The Disinterested or Unwilling Partner 

I regularly receive questions from people who have unwilling partners. These are always, always, the hardest emails to answer. And I never feel like I've come up with a good enough response. But people keep asking, and I keep trying:  
 

For anyone who doesn't naturally like the feeling of things biting into their limbs, rope sucks! Hey, sometimes it even bugs me!   

The nicest, snuggiest, most comfortable bondage is with torn bedsheets, so maybe you could try it once for her sake. This is one of my favorite materials of all time.  

Have your wife pick your oldest bedsheet, it should be soft and worn down. (Of course you'll be offering to buy her a new sheet set to replace this.) Snip little cuts along one side, each of them about six inches apart. Then take them at the snip and hand-rip the sheet into long strips. (The tearing is important because if you cut them all the way down instead, they won't be as soft.)  

These long strips won't be quite as versatile as ropes, but you can accomplish most positions with them, and they bunch up around the skin in a soft, pleasant, comfortable way. The knots hold well, but are big and easy to untie when you pick at them.   
 

Hmm ... It sounds like if you're not physically stimulating her every minute, then she doesn't find most bondages interesting or exciting.  

I started out like that myself: just being tied wasn't enough -- I wanted the sex with it. I think that's a reasonable orientation ...   

See, I've had so much bondage sex that by now I have a Pavlovian response to it. I see the ropes getting picked up, I know I'm going to get tied up. When I get tied up, I know somebody's going to have an orgasm... it's all become one big pleasure trip. So at the very beginning, when I see the ropes getting picked up, I get excited, and my body starts to feel good -- ahead of schedule!  

The only way to create that kind of atmosphere is to make pleasure the focal point! Constantly! So next time there's a big occasion (New Year's Eve?) ask her extra-special if you can hogtie her or chain her and then do EVERYTHING to her body that she likes WHILE she's bound ... no down time ... don't rest!  

To read a little more on how pleasure-association works, read the "How to get your partner interested" section of TickleGal's site.  
 

I've gotten other e-mails like yours. And I know people in your situation. In fact, my boyfriend had it happen to him at one point in his life.   

All I can do is tell you what my own opinion is, from what I've known of such situations. Maybe I'm not right. This is just what I think I've seen.  

Some women have a kink or kinks inside of themselves that they know about, and they don't tell anyone or try them ... some have a kink that they don't even know they have; it stays under the surface until something happens to make them realize. Many of the bondage models I work with fall into that category.  

Some women are fetishists of Newness. If they try something New, it is exciting to them, and arouses them more than the stuff they're used to. Eventually that thing will not be New any more, and it no longer qualifies as something exciting. It becomes something boring or bothersome.  

Also, most people enjoy, and are excited by, Newness and experimentation MORE when they're younger, and less when they're older.  

Your wife could fall into either of these groups.  

Some women like a kink activity only as long as it has a direct link with pleasure. I can relate to this (yeah I'm into bondage, but I like to include sexual pleasure). If the petting, kissing and cunnilingus falls by the wayside during the roping, the whole thing eventually loses allure because there isn't enough Pavlovian connection between bondage and gratification.  

And then some women are fetishists of Approval. They do a foot scene with a foot fetishist, the man is excited and adoring, and the woman discovers that this excites her, the feeling that is occurring in the scene. But her need for this approval may wear off eventually, and then she'll lose feeling for the act, and won't know why.   

Your wife could be in that group.  

Either way, I feel it's unlikely you're going to rekindle the adventuresome feelings she had six years ago. Also she's older and her hormones are quieter. Most women have two hormonal surges, one in the early years of sex life (teens or early 20s) and then one in the early-mid 30s. I'm coming out the end of the mid-30s one and it was just as great as all my ladyfriends said it would be. The final peak of sexual interest seems to occur right after menopause, when some women seem happy to be freed from fears of pregnancy. (How old is your wife?)  

Does she like regular intimacy? I mean actively enjoy it? If not, you have a more universal problem that will have to be addressed and fixed before you can think at all about this secondary problem.  

Regarding the bondage: the best working scenario I know of is actual trade-offs. Find out what does matter to her right now regarding physical pleasure. Depending on where she is in life, it might not be sexual. To her, it's possible that the biggest physical pleasure these days is a hot bath or a backrub. Whatever it is, ask her if she can do trades with you. (Not in the same day. She gets hers, then you get yours a week later. Equal time.) If she turns down the idea, then do her pleasure thing anyway. If you do it with no strings attached, she may eventually start thinking about reciprocating (it may take a few months).  

I can't overemphasize this thing about trying to find out her thing and do her thing. For most of us bondage fetishists, we get very wrapped up in our needs and what we want and how we want it to happen. We get tense, frustrated and twisted up when we're not expressing bondage physically. Before you know it, we've gotten a little distant from the partner, and although we're often thinking about what we want our partner to do for us, we no longer have any idea what they want. We haven't asked them what they want, or we've been assuming that they still want what they wanted a year ago.  

When a marriage is a good team, the teamwork fills in gaps on both sides. He takes out the trash because he knows I don't like to. I do the dishes because I know he doesn't like to. When doing it, I think about him, and I feel good because I'm expressing love to him in a small act, and there aren't any ambivalent feelings about it. When the teamwork breaks down, and we can't feel good about giving in around the edges, the whole ball of wax can feel a little shaky.  

I know I'm rambling a bit. I feel for you because I know personally people who have been there. If you can do any extrapolating about how your relationship normally resolves problems... if you like bowling and she doesn't, what's the normal solution? Does she come along and bring a book, or does she let you go alone? The way the two of you resolve other differences may provide clues on how to work out this difference.  
 

Picture yourself in her shoes. Let's suppose there was an activity that you just don't like ... how about sex with a horse. Okay, how would you feel if this was what your wife was into, and she wanted you to do it?  

I'm not saying bondage is a disgusting fetish. What I'm trying to express is that every person is different, and we all have things we hate, dislike, like, and love in life. Each of us can bend a little, but it's a rare bird who is going to change from hating something to loving it.  

In this situation, the only thing I can suggest is that you ask for it on special occasions only (birthday), make it as basic and comfortable as possible, and make it clear that you recognize and appreciate her sacrifice. Also make sure you find out what sacrifice you could possibly make for her on her birthday -- something very special that is going to make the trade seem worthwhile to her.  

Get a little counseling for yourself, so that your frustration doesn't become anger in the relationship later on.

 

I want to give special thanks to everyone for reading this column. It's more fun, I know, to read about fantasies and role-playing and rope techniques ... but hopefully, by discussing the difficult and/or frustrating aspects of being bondage fetishists, perhaps together we can come up with some helpful answers once in a while.

  ~~Lorelei  

 

Back