Breakthrough in Trust: Facing Fears by LeoLupine and SaffronSlave

A member of the Humbled Females community offered to try to help "LeoLupine" and his wife "SaffronSlave" after reading a rant in SaffronSlave's online journal. The offer was accepted and the three exchanged several messages, culminating in a breakthrough. They share excerpts from their correspondence here.

from SaffronSlave:

The last few months have been miserable for me. I love my husband so much but I really wonder if the two of us are cut out to do this dynamic. I've begun to question whether or not I am "truly" submissive because it seems like I just can't ever get anything right. I love to do things for him and I feel like because of our living situation I'm not able to fully do things the way that I should. We're currently living with my parents, in a very small house that just isn't meant for seven people. My parents are struggling financially and so are we. I don't think LeoLupine really feels like he can be the head of his household when we're always having to tiptoe around my family. My mother, though I love her very much, is a very big stress for the two of us. She has the viewpoint that men are lacking in common sense and that Leo is borderline incompetent with our children. This could NOT be further from the truth, but if you don't do things my mother's way, it's wrong.

To be honest when I first saw your message, my first instinct was to run away. In my mind all I could see was another woman coming at me to tell me how inadequate I am, and how much I'm sucking at this... If you could help me I would very much appreciate it, because I really want to give my husband what he needs and I just can't seem to get it together on my own.

from SaffronSlave, in response to questions:

Well, I may as well start off by telling you about what I am having the most trouble with, and why. You wrote: "Saffron. Can you place your trust in LeoLupine, if he steps up to assert his dominion over you?"

Honestly... No, right now I can't. I am (and have been) having major, major trust issues... Late in 2009, one night I got up to find Leo having a sexual roleplay with a female character in an online roleplaying game... Now, since it was online, I realize that it wasn't real cheating; however, it hurt me deeply to see him saying sexual things to someone else, especially someone I didn't like. I then found out that he had done it several times behind my back. I have begun to feel that if he could do that online, he would have no problem doing it offline.

This destruction of my trust with him has clouded our relationship. Our fights are more intense and have resulted in us hitting each other on more than one occasion. I have been seriously depressed. When I get angry I feel like a trapped animal and have taken to hiding in the bathroom, sometimes scratching myself hard enough to bleed and bruise without even realizing it. I don't think I can really enter into the sort of relationship that both of us so desperately want until I can trust him again, and I have no idea how even move towards that. I don't know what I need from him or myself. I feel lost and alone and I think if I could just sit down and cry it all out I might feel better, but I'm numb to the point of being unable to do even that.

Most of all I am afraid if I don't hurry up and start being perfect he'll leave me and find someone else who can.

from LeoLupine:

In your last message you wrote this:

So I encourage both of you to look deep within yourself and determine your priorities. Is protecting your own self-interest your primary goal? Is your partner's happiness and fulfillment your primary goal? Is a hand-in-hand growth journey your primary goal? Is it possible to take the huge step of trusting that your trust is not misplaced? Is it possible to be worthy of the immense trust placed in you by your partner - a trust that you are life partners, acting together for your mutual benefit? Can you trust your partner to help you feel safe and cherished within your own relationship? If your trust is shaky, can you take active steps toward achieving greater trust and greater trustworthiness?

I have a problem. It is probably the greatest hindrance to our D/s relationship. When something hurts me, directly or indirectly, I turn in on myself. I become unresponsive, numb, and uninvolved. I turn away from those around me and to the safer internal landscape of my mind. There, I can be strong, important, never faltering. In reality, I have to admit that: while I'm very strong, confident, determined, loyal, and trustworthy (I really am), I am also human. I have flaws, failings, and a lifetime's worth of issues that give me so many kneejerk responses that dealing with me can be like walking across a minefield blindfolded.

I have a very strong personality. I have a great respect for hierarchy and rank, and chain of command. That being said: I grew up under the thumb of my mother and younger sister. They used "democracy" to tell me I could never watch/do/play the things I wanted. They would put it to a "vote." Two female perspectives versus one male perspective. Yeah. I was browbeaten every day of the first eighteen years of my life because I was male - probably moreso because I reminded my mother of her abusive, dead husband. I hate that segment of my life. Since then, I cannot tolerate unreasonable orders, people exerting authority because they can, or any other seemingly arbitrary use of power that I see around me. It crawls under my skin, especially when I can see ten better ways to do something than what is being done at that moment in time.

I also hate guilt trips. I hate it when someone gets angry and decides to throw out their promise of "being submissive" in a fit of anger. I get absolutely furious at work on a regular basis and I can control myself well enough to not cuss my manager out and tell her where to go and stick her ideas at least twice a week. It's not a submissive streak in me, but instead a knowledge that I need at least a little income in order to pay our bills. I don't let rage mess with my position at my place of employment. A submissive should not let rage mess with her place in the relationship. I understand anger and rage very well. I feel it on at least a low level every single moment of my life: decades of built-up and stored emotions that I don't feel safe letting out because I see no safe outlet for these emotions. I hate myself, in a way, because of the creative and gory fantasies I get on a regular basis of how I would deal with someone that tried to hurt my family in various ways. IT is the only safe outlet for my rage I can find. At one point, Saffron offered to be my outlet. I did not take her up on that because I feared what I might do to her. Now I know she will never make that offer again.

I know I have destroyed large portions of our relationship. I have hurt Saffron and myself in ways I'm not certain I can repair in my current state. I'm tired. I'm utterly exhausted with my struggles just to contain and maintain myself. I can find the resources to do more, I know it. It's just very hard. And when it's very hard and you're already exhausted, you really don’t want to do whatever it is. I'm running out of steam more and more every day. I feel like I have to fight every moment just to keep awake some days. It's a maddening spiral I see before me, and I fear it ends in the destruction of not only our D/s relationship, but our entire marriage.

from LeoLupine, a few hours later:

Heh, I have to tell you something. Probably for the first time in three years, I'm happy, and Saffron is giddy to see me. Saffron offered herself up for me to vent my anger upon her. I took her up on the offer, and we had the roughest, raunchiest sex we've had in years. I held her down, choked her, scared her and vented all my frustrations of the moment out upon her. I was calm before we even finished. I did not hurt her, just scared her. By the time we finished, she was describing one of my fantasies to me and we ended on a more tender note. I feel calm for the first time in years. I can genuinely smile and not feel it's false. This all stemmed from me reading the email I sent both of you out loud to Saffron. We were thinking D/s might have been the worst blow to our relationship. Now, I think it may just be the salvation of it. Saffron is going to offer herself up to my anger on a regular basis. I'll get to vent my frustrations, and she'll get some good, rough sex (which she absolutely craves). It's a win-win situation.

Thank you for helping us to bring out what has been bothering us. Having a neutral third party has really helped us to be honest to each other. I'll have Saffron tell you her side of things when we're back from a walk.

from SaffronSlave, two days later:

It has taken me a little while to process what happened and I've been trying to figure out how to put it into words.

On Saturday we were both our our respective computers and Leo was replying to your email. I was nursing the baby when he finished so I asked if he could read it to me. When he did, the part about offering myself and "Now I know she will never make that offer again" stuck out at me. When I had offered that before, it didn't really seem to help him, which was frustrating for me. A big problem of mine has always been if I get frustrated with something I just throw up my hands and walk away. Sometimes it's for good, but often it's just long enough for me to be able to go back and look at it from a different angle. Well, I could see by the way he talked about wanting to vent his anger that it might be something that could help us. So I offered again.

I finished nursing the baby and asked my Mom to watch the kids for a little while. We closed ourselves off in our bedroom and I waited to see what he would do. I wasn't afraid of him hurting me physically, though if he wanted to I was prepared to accept it. I had a feeling he wouldn't outright hit me or even spank me (which he confirmed before we really got started) and told him to do whatever he wanted. What followed was some of the most intense sex I think we've ever had. The feel of his hands on my throat sent warm tingles throughout my body and I found myself relaxing into it instead of struggling. He was rough, demanding, and I was powerless and it felt right. Somewhere during the sex it seemed as though his anger was gone and all that was left was passion. We ended up cuddled together after and I could not stop smiling. As we got dressed I found myself feeling the same way that I used to when we were first dating. I was blushing, had a hard time looking up at him because I suddenly felt shy, and I could not keep my hands off of him. We were hugging and kissing and I was so full of joy that I finally had my Leo back. We went on a walk and talked about all kinds of things, which is something we hadn't done in probably three years.

Sunday I found myself becoming frustrated. We needed to get some cold medicine at the store and everyone was being slow, which drives me utterly crazy sometimes. I ended up snapping at Leo and he wasted no time in putting me back into my place. Like before, he had a hand on my throat as he told me in no uncertain terms that I was his, and I would be respectful of him and stay in my place. Where before I would have gotten angry, or would have said "Yes, sure," while silently fuming about it, this time I found myself agreeing and apologizing to him genuinely. It didn't seem like before, where I had thought that he was just "acting" like a Master or Dominant. Now I could very clearly see that he is one. I know things are still not "perfect" and that I have a lot of work to do on myself, but I think I'm finally beginning to feel what I have heard other submissive women talk about before: happy, content, almost giddy when I think about his power over me. I can't help acting like a schoolgirl with a crush sometimes.

I don't know if I've been able to even scratch the surface of my feelings in the email, but I hope a little bit of the joy I've been experiencing shines through in it. Thank you for listening.