whacked him hard with my right hand. It landed squarely across his right arse cheek. K flinched and then said,

“Again. Please”

So I did, stifling a laugh that had been emanating from my throat for a while. I slapped him hard across his left cheek. K flinched again, and I thought I was going to burst out laughing from the stupidity of it all. Here I was hurting him, and he was asking me to do it. Weird. I almost got off him and walked away.

But then I noticed something. K was grinding his hips in towards the bed. He was breathing very heavily. His hands were clenching the sheets.

Oh my god.

I reached forwards and slid my hand between his thighs and felt for his cock.

He was rock hard.

Oh my god.

He was hard from two slaps on his arse.

He was enjoying it.

Wow.

This was an epiphany for me, really. Until this point I didn’t know that one could get pleasure from pain. And I never thought I would be creating the pain in someone that would enable them to get this pleasure.

And I figured: if he’s liking it, who am I to deny him that pleasure?

So I slapped him again. And again. And each time he ground his hips into the bed, rubbing his cock against my mattress, grinding faster and harder with each slap, until I knew that he was close and that a wet patch was surely imminent on my sheets.

That night I learned how K liked it:

1) Having hard slaps on his arse
2) Being told he was a bad boy and needed to be punished
3) Having his hands bound to the bed above his head
4) Getting his cock gripped hard by me in between slaps on his arse
5) Being lashed on his back and arse with my belt
6) Sitting on his face and ‘forcing’ him to fuck my pussy with his tongue

And during the next few months I learned to role-play for him even more, dressing up in a tight top, skirt and stilettos, verbally abusing him to the best of my ability, and handcuffing him and whipping him violently across his back and arse with a leather riding crop.

Being with K taught me to explore playing games in bed, using words to turn him on, and complimenting the dialogue with the occasional slap. Sex for K was all about the fantasy: in bed he wanted to be totally submissive, but out of it, he was just a normal average bloke who liked a pint and watched the football.

Fun and games. Consensual, easy and not at all the weird thing I thought it would be.

That night was a turning point for me: I learned that sex can be even better with full use of the most sexy organ of the body: the mind.

And it was with this thought in mind, that I found myself some months later, clad in a rubber dress, watching a man be humiliated and tortured by a professional dominatrix in a purpose built dungeon.

I will explore this in the next episode, Domination, Dungeons & Dominatrixes (part 2)