After reading many, many threads a question came to mind. I am directing this question at those who are actually living the D/s lives, not at people like me who mostly think or fantasize about fetishes.

What I would like to ask is do you always have to live out your fetishes each and every time you and your partner have sex? In my mind, my fantasies never had to end with the sex act. I always realized it was sexually erotic and arousing. However, it did not necessarily have to end with the sex act itself as the end result. After reading all these threads I now think that most of the time the BDSM activities lead to some sexual activity.

Anyway again I ask, is there always your Dominant and/or submissive needs that must be met first before you can have an enjoyable sexual encounter? I believe it would be called a vanilla activity without the BDSM activities being involved. If you sometimes do only engage in a vanilla sexual encounter, are you at the same time fantasizing about the fetish activities that you normally enjoy to get you in the mood, so to speak? Can you get into the mood without these BDSM activities or at least thinking about them?

To my way of thinking, I believe that once you have become used to these BDSM activities, no matter what they are, you may need them to become aroused. This may depend on the intensity of those activities, I have no idea.

Until joining this forum I never before even imagined this type of question let alone having a venue to ask it. So I thank you in advance for your replies.