How do/did you cope?

[Iseabail]

This is slightly repetitive for me, as I am sure it is for all others who are new to scene of BDSM. I am new, and with this, comes new experiences, new understandings, but most of all: new secrets and fears. Secrets of these new experiences. These new people, things, ideas, possibilities. And fear of the reactions. Fear of yourself and if your family will step away and draw a line between you and them. It is now 'Us' Versus 'Them'. Who walks away with the title? Or does the title get ripped in half? In favor of family and comraderie, or will it drift away to nothing?

This question goes to those 'noobs' and those who have been around for an age or two, who have to keep this life secret or on the down low. How did/do you cope with ostracizing yourself from your friends, your family? Those so close to you can never or will never know/understand this key part of you? How do you find a way to release all those thoughts, all the experiences you want to share, with those that know you so inherently?

And for those that found that amazing courage to tell your family/friends about this new life you have embraced, how did you go about it? How did you manage it? How did they react? Did they understand at all?

I understand those can be personal questions, and I apologize if I offend anyone, for anything or any part of the post should it occur.

But all stories are welcome. The failures and the winners.

Personally, I am not sure I could ever open this part of myself to anyone in my real life. My friends, my family. I live in a small, southern town, with a family who has admittedly in the past had connections to the KKK, so you can imagine how they react to anything different or strange by their definitions. I am not close to them, but still, having that small bit of welcome cut out would be strange for me. So I fear that possibility. Same with my friends. Maybe one day I will be able to say, "Screw it all and you, too." And just come out with it. Until then, what do you have to say?

[FrgnSwtc]

As I'm a closeted sub myself I can relate to your situation.

The way I see it, is as I would do if my "vanilla bedroom accounts" were asked. I'm not Madonna, my private life is my own. Nobody has to (or really cares) about what I do behind closed doors and the details of my relationship are my own. By definition, I'm a private person and as I work in a very conservative and strict vanilla environment (my Master too) the tendency for discretion is more pronounced.

If you feel a "punk rock moment" coming your way, I'd try to avoid it. Making a personal statement will, more often than not, harm your relationship with your family (mine are ALL catholic) or get interrogated in a not too comfortable way by your friends. My "weirdness" will get instant judgment and I'm not up for justifying my choices, likes or dislikes.

Unfortunately, we still live in a prejudiced world and the price for overstepping certain limits is frequently too high compared to the actual outcome. What I do is look inside me and gather strength from the peace and fulfillment that I find there since I started down this road.

my 2 cents, good luck!!

[Iseabail]

Well, it is just my family has this notion that privacy is idiocracy. (I am fresh out of high school so while I figure out cash to get an apartment, I am at home) There is not even a knocking policy in my household, so I am the odd one out with all my secrets even beyond and long before BDSM. I am a private person as well, but I am also very analytical and I tend to examine and break down things more than is healthy. Haha.

I...yeah, I am in no way, shape or form, about to have that rebellious moment and declare to my family about this new life. Lol. I think I might need to live at least an hour/hour and a half or even a state away before I pulled a stunt like that.

How do you keep it inside, though? Congrats to you for that ability! I have to have all views, aspects, opinions, analyzations, profiles, I have to know every little piece and angle of the information. Otherwise I feel like I am missing something. But if you are able to that all on your own. Dang. Lol.

Thanks for your two cents. It is greatly appreciated.

[FrgnSwtc]

Catholics can be very idiosyncratic too. The bounds set by "public normalcy", and I use this term very loosely, leave little space for personal development and often branch out into secretive people and therefore, communities. I can assure you that you're not the only kinky one around you, it's just more commonly accepted frowning upon the differences.

I'd tell you to be patient, waiting until you can leave your parent's home may seem too long, but I can assure you that it isn't. You have more time ahead of you to seek from life what you want.
Overanalyzing is something that I do too much for my own good, but looking back I've gained more from calming the fuck down and breathing than flipping out and shouting my lungs out.

[Ozme52]

You think you're the only one with secrets... but you're not.

Have your parents announced their intention to copulate... or told you they just finished, when they go off to their room? Share positions? Share details? Do you know for a fact they don't use prophylactics? Is your dad using viagra or cialis or does he still get it up himself? Does he mention when he's horny? If not with you, maybe they share this with the neighbors? No?

My point is... why do we as kinksters, presume we have to reveal our kinks to our vanilla friends? They don't share their intimate details with each other nor is it expected, and except amongst (some) of the very closest friends, they don't even acknowledge it.

No one of us need "out" themselves to their friends or family. Just our immediate partner(s).

And to Iseabail, if you were 100% vanilla, you'd have the very same problem with regard to masturbating in your room or having a vibrator in your sock drawer.

It has nothing to do with being kinky. It's all about parents and their children.

[sera]

You think you're the only one with secrets... but you're not.

That is SO true!

How do you keep it inside, though? Congrats to you for that ability! I have to have all views, aspects, opinions, analyzations, profiles, I have to know every little piece and angle of the information. Otherwise I feel like I am missing something. But if you are able to that all on your own. Dang. Lol.

I don't just keep it all in. I come here and to another community to chat about it with other understanding people. Between that and time with my Dom, I stay sane and none of my vanilla friends have any idea.

Best of luck to you!

[leah06]

Be sure you password protect your computer. Don't post any photos that anyone who knows you could recognize. Don't drop information about yourself. I suppose the small southern town is OK, but no more than that. If you ARE going to come out to people, do it on your terms, not have it be some accident of the internet.

Be sure no one sneaks up behind you while you're on your computer.

Beyond that, I think many of us live a "double life" to some extent. Oz is right, of course, that most people, vanilla or not, keep bedroom secrets, but this is a sliding scale. I think people generally assume that other people's bedroom secrets are similar to their own. They allude to them; women of a common generation sometimes share them; men joke about them. If you fall outside the perceived norm, it can get lonely and your "personal space" can feel more isolated. It's hard to be out with the girls, and they get all drunk and giggly about their guys, and you can't really share that. It's a barrier to intimacy.

Yes, that sucks, but that's life. A lot of us are lucky to have a RL partner who shares our interest, and perhaps a few RL friends, met at munches or parties or on the internet, but many of us find community, and conversation, mostly online.

Try Fetlife and look for parties and munches in the nearest large city to your town. Try to hook up with the under-35 group nearest to you. Try to make at least a few real life friends and don't just live online. Will you still feel isolated in certain ways from your community? Yeah, probably.

[Iseabail]

First off: Thank you all for the advice, but I believe I made a faux pas somewhere along the way and made it seem like I was going to tell my family and friends. Which I am not going to, I do not know if I ever could. I apologize for the confusion.

I simply wanted to hear the stories and experiences of those around me. A chance to learn about another aspect of BDSM. That line where people have to toe between BDSM and their Vanilla lives.

I am sorry for the confusion, I should have made that clear in the intial post.

Ozme52: Everyone has secrets. That is so very true. Whether it be who took the last cookie out of the cookie jar or who killed Kenny. But I was wondering who do people manage their secrets? Your secrets? Anyone's secrets?

I just wanted to hear everyone's stories. And if all of this makes me seem like a brat, once again I apologize, that is most definitely not my intention.

And, I probably just made another mistake in posting this, but still, I felt the need to make myself clear, since I screwed up somewhere along the way.

Reading that over, it slightly sounds sarcastic, but it is not. I promise. Lol.

Thanks, everyone, for your advice, and replies! More are most certainly weclome. Please, keep them coming.

[roxi.slut]

I, for one, do NOT want to know about my 18 year old son's sexual fantasies, exploits, or endeavors, any more than I would want to know about my parents. Ewwww! Ewwwww!

You can still be a daily submissive soul to your partner without outing yourself. My Husband tells me what he wants, and I am his caring little wife, who does as he asks. Since you are in a small southern town, this sort of behavior should be no shock to anyone around you. And as you grow older, and show more of your mature/responsible side, most will treat you more as an adult...and those who are still nosey will have to be told what they can do with those noses!

[spicennice]

This is new to me as well. I had this sit up on my computer - which is hooked up to my very large tv screen. My youngest son (24) came in one morning unexpectedly. I was out smoking in the garage. We chatted for a minute and he walked into the house before me. He was already in the kitchen (tv is very viewable from there) when I realized. I yelped and came scrambling in trying to distract him (I have to admit, this was hardly a well thought out strategy). I have no idea whether he saw it or not. It wasn't just about the BDSM bit though. I have never wanted to sexualize myself in front of them. Like another poster aid above, ewww.

I will need to figure out strategies - just in case. It isn't that I wasn't sexual before, as I have always been, but instead I had rarely had my sexual slant blaring off of the tv in the middle of the house.

[Ozme52]

First off: Thank you all for the advice, but I believe I made a faux pas somewhere along the way and made it seem like I was going to tell my family and friends. Which I am not going to, I do not know if I ever could. I apologize for the confusion.

I simply wanted to hear the stories and experiences of those around me. A chance to learn about another aspect of BDSM. That line where people have to toe between BDSM and their Vanilla lives.

I am sorry for the confusion, I should have made that clear in the intial post.

Ozme52: Everyone has secrets. That is so very true. Whether it be who took the last cookie out of the cookie jar or who killed Kenny. But I was wondering who do people manage their secrets? Your secrets? Anyone's secrets?

I just wanted to hear everyone's stories. And if all of this makes me seem like a brat, once again I apologize, that is most definitely not my intention.

And, I probably just made another mistake in posting this, but still, I felt the need to make myself clear, since I screwed up somewhere along the way.

Reading that over, it slightly sounds sarcastic, but it is not. I promise. Lol.

Thanks, everyone, for your advice, and replies! More are most certainly weclome. Please, keep them coming.

It's easy to lose the tone of a written comment, especially on the net it seems, where we tend to write and post, rather than write, edit, rewrite, rewrite again, and only then, publish.

I took none of what you wrote as being in any sense bratty. It seemed a sincere question and concern... and my empahsis was not on your attitude, but your perception (as I saw it) that the secrets were unique.

In fact... if anything, I was trying to be supportive. I once has a submissive whom I lost because of a self-induced frenzy to tell her family she was kinky... as if she were keeping dark secrets from them... despite the fact she knew nothing about their, (parents, sisters, cousins,) sex lives.

My intent was to tell you to not sweat it, and not feel that you had to share your predilictions with your family... because, imo, if you were 100% vanilla, you wouldn't either.