At the bottom of the doll

A note to myself and to others: I don't think I can submit right now.

All in all, I've had a rather difficult, personally challenging few weeks and I'm still dealing with my feelings on the matter, and with my often contradictory and complex reactions within my own sexuality. I feel rather removed and a bit distanced from my place within kinkdom and have come to a natural hiatus along my journey. I've moved from being a sure and certain female submissive looking for a dominant partner, through defining as a switch with a wide palate of tastes and now I'm not really sure what I am. It's a funny place to be really, the idea of handing over power or control to someone else sets me on edge. A total change from where I was a few months back. However, I am clearly going through an alteration and therefore I need that power and control for myself, to take me where I'm going next.

What I have been doing, over the past few weeks, is sticking my head in the sand over this. Partly because I had a lot of other things going on which distracted me and sucked out my energy reserves. Another part was that I didn't want to deal with it, so hoped it would blow over and that I would be able to re-engage and once again slot my desire against my will. I have realised that not only is it a bad way of living (it is) but it's also liable to cause some damage to others, which isn't fair.

And in the midst of all that, there was a desire to bottom to Majeste. It's been a long time since I've been a doll and there was a part of me that had certainly missed those deep, dark waters of cool space. Lying on my back, breathing slowly and blinking with the controlled, measured pace of an object, whilst Majeste poured bead after bead of a pearl necklace into my open mouth. If I run my tongue around the insides of my mouth I can almost taste the lacquer. I am almost certain that my mood right now - particularly the calm I'm experiencing - is a result of those few hours of being scratched, whipped, bitten and fucked (the latter with an inflatable dildo that expanded to approximately the size of a marrow). I needed it. I wanted it. I feel better because of it.

But what I was able to give and what I really should have given were two different things. And I'm sad about that at the same time as I am aware I couldn't have done anything else and that I really enjoyed what I did do. In the moment I was an empty toy, devoid of will and simply "there" to be done to, to be taken and enjoyed. I was a bottom, not a submissive. I gave nothing and in fact, I rather greedily took. Superficially, it's hard to see the difference, but we could both feel it. I was almost lazy: content to be passively receptive, rather than actively seeking to fulfill the desire and wants of my partner.

Part of it is my own inner coldness. I don't feel particularly warm or affectionate at the moment and I'm not responding very readily for requests for affection. The idea of romance, of developing that kind of emotional interdependence leaves a funny taste in my mouth. Submission requires feelings, and I don't really have any to give. I can be friendly, and I can be caring, in a way. But I am much keener to dominate, so my friendliness is about reassuring a skittish submissive, my care is about good grooming and training. My dominance is at arms-length: I am happy to maintain aloof distance, to control from afar or, if the option of having someone for a few hours or the night came along, it's likely that there would be no skin sex.

At the bottom of the doll, then, is more doll: a cool and empty space from which play can be controlled and manipulated. When I started The Doll Project, I imagined that it would be a submissive experiment, but it appears that some of those parameters will carry over into this next stage. It's made me think a lot more about labels and the difficulties of being able to negotiate what it is we want, how we want it and who we want it with. There is also a space between how we see ourselves and how we really are, the gap between image and reality. Each time I come to a change within my life, that gap needs re-negotiating as I work out which bits of me are actually there and which bits I only think are there.

Bear with me.