Jealousy
Sun, 12 Dec 1993

>>> Have any slave out there ever expereinced problems when their Master decided to add another slave? If so, how did you handle the situation? <<<

Dear Terry,

This is kind of late, but hey! I've been busy! I haven't been in the situation you describe, I think because my master is convinced that a harem would not work (read "for us" between the lines, so I don't have to turn on my disclaimer neon sign, Ok?--g) unless the other slave was pretty exceptional: very open, honest, trusting, good-intentioned (not to mention an intellectual equal and, as the other adjectives listed above suggest, on the same level of emotional maturity). AND she'd have to be able to top me . I know, picky, picky, picky, but when you're dealing with the longterm, you have to be! So far neither of us has met anyone like that, nor are we really looking. If she (Don is hetero-oriented--it would have to be a she) falls into our collective lap, fine, but Don and I are content as we are. Donald has, of course, played with other subs, but that's completely different.

Anyway, despite my lack of experience in this area, I can offer a couple of pointers. Start reading alt.polyamory if you aren't already. This is a newsgroup in which multiple relationships of all sorts are discussed. Pay special attention to the crash-and-burn messages: you'll learn more about the challenges that such relationships face from these than from the "I've just got involved in polyamory and isn't it Wanerful, Wanerful!" sorts of messages.

My other thought on this situation (and this is pure speculation on my part but you may want to explore it with your master) is that this other woman wouldn't be "making noises" about your dominant owning her if he was totally uninterested in obtaining another slave. What has your master done to encourage this woman, or to draw her attention in the first place? Never mind about owning other slaves in general, what specifically does he feel (if anything) toward this particular person? Is he friends with her? Sexually attracted? Interested in long-term ownership? Do they correspond heavily or talk on the phone a lot? And is it possible that you could be exaggerating her interest? Maybe she just wants him to top her, to do an occasional scene with her. If your master is a public figure in the S&M circles you travel in, is halfway decent at his topping, and maybe even kind of cute, it could be that a lot of subs are panting for him. If so, that interest on the other sub's part (and I could see how it would go so far that she would claim to want him to own her) is something you may have to learn to live with until such time as he decides to retire from "public office."

Having a married partner--even one with an uninterested spouse--is never easy or entirely secure, and this further complication in the person of another sub must not be welcome _at all_ to you. Your jealously, if that is what it is, is certainly understandable. While I am of the opinion (as you seem to be) that it is my master's prerogerative to take another slave should he desire to do so, I am also of the opinion that, as he is the one running the relationship, my jealousy is as much (if not more) his problem than mine. He's the one in charge, he's the one making the decisions, he's the one who has to choose what's best for you, for his wife, for himself, and maybe now, for the other sub, and balance all of the differing needs. The more people he chooses to bring into the picture, the more complicated this juggling act can become. If he isn't competent enough to help you through or "fix" your jealousy so that you feel better about him or the situation, then he shouldn't be messing around with a potentially polyamoryous situation in the first place.

Look, Terry, whether your master is messing around with this other sub or just thinking of messing around with her, he seems either to be doing it without much regard for how you feel about it or he cares but is incapable of helping you. The fact is, this is causing you to feel bad. In longterm and sucessful relationships, the sub's feelings are important, as important as the top's, because, the folklore goes, due to the intense intimacy and sharing that is common in such situations, if the sub is miserable, how can the top be happy? In some BDSM relationships, the sub's feelings are considered to be the responsibility of the dominant--because the specific dominant wants it that way. Ah, control....I'll never get what some people see in it. Back to the point: while taking on another sub may be your top's right, and I would certainly cede that right to my master as well (not that I have much choice about it--g), I would also legitimately wonder why (if I were feeling hurt and jealous) he held my feelings in such low regard. Surely such behavior would not make for a rewarding and happy relationship over the long haul. I would also ask myself if I wanted to be in service to someone who would continue not to care about how I felt, or who would regard the pursuit of a harem as more important that his slave's well-being and long-term happiness. I'm not saying that both (his harem and your happiness) cannot co-exist, but it is more difficult to bring about than most people think when they first start having their sugar-plum-fairy dreams of polyamory.

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