Day 10: What are your hard limits?
I think I’ve always approached the topic of limits backwards, even before I realized I was doing it wrong. My kinky world and mind has always been wide open, sometimes even more than I am comfortable with sharing. I’ve always been eager to try and experience everything, and the concept of starting out with a “I will not do A, B, C or D,” right off the bat is counter to that philosophy. How can I know whether or not I like something if I’ve never tried it?
I remember when my ex and I were just starting out. At the suggestion of a friend in the scene, we started with one of those BDSM checklists floating around the internet. On it was this long list of things I had never tried, never considered trying, and some I had never heard of.
There were things I had heard of but that were so far “out there” that I was afraid to admit I was curious about them. Things I was ashamed to admit to being curious about, even to myself. To have to admit those things to him, out loud, well…he already thought I was a freak for wanting to do this stuff in the first place (I introduced him to kink after 10 years of vanilla marriage–you can read about how I did it in my writings on Eden Cafe: One Couple’s Journey into Kink, Part 1, Part 2 & The Trigger.) What if he knew just how freaky I really was? So I ended up with the usual list of hard limits, admitted to some things I felt comfortable saying I was interested in, leaving out a whole lot more, and basically gave him the PC version of Jade.
I don’t have to be PC anymore. I can confess and admit to any curiosity, any desire I have, no matter how “wrong” it might be. And yeah, there are a lot of “wrong” things that turn me on, at least in my head. In reality? I don’t know. But if he is willing and wants to try them out, then it’s certainly not a “limit”–
Until it is. See, that’s the kicker. I don’t start out saying no, I start out saying, ok, I’ll give it a go. But there are some things that once tried, I may never want to do again. Of course there’s a difference between a hard, “NO NEVER AGAIN PERIOD!” and “Well that didn’t do a whole lot for me, but I’ll do it if you really want me to or make me,” or “Guh–I hated that, but it didn’t kill me, so I’ll do it again if you really want me to (etc.)” But I play with a partner that I know gets that difference.
And no, I am not going to share my list of hard limits with you. Those are between him and I.
