Ladies: I need help with a female protagonist undergoing non-con sex therapy

[procndest]

Hi everyone,

I'd like some female perspectives on a female protagonist undergoing a form of non-consensual sex therapy. The summary is below. I need to know if the reactions I've described in the summary are completely unrealistic, as well as any other general ideas about how the female protagonist would react during this kind of experience.

Please feel free to send me PMs with your responses. I'd prefer to discuss more about the character and setting over PMs, rather than in a publicly viewable thread



I'm trying to illustrate a woman being forced to confront the experience of her sexuality, one the most hurtful parts of her identity. The 'therapists' are trying to get her to surrender to arousal and pleasure, and eventually embrace her sexuality. What stops her are powerful social taboos, her role in society, intimacy issues stemming from being unwanted by her mother, having no father in her life, negative sexual experiences as a teenager, and adult intimate relationships ruined by these unresolved issues.

The 'treatment' forces her to experience extended pleasurable sex against her will, violate the taboos of her society against her will, and become physically exhausted. She finally surrenders to the treatment out of exhaustion , a sense of degradation, and having nothing left to lose.

After she surrenders, she gives herself over to intensely pleasurable sex with her 'therapists'. She discovers true sexual ecstasy. Her emotional defenses crumble, and she submits to her 'therapists' as a heartfelt and sincere submissive. She opens herself to an intense emotionally intimate relationship with them. She discovers this to be the emotionally fulfilling relationship she has been missing for so long. She is finally freed from societal restrictions and can experience and express her true feelings of grief, sadness, bitterness, and loneliness stemming from the emotional injuries in her life. This catharsis allows her to begin to heal, and she is comforted and protected in the container of her submissive relationship with her 'therapists'. Her last challenge is having to leave them and return to her society.

 

[lazyhobo]

I'll probably just throw this out : As a short Jerk off story, It sounds like it'd do a great job!

 

[procndest]

This is a fragment from the story. The setting is futuristic and the two characters are bisexual women who are currently in a relationship.

Feel free to comment on the dialogue between the characters, the illustration of the tension in the characters' relationship, if it seems realistic, and anything that resonates!

* * *

The aircar's turbofans whined and it took flight with a small jerk. The pilot guided it into the city's air traffic control grid then picked up speed. The trip to the headquarters would take a few minutes.

Kara didn't take her gaze from streets and buildings below. The city was laid out like a model crafted by some giant hand. The parks and rooftop gardens stood out like a quilted patchwork of green among the marble and pastels of the city.

Niki had been looking at Kara since the aircar took flight. She grimaced at Kara's stubborn refusal to turn her face from the window. She twisted in her safety harness until she faced Kara. She closed her eyes and breathed the orange and aloe scent of Kara's hair. Its glossy black wave concealed the younger woman's face. She gently put a hand on Kara's thigh.

"Your hair smells lovely. Orange suits you."

Kara brushed her hair behind her ear, but didn't turn from the window.

"I've been using it for the last three months."

Niki grimaced but didn't take her eyes from Kara. She gave her thigh a soft squeeze.

"We're getting together at the spa tonight. You should come."

Kara turned sharply from the window and met Niki's gaze.

"You know what I think of your friends."

Niki rolled her eyes in exasperation. "They used to be your friends."

"No, they were your friends." Kara shot back. "They were your friends. I just had to work with them."

Niki looked down for a moment. She squeezed Kara's thigh again. "Just come. We don't have spend much time with them."

Kara shifted in her seat and straightened her uniform. In doing so, she removed Niki's hand. She stared at the back of the pilot's headrest.

"We're working."

Niki looked down, then turned away. She angrily tugged on her own uniform.

"You're always working, Kara, always working."

The rest of journey passed in silence.

 

[TwoHundredTabs]

Hi everyone,
I'm trying to illustrate a woman being forced to confront the experience of her sexuality, one the most hurtful parts of her identity. The 'therapists' are trying to get her to surrender to arousal and pleasure, and eventually embrace her sexuality. What stops her are powerful social taboos, her role in society, intimacy issues stemming from being unwanted by her mother, having no father in her life, negative sexual experiences as a teenager, and adult intimate relationships ruined by these unresolved issues.

The 'treatment' forces her to experience extended pleasurable sex against her will, violate the taboos of her society against her will, and become physically exhausted. She finally surrenders to the treatment out of exhaustion , a sense of degradation, and having nothing left to lose.

After she surrenders, she gives herself over to intensely pleasurable sex with her 'therapists'. She discovers true sexual ecstasy. Her emotional defenses crumble, and she submits to her 'therapists' as a heartfelt and sincere submissive. She opens herself to an intense emotionally intimate relationship with them. She discovers this to be the emotionally fulfilling relationship she has been missing for so long. She is finally freed from societal restrictions and can experience and express her true feelings of grief, sadness, bitterness, and loneliness stemming from the emotional injuries in her life. This catharsis allows her to begin to heal, and she is comforted and protected in the container of her submissive relationship with her 'therapists'. Her last challenge is having to leave them and return to her society.

That's an unusual theme that you're working on, and I'm glad to see it done. The big problems I anticipate are with degradation, d/s, and and separation.

Degradation wouldn't be healing in any way. It would be devastating. For someone with a fragile psyche on the subjects of sex and attachment, it'd be like permanently telling her that she could never be sure if she was being used or cared for.

Giving herself over to her own lust does not lead into becoming a submissive. The two are not only worlds apart, but are opposites for someone just coming into her own control over her sexuality. For her to decide to submit, she must first feel secure in her ability to control and explore her desires - of her own volition.

Forcing her to separate from the people who helped her (much less those who might have given her love that she could feel for the first time) would be like telling her that she wasn't good or loved enough to be worth keeping.


A story with such deep psychological roots needs to be slow in development and build up the protagonist's self-control and self-assurance slowly if it's going to be realistic, which is what you've said you're aiming for.

 

[procndest]

Thanks TwoHundred for sharing your perspective.

You mentioned one thing I used the wrong words to describe, the protagonist's leaving the people. My phrasing gave the wrong impression. After living with them for a year or two, she leaves of her own volition because she has come to terms with the experiences of her life, including those of her 'treatment' and the circumstances which brought her to it, and she has the feeling that its time for her to live her own life. She returns to her society, no longer beholden to it, unafraid of its taboos, and having overcome her need for the relationship with the people who gave her the treatment. The thorn within her heart has been removed, and she is healing. For the first time in her life, she is her own person.

An acquaintance once told me that many of my stories (without sexual themes) had to do with collapse, failure or exhaustion and then becoming stronger. I'm thinking about this in comparison with your comment about a protagonist feeling secure enough to submit.

The story will be developed quite slowly to illustrate the protagonist's subjective world, how it is, it's crumbling, and her rebirth. It's a big project for me.

Anyway, thanks for your comments

 

[xssve]

One reason therapists are constrained from having intimate relationships with their patients, is the tendency of the patient to become emotionally bonded with the the therapist due to transference - you haven't mentioned this, so I'm guessing what you have in mind is more like "training", to become a sexual object without the emotional attachment, and there are antecedents, in the Victorian era, women were "treated" for hysteria by doctors who manipulated them into orgasm - in fact, that's why the vibrator was invented.

In any case, if you are considering a novel, rather than shorter wank fodder, I think you'll need to consider the emotional attachment issue, most people become emotionally attached to someone, and it adds tension and depth to a story, otherwise you risk making the protagonist too one dimensional.

 

[xssve]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Female_hysteria

You might enjoy this one as well:

http://www.motherjones.com/media/2012/05/hysteria-sex-toy-history-timeline

Story ideas abound in that article.

 

[xssve]

Oddly enough, the quest for a treatment for female hysteria also led to psychoanalysis: this article on the case of "Anna O." goes into some of the issues I mentioned.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anna_O.

 

[procndest]

Thanks for your comments, xssve. I read the links and they were very interesting, if tragic from a modern viewpoint. Poor patients, I'm just glad they didn't give them trepanation for 'hysteria'. They gave me an idea for a steampunk genre story, but I'm going to finish this project before considering another

I'm writing a long story as an enjoyable creative exercise for myself and for the mutual enjoyment of a co-writer. She created the setting and I'm writing a story in it. The story has many themes, but they revolve around the heroine, her relationship to her society, her intimate relationships, and the crumbling of them all during a dangerous journey which leads to her physical and psychological exhaustion. At this point she falls into the hands of people who discover her issues surrounding sexuality and intimacy, and, due to their diametrically opposite cultural perspective and immense arrogance, decide to 'cure' her whether she likes it or not. They are not medical professionals; the relationship is more akin to artists and their canvas, though they do feel compassion for the heroine. She is forced to confront her issues in a process which is emotionally painful, psychologically exhausting, and intensely pleasurable. At the end of her strength, she gives up instead of continuing to resist in the name of a society which isolated her, a spirituality which failed her, and lovers from whom she is estranged. The body betrays the will and her societal indoctrination breaks down. She surrenders to the artists (or captors who consider themselves artists, really) because she is completely in their power, she is at the end of her strength, she has been forced to confront the innermost of the hurts inflicted on her by her society throughout her life, she desires the pleasure they offer, she desperately needs the compassion they hold despite their treatment of her, and she can't carry the burdens her society has placed on her and wants more than anything to put them down.

I wrote the initial post using the words 'therapists' and 'treatment' because it was the best way I could think of to describe the heroine's captors wanting to give her a treatment to 'heal' her, according to their cultural perspective. I didn't want to go into so much of the plot in the initial post, since it's just about sexual psychological themes rather than erotic sexuality like most stories.

Now that you mention it, they would use a great deal of conditioning and training to make her body betray her will, but their intent is far from callous. They want her to be able to enjoy intimacy and sexuality, and as far as they're concerned, the heroine's pesky neuroses have got to go. Her consent is irrelevant. The choice she has is constant: she can resist all she likes, or she can surrender and give herself over to them. She can give up her personal sovereignty in return for pleasure, acceptance and freedom from her burdens. The choice stays the same as the heroine's strength ebbs. Her captors simply continue her 'treatment' and wait.

I need advice on that crucial transition between resistance and surrender. If I can't express it well or in a plausible way I'm going to change the plot. I just have my own perspective to go on, and since I'm writing for a female protagonist I wanted the perspectives of other writers.