Hi, welcome to the latest episode. Call Me Mistress. I'm your Hostess, Mistress Mia, and today I bring you a special guest, one from Maryland, one from Missouri, The Show me state. And you're getting ready to show us so much with your book. I bring you Alicia Walker and Arielle Kuperberg. So ladies, welcome to the show. Thanks for having us. Absolutely. I know we tried this before, so
we're going to give it a whirl. But you all wrote this wonderful book bound by BDSM, unexpected lessons for building a happier life. And I, I love this book. Myself and Edie Boleyn, we both read it and she is of one of the Doms in the dungeon. She is very insightful, very intellectual about the psychology behind BDSM. And so we really have extensive conversations about it, but you
know, it's great. And like I said, we really enjoyed the book and we were talking a lot specifically about the different topics that you've brought up that really isn't covered in a lot of BDSM, you know, literature quite truthfully. So that's why I was kind of a refreshing to read yours. And I was like, oh, this is great. You know, you lay it out so easily for people to really comprehend so. Thank you. Yeah, I loved it. So, Ariel, would you tell us how how you all started this?
How did you all meet? We met probably over 10 years ago at this point on a Facebook group, actually for academic mothers. And there was a long introductory thread and everyone was kind of like introducing themselves and saying what they did research on. And Alicia introduced herself and I think she mentioned she had just done a study on women who had affairs with other
women. But I identified as straight and I had been working on a study that was on college students who said they were straight but who had hooked up with same sex partners. And I was kind of stuck on the project. And I was like, hey, we should work together and you should help me actually finish writing this paper. And since then we became like
really good friends. We started off chatting on Facebook and having, we still chat probably daily on Facebook and now we've met, you know, several times over the years now at conferences and stuff. But that was, I think we originally had this kind of shared interest in sexuality topics. And yeah, we've been collaborating ever since then. That's wonderful. And so you all came about to discover how you were going to write this book. So, Alicia, how did you start
that? I had about 6 different students independent of each other just approach me after class and say hey have you ever thought about studying BDSM? In the first like 3 or so I said, no, I, I haven't really thought about it. And by the 4th 1 I started thinking maybe I should start thinking about it. And so I approached Arielle because I love working with her. And I said, hey, you know, what if we did this project and she
was game. So we, we designed a survey and interview protocol and we launched the study and Arielle came up with this great idea to post invitations to participate in Reddit, sub subgroups, subreddits and got a lot of folks that way. And then we had a large group of undergraduate researchers who were helping helping us. And a lot of them were actually in the BESM community, which was really helpful. And they helped kind of inform the questions. And they were on Fetlife.
And so we got permission from Fetlife and put a call out there as well. And pretty soon we had a really large sample. This is actually the largest study on BDSM to date. We had 96 completed interviews and like 20 more than 2400 survey bugs that. That's right. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I remember you saying it was almost 2500 people that you did this survey and and you asked them several obviously extensive questions. What kind of stuck out to you when you were writing this, this survey?
What were you thinking? Like God, what are people really into? Yeah, I think part of it was finding out what are people into like when people say they're BDSM practitioner, what does that actually mean in the like, what have they actually done? What do they typically do? So, yeah, I think as I said, I'm interested in like kind of hidden sexual behavior too. So that's just like, you know, tell me the numbers, like, how often are people doing these
types of things? But we also asked a lot about community benefits they had gotten from the BDSM community. That was something I was interested in having had some like, different encounters with the BDSM community.
So in some ways, like I grew up in a very religious community and there were some aspects of the BDSM community that you wouldn't think they'd have anything in common, but I think they do just that like sense of community and all these kind of like non sexual benefits that people are getting from it. So yeah, we had a lot of questions on that. We had questions on like how many friends do you have who are into BDSM and, you know, life and their attitudes, all sorts
of different questions. Yeah, that's, that's incredible. I know you all had talked about in your book specifically you said that you were losing community and you had to, you said specifically you put in what you get back in the BDSM community. So I thought, you know, it's entirely true. I I try to explain to people in our area, we don't have the really the best community. I find that there's a lot of cliques and it's really strange.
I find it really strange because parts of them kind of frown upon crossdressers and then I don't know it. It's just, I want it to be a non judgmental group, but it sometimes people, I don't know if it's, I don't know, maybe if it's just the lack of education with people I don't know. But that's just been my experiences.
I think every community has some like inherent problems and disagreements and like, you know, things that people feel really passionate about that people outside the community would have like no idea what they're talking about. But yeah, I think there's also, I don't know, for me, I moved last year, I moved states after living in the same place for 15 years. And like, as I was writing this book, thinking about like, how do people form communities?
How do people find that sense of connection? And I think that's something a lot of people are kind of thinking about these days as if you've read, people have talked about there's no, you know, people don't have community. They all stay home. They're on their like Facebook all or, you know, not Facebook whatever young people do. Like that's the one. Yeah. Like the, you know, they're all on their computer all day and like not interacting with people.
And I think people want more of a sense of community. And it's it was interesting to see like there's this whole build up community with all these rules and kind of social ideas about how you should do things. But it also that kind of leads BDSM partitioners to have this built in community that gives them all these benefits that they could kind of like step into very easily.
OK, now Alicia, in the book you all mentioned that a lot of people say that when they get into the BDSM community, almost feels like it's home to them. Yeah, that came up a lot in the interviews. People talked about discovering BDSM and like finally feeling like they could fully be themselves and they were fully accepted and they found people like them and that it was very much like coming home. And you know, what a wonderful gift that is.
How many people never really find that for themselves? You know, lots of folks just kind of wonder around sort of like where is my place? Where exactly do I fit in? And so I think that was just really powerful for folks to say and really stuck with me as just not an unfortunately not an
experience that everyone has. Yeah, because I felt like when I saw that that one part of a chapter where you talked about freedom for society, expectations, and then it just kind of rolled into the gender burdens that some people experience it to me, it's resonated because I think about the primary people that come to see me are cross dressers.
And, you know, I feel like so much of what they experience is problematic in their life, that they can't be who they are, you know, and we see that a lot of times too, with where it goes from cross dressers. They'll start off as a cross dresser, then they'll go into being a transgender person and so forth and just kind of expand from there in their life. But I don't know what else have you all? Yeah. Go ahead.
You were going to say Ari? I was going to say, I think there's a lot of areas and gender is definitely one of a major one, especially right now. I feel like in this current moment, but there are a lot of places in society where like society expects you to behave one way and that may not be the way that feels authentic to you. So I feel like when there's that tension, like you want to find some place where you could.
I think last time when we had our like, failed attempt to record this last week, you talked about like catharsis. I think there's like catharsis to be able to like reconcile, like and be accepted for parts of yourself that society is like, don't do this, but you're like, but I really want to do this. And then finding people who are like, well, that's cool. You could do that and you could like be yourself around us is, I think, very powerful. It really is. It really is.
So Alicia, when you go into embracing vulnerabilities, when you all were discussing this in your book, you were talking about finding people and trusting certain people with your secret. How were people gauging with that? Like was it specifically they would go on Fetlife? Would they try to find the community like that? So it depended.
Some people found community by going to munches and play parties, some people only had community online fetlife or Reddit, or some people were even in BDSM Facebook groups.
So it depended on what access folks had because you may live in a place where there isn't ABDSM community or maybe you don't know that there is. So for example, I know that there's a BDSM community here in Springfield's, but if I didn't know that, I would not know that, you know, if you just like ran a Google search or something, it would seem that
there isn't 1 at all. And so unless you stumble on to someone who can kind of, you know, be a realtor into that community, you, you wouldn't have one locally and you might end up resorting to online, even though there is actually a community available to you here. And, and I understand why the local community isn't necessarily super visible online. I can see where pit books would feel like it's not a very safe place here to do that.
It's pretty conservative here, so you know, it's a delicate line and a lot of places for folks to walk. You know, how do we connect with like minded folks but also keep ourselves safe? Yeah, that's interesting. So Ariel, what has been your favorite part of the book that you've spoken about and you've written about? I I feel like my favorite part writing about was there was a chapter just on like what is PDSN and what do people do?
And I like, there was a lot of like I knew a lot of it, but there was even more stuff I hadn't heard of that I went and researched on. And I don't know, just having those numbers of like, how often do people do this? How often are people doing that? And like, let's read all about like Easton or whatever topic of the day I'm reading about. I thought that was really interesting. I thought I really like the chapter. We also wrote on community and all the non BDSM communities
people were involved with. I did some of the analysis of like we had a survey question of just like what other communities are you a part of that also meet up in person regularly and looking and trying to like sort them and figure out like how do we categorize these? And so for instance, a lot of people were into like what I would call like creativity, like creating things or playing music or doing art projects or exercise or role-playing was a big one, wearing costumes.
And then we we're kind of in that with like the BDSM community incorporates all these different things that just humans like to do in their free time. But I thought it was really interesting to be like, what do humans like to do in their free time?
And yeah, as I said, you know, moving last year and trying to completely restart my social life in my mid 40s, I feel like I got a lot of insights and kind of was able to use stuff from the book to like, they're like, OK, you have to, like, show up to the same place over and over again. So I'm going to go do that and, like, make some friends. And it actually worked. So yeah. So as the personal question I have are, were you 2 actually active before all of this at all in the BDSM community?
Like, did you go to a function to kind of explore things? So I had had some encounters with the BDSM community when I was younger. I would say my spouse is kind of super vanilla. So I did end up married to someone who's like crazy vanilla. But when I was in my 20s, I dated a BDSM practitioner for a little bit, and I had some friends who were active in the BDSM community, and I went thanks toy shopping with some of
them. So I've had some encounters, but we didn't, yeah, we didn't do as much like participant observation as I feel like we could have. We didn't, we didn't, we didn't have IRB approval for that. That's the big thing. We were not approved to attend anything like that. I did get some invitations from folks that I interviewed and some very kind invitations that I had to pass on because I did not have IRB approval for that.
And prior to initiating the study, no, I had never, I had read about BDSM dungeons when I was in college, actually an undergrad, but more as like professional, you know, like you like folks that have a dungeon and that's like their profession is to do that. So I, I was aware of it from that, from that aspect. I don't even think I ever dated. If I dated someone who was into BDSM, they didn't tell me they were into BDSM. Doesn't mean I didn't obviously.
And yeah, I don't think I've ever been invited to any. No, I don't think I've ever had any invitations whatsoever. Maybe I haven't lived in the right place or I, I don't know. But no, I've never ever been invited. A cool thing, though, while I was interviewing folks is people kept saying, well, I can just tell from interacting with you, even over e-mail, that you have like a really dominant personality. And I really like dominant women. And I remember telling my mom I
was like, I'm very jealous. And I feel like if I weren't to BDSM, it would solve a lot of things in my life because no one in my regular life ever says, I really love that You're a dominant woman so. That is too funny. So I was going to say the reason why I asked that, because were you all like it? Was it really a big shock to you when you listen to some of these people talk about things and answer your surveys? Was it more or less like, oh
really? I had like, I'm like, I have been studying sex and teaching about sex for almost 20 years. So I wouldn't say it was like anything super shocking for me personally, but it was interesting. I mean, I, yeah, I think I, I interview people about their sex lives all the time. And I had interviewed people who were BDSM participants for other studies that were not about BDSM. So it had come up in other interviews. So it wasn't really shocking exactly. It was just interesting.
I think folks were it was like really important to people that we understood that hey, we're your neighbors, we're your Co workers, we're your friends, we're your family. You know, we're not these like super strange people. Like media wants to paint us. And people talked a lot about like the stigma that they feel all the time, which made the fact that every single person I interviewed was so happy all the
more surprising. You know, you're talking about, oh, I'm a part of this like super stigmatized group and it has to be like really secretive, but I'm like insanely happy. You know, that really made that stick out. I don't, I've never interviewed another group of folks for a study where every single person I talked to was like really happy. So that was to me, the more surprising thing than any specific sexual practice or PDSM practice that anybody talked to me about.
And that was that was the main premise of your book, was that everyone that you engaged with in this this study was. Happy. Yes, yes. And I think, yeah. And, and it's funny because since then I've collected data for a different study. And there's been a lot of people in that study who also do BDSM who've asked me about the book. And when I said, oh, yeah, you know, it was like, really wild. Everybody was so happy. They look at me like, why would that be?
I'm like, OK, if you're not in the BDSM community like that, it's actually very unusual. And so, yeah, that became the basis for the book because I kept saying to Ariel, like the big thing that all these people have in common is that they're like, really, really happy and like, what's going on? Why are people, Cuz I've interviewed other people who are sexually fulfilled. So I knew it wasn't just, oh, they're sexually fulfilled, it's something else.
So yeah, for me that was that was way more surprising than any particular. And people did go into, like, great detail about the scenes that they participated in, the practices they were into. But yeah, the how happy everyone was the most shocking thing, yeah. And do you think maybe just the reason is that they can actually gauge with other people in a community and they can actually be completely honest with what they want with other people
without judgement? Yeah, I think it's the authenticity, it's the level of trust and communication and that sense of community. And I've said this Ariel, before, but I was jealous talking to folks. You know, they're talking about like, I've got this group of 30 people that I have holidays with and, and game nights or whatever. And, and, you know, I want to throw myself a party for getting full professor and I don't have
30 people in the same town. I could advise something like really jealous of y'all, you know, your network of folks. I mean, I think that's impressive in general, but especially in the world we live in right now, where loneliness is, is in an epidemic and, and people are not as connected like Arielle was saying earlier. Yeah. I think so. No, no, no. Go right ahead. Go ahead. Oh, I was going to add, I think yeah, it's.
I mean, the premise of the book ended up being like, what is it about BDSM that makes people so happy? And there's community, there's the ability to be authentic, the ability to kind of break these strict norms about gender and how we're supposed to be. But there's also, like, it allows you to exercise your creativity, which I think is something that, like, humans are happier when they can be creative. Humans are happier when they can
like connect with other people. And it just kind of incorporates all these different things into it that it's kind of like, we call it like a blueprint, Like there's like here, just like live your life this way. And it incorporates all these different things about life that like, makes people happy in general or usually makes typically makes people happy. Right. Yeah.
So I think that's. Yeah. That did end up becoming the book is like, what is it Like, I remember we were talking at one point, Alicia was like, I don't know what the story of this book is. Like, I don't have anything except that they're really, really happy. And I'm like, well, maybe maybe that's. And that did end up being the story. It's like, what is it that makes humans happy? And what is it that BDSM kind of has built into it? But like, sexual pleasure is
also part of it too, I think. But yeah, I think the the ability to like live authentically and talk to people and be your like true authentic self and have that community is also really important parts of it. You know, I, I throw lifestyle parties probably 7 to 10 times a year. And when I host these parties, I always get like vendors that will come that are in the lifestyle and I will get, you know, entertainers that are part
of the lifestyle. Anyone that is kind of, you know, under that umbrella of BDSM, I try to bring them together. And I have gotten people that have just come from all over the states for some of these events. And I, it's flattering. It really is. It's just, to me, it's just an incredible thing that people can really just come together without judgement. And like you said it, it really is so fulfilling for them that
they can express who they are. I said, you know, it's very sex positive and people are just kind of like they're kind of awestruck at 1st and just kind of dumbfounded because it's like really, we can, we can do that here, you know, But we, we leave the dungeon open and, and people just come and they just enjoy every aspect of different things of the, of the party, whether it's, you know, the drag show or the fire show or the, the, the vendors, you know, selling paddles and whips and, and
seeing scenes. And we'll do like demos, you know, rope demos and, and that kind of thing. So it, it really is, it's so much fun. And like you said, we're in this time where it's like we have to be guarded and, and we're lonely at times. And when people, you know, they don't have anyone to reach out and really express themselves, it's just a sad thing.
So it's just a great thing that we can all be together and, you know, experience the joys of, you know, human sexuality, you know, without, without so many limitations, you know, But Ariel, you said that you, you taught, you've been teaching about sexuality, obviously for 20 years about this and, and the kinks and everything else. Now, did you all watch the show Bonded? I did not.
OK, Well, I think when Alicia mentioned that, a lot of her students were asking about, you know, writing about BDSM. So there is a character, it's a show on Netflix and it's just a a funny little drama, but it it's wait, I. Have I have seen some of this? I think I've seen a few episodes. Anyway, yeah, sorry I didn't recognize the the title, but yeah, yeah, I did see a. Little bit of it. So just in case the listeners
don't know. So it's she was a psych major, she goes she's studying psychology and she's a college student, but at the same time she's a professional dominatrix and she doesn't necessarily work at a specific dungeon of her own. I think she has like she goes to rented space dungeon, but then she'll do a lot of outcall and everything else. But she kind of talks about, well, not really talks about, but a lot of the episodes are about different genres. And it's just, it's the funniest
thing. It really is. And it's, it's funny because after me doing this for 30 years, I always think like, is there really something else that I don't know about? But I, you know, but I'm getting ready to interview this gentleman. And he's been a client and I interviewed him quite some time ago and he was a little shy kind of about putting himself out there. But he's, he's an absolute doll. He's such a sweetheart. But his kink and I never experienced this before was the rubber balls.
They're, they're those rubber bouncy balls and they make them adult size. But what's interesting is a lot of them, they actually have insertable like penis inserts, like vaginal type inserts in the structure of these bouncy balls. And so one of my associates who's in the dungeon with me,
Liv, she she's a doll. But he's like, yeah, Madam Liv, I just want to go out by the pool and I want you to bounce on the bouncy ball for me. So here she is in her bikini, and she's like, this is the easiest session I've ever done. So, you know, in just, in just in your studies and you all being professors, obviously it's like, do you think everyone has
a kink? I don't know if everyone has something that rises to the level of kink, but I think everyone has a little something, you know, like I have a hand thing, you know, like how somebody's hands look could be like a big turn on or turn off, you know, like like it would, it would be challenging for me to be really attracted to someone that I thought had not attractive hands, which is like weird that I'm just a little strange side. Is it like hands? Hands like vascular like hands?
Pretty hands. Men and women's hands, Yeah, no, it's just a certain like and, and some of it maybe I think I do not have attractive hands. So it could be something about projection. I really don't even know like where and as you would like the shape, like the shape of the hands and and. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure. So I think probably everyone has something, maybe not doesn't rise to the level of kink, but they have a little something. What do you think?
Are you? She's like, I'm not telling you about my hand fetish, but yeah. You. Know, I think a lot of people, I mean, I'm not going to say like 100% of people have like a kink or something, but I think a lot more than you would expect yeah. And I know what I do. We haven't done like a kink survey. Maybe I should do that. But I do like anonymous surveys of my students sometimes in class and like, I don't know, my class is now like over 70% queer and I mean so.
Yeah, right. Yeah, no. And whenever we talk about anything, I always have students come up to talk to me after class and like, or even like writing this book. So many people have come out to me as BDSM practitioners. Just this weekend alone, I had two different people come out to me at like, I went to a show and ran into some people and they were like, oh, you just wrote a book about BDSM. Like me and my late husband lived in like a 24/7 like dominant submissive arrangement.
And I was like OK cool. Like I hope you told. Them to buy the book, right? For most, that book are real. Geez. No, but like a lot of people since writing this book have like come out to me as BDSM practitioners who I wouldn't. I mean, as I said, it's hard to shock me, but it's like, it's not necessarily like the people you would expect. Yeah, 'cause you, you think they're going to look different, you know? Yeah, you think they're? Going to be like goth and have a lot. Of yeah.
Do something, but they're not like, they're just like typical people. Well, you know, it's funny because I've met swingers, you know, within the last 10-12 years and they said, well, you know, whenever 50 Shades of Grey came out, that's when we really thought, oh, we could try to be a swinger. We could try to go into that. But growing up, I can remember the only BDSM movies, the story of oh, which is to me is OK. And then the secretary, which to
me was a beautiful story. I love that, that movie. That was that was the thing. It just like it always felt like a bad stigma because I mean, they made her look crazy. She was mental health and then then we had like 8mm with Nicolas Cage in the 90s. It was like CD and made BDSM just look like really dark. And so I think we just kind of get stuck in our minds, like, but then Christian Grey came out
and Christian Grey is like, hot. Yeah, I feel like my first encounters with BDSM was like Buffy the Vampire Slayer kind of scenes and Stephen King books. Like there was Gerald's Game where I don't know if you read that, but where he like, handcuffs her to the bed and then dogs or something or yeah. So yeah, I've read that in like middle school. So that was like my first, yeah. I'm like, that was the first time I really encountered BDSM. So there was like media stuff.
And yeah, that was probably like the early 90s that I first read that. But yeah, there was some stuff, but it was it was more like a joke or even today, like there was an SNL Saturday Night Live episode recently where they had Keenan Tom Thompson or Thomas or whatever his name is, the guy who's been on forever talking about he's like doing only fans and like sitting on a birthday cake.
But it was like a joke. Like the, yeah, like the, it's usually shown as like the bad guy or like the, you know, the, like the villain of the episode or the joke of the episode or something like that. It's not shown in like a very positive light. And I think 50 Shades, I remember in 50 Shades of Grey, the book came out and I, I remember someone reading it next to me on the train and I was kind of like reading over their shoulder, like, what is this book they're reading right next to me?
Now, see, when that came out, I remember I had a bunch of students in my social sexuality class who were BDSM practitioners who were raised in hell about 50 Shades and how inaccurate it was and how much they hated it. So I never ended up reading it. But have you seen the recent Hulu show, The Dying for Sex show? It's actually, yeah. It's actually based on a true story about this woman who was on a quest to have an orgasm with a partner before she dies of cancer.
It sounds really uplifting. It actually was though, in like a weird way, but I think that was the most realistic portrayal I think I've ever seen. Probably because it was based on a true story. It's like an 8 episode limited series kind of thing. Completely worth the time. But yeah, it's not like making fun of it and not positioning anybody as like a villain or anything like that. So it really stands out because of what you're describing, which
I think is the norm, yeah. Yeah, 50 Shades of Grey. It, there was this one scene at the very beginning, kind of like already engaged with, you know, going out and seeing each other and, you know, you took her to the infamous Red Room. But he has her on the bed and he attaches A spreader bar to her ankles and he flips her over and she's, you know, a hundred, 120 a 130 lbs. And I'm like, Oh my God, don't do that. Gonna break her ankles. You know, that's what I'm thinking in my mind.
But I mean, I know it wasn't accurate, but it just put it in a sexy light for people. And that's what I, I try to keep the positive with people on it. But I remember Exit to Eden, that was another one. Rosie O'Donnell, Dan Aykroyd. That was early what, early 90s, late 80s? But great, funny movie. And again, it makes fun of BDSM. So it's just like, come on, people. Hollywood could do. Better Hollywood always likes things that are, like, tawdry. And what's more tawdry than
alternative sex, right? Exactly, exactly. But fun times it really is. It's interesting. So do you all see a Part 2 to this to the book? I think we're working on other projects now. One of the things we're collecting data on now is polyamory, so polyamorous relationships, and I think that's going to be our next big book. Other than we're also writing like a textbook about sex, which, yeah, that's not really like a research study. No, it's OK. It's all right.
Well, we have a lot of articles coming out though from this. From this data, I could definitely see a project in the future about female Doms. We did not. I don't know about in the survey, but in the interviews I think I only talked to maybe 8 of them. So I could definitely see a future project that just focused on female Doms. Yeah, we have a few other articles we're working on getting out now. One looks more into community participation and who benefits
the most from BDSM communities. We have one that's like floors more about the masculinity and how men use BDSM to kind of break these ideas about gender. So yeah, we have a few other articles that are going to be more like scientific journal type articles, not a whole book, but we definitely have. I feel like we have like 5 in progress and I can't even keep track of them anymore. It's a lot of data.
So, well, let me tell you. So if you're doing your research on the polyamory topic here, the actual person who coined the term was Morning Glory. You know this, right? And I just happened to have Oberon Zell's private phone number. And but he was married to Morning Glory and they actually had a, a commune of people together. And he is a brilliant, brilliant man. I did an interview with him a few years ago. I was actually going to do
another interview with him. I think he kind of likes me and I kind of like him. But he's brilliant. He has, he has his doctorate in psychology. He has written, Oh my goodness, probably 1212 to 20 books. I mean, it's, it's incredible. They have, they have a lot of merch of him because he's, you know, this, he looks like a wizard. He's just a cool old sexy man, you know? He's. Great, he's great, but and his late wife sounded like just an
absolute sweetheart. And you know, he was talking about the concept of being Polly and how you know when you are in a relationship, how not everyone in your in your relationship within you know, two people can can meet all of your needs. And at the time, I was kind of like, come on, This is why you marry your spouse. You know, they got to meet every need. Come on, you know, and you don't want to think that. But then when you talk to him more about it, he was just, it's very enlightening.
He's a very enlightened man. He's he's really, he's incredible. Oberyn is a wonderful man. I think Alicia has actually written a little bit about that because she wrote a couple of books on infidelity, so non consensual, non monogamy. And that was something she talked about. I remember reading in one of your books, Alicia, about how we put all this stuff on an individual marriage to like meet every single one of your needs and they're supposed to be your best friend and everything else
in your whole life. And it's a lot for one person. Yeah. It really has. It's amazing. I know I've, I've dealt with that myself and my husband's amazing. But sometimes he thinks he can meet every need as much as he wants to. And I'm like, honey, that's the sub in you. That's it. Your little sub, you know, But you know, I love the BDSM lifestyle. I really love it. And it is, it is. I could not be without it.
You know, a lot of people, they, we have this little thing within the community will say, you know, are you purging more or less? Like, are you getting rid of all your things and throwing BDSM away? And a lot of people, you know, they do that. Whether it's, you know, crossdressers, whether it's just, you know, people who are active participants, whether it's, you know, Dom Subs, doesn't matter.
There's a point where someone has to give it up for some reason, whether it's, you know, their own personal guilt or relationships and they get something, get into something new and they just their partner doesn't want anything to do with it. That happened to me years ago. But but a lot of people, they'll say, you know, I got to, you know, purge my things and, you know, they'll get online and they'll, you know, sell their stuff.
And it's just, it's sad to see because they always come back. Because in actuality, it's so cathartic in your life that when you find your peace with it, you'll never leave. Yeah. So you said this happened to you a few years ago? What? This happened years ago when I was first married. I college, high school. I knew when I was 13 years old that I wanted to be a dominatrix. And, you know, I went to school, went to college, just kind of
pushed it down. And then I started, you know, pimping out my boyfriend and, you know, created my own dungeon, you know, in my early 20s and, and started seeing clients years ago. But when I got married, he was very vanilla. And we, we kind of met on other levels outside of BDSM. And, you know, I, I started a family business and I started, I continued on with my, with my
degree. And, you know, you just kind of brushed it aside and I thought, well, maybe I could live without it. And, you know, I went without BDSM for, you know, six years too long. So it happens. But I get a lot of crossdressers. They'll come and they'll bring me all of their belongings because they don't, they don't want to deal with it anymore. Or they'll get in a relationship and they're like, she's not going to understand.
I got to purge all my stuff, you know, it's, it's just sad to see, you know, yeah, I had this guy and, and he's a rubberist, you know, and he, he brought me his latex back bed. He brought me all of his rubber and, you know, latex gear and all his stuff. And he had hormones he was taking. And, you know, it's like, I'm like, well, I'm not going to take your hormones, but I'll take everything. So it, it's just funny, but it's
sad at the same time. But but yeah, I. Feel like that could be a study all all in itself, you know? Like, yeah, it really could. It can be one of my very good friends. She wrote her thesis on her crossdresser husband. They have an open relationship. He has no desire really to be with other women. But, you know, I think he would. I think he crosses into, you know, bisexuality. He's just not, you know, obviously telling everyone about.
He's very secretive. But even even then, you know, I keep bringing up crossdressers, but but you know. It's it's like it's just that one part of BDSM where when they're true to themselves, being a crossdresser, they don't like to age. And when they start to age and their looks start to fade and they could no longer be pretty, that's when it's kind of like it's done. It's sad. It's sad. Yeah. I don't know. I just kind of see different things about different people in
the kink community. I think, you know, it's our biggest thing to and you know, I try to be an advocate for people, but you know, being a Dom, I never try to dominate over anyone. It has to be, you know, I have to talk to them, I have to know them, I have to gauge with them. And a lot of people, they really have this misconstrued idea that just because they're a Dom, they can be dominant over everyone
and kind of be disrespectful. And so a lot of submissives, they go through a lot of really kind of personal attacks from people in the community that that really kind of mistreat them, you know, and take advantage of them. So a lot of me sub females go through it and it's, it's much more difficult for them to actually find a partner because a lot of times they'll just find overpowering dominant male who, you know, takes advantage. It's it's a sad situation.
But. Anywho, I, I, I'm really going to enjoy your book and I'm going to share it with other people and, and pass on to to everyone because like, we're in 190 countries, so they need to buy the book. Bound by BDSM, unexpected lessons for building a happier life, and Alicia Ariel again. It's been a pleasure. Thanks for. Having us, Yeah. Thank you so much. And if you want to be in contact with Oberon, I'll certainly pass along his info so you can reach out to him. He's a wonderful man.
He sounds like it. Yes. So until then, I will say this has been the latest episode of Call Me a Mistress.