Out of control

There's been a few posts on the issue of control over the past week, from my post on power exchange to Eliane and Indy's interesting comments in response to it and then Eliane's own post on the matter. In that post she writes that even in play she doesn't think she could give up control in the same way I do.

But I have to confess that giving up control isn't easy for me to do either. And it only happens with a few select people that I completely trust and have a certain dynamic with. Even then it's still difficult and doesn't happen every time we play. Which can lead to me being disappointed not to reach that high flying state that deep submission leads me to, even if the scene itself was great.

And sometimes I find myself falling into no-man's land. A place where I seem to be out of control; not fully immersed into the role to be entirely submissive, nor fully in control of myself to be reasonable and rational.

As bad enough as it when I'm playing with one top, when you introduce other tops and bottoms into the mix it really complicates things. I'm beginning to wonder if that state of giving up absolute control can ever really happen in a group scene. I'm too easily distracted or pulled out of my headspace by the actions of others. Actions that are in no way meant to be a distraction but end up being so anyway.

I've long since noticed that my behaviour changes around other bottoms. I'll be more stoic, more silent, more determined not to cry and more frustrated when the pain gets to me. More resistant to being submissive and yet more angry with my failure to be submissive.

And a couple of times now I have found myself getting tremendously angry either during or after a scene. Throwing a strop over the slightest thing, being furious that the play hasn't gone the way I imagined it, lashing out at the nearest person to me.

This always leads to me feeling ashamed afterwards, that I've let people down, guilty I've ruined the scene or upset the other players. And I get annoyed at myself for being so out of control that I can't temper my words or actions.

It's a subject I've been discussing with HH and as usual he always has an answer to make me feel better. His take on it is that a person who endeavours to give up total control to play and submit can't be then expected to exercise control when their emotions take over, or the intensity of the scene gets to them.

I'll concede that it's a fair point but it doesn't make me feel any better when I'm mentally beating myself up over a scene. Although it does help that he and I have agreed how such behaviour should be dealt with to both help me learn the lesson and also forgive myself afterwards. Time out from the scene followed by the conclusion of it. Or else a period of time afterwards to calm down and then being punished severely, as was the case during this particular episode.

But I can't help wishing I could put a stop to it, that I could be in control, even when I'm not.