BDSM As Catharsis

I cry very easily, just like I laugh very easily. I experience very intense lows and highs in my emotions, and where my mind and heart go, my body follows. It's not so much wearing my heart on my sleeve, as holding it over my head like a giant neon sign from Vegas. But sometimes, when something's really bothering me, tears will fall easily but the really good howling bawl that I need, eludes me. Last week was difficult for me in lots of ways. Problems with work, family, an operation pending which was freaking me out. I drove up North and back in an unfamiliar car on saturday, then got lost in london for an hour, and that was less enjoyable than a slap in the face (see below). And I still couldn't sob my heart out like I needed to, even though I felt as if the need was almost poisoning me, like something toxic inside that just had to be GOT OUT.

It was with this mix boiling inside me that I went to Sweet Torments on saturday night. I knew N had something special planned for me, as it would be my last chance to play for a while, and I had a small idea of what it would involve, but I didn't know the details. We went with a friend and for the first couple of hours just enjoyed watching the play, taking in the atmosphere and catching up with people. As we walked in the door, we found a certain MT having her boots laced up by a young lothario I shall refer to only as 'MVn'. It's APPARENTLY my own fault, not MT's, that N banned me from the internet for three days last week, for online flirting. I'm saying NOTHING, but if MT hadn't teased so naughtily....well, let's just say I wouldn't have been in so much trouble!

ALSO, N said I couldn't even TOUCH the young lady in question, which I thought was most unfair, particularly as MT was living up to her name and practically giving me a lap dance, knowing full well I couldn't lay a finger on her. I ask you, really, is that right? Is it fair? WHY??!!!! The only answer I got from N was, as usual, 'Because I can, honey'!

I was sitting down, chatting and talking rubbish, when I suddenly got yanked backwards so hard by my hair I nearly fell off the seat. Her hand in my hair pulled me upright and marched me forward - and despite wobbling precariously on my heels, my body decided it had no choice but to follow orders. Before I knew it, she had my skirt pulled up, my arms and ankles cuffed securely to the frame on which I was perched facing forward, with my legs bent at the knees but spread and open, ready for whatever she chose to do to me. Which turned out to be - leaving me there for ten minutes while she went to chat to her friends and get a drink.

Fortunately my friend and partner in crime A was at hand to save me from the full implications of showing the entire room my thighs for this period of time, as she kept me company and to some extent, blocked the view.

When N had finished her social butterfly routine - sorry, I mean, essential networking activity - and deigned to return, she tried to get a blindfold on me. Due to my weird headspace, and the thumping din coming from the pub downstairs, it freaked me out, and so she let me go without it in return for promising to keep my eyes shut. She began some sensory play, and despite the fact that I was an EXTREMELY GOOD GIRL and kept my eyes shut all the time, I kept getting told off for opening them! Then I got the blindfold put back on as a punishment, and even though I was pretty sure she knew I hadn't opened my eyes, the uncertainty, the unfairness of it, made tears come. N sensed I was on the edge and before it went too far, she whispered in my ear 'we're playing', which stopped me from going too far into claustrophobia.

The next thing that happened took me close to tears again but only because I was nearly crying with laughter - a growly-gruff man voice in my ear asserted that I was a FILTHY LITTLE SLUT! I don't quite know why it was so funny, but it was a piece of comic timing that you just had to be there for!

N relented and took the blindfold off but I had to keep my eyes closed again. Which meant that when Mr Growly returned with what he claimed was a Very Big Knife, and ran it all over me, I couldn't see what was what. Now, N has got me like this before. The last time she ran something cold and metal all over me and claimed it was a knife, it turned out to be a teaspoon. So as much as I wanted to believe that the man stroking my face, running it between my legs over my knickers, and giving me goosebumps all down my arms, was using a bloody big knife - as I have what might be mildly described as a Bit of A Thing About Knives - I was damned if she was going to get me like that again, and I refused to make a fool of myself by moaning in an orgasmic haze over what would probably turn out to be a keyring in the shape of a teddy bear, this time.
However, after play was over and I evinced this opinion, N and my friend STILL swore that it was a big knife, and I STILL didn't believe them, so they called over Mr Growly, who showed me his ENORMOUS big weapon. Apparently my face was something of a picture. N thought this was hilarious, as while he was playing with me, she was watching and guessed what was going through my mind. 'She thinks it's a teaspoon! She thinks it's a teaspoon! If Imp opens her eyes while he's doing that and sees what he's really using, she's going to come right in his FACE!'
So that was all pretty awesome.

Later on, N had to run our friend A home, before she turned into a pumpkin. I stayed behind, doing my impression of a dog left outside a shop waiting for its person to come back - looking up excitedly every time someone new came in the door, and then sighing and slumping back into my seat again when I realised it wasn't her. I sat with some friends and the aforementioned young knave MVn, who was also doing his dog impression - but his version was more like a boy dog; thoroughly over-excited and determined to leave his mark on the world by humping every young ladies' leg and pissing on every lamppost. I suspect I fell into his lamppost category...
I'd been chatting earlier in the evening about face slapping, and how I'd never tried it but it did appeal to me. MVn then decided to give me a trial run, WITHOUT ASKING ME!!! The little shit. He speculated, 'I wonder what would happen if I slapped you now?' and his hand connected with my face at the same time as I replied 'Don't!' - I screeched 'OW!' as the sound of his palm hitting my flesh resounded round the room, and I stared at him all agog, heat flushing my face and everything else. Which I think was mostly rage, not arousal, I should point out.

MT looked at him like someone looks at a lobster being picked up by a chef, as I turned to him and said 'N. Is. Going. To Kill. You.' I've never seen anyone get on their knees in front of me and grovel so quickly.

After the excitement had settled down, and MVn had finished roughhousing with everyone in sight and buggered off, I was left chatting to a couple of people while I watched a suspension going on, a few feet away. Everything, every action, every expression, by the people involved, told a story. The suspension was one of the most beautiful things I've seen in my life. The woman's face was blissful, and it was so clear that the freedom, the sensations, were a kind of therapy in action. The person who had suspended her, and one other, were playing gently with her. I didn't think it was possible for my opinion of these two, who are highly respected on the scene, to get any higher, but that depth of compassion is a very special gift.

I found it very moving, and I went off for a quiet cry in the other room by myself. While I was there, I heard My Master's Voice (sic) and came rushing out, delighted and excited to have hunted down my N at the bar on her return.

It wasn't long before another friend, LF, came and found me, and with N's permission, took me to the other suspension frame and began putting rope around me. He bound me with my hands together in front, my arms at my sides, and my body decorated with rope that attached like a harness to the frame above. My ankles were tied together, with just enough space for hands to sneak inside and run up my thighs. She came to where we were standing, and stroked the skin at the back of my neck and shoulders with the sharp silver claws which slip over her fingertips. I closed my eyes and she slipped the blindfold on again as I leaned my head back against her, trusting her to take care of me. I knew MT was going to be doubling up with her at some point and I suspected after N had played with me to her fill, she'd hand me off for a short session, or the two of them would torture me together.

There was a pause while LF finished the ropework, and I felt the anticipation, my excitement, my fear, my tension, my arousal, all grow. He spoke in my ear and I was glad the ropes prevented me from falling, I got such a shock! Then I was soothed by hands which stroked me, the sensation of silver claws on my skin, running down my arms, my back. My head pulled far back by the hair, my lips falling open in response. Fingers on my thighs, touching, exploring, scratching me, on my skin everywhere, hurting, not hurting, pain, not pain. Teeth in my neck, biting down, hard. Time collapses, expands. Her fingers on me, lifting my skirt, lightly spanking, the nails digging in. Something metal and cold touching me...something hard and woven...ice, on my nipples, hurting my breasts, no, no I whisper, please don't...wanting it....not wanting it...

Then sensation turns to pain, more pain, and there are more hands on me. I'm being beaten from the front and the back at the same time, it hurts, it hurts so much, but it feels so utterly what should be happening now, what needs to happen now. And then, finally, the release. As if a tight band which has been growing tighter all week, constricting my chest and my throat, suddenly breaks. And whether I want to or not, I'm sobbing, crying out, the release is overwhelming, I've no choice, there's nothing I can do but cry and cry as N holds me tight, whispering comforting little words, holding me safe, making a place for me in which I can let it go, in this place, in this time, nothing can hurt me.

The scene winds down as LF quietly undoes the ropes, the others discretely check we're okay, and we are, I'm okay, I'm okay and I'm not held back by this choking need to sob as I have been, because I'm done, I'm finished. Quiet now, I float in a distant haze of tiredness and safety as N holds me tight and only lets go of me to pack up, and do what's necessary before she takes me home. She asks me at what point during the sensory play had I realised it was MT - and I slowly understood that they'd planned and schemed to trick me. All along I had thought it was N, and until the hurty toys came out, it hadn't been at all.

We sleep. The next day we're exhausted, and I'm over-emotional but it's okay because we both know why. I cry on and off throughout the day, absently, as if the last of the poison is leaking out by itself. I cry but I laugh too, easily and without effort, restored to my default settings. We drive through windsor and visit the queen's park, gently seeking the restorative surroundings of trees and green and earth smells underfoot.

N is driving down the lanes, and jokingly says 'open your door!' as we pass a young boy on a bike, and before my brain kicks in, I lean over to do it! Talk about pussy-whipped! Fortunately she grabs my wrist before I have murder on my conscience, but it just goes to show the depths of depravity she's taken me to.

On monday I go in for my operation, covered in beautiful bruises, but none are on my bottom so the surgeon has nothing to object to. With my terror siphoned off successfully on saturday, I'm able to remain calm, right up until the last minute, although I had a slight wobble as I went under the anaesthetic. I woke up in recovery to find it all went as well as can be expected.
I'm pretty sore now and it's hard to get comfy (in fact I've written this in short bursts, mostly standing up), but it's healing up well and it looks as if the scar will be smallish. I feel calm and very relaxed about the pain, which is nastily hurty most of the time but improving daily, and most importantly, isn't upsetting me. I can cope.