Where does the time go? I realized last night that I’m well into my 6th month of life post-M/s! 6 months... yet it seems like a lifetime ago. I found myself ruminating on the transition from owned slave to whatever unowned version of myself I decide to be from one moment to the next. What follows is my personal take on some of the more notable life changes, in the form of a few random reflections. It’s mostly for my own purposes, to sort of document personal growth, but I thought it might be beneficial to some for me to offer a little insight.
First of all, I must address the double stainless steel cuffs I wore around my ankles. The removal of those cuffs was intense, far & away the most drastic & dramatic part of the process. I sat alone on the floor in my apartment with a tiny tool, unscrewing my beloved cuffs for the first time since they went on, fully aware of (& halfway paralyzed by) the weight of my decision to be released. It was in that moment that my reinstated autonomy became tangible, a notion both terrifying & thrilling simultaneously. One instantaneous upside was that my wardrobe options expanded. I can wear tights again & they don’t need to be footless. My favorite thigh high socks take seconds to put on versus minutes spent inching the fabric up underneath the cuffs. Hi-top Chuck Taylors & Doc Marten boots are back in the lineup because they don’t cause bruising & discomfort anymore, & I no longer have to cuff my jeans every day just to avoid bulging rings around my ankles. However, if I said my heart doesn’t sink a little every time I see someone with double cuffs on, I’d be lying. Those cuffs were so much more to me than a representation of the dynamic, or even the blood, sweat, & tears that went into earning them; they became a part of ME, distinct markers of MY identity & individuality. I definitely feel their absence in that sense. I’ll occasionally reach down to touch them, not even thinking about it, only to find vacancy in their place. It’s a feeling comparable to suddenly realizing that I’m naked in a dream; jolting, momentarily confusing, even now. People still ask me what happened to them 6 months after the fact.
On a lighter note, I’m allowed to sit on furniture! This became quite a conundrum for me once we moved into my place together, which was filled with my stuff, that I paid for & arranged just so; something about having to ask permission to utilize my own things didn’t sit well in my mind. All the while though, my heart understood & valued the precedent set forth when we committed to the dynamic, so eventually I settled happily into my place on the floor. That being said, you cannot possibly understand how long it took me to override the compulsion to get permission post-dynamic, even in my own apartment. With no one there to ask, I was beginning to think I was destined to sit on the floor for-ev-er. It still feels a little naughty to just enter a room & plop down on the couch, & I absolutely have tendencies to immediately find a spot on the floor when visiting the homes of friends, but I’m getting there.
Coffee is once again an acceptable & complete breakfast if I so choose. And I do. Frequently.
Speaking of sustenance, it is decided that ordering food shall forever be the bane of my existence. My former Sir would always order for me, largely due to my indecisiveness. Having to actually read the menu & come to a decision within a reasonable amount of time has been Mission: Impossible. Suffice it to say, I’ve been eating a lot of Caesar salads by default, as they are served just about everywhere.
Let’s talk honorifics. To be real, I was shit at using honorifics regularly in a direct, spoken context, so not needing to think about it has felt like a weight lifted. However, it took my phone months to stop predicting “Sir” at the end of every question, every answer, everything.
Showering with the door closed is ah-mazing. Turns out I really, really love my privacy. I can blast whatever music I feel like listening to, I can dance literally like no one is watching, because duh, no one is, & I can take as long as I want, uninterrupted.
If I’m too tired, too lazy, or running too late to make the bed, guess what? I don’t make it. And you can forget about “hospital corners”... I always felt like that style looked so military & rigid, & these days I prefer my bed to look soft & inviting, when not completely disheveled.
Back to getting dressed... I am free to wear whatever I want!! My former Sir frequently complained that I dress like a teenaged boy. He’s not wrong. I live in Chuck Taylors, skinny jeans or yoga pants, & band tees or zip-up hooded sweatshirts. I fight with a plethora of body image issues, & this is the only way I can consistently dress that makes me feel comfortable, kind of cute, & most importantly, authentic. Even so, it takes me an ungodly amount of time to settle on an outfit without someone to just lay it out for me. If only it were societally allowable to just wear a big bath towel around & call it good. Oh, the struggle.
I still serve people with both hands, no matter the circumstances. As recently as 2 weeks ago a waiter asked me for my empty coffee cup, which of course I offered up to him with one hand flat underneath, & the other bracing the side of the cup opposite the handle. Old habits die hard.
I swear, a lot. I always have. Perhaps it’s inherited from my stereotypically Catholic family - no one curses like the Catholics. Regardless, a major component of D/s or M/s dynamics is that the s-type serves largely as a direct representation of their D/M counterpart. Therefore, we have to constantly be conscious of how we present. To my credit, I did such a good job of maintaining a refined, high protocol demeanor that people often assumed I was either mute or wildly stuck up. I was exceptionally good at not speaking unless my Sir prompted me to, one of many aspects in which slave headspace came so organically to me. All of which made the whole not swearing thing rather easy, at least in his presence. But here on the other side where I exist as unchecked Everlee, I tend to curse like a sailor once again & present only as myself unfiltered, & that’s maybe been my favorite part of being unowned.
Polyamory is no longer massively complicated. If connections are formed, they can be explored without being boxed in by the protocols of a traditional dynamic. M/s specifically is insanely difficult to navigate in a poly context, & while I’m in no position to say it’s impossible, it has been my experience that those relationships are unfair in nature, & subsequently, after a while, resentment builds, tension thickens, & people get hurt. No one deserves to feel expendable, suffocated by someone else’s rules, or somehow less important in any stage of any relationship. Again, that’s my opinion based on my personal trials & tribulations surrounding the subject. To each their own.
Wait... What’s my name again? You get so used to responding to ‘girl’ that when people start using your actual name it takes longer than you’d think for that little light bulb to come back on: Oh yeah, that’s me.
Authority transfer forced me to be more vulnerable & communicative than I ever thought possible, & in the hereafter I’ve never been more introspective & self-aware. I intend to carry that with me always. Do I tend to overthink & overshare? Yes, but I wouldn’t want it any other way. I think we all just want to be understood, & it’s nothing to apologize for. What you see is what you get with me, truly, & I owe a lot of that to my time as an owned slave in a 24/7 dynamic.
So what is ultimately my takeaway in all of this? No rules, no restrictions, no protocols. I am completely & totally autonomous, accountable for my own decisions, & in charge of myself. How invigorating! The stumbling block in all of that, however, has proven to be exactly that: no rules, no restrictions, no protocols. I am completely & totally autonomous, accountable for my own decisions, & in charge of myself. How daunting...
*Disclaimer: I hope it’s obvious but just in case there’s any doubt, this was entirely meant to be a somewhat silly account of an otherwise poignant situation. I harbor absolutely no hard feelings towards my former Sir, & nothing I’ve referenced here was meant to attack or demean him. The entire M/s experience, up to & including the aftermath, has been affirming, eye-opening, & immeasurably instrumental in some serious personal growth. It’s been a very dedicated adjustment, sometimes challenging but indisputably necessary, & I’m better for it; forever grateful for every rise & every fall, & every decision we’ve both made throughout this life-altering journey. The universe has a way of giving us exactly what we need, exactly when we need it - all we have to do is trust in it, & I do. Fiercely.
SOURCE: https://fetlife.com/users/6906251/posts/5553692