A question I often ask new lovers when we are getting to know each other is a common one:

“How long have you been into this?”

I ask for no other reason than sheer curiosity.  I am obsessed with human sexuality and the myriad experiences within that – and admittedly, I’m a sucker for a smutty first-time-kink story.  The answers are as varied as the people who are asked them, but a running theme is that they have known since they were very young.

I can relate to this strongly.  As a teenager I had desires I didn’t fully understand, and wouldn’t begin to until I reached sexual maturity. I remember daydreaming about being bound and locked in my wardrobe long before those daydreams had any kind of submissive overtone.

My first ever exposure to kink came in my late teens.  I was absent-mindedly browsing twitter and came across an account that was sharing kinky images – images I had never seen before in any context outside of mocking comedy sketches.  Beautiful people of all genders, shapes and sizes sporting ball gags, cuffs, blindfolds, and hot, raised stripes on their bare bottoms.  I started exploring from there, and quickly realised what my life had been missing up until that point.

I was lucky; the product of a modern, liberal and open-minded upbringing, I didn’t feel ashamed of my desires, only desperate to explore them further.  Early forays into spanking and restraint soon flowed into darker scenes – kidnapping roleplay, consensual non-consent and age play became my mainstays, as I successfully corrupted my innocent boyfriends and girlfriends over the years.

Years later,  I know exactly what I want and how to ask for it.  I no longer feel as though I ‘should’ be submissive all the time, or indeed dominant all the time.  My desires are fluid, depending on who I’m with and my mood at the time, but I mostly identify as a true switch.  Within the  BDSM scene there can sometimes be a feeling that this orientation is somehow not ‘true’ submission or domination.  Luckily, I don’t much care about what is considered ‘true’ or ‘real’ – I care about pleasure, sensation, exploration, throwing off my own inhibitions and gleefully tearing them from my lovers.

Whether you’re at the very beginning of your kinky journey, or a seasoned pro, there is so much more to come.  I have gone from being purely and totally submissive, to often-dominant, to somewhere in between.  I’m thrilled to see where this journey will continue to take me, and what I can learn from it alongside my companions.