sub with vanilla spouse—how to explore solo?

meekferret

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TL;DR I’m a newly self-identified sub married to a strictly vanilla person. I’m looking for suggestions on how to explore my sub side within the constraints of my current life.


I’ve been going through a rapid period of self discovery recently, and I wanted to see if anyone here has been in or heard about a similar situation. I feel like I’m figuring things out ok on my own, but I don’t want to ignore the benefits of others experiences.

I am a cis man in my forties, married for nearly twenty years, and have a kid about to start high school. I’ve struggled a lot in my relationship with my wife, especially around sexuality and power dynamics. I’ve recently come to realize:

- I have a bit of a submissive streak, and at least in some ways I want my wife to dominate me. She plays the role of Domme pretty naturally—she’s very controlling and capricious, and has a lot of rather particular needs. This includes sexual needs but it’s mostly about other aspects of life.
- To a lesser extent, I’m a masochist. I haven’t explored enough to know how far this goes. For what it’s worth, my wife does not have the slightest sadistic inclination.
- My wife is vanilla to the point of it being a kink. That is, she has no interest in anything except the most ordinary sexual practices, *and* it’s critically important to her that her inclination is “normal” and “right”. So in spite of being a natural Domme, she would absolute deny the label.

The challenge here is that I can’t come out to my wife without fast-tracking the end of our relationship, which I absolutely don’t want.

There are a few avenues that I’ve been exploring to try to meet my needs while keeping my family intact.

One is service submission. This is further complicated by the fact that I’m the sole breadwinner, and sometimes my wife does do nice things for me (like make dinner). But most often I’m doing 95% or more of dishes, laundry, pet care, child transport, etc. I’ve started making a mental shift where instead of this feeling like an unfair burden, it’s instead a submissive practice, and it’s feeling pretty good.

Another is symbolic sub behaviors. I have to be sly with these, but things like standing at attention or with my hands held in a “bound” position behind my back while she’s “giving orders” have helped me feel the pleasure of submission. Another behavior I’m playing with is wearing an apron when I’m home, as a less blatant symbol of servitude than a collar.

The third is self-administered domination. This includes some light bondage/pain but the big one is orgasm denial. I’ve come to look forward to the throbbing sensation I get after teasing myself, and I’m loving the building anticipation of when my wife will let me cum.

I feel like I’m doing an ok job of figuring this out on my own, but I don’t want to miss out on wisdom from folks who have dealt with similar problems. The only non-starters are trying to bring my wife around to accepting kink, or ending my marriage.

So—what suggestions do you have?
 

subzzzero

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I’ve answered a few of these before with Similar situations. Maybe in my post history but that’s a deep dive to find the specific ones.
Your Options are:

1. Self domination is your one honest approach if you don’t want to have the convo with her. It’s not labeled as cheating or anything. I will say you’re likely to want more as it goes and you’ll slip into finding a domme to guide you. This depending on the level of interaction will most likely be cheating. I think the other options you mention still all fall under this category as it’s only going to be you enforcing any of it since she is unaware.
2. Talk to the wife and see if she’s open to any of it at all. Being that dominant role in the bedroom for you at times. Open honest clothes on sober discussion.
3. Talk to the wife about an open relationship so that you can get the strictly kink needs from another. Whether it’s online or in person. Limits and boundaries of what’s allowed should be discussed
4. Don’t talk to her at all. And do your thing on the down low. Find a kink affair of sorts and just get what you need following the “what she doesn’t know won’t hurt her” approach.
5. End things with her and find a match that will provide you all you need kink and vanilla.
6. Give up kink entirely and devote your time to vanilla spouse relationship only.

Some people may have issue with some of those options. It’s not for me to decide if they’re right or wrong but that’s about all the choices you have with the situation you’re in.
 

meekferret

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Apr 24, 2024
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I’ve answered a few of these before with Similar situations. Maybe in my post history but that’s a deep dive to find the specific ones.
Your Options are:

1. Self domination is your one honest approach if you don’t want to have the convo with her. It’s not labeled as cheating or anything. I will say you’re likely to want more as it goes and you’ll slip into finding a domme to guide you. This depending on the level of interaction will most likely be cheating. I think the other options you mention still all fall under this category as it’s only going to be you enforcing any of it since she is unaware.
2. Talk to the wife and see if she’s open to any of it at all. Being that dominant role in the bedroom for you at times. Open honest clothes on sober discussion.
3. Talk to the wife about an open relationship so that you can get the strictly kink needs from another. Whether it’s online or in person. Limits and boundaries of what’s allowed should be discussed
4. Don’t talk to her at all. And do your thing on the down low. Find a kink affair of sorts and just get what you need following the “what she doesn’t know won’t hurt her” approach.
5. End things with her and find a match that will provide you all you need kink and vanilla.
6. Give up kink entirely and devote your time to vanilla spouse relationship only.

Some people may have issue with some of those options. It’s not for me to decide if they’re right or wrong but that’s about all the choices you have with the situation you’re in.
Thank you! This is really good food for thought.

You’re exactly right, option 1 is really my only avenue forward.

The point about wanting more as time goes on is particularly well taken. I hadn’t thought about it explicitly, but my mind has been idly moving in that direction. I will be careful about what lines I get close to.

A interesting twist regarding option 2 is that she already dominates me, both in and out of the bedroom, she just doesn’t label it that way. For example, I’m not allowed to express attraction to her, even if she’s naked, without her approval. But if she wants sex, I’m expected to perform on demand. And then, it’s 100% on her terms, right down to which parts of her body I touch and the very specific angle of entry (if I’m allowed to enter at all).

As I’m writing this, I realize that I’m also looking to learn techniques to self-dominate on the down-low. I’ll pose that question in the Submissive Lounge.
 

meekferret

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A brief follow up. I’m slowly starting the process of coming out to my wife. It started when she would apologize for making me do so many chores, and eventually I stopped her and said “no, thank you—I _want_ to do them”. Any time we had this kind of conversation I would find myself getting hot, which helped me confirm my kink orientation.

Most recently, she came home after I had been doing some ironing for her and when she hugged me she said “you’ve been masturbating, haven’t you? You smell like sex.”

I told her—no, not recently, but what she was probably smelling was my arousal from serving her. She said “huh, that’s weird.” So not totally accepting, but she didn’t freak out either.

I still haven’t used the actual Domme/sub language, but it feels really good to be taking about the concepts explicitly at least.
 

Playfullwolfy

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Dec 16, 2022
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Can you start massaging her back and neck inviting her to sit on sofa after she came back from work and you are available at home?

You may also offer foot massage too
 
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Naughty nova

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You could have a Dom give you task to serve your wife with. No pictures sharing. And then slowly expose your kinks to her.
 
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Ungawa

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Jul 8, 2024
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TL;DR I’m a newly self-identified sub married to a strictly vanilla person. I’m looking for suggestions on how to explore my sub side within the constraints of my current life.


I’ve been going through a rapid period of self discovery recently, and I wanted to see if anyone here has been in or heard about a similar situation. I feel like I’m figuring things out ok on my own, but I don’t want to ignore the benefits of others experiences.

I am a cis man in my forties, married for nearly twenty years, and have a kid about to start high school. I’ve struggled a lot in my relationship with my wife, especially around sexuality and power dynamics. I’ve recently come to realize:

- I have a bit of a submissive streak, and at least in some ways I want my wife to dominate me. She plays the role of Domme pretty naturally—she’s very controlling and capricious, and has a lot of rather particular needs. This includes sexual needs but it’s mostly about other aspects of life.
- To a lesser extent, I’m a masochist. I haven’t explored enough to know how far this goes. For what it’s worth, my wife does not have the slightest sadistic inclination.
- My wife is vanilla to the point of it being a kink. That is, she has no interest in anything except the most ordinary sexual practices, *and* it’s critically important to her that her inclination is “normal” and “right”. So in spite of being a natural Domme, she would absolute deny the label.

The challenge here is that I can’t come out to my wife without fast-tracking the end of our relationship, which I absolutely don’t want.

There are a few avenues that I’ve been exploring to try to meet my needs while keeping my family intact.

One is service submission. This is further complicated by the fact that I’m the sole breadwinner, and sometimes my wife does do nice things for me (like make dinner). But most often I’m doing 95% or more of dishes, laundry, pet care, child transport, etc. I’ve started making a mental shift where instead of this feeling like an unfair burden, it’s instead a submissive practice, and it’s feeling pretty good.

Another is symbolic sub behaviors. I have to be sly with these, but things like standing at attention or with my hands held in a “bound” position behind my back while she’s “giving orders” have helped me feel the pleasure of submission. Another behavior I’m playing with is wearing an apron when I’m home, as a less blatant symbol of servitude than a collar.

The third is self-administered domination. This includes some light bondage/pain but the big one is orgasm denial. I’ve come to look forward to the throbbing sensation I get after teasing myself, and I’m loving the building anticipation of when my wife will let me cum.

I feel like I’m doing an ok job of figuring this out on my own, but I don’t want to miss out on wisdom from folks who have dealt with similar problems. The only non-starters are trying to bring my wife around to accepting kink, or ending my marriage.

So—what suggestions do you have?
I completely empathize with you. Sex has been non existent for years and when it comes it is super vanilla. That is how I got here. I’m exploring my kinks in secret by myself.
 
Last edited:

meekferret

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Apr 24, 2024
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I can’t quite believe it, but it happened—I came out to my wife and it’s actually been really good!

The way it played out was that she kept apologizing for “making me” do so much around the house. When she did that it really interfered with my ability to experience the satisfaction of service. I finally broke down and explained that I really wanted to serve her, and put it in sub/Domme terms. It took her a while to take it in (honestly she’s still trying to make sense of it) but she’s accepted it, and perhaps most importantly, accepts her role in the partnership too.

The biggest thing for her was realizing that D/s can be totally separate from bondage, sadism, etc, which are huge icks for her. Once she got clarity on that, and realized that I _want_ to be bossed around, she settled into the role naturally.
 

Naughty nova

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Jun 10, 2023
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I can’t quite believe it, but it happened—I came out to my wife and it’s actually been really good!

The way it played out was that she kept apologizing for “making me” do so much around the house. When she did that it really interfered with my ability to experience the satisfaction of service. I finally broke down and explained that I really wanted to serve her, and put it in sub/Domme terms. It took her a while to take it in (honestly she’s still trying to make sense of it) but she’s accepted it, and perhaps most importantly, accepts her role in the partnership too.

The biggest thing for her was realizing that D/s can be totally separate from bondage, sadism, etc, which are huge icks for her. Once she got clarity on that, and realized that I _want_ to be bossed around, she settled into the role naturally.
That's awesome
 
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meekferret

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That's awesome
😃

Something really cool—even though the physical aspects of our sex are still 99% vanilla, the emotional dynamic of explicit D/s has made it so unbelievably satisfying for both of us. We just didn’t know what we were missing before.
 

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