Why do I write?

I mostly write because it helps me to make sense of my experiences. And I do feel a strong need for making more sense out of the things that turn me on. Having my thoughts put on paper makes it easier for me to extract insights from them. It facilitates seeing the reality for what it is with all its contradictions. Therefore, a lot of material here is of self-analytical nature. I dissect my, often conflicting, thoughts and desires, and put them under the magnifying glass of my analytical brain, extracting patterns and trying to find the reasons for my behavior. 

I also write to capture moments. To record fleeting scenes from my reality or imagination. When I write about things that happened to me or the fantasies that I’ve lived, I reenter them and go even deeper. This makes me realize their impact on me and helps me see how it fits into my general understanding of who I am in this moment in time.

Finally, I write to organize my knowledge. Writing helps me to structure information and make new connections. This doesn’t only apply to my self-knowledge but also to what I learn about the disciplines that I am passionate about. Some of my posts are syntheses of knowledge that I have acquired through workshops and research, others are records of my personal evolution in the world of kink. Especially, I write a lot about kinbaku (the art of Japanese rope bondage), because it is my huge passion and because I feel that is a topic that still needs more written knowledge and honest perspectives on it. Particularly when it comes to models’ views which is the position that I am writing from.

This website is a collection of my past writings and a space for new ones. It is a place for me to share my journey as a rope model, as a BDSM (Bondage and Discipline, Dominance and Submission and Sadism and Masochism) and polyamory practitioner and as a woman living in today’s society. Some of my posts are more general, some very personal but I hope that all will contribute to a better understanding of kink, BDSM and kinbaku or at least spark some new thoughts around them.

Why SMothered?

The word ‘smothered’ is one of my favorite words. There is drama to it but at the same time a certain kind of softness. It can be frightening to be smothered. Thinking about it gives me a claustrophobic feeling. I imagine having no space for myself, no space to breathe, being squashed by something enormous, something unimaginable. At the same time, it doesn’t indicate violence. There is no intention in it to hurt me. Rather, any damage that becomes a result of it seems rather accidental. Like in the story of Lenny from ‘Of Mice and Men‘ who loved to play with cute fluffy creatures but kept on killing them because of lack of self-awareness about the strength he had. He kept on smothering them with his love. But he was still a good man.

I often feel smothered by my desires. Smothered by my experiences. By rope, by D/s play, by SM play, by life. It is not that it happens intentionally. It is not that my partners want to damage me. It is just that I love life so much and I seek so much intensity that sometimes it just becomes overwhelming. And I become SMothered by it.

SMothered is also a word play with the abbreviation SM which comes from Sadism and Masochism, and I like how perfectly it marries the cause and effect. How it captures my state of being smothered with the exact reason for it. It is my clever friend who came up with it one evening after I was torturing him for the 100th time to help me find a good name for my website. He is not kinky himself (well, maybe mildly) but he knows about my inclinations and passions and he knows that I love to write about them. After endless unsuccessful suggestions, he proposed this one. And I knew that this is it.

My D/s story

I ventured into the world of SM (Sadism and Masochism) and D/s (Dominance and submission) in my mid-twenties, but I have been fantasizing about it forever. I have always been fascinated by dark dramatic stories involving breaking someone’s spirit, humiliation, degradation and being forced into submission or sexual slavery. I would get aroused by the scenes of sexual violence, rape or public humiliation in books and movies and once I found it somewhere I would go back to it over and over again. These weren’t specific SM- or D/s-themed stories, but motifs that I would find in everyday media that appealed to me more than they should to an ordinary recipient. And this fascination has been in me since a very young age.

As a child, I had a deep love for role playing where I acted as an imprisoned animal (usually a puppy) held captive against its will and taken care of by his older and wiser companion. I remember that the thought of being an innocent victim held in captivity combined with a powerful figure who was there for me and at who’s mercy I was has been seductively gratifying for my young self. 

As a teenager, I would put myself in positions of being used sexually. I sought after sexual encounters with as many boys as possible even if I did not find them attractive (or even especially if I didn’t), just to have a feeling of being objectified. During my early sexual experiences I was rather passive, making myself available to my partners, but not initiating anything on my own. I know now that unconsciously, I wished for them to use me any way they wanted. They, however, did not see my intentions (understandably for they did not share my fantasies), and ended up criticizing me for my lack of initiative and a passive nature, which led to my insecurity about my sexual performance for years to come.

During my twenties, I kept on trying to build a ‘healthy’ sexual life but it wasn’t satisfying for me in the way that it seemed to be for other people. Then, one time, my then-boyfriend handcuffed me to the bed during sex. And that was a turning point. It was so much better than all the sex that we’ve had before! I didn’t admit it to him, though. Instead I’ve told him that it was nothing special, but that we could repeat it sometime. And that going further than that would be too much for me. It was a complete lie, but I’d said it because I was worried about how much I liked it. I felt like I shouldn’t have. And I was afraid to explore it further.

It took me years and many more tries to come to terms with my sexuality. To understand and accept the things that I find sexy. To allow me to give away the power over myself to someone else in a conscious and consensual way. To admit that I enjoy pain, physical, and even more so, emotional. To not look down upon myself for wanting to serve, to feel owned. For taking pleasure from pleasing others and not from getting pleased. 

The things that I find hot can be dark. I love mind games. I love my feelings to be hurt. I love being forced into performing impossible tasks. I love being humiliated and degraded. I love being objectified and reduced to a mere pleasure dispenser. I love being denied things that I want and being made to do what I don’t want. I love feeling like I don’t mean anything, like I am nothing. The deeper and more intensely something or someone makes me suffer, the more low and unimportant they make me feel, the more sexually drawn to them I am.

I still don’t know what are the reasons for my sexuality being this way but I believe that few people can appreciate emotional pain as much as I do. And while in the past I thought that it means that there is something wrong with me, right now I think that it is beautiful. It is beautiful to be able to find pleasure in the emotional realms that other people tend to avoid. To willingly explore the dark corners of my psyche. But especially, it is beautiful that there are people who match me on with their preferences on the other side. And that sometimes, we find each other.

My kinbaku story

The first time I got exposed to rope, was when my first kinky boyfriend brought a black cotton rope home and proposed to tie me up with it. That proposal initiated a spark in my imagination. I knew that I am going to love it. And I did. Of course, it was nothing like kinbaku that I engage in now. Just simple ties for sex that he looked up on the internet, serving solely to immobilize me so that he could have his way with me. However, it was enough for me to realize how much I love bondage, and rope in particular. And to make me hungry for more.

We broke up. And after a while I began to miss D/s. I’ve realized that I enjoyed kink not only in that specific relationship, but that I genuinely crave this kind of dynamics. Even more so, I’ve realized that I can’t imagine my future without it. So, I decided to seek people who might have similar interests.

I found a kinky party in my neighborhood which was supposed to be open and friendly to the new people, and I went there. Coincidentally, there was a Japanese rope bondage demo from a local couple. And hearing about it made me even more inclined to go. I was right because when I saw it, my heart was lost. 

I loved every single thing about their scene. The simplicity and merciless brutality of rope, the beauty of the shapes that the body of the model was put in, her visible suffering, her humiliation when the rigger slapped her, the symbolism of a cloth covering her mouth, silencing her... Watching them, I knew that I want THIS!

And I got it. Shortly after (which was the summer of 2017), I began getting tied and I haven’t stopped ever since. At first, I was tied in many different styles. And actually, I didn’t even have much understanding of the differences. I was just trying things and enjoying myself. Over time, however, I’ve learned that some ways of doing rope speak to me more than others. And that I have an especially deep appreciation for the more ‘traditional’ way of doing rope bondage, kinbaku, which is usually filled with eroticism, SM and D/s and which, drawing abundantly from the traditional Japanese aesthetics, I find very beautiful. It is not the only way in which I enjoy being tied, but it is the one which fits me the most as a rope model, and practice of which I want to develop so that I can experience it more fully.