How do you like to hurt?

A Desert Rose said:

aaaaaaaaahahahaha!!! This could be a fun exercise, like riding a bike with a dildo attached to the seat.

Simile? Correct?

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yes, simile

A Desert Rose said:

aaaaaaaaahahahaha!!! This could be a fun exercise, like riding a bike with a dildo attached to the seat.

Simile? Correct?

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Correct.

And now you've put thoughts in my head, and I'm going to have to figure out how to attach a dildo to a bicycle seat, LOL.

BiBunny said:

Correct.

And now you've put thoughts in my head, and I'm going to have to figure out how to attach a dildo to a bicycle seat, LOL.

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let me introduce you to the sybian

BiBunny said:

Correct.

And now you've put thoughts in my head, and I'm going to have to figure out how to attach a dildo to a bicycle seat, LOL.

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If anyone can, my darling, you can

Vail_Indigo said:

yes, simile

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BiBunny said:

Correct.

And now you've put thoughts in my head, and I'm going to have to figure out how to attach a dildo to a bicycle seat, LOL.

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I bet you both could hatch a game thread on this idea... We need another one, don't we?

intothewoods said:

You have to understand, no one would ever dare to treat me this way without my consent. No one I've ever been with would ever in a million years be abusive, and that includes my current PYL. That I consent to this is the thrill.

I've never been in an abusive relationship, but I have tasted a bit of seduction that abusers use. This isn't that, and I say that with the utmost confidence. In the beginning when we'd do this, and I'd freak out a little afterwards, he'd sit with me and hold me and stroke my hair. Now I'm like, yeah, bring it on. I want this, and I'm completely conscious of the fact that I want it. Without it, I'd be bored. I have been bored! This is the best sex I've ever had in my life. And I was no slouch to begin with.

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I didn't mean that you were in an abusive relationship. Just that this sort of thing can easily become abusive IMO. I also believe that what some people see as a functioning relationship is abusive. Again that is not pointed toward you. I don't know much about you or your relationship. It's just a general observation.

I've been in abusive relationships. I don't want to go there again.

In D/s or nilla or any relationship I think there is usually some down side. I think we subconsciously choose the down side we can deal with best or which fit what we've always known. Often we don't see it for what it really is because we've always known relationships to include that.

I think this is a pretty great thread too!

Bravo ADR!

What a good thread!
I've been trying to understand my relationship with pain, why I am willing to go back for more when I do not get off on it and in reading Recidiva's post it feels as if she is putting my scrumbled thoughts into proper words! So: thank you Recidiva-san and sorry for borrowing your words!

Recidiva said:

....
I don't think I like hurting. I do like the intimacy and knowledge bonus gained by being willing to hurt for someone who wants to see it, or needs to see it somehow.

Being willing to hurt makes me open to seeing people at their most vulnerable, their most needy, their most honest.

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Recidiva said:

....

I'm entirely selfish in that testing myself against other people makes me stronger. People willing to test me, are the ones that provide the opportunity.

....

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Recidiva said:

....
I actually don't like exposing my issues at all. I like learning through other people's issues.

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I've been trying to understand why I am willing to go back to be the recipient of physical pain if I am not a masochist. And the above quotes just sum it up very well: I want to get deep into another person, I crave to touch their inner soul and demons. Letting the person dish his sadism on me, I feel he is exposing himself to me and letting me see inside of him. At the same time, I get to test myself, my limits, how much I can take it and feel stronger for it. And as a bonus, I might get to learn from exploring his issues.

A Desert Rose said:

....
Staying with someone who treats you with indifference, makes you constantly wonder if you matter at all... stuff like that. But when they come 'round again, your whole world lights up.

You sit on the edge waiting for the next time.

And when the next time happens, he canes and bites and beats you black and blue. And you tolerate it not because you like that kind of pain, because you don't, but because you're getting his attention again.

Does this mean anything to anyone besides me?

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Yes, it makes perfect sense.
I don't want that to be the dynamic of my primary relationship, as I know the intensity would not let me function in the real world, but I can see how attracted I have been all my life to such a dynamic.

It is something that is hard to admit, but honestly looking back, it explain why I need a rock solid relationship in my life to be able to explore myself with other relationship. I can indulge my desire for such emotional torment only because I know that I have a safe harbor waiting for me.

Back to thinking some more ...

BiBunny said:

Correct.

And now you've put thoughts in my head, and I'm going to have to figure out how to attach a dildo to a bicycle seat, LOL.

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Two words...

Strap-On Harness!

FurryFury said:

I was raised by people who habitually hurt me both emotionally and physically... I think in somewhat that was my "comfort zone", to be treated like shit...

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A Desert Rose said:

But what causes someone to keep going back for the psychological pain? That part baffles me.

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Some days I feel the need to be psychologically hurt, used, humiliated. It calls to me because then I can feel the pain, but it is outside of me. If someone else hurts me then it's ok to like myself. I don't have to hurt myself if someone else is doing it for me. Growing up the only constant was inconsistency. I learned to be my biggest critic. Whenever I made a mistake, did anything wrong I was humiliated or denigrated by those closest to me. The idea of someone taking the reigns, putting me down, seeing me broken and imperfect...and still loving me, accepting me after it's all done...fulfills me somehow. It allows me to embrace that dark place where I hate myself and let it free. And then to be validated in the face of that truth, the acknowledgement that I have dark niches, that I am not perfect. But I am still lovable. Acceptance of the whole person, I think that's what it does for me.

The kind of pain your talking about ADR, I'm not sure. Part of me wants to reject that sort of thing. Because I want to feel validated and to be loved. The people I choose to spend time with now, they are supportive, solid, positive people. And I'm extremely gunshy about relationships, very slow to trust, and if I feel myself getting in deep I tend to have a knee-jerk reaction and pull back. That said my family still has too much influence over me. I think what keeps me connected is hope. Hope for change, that they will see in me something good and worthwhile. It is a need for validation, a craving for love. Logically I know I'll never get that, but there is comfort in the familiar and there is hope that someday something will improve. And the alternative is also hard: accepting that my parents might be wrong, that a rough childhood was no ones fault, that I deserve to be treated well. Logically it's easy to say. Viscerally, emotionally it is much harder to change that child's mind.

It's convoluted, but I hope this helps...

faeriefire said:

Some days I feel the need to be psychologically hurt, used, humiliated. It calls to me because then I can feel the pain, but it is outside of me. If someone else hurts me then it's ok to like myself. I don't have to hurt myself if someone else is doing it for me. Growing up the only constant was inconsistency. I learned to be my biggest critic. Whenever I made a mistake, did anything wrong I was humiliated or denigrated by those closest to me. The idea of someone taking the reigns, putting me down, seeing me broken and imperfect...and still loving me, accepting me after it's all done...fulfills me somehow. It allows me to embrace that dark place where I hate myself and let it free. And then to be validated in the face of that truth, the acknowledgement that I have dark niches, that I am not perfect. But I am still lovable. Acceptance of the whole person, I think that's what it does for me.

The kind of pain your talking about ADR, I'm not sure. Part of me wants to reject that sort of thing. Because I want to feel validated and to be loved. The people I choose to spend time with now, they are supportive, solid, positive people. And I'm extremely gunshy about relationships, very slow to trust, and if I feel myself getting in deep I tend to have a knee-jerk reaction and pull back. That said my family still has too much influence over me. I think what keeps me connected is hope. Hope for change, that they will see in me something good and worthwhile. It is a need for validation, a craving for love. Logically I know I'll never get that, but there is comfort in the familiar and there is hope that someday something will improve. And the alternative is also hard: accepting that my parents might be wrong, that a rough childhood was no ones fault, that I deserve to be treated well. Logically it's easy to say. Viscerally, emotionally it is much harder to change that child's mind.

It's convoluted, but I hope this helps...

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GREAT post!

faeriefire said:

.....
The idea of someone taking the reigns, putting me down, seeing me broken and imperfect...and still loving me, accepting me after it's all done...fulfills me somehow. It allows me to embrace that dark place where I hate myself and let it free. And then to be validated in the face of that truth, the acknowledgement that I have dark niches, that I am not perfect. But I am still lovable. Acceptance of the whole person, I think that's what it does for me.
.....

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Wonderful post faeriefire.
Even if my childhood cannot be considered bad, even if I didn't suffer what you suffered, the part quoted above ... it rings so true it is scary.

FurryFury said:

I didn't mean that you were in an abusive relationship. Just that this sort of thing can easily become abusive IMO. I also believe that what some people see as a functioning relationship is abusive. Again that is not pointed toward you. I don't know much about you or your relationship. It's just a general observation.

I've been in abusive relationships. I don't want to go there again.

In D/s or nilla or any relationship I think there is usually some down side. I think we subconsciously choose the down side we can deal with best or which fit what we've always known. Often we don't see it for what it really is because we've always known relationships to include that.

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No worries, I didn't think you were saying I'm in an abusive relationship. I was just trying to explain what degradation does for me. Also, I should add that we don't always do it. I think an entire sexual diet of, well, any one thing isn't so healthy.

I've written about this before, but some psychologists think we choose our partners based on a past wound that we want to heal. That's just one theory - we also choose people, sometimes, because they possess a trait or traits we wish we had, and then we end up resenting them for it. We tend to keep picking people based on these same criteria until we get it right and work through it.

intothewoods said:

No worries, I didn't think you were saying I'm in an abusive relationship. I was just trying to explain what degradation does for me. Also, I should add that we don't always do it. I think an entire sexual diet of, well, any one thing isn't so healthy.

I've written about this before, but some psychologists think we choose our partners based on a past wound that we want to heal. That's just one theory - we also choose people, sometimes, because they possess a trait or traits we wish we had, and then we end up resenting them for it. We tend to keep picking people based on these same criteria until we get it right and work through it.

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I think it is more complicated than that...I think we pick people based on a complex web of needs. I also think that happiness isn't really part of the picture. It is about fulfillment.
getting thrown around, degraded, hurt doesn't make me happy, it makes me feel fulfilled.

Vail_Indigo said:

I think it is more complicated than that...I think we pick people based on a complex web of needs. I also think that happiness isn't really part of the picture. It is about fulfillment.
getting thrown around, degraded, hurt doesn't make me happy, it makes me feel fulfilled.

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Oh, it's absolutely a complex web. We've got our conscious and our unconscious at work here.

intothewoods said:

Oh, it's absolutely a complex web. We've got our conscious and our unconscious at work here.

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which is why psychology annoys me at times when it tries to oversimplify things

rida said:

What a good thread!
I've been trying to understand my relationship with pain, why I am willing to go back for more when I do not get off on it and in reading Recidiva's post it feels as if she is putting my scrumbled thoughts into proper words! So: thank you Recidiva-san and sorry for borrowing your words!

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You're welcome, and my thanks to the thread starter.

It's interesting how often the answer is there if only you are asked the right questions.

intothewoods said:

No worries, I didn't think you were saying I'm in an abusive relationship. I was just trying to explain what degradation does for me. Also, I should add that we don't always do it. I think an entire sexual diet of, well, any one thing isn't so healthy.

I've written about this before, but some psychologists think we choose our partners based on a past wound that we want to heal. That's just one theory - we also choose people, sometimes, because they possess a trait or traits we wish we had, and then we end up resenting them for it. We tend to keep picking people based on these same criteria until we get it right and work through it.

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Oh good! I'm glad you didn't think I was judging you or anything.

I actually agree that we do, in part, choose our partners based on past emotional challenges.

I was talking with my mother about this just yesterday. The shit people do to us rarely has much to do with us. It has to do with them, their baggage and us just being there.

BiBunny said:

The lows make the highs that much better, I think. Like being addicted to heroin or something. (That was a simile, too.)

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I agree with this but don't you think this is true of most everything in life? It's definently true in the relationship area the we've been talking about, but I think it's true of lots of other things in life, too.


And I'm visually impaired today so overlook any typos. Feel free to point out similes and metaphors though. ;-)

faeriefire said:

Some days I feel the need to be psychologically hurt, used, humiliated. It calls to me because then I can feel the pain, but it is outside of me. If someone else hurts me then it's ok to like myself. I don't have to hurt myself if someone else is doing it for me. Growing up the only constant was inconsistency. I learned to be my biggest critic. Whenever I made a mistake, did anything wrong I was humiliated or denigrated by those closest to me. The idea of someone taking the reigns, putting me down, seeing me broken and imperfect...and still loving me, accepting me after it's all done...fulfills me somehow. It allows me to embrace that dark place where I hate myself and let it free. And then to be validated in the face of that truth, the acknowledgement that I have dark niches, that I am not perfect. But I am still lovable. Acceptance of the whole person, I think that's what it does for me.

The kind of pain your talking about ADR, I'm not sure. Part of me wants to reject that sort of thing. Because I want to feel validated and to be loved. The people I choose to spend time with now, they are supportive, solid, positive people. And I'm extremely gunshy about relationships, very slow to trust, and if I feel myself getting in deep I tend to have a knee-jerk reaction and pull back. That said my family still has too much influence over me. I think what keeps me connected is hope. Hope for change, that they will see in me something good and worthwhile. It is a need for validation, a craving for love. Logically I know I'll never get that, but there is comfort in the familiar and there is hope that someday something will improve. And the alternative is also hard: accepting that my parents might be wrong, that a rough childhood was no ones fault, that I deserve to be treated well. Logically it's easy to say. Viscerally, emotionally it is much harder to change that child's mind.

It's convoluted, but I hope this helps...

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I might come back to this (because right now, I'm not able to focus, in more ways than one) but it's certainly part of the psychological pain that I was talking about earlier.

It's not sensible to think you (in general terms) can change anyone so it has to be about changing yourself, in order to change the situation.

The part I highlighted struck a chord with me. Good post! I'll think about this more today.

Interesting conversation and comments.

I think that I'm not so much of a creator, I'm an observer.

Like my acting career. I couldn't write the scripts, I wasn't motivated. But give me a part to play and I shine. Some of the best parts are dramatic and painful. Those are the most interesting. Being the bad guy is interesting. Being near a bad guy creator...even more interesting.

I don't think pain has any inherent value. I don't think it's a test, I don't think it's meaningful. I get lots of physical pain from migraines, I'm not interested in that. I also don't have to explore what being good and painless is about. I get that already.

But seeing people treat pain as if it were of value, even though I know it's not, at least not for me. It's like having a dramatic part to play. It's ultimately meaningless, but the symbols...they're interesting. Something happens in that format the way something happens on a stage. Energy is generated and exchanged. Doesn't even matter if it's pretend. It's theater. It has meaning to those who choose to believe it has meaning.

This isn't intended to tell anyone what pain means or should mean. Just that it's entirely empty and meaningless to me, but I can be occasionally fascinated by why people feel differently.

It's a bit like wondering why people believe in this little green piece of paper and call it "money" - why is it powerful and valuable? Because people believe it is. There's the power and value right there. In the belief.

I feel like I observe, catalogue, and ultimately understand people's symbols. Pain's a biggie. It may come in different denominations, different colors of paper or metal, different amounts...but it's currency to lots of folks. Since I consider it Monopoly money, it's free for me to print and distribute. Costs me nothing. But it buys a lot.

I can regenerate like Wolverine. I'm sorta impossible to hurt for long. I heal so fast. So for me, I'm just playing to my strengths for maximum payoff.

FurryFury said:

Oh good! I'm glad you didn't think I was judging you or anything.

I actually agree that we do, in part, choose our partners based on past emotional challenges.

I was talking with my mother about this just yesterday. The shit people do to us rarely has much to do with us. It has to do with them, their baggage and us just being there.

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I like this. It's something I encounter in my job all the time. Patients and their families can be very mean, demeaning and demanding of the staff. But it's not about the staff or the care (a lot of the time). Quite often it's about feeling frustrated, helpless and worried and "us just being there."



On another note: Is it the same, to some of you, as objectivication (gah if I misspelled that nevermind) when someone treats you with indifference? Is that the same thing or can it be the same thing?

Recidiva said:

Interesting conversation and comments.

I think that I'm not so much of a creator, I'm an observer.

Like my acting career. I couldn't write the scripts, I wasn't motivated. But give me a part to play and I shine. Some of the best parts are dramatic and painful. Those are the most interesting. Being the bad guy is interesting. Being near a bad guy creator...even more interesting.

I don't think pain has any inherent value. I don't think it's a test, I don't think it's meaningful. I get lots of physical pain from migraines, I'm not interested in that. I also don't have to explore what being good and painless is about. I get that already.

But seeing people treat pain as if it were of value, even though I know it's not, at least not for me. It's like having a dramatic part to play. It's ultimately meaningless, but the symbols...they're interesting. Something happens in that format the way something happens on a stage. Energy is generated and exchanged. Doesn't even matter if it's pretend. It's theater. It has meaning to those who choose to believe it has meaning.

This isn't intended to tell anyone what pain means or should mean. Just that it's entirely empty and meaningless to me, but I can be occasionally fascinated by why people feel differently.

It's a bit like wondering why people believe in this little green piece of paper and call it "money" - why is it powerful and valuable? Because people believe it is. There's the power and value right there. In the belief.

I feel like I observe, catalogue, and ultimately understand people's symbols. Pain's a biggie. It may come in different denominations, different colors of paper or metal, different amounts...but it's currency to lots of folks. Since I consider it Monopoly money, it's free for me to print and distribute. Costs me nothing. But it buys a lot.

I can regenerate like Wolverine. I'm sorta impossible to hurt for long. I heal so fast. So for me, I'm just playing to my strengths for maximum payoff.

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OMG... Brilliant!
This is a eureka moment for me!

Thank you. ;-D

A Desert Rose said:

I like this. It's something I encounter in my job all the time. Patients and their families can be very mean, demeaning and demanding of the staff. But it's not about the staff or the care (a lot of the time). Quite often it's about feeling frustrated, helpless and worried and "us just being there."



On another note: Is it the same, to some of you, as objectivication (gah if I misspelled that nevermind) when someone treats you with indifference? Is that the same thing or can it be the same thing?

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Part of me being a good human being, being a good employee, being a good daughter, being a good wife, being a good mom...has to do with doing incredibly unpleasant things because they need to be done, without a medal, and occasionally getting kicked around for it. "No good deed goes unpunished."

I think if I can remember that I'm doing it because I'm strong, and not because I'm weak, that I'm compensating for someone else's weakness by being polite and doing the hard stuff (like...if an animal makes a mess, a baby messes a diaper - I clean it up - everyone else is busy complaining and gagging) without complaint, I get stronger every day. The world's a better place. I'm doing it for the world, not for the complaining person. I'm doing it, ultimately, for me.

I don't think the person or creature demeaning a valuable act or making the mess is the strong one. The person able to handle the unpleasant task of going about handling the drama of the event is breaking a cycle of judgment and anger and helplessness. If I can take abuse and anger and not throw it back, but deal with it through healing and compassion, I've lived up to who I want to be. To some folks that actually does qualify me as a masochist. To me, that's just who I want to be, who I aspire to be.

It's an inverted value system, but one that I think if everyone behaved the way I did - the world would be a better place. I'm living an example of tolerance and compassion. Forgiveness is a huge part of my practice, and any faith I might represent.

Lots of people would term that conditioning, victim, or weak. That I should stand up more for myself. I should demand more for myself. I should be this or that or the other. I should be more like them, selfish and demanding and myopic.

There are plenty of people standing up for themselves and complaining in the world. I'll stand up when I need to, but most of the time, I'm just going to do what I think is right, what's compassionate, what's understanding, and not fuss about it.

There are messy diapers and messes to clean up, cooking to be done, injuries to be attended, the bodies of the dead to wash. I don't consider it humiliating or demeaning or anything but doing what needs to be done. Only because it needs to be done, therefore that's why I do it. No amount of complaining or feeling superior makes a single dirty diaper go away.

No amount of objectifying, analyzing or treating me according to any other world view, will change that.

A Desert Rose said:

OMG... Brilliant!
This is a eureka moment for me!

Thank you. ;-D

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Yaaay! You're welcome