Can I Stop Being Kinky?

If you’re considering leaving BDSM, it’s natural to be curious about if you can stop being kinky. I hear quite frequently of Doms and Dommes, Masters and Mistresses, submissives and bottoms talking of quitting ‘the scene’. The scene of course, being the BDSM / Fetish scene.

So, can a person ever stop being kinky? Is it possible to retire from BDSM?

I think really it comes down to what quitting means for you. Do you want to actually not have anything more to do with Fetish, or do you just want to sever ties (excuse the pun) with acquaintances?

Leaving BDSM: How Can I Stop Being Kinky?

All too often, those in the scene get burned one way or another, through the power exchange relationships that they form. This echoes life, really. We make friends, we fall out. We have partners, we break up. People from all walks of life will find ways to not want to be in each other’s’ presence anymore, kinky or not.

It should be safer in BDSM – ‘should’ being the operative word. There are more guidelines to act by, to set the course of our behaviour; there are even safewords and the coverall of consent.

However there are still times when you might feel you’ve just had enough. Person X has hurt you in whichever way and you want out: out of the relationship, out of the scene. Just, out.

Leaving BDSM: How Can I Stop Being Kinky?Perhaps you don’t want to quit BDSM over a falling out. Maybe you are just bored; you’re not getting satisfaction from putting yourself out there. Things that used to arouse the hell out of you just aren’t getting you the same way these days.

It could be that you’re in a relationship where your partner doesn’t agree with your kink preferences. Or you wish you weren’t kinky – guilt over your orientation in BDSM is an all too common thing.

Whatever the case is, your mind is screaming, “get me out, it’s over. I quit BDSM.”

I believe that while you can stop certain actions, you can’t really stop being kinky. Being kinky is what makes you part of BDSM. The thing, the scene, whatever ‘it’ is, you’re a part of it.

Sorry.

Yes, you can stop Topping or bottoming. You can sever ties with your submissive(s) or stop being the submissive for your chosen Masters and Mistresses. You can sell all your spanking paddles and whips, and make a bonfire in your garden and burn your PVC knickers and then dig a hole and bury your collars and bondage cuffs.

Will this make you vanilla? Will it stop you thinking about ‘the scene’? I don’t think it will. You will still be that person.

Leaving BDSM: How Can I Stop Being Kinky?Being kinky is a part of being you. It is your nature, your personality. I believe that while circumstances and experiences can definitely mould a Fetish orientation, certain people are more inclined to be Dominant, switch or submissive even from an innate perspective.

I’m Dominant. I am also a woman. I have brown hair.

If I didn’t use my vagina for a week it wouldn’t make me less of a woman. (I’d be sad though.) If I dye my hair blonde, it will still grow brown. It’s the way it is.

I get turned on by holding the keys to a man’s chastity device. I like hearing about how they suffer within it, for me. I love holding my girl down by the neck as her wrists are chained above her head, stealing her breath and ravaging her willing body. I might not do that for a while. It doesn’t make it any less of something that I enjoy, a part of me that is just there.

So yes, call yourself an ex-Mistress, an ex-Dominatrix. Say you retire from the scene, that you’re leaving BDSM.

For those that turn their back on professional Domination, pure pay-per-hour Dominatrices and the like – then yes, perhaps as it’s just a job for you it will be easier to hang up the whip by the door on the way out. Sell off the shinies and carry on with your life.

But for those with kinkiness in their heart and soul (Lifestyle), I’ll call your bluff and say you won’t be able to stop thinking about it. I know, I have tried to force myself to be vanilla for a partner, for years. It didn’t work.

Instead of terming it quitting, or retiring, how about ‘a break’. Have a lovely break from the BDSM activities of your preference, then choose to return and indulge when you are ready.

I honestly believe it’s naive to think you can just switch off your kinkiness for all time. You may be leaving BDSM when it comes to the community, you can get rid of your implements and finish any D/s relationships, but being a kinkster is simply too much a part of a person’s character. It’s up to you if you decide to act on those kinky impulses in your life or not.

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9 COMMENTS

  1. This made me think about the TV show CSI. Lady Heather was my favorite special guest and the chemistry between her and Gil Grissom was one that made even me wet. Yes I am still pissed he married Sara because she is stupid and no where near on his level in any arena.. anyway I digress. Heather had gotten her degree in sexual psychology yet opened a ‘house’ for the BDSM world. She was elegant and refined and intelligent, she read people. It was a near death experience that led her to close her ‘house’ and begin using her actual degrees to help people see their sexual kinks were only kinks because society said so. She openly admitted she was not a Dom or a Sub, it was money. Good money. But I love the feel of being held against a wall and ravaged. I love when I am controlled. Do I want it all the time, no. But I do know I will want it again, just as much as I want coffee when I get up. It is part of my make up period.

  2. To believe that a person can not decide to change would mean that that same person could never truly give consent to anything.

    A far different thing maybe but ,I decided to change my eating habits massively 12 years ago and did over that time I have CHANGED what food I eat. If something as basic as what one eats and is ingrained to enjoy so can ones choice to be in bdsm / d/s etc.

    2 of my relatives gave up smoking (actual addictive drug) and did on for 30 years (now passed) and the other 40 years and still going.

    Do NOT believe any one when they say “that i just what you are” its a cop out. I may be hard to do but It is not impossible people Can choose to change.

    As to if you think about something you still are that.. rubbish I have thought in anger to do some very violent things (which I have the skills to do) but did not do them. Does that mean am violent person? NO.. Would a thought of being in a BDSM scene and NOT doing so make you still kinky.. NO.

    We as people are a combination of our thoughts AND our actions.

    If the actions stop with time the thoughts tend to do the same

    I wish all that try to leave anything they decided is harmful to them the best in their attempt to do so.

  3. I suspect that a lot of the time when people think they want to “stop being kinky,” they really want to get out of the BS that takes place in the public scene. Was certainly true for us and I assure you, we are still kinky as any cheap garden hoses–and much happier not having to deal with scene politics.

  4. I’ve been looking around for answers about how to give up kink and found this article. I truly hate my kinks, and they are a part of me I will never accept. The idea of people suffering for real makes me sick to my stomach, but I get turned on by the idea and images of women in all kinds of bondage.

    I know other people do this, and that’s fine for them, but it makes me feel like a terrible person. I already know I’m unloveable and ugly, and this on just makes the prospect of ever having a meaningful relationship impossible. I don’t deserve to be happy. Maybe if I try harder to be selfless it will make up for the fact I’m so broken and disgusting.

    I’m sorry I’m like this

  5. To the person I hatemyself there are some good Bdsm social networks out there with nice communities to share your feelings with http://www.mydungeaonmasterkeeper.com is one,of them a great site with some great people that know how to express them selves may be you should join.Writing about your angst can help

  6. i was in a bdsm relationship for 3 years, and was very happy. Then it ended and so did my world. So I saw a psychotherapist who specialises in sm relationships and I’m in a vanilla relationship and happier than before. Don’t mistake me. I still have the desires but my time in therapy allows me to put them into context and recognise them for what they are.

    If you want out, there is a way. I did it, so can you.

  7. “The Scene” and BDSM are two different things. If BDSM is part of someone’s sexual makeup, then trying to change that is as absurd as trying to “pray away the gay;” but that doesn’t mean anyone needs to keep going to clubs, munches, workshops and other parts of “The Scene.”

  8. This strikes a chord with me, being in a similar situation to “hatemyself”. The difference is that I’m also introverted and have social difficulties that are related to being on “the spectrum” so being kinky is something that I see as one of a number of problems for me (caveat – I don’t consider it to be a problem in general and still have friends “on the scene” for whom I’m happy for them that they are able to enjoy their kinks).
    Although I hate my kinks and wish I could live a nice, quiet, vanilla life I also recognise that had I not joined the scene I would not have made some great friendships (at least with the people I’ve been able to speak to and get to know).
    Ultimately, I know that I’ll never stop being kinky and it’s something that will always be a part of me. I will always posses these desires but at least I may be able to contain them. Almost like a kind of kink celibacy or asceticism.

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