What Excites Us!

Episode 28: Tell All with D20 Domme

Transcript:

[00:00:00] d20Domme: Because uh that toilet seat being up in the middle of the night, it has happened too many times. And I have a squirt bottle. It's like the naughty squirt bottle. And I will wake you up at two o'clock in the morning if I've sat on a cold toilet seat. You're getting cold water in your face while you're sleeping. ​

[00:00:15] Gwyn: hello and welcome to What Excites Us, the podcast that discusses sex and sexuality throughout time and place, including the here and now. I'm Gwyn Isaacs, a certified sex coach and educator who really believes that the more that we listen and try to understand our fellow humans. The better the world will be for everyone.

[00:00:47] And since sex is so intimate and so intense and yet so important for so many folks, it becomes so difficult to discuss. I'm here to help that change. My conversation with d20Domme may inspire you, lead you to question why or simply be interesting to hear and learn about how she enjoys her 24/7 kinky lifestyle.

[00:01:12] We also touch on theory and just generally have a good time. d20Domme is a human behavioral expert and an erotic hypnotherapist with more than 15 years in the kinky community. As a lifestyle female dominant, she is unapologetically kinky and known as a pint size, polyandrous, plus size, POC, 24/7, femdom. Who knows what she wants and will use her craft in mind fuckery and persuasive viper tongue to get it. Her main kinks are getting her way, and normalizing kinky lifestyles across the board. Thus, she can often be found writing on her popular Kinky Living Memoir website. From Mundane to Mistress, which is at mundanemiss.com, chatting away on podcasts like this one, teaching classes, workshops, demos, or presenting virtually and locally in the DC area, California, New York, and across the pond in Europe.

[00:02:25] Hi D20. Thank you so much for coming on and doing this show with me. This is gonna be really, really exciting.

[00:02:32] d20Domme: Happy to be here.

[00:02:34] Gwyn: For this conversation, what are the important bits that people know?

[00:02:37] d20Domme: The important bits that people know, I am a lifestyle femdom. I've been doing this for over a decade now. I can't even believe I'm saying that. I am 24-7 as best as I can be. I try to keep like one hour for myself, but generally speaking, kink is my lifestyle and I am a human behavior expert. And so I've been able to weave my kinky stuff into my vanilla work and vice versa. And so that's kind of, that's kind of me in a nutshell. Most people are gonna know I'm a sadistic bitch if they've seen me play or set up scenes, but I promise, like I have your best interest at heart. I just wanna make you scream. That's all.

[00:03:19] Gwyn: I'm imagining the screams of all the subs in a jar.

[00:03:23] d20Domme: Oh yes. It's like perfume right there.

[00:03:27] Gwyn: So for folks who are not in the lifestyle, what does it mean when you say you're a femdom?

[00:03:35] d20Domme: It means I am a female dominant and all of my relationships that I am in, because I also identify as polyandrous, which is different than polyamorous.

[00:03:47] And I am in four relationships right now. In all of those relationships. They are F L R, which is female led relationships. It means I'm in charge, I get the final say. I am the literal queen of my queendom and my humble servants are very keen to help make me happy.

[00:04:09] Gwyn: Beautiful. So let's break down polyandrous as opposed to polyamorous.

[00:04:16] d20Domme: Traditional polyamory is going to be multiple people having multiple relationships. Polyandry is more so just one person having multiple relationships, and it's generally considered the woman has multiple males who are devoted to her. And I think I was reading when I was first learning about this, that this is a lifestyle that's kind of practiced in other countries and it has to do with, you know, tribal stuff, trying to make sure there's enough resources and so that you make sure that your kids are taken care of. And like, it's just, it's more of a practical thing rather than what it is I'm doing. I'm choosing to do this as a lifestyle. And so I learned about it and I identify as that currently. And that's kind of what we're doing over here in my neck of the woods.

[00:05:03] Gwyn: So the counterpart would be polygamy, which is widely known as what the secret Mormons do.

[00:05:09] d20Domme: Mm-hmm. This is like the antithesis of the one penis policy. Yeah. This is the one pussy policy in my queendom.

[00:05:18] Gwyn: I love it so much. That makes me so happy.

[00:05:23] Um, Are any of your partners a nesting partner? Do you live with any of them?

[00:05:28] d20Domme: Yeah. So I have a, if you can believe it, I have a vanilla partner of 15 years and he is just, he is amazing. I have no idea how he puts it with all my antics. But he does, and we have lived together the entire time that we've dated.

[00:05:44] And he know I was kinky when I met him. And so I've always had subs, but then I met the sub the sub that I just couldn't get outta my head who was from another country. We spent a lot of time going back and forth seeing each other, and I told my nesting partner, I'm pretty sure this is someone who's very important to me and I'm gonna marry this person if it's okay with you.

[00:06:08] And he gave us blessing, and I did. And so I married my submissive. We've been married for four years, and I have another partner who doesn't live with us. He lives in our neighborhood. He's like five minutes away. And then I've recently met a new boy who I would love to become my slave. And so we've just moved into a larger home so that we can possibly accommodate the new slave boy.

[00:06:36] Gwyn: So can you define for us the difference between sub and slave in your world?

[00:06:42] d20Domme: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. So I think we had a lot of preconceived notions about what our Ds was gonna look like 24 7. And it's great. It's just we don't have enough time to do the things that we wanna do because my subs job, it requires him to travel a lot. It was a job that he didn't have when we met. So he's traveling a lot and we don't really get to, like, do the deep, deep stuff anymore. And because of the type of work he does, I can't really mark him up the way that I want anymore, and we've gotta be a little bit more careful with what events we're going to.

[00:07:19] And so he is a bratty sub, I should say. I love him, but oh my God, he drives me crazy. He drives me crazy with his brattiness. And so the difference between him and the slave, which I'm hoping will come to fruition, is that I'm gonna be able to take the slave a little bit deeper than I've been able to take my submissive.

[00:07:39] We very intentionally started to practice hierarchy polyandry here in the house. And the new slave is very happy being the bottom of the totem pole. So I'm hoping to use him in a lot of ways that I don't use my submissive and wouldn't use my submissive so that he feels more like a slave and I feel more like an owner. Um, It's something that I've dreamed _about_ since I first learned what kink was. I just never thought it was real. I never thought anyone could do this. And honestly, if you would've told me 17 years ago, this is what I was doing, I would've laughed. I would've been like, no way. That's crazy. This started out as just a random hobby of mine and now it's my lifestyle.

[00:08:24] Gwyn: Yeah. Wow. Okay. So you mentioned that you're a sadist. Mm-hmm. But also it sounds like parts of what happens is household management stuff. So how does that breakdown in your polyandrous world?

[00:08:40] d20Domme: I am definitely the household manager, the queen, the last say, the daddy of the like house. That's just me. And so I have a say so on everything that happens in the house. There's nothing that's done in this house without my say so. I'm very fortunate that I work for myself that I'm able to devote so much of my time to this because otherwise I'm not sure how I would do this with a traditional nine to five job and still have the energy to be able to feel like I was filling up my partner's cups as well as my own.

[00:09:13] Gwyn: Yeah. Cuz it's exhausting.

[00:09:15] d20Domme: It really is.

[00:09:18] Gwyn: Yeah. Because you're managing a, a stable of humans basically.

[00:09:22] d20Domme: A stable of boys. Let me correct you. This is a big difference, a stable of humans, but we got a stable of boys here. I always tell 'em this is my reverse harem. They say like, without you mistress, we are nothing. Like we can't function. And it's half joking. They're getting, they're so much better than when I met them. And so that's, that's my main thing with my partners and anyone I've dated in vanilla life or poly, my goal is always to leave people in better condition than when I found them.

[00:09:49] Gwyn: That's lovely. I really like that. So you mentioned that you're a sadist. Are you also into other forms of traditional kinky play? That's a weird sentence. Traditional, kinky play

[00:09:59] d20Domme: Yeah. I've been doing this so long. I feel like I am like I said, when I started out, this was kind of a, a hobby. I was writing a paper about alternative lifestyles and then just kinda fell down the rabbit hole and just never, never have gotten out of it.

[00:10:14] And I get to points where I'm like, what can I do? And so I think because I've been doing this for so long, it's required me to find more creative ways to fill the kinks that I like. So I love rope bondage. I love predicament bondage. I'm very into behavior modification and submissive training. I think I've mentioned to you erotic hypnosis is a big thing.

[00:10:40] Sissification is another huge, huge kink of mine. My two s types are both sissies. And my other partner is a crossdresser. So I love that I get to dress my boys up most of the time. There's hardly any kinks that I haven't tried or don't enjoy in some way. Impact play, rough play, I'm really into edge play, fire, electricity, all of these things excite me. I love, I love knife play. I love any sort of mind fuckery or like mental domination. I'm into that as well.

[00:11:12] Gwyn: Did you struggle with being okay with being a sadist.

[00:11:17] d20Domme: It's funny you say that cuz my sub actually is the one who kept saying over and over like, mistress, you're, you are a sadist and I was like, no, no I'm not, I'm not. And he was like, yeah, you, you are like here's the evidence X, Y, Z and like the more I started being like fine. So I was a reluctant sadist. I always say that I'm a reaction slut.

[00:11:42] I wanna see people react to the things that I'm doing. And that usually takes a sadistic turn, even if it's not painful. Cause I think a lot of people think sadism must hurt, but tickle torture is one of my favorite ways to be a sadist. Knowing that someone is ticklish and strapping them down and then making them laugh uncontrollably.

[00:12:05] Like one of my kinky bucket list is to make someone laugh so much from torture that they pee on themselves. Like, I cannot wait to do this. So I'm excited for that.

[00:12:18] Gwyn: Yeah. No. Yeah. Sadism doesn't necessarily have to include pain. I think that's a misnomer. Mm-hmm. . Mm-hmm. Mind fuckery is extremely sadistic.

[00:12:30] d20Domme: Oh yeah. Oh yeah. I practice a lot of emotional sadism as well. And that can come in different forms. I have a ignore fetish as well. And so you couple the ignore fetish with sadism and emotional sadism. Um, There are things that I, I like to say I consider myself a humiliatrix, that can sound really, really awful. There's people who have asked my partner, Lucky Puppy, like after a scene like, wow, oh my gosh. He's like I can let her say these things because I know how much she cares for me. And so it's been fun to kind of push the boundaries of that and see what kind of things make you feel like, ooh, when you, when you say them or hear them.

[00:13:15] Gwyn: What's the mental gymnastics that's involved with having three different subs who have different boundaries?

[00:13:24] d20Domme: Oh, it's very interesting. Even when I first started being poly, I told myself, you know, two partners is probably enough for me. Cuz I had been in dynamics where I had been with people and like our polycule was like nine or 11 and it's crazy. Like we're getting out of hand here. And so I'd always told myself two, you've got my vanilla partner and my sub. And then I met my other partner and was like, okay, he's not a sub, he is a kinkster and we get to do things together.

[00:13:54] Like we practice our age, play together and things like that. But they all have such different things that light them up and also that they recoil from. And so I almost have to do like a little mental Rolodex in my mind when I'm planning a scene or playing with them to make sure that I don't accidentally swap someone's boundaries with another person's.

[00:14:17] I like to reiterate what I'm going to do sometimes if it's not gonna spoil the scene, I'll say like, you know, or even just laying out the things I'm going to use. Sometimes it's like, wait, what's that? It's like, no, that's not for you. Don't worry that toy's not for you. And so it's something that I just didn't consider because it's so easy for me when I had two partners. And they have such opposing boundaries as well. I have a partner who loves to be choked and then a partner who if I put my hand on his chest, is like, no, absolutely not. So I have to be careful with when they have these opposing boundaries like this.

[00:14:52] Gwyn: When you're living in the lifestyle 24-7 and you have a variety of subs that you're playing with, it seems like just the mental shifting in and of itself is a whole thing. Like that's part of the exhaustion that I was referring to earlier.

[00:15:11] d20Domme: It's interesting that you say that cuz I've heard from a, some fellow femdoms as well, that they get mentally exhausted. And my newest sub, hopefully slave is mentioned several times as something that we're working on together. The mental shift for him, especially because, you know, he's a few hours away, he drives here to me, he stays for the weekend or a week, and then he goes back home to vanilla life. And we've been talking about the transition between here and there and how he's experiencing a lot more sub drop, even though we're not doing a lot of intense play.

[00:15:48] But it's the mental shift he has to do between here and there. Because here he can be totally open all in, you know, he's in, he's usually in cuffs, he's plugged, he's wearing his cage, you know, he's in a collar and so that's him from the moment he gets here until the minute he leaves. And so we've been navigating, trying different transitions to the mental shift because I'm used to it.

[00:16:15] I've been doing this for years and years, but he's very new to kink and I can see that it's taking him a while to get the gears to kind of turn directions when he needs to.

[00:16:27] My way of doing this, or at least explaining it, is that we try to make sure 24-7, there are elements of kink present. That doesn't mean we're actively doing kink all the time, but because it is a lifestyle, we are. You know, last night we were all sitting in the living room playing video games. The boys were cuffed and caged and plugged and that was it. That was the kinky element of us playing video games and watching television.

[00:16:51] So I would say if you are worried or think about that exhaustion, the main thing is to find out what you can pass on to your submissive if you're in the top space. And also make sure you carve out that time for yourself, whatever it is. I sometimes tell the boys like, 90 minutes leave mistress alone. Go, don't text me, don't bother me, whatever. And either I'm, watching a movie I want, I'm yoga, I'm shopping, I'm doing whatever, but it's my time for me. So it's important that you don't give so much of yourself away in these dynamics that you don't have anything left for yourself.

[00:17:23] Gwyn: Yeah. Boundaries are important. And I think that when people jump into this lifestyle, they tend to jump and forget that the mundane aspects of life are actually an important part of life. So you mentioned sub drop which I'm sure a lot of people don't know, is when you are in an amazing submissive space for a time being, and then you leave that space to go back to quote unquote, regular life and you experience a depression. [

00:17:52] Which can be debilitating sometimes, especially if you don't expect it. You don't know that it's coming. And for me, whenever I've had an amazingly good time there's a low that comes after it. And so what goes up must come down and then you come back to homeostasis as it were. Yeah. So I love that you're trying to figure out transitional ways to help your boy.

[00:18:13] d20Domme: Yeah. I haven't seen it happen in people I've played with like this as much. And even with my partner, Lucky Puppy, we were very long distance. We were in different countries. It was, you know, an eight hour plane ride to see each other. And so we'd be with each other for a month or two at a time, and we would spend like that last week kind of getting ready for one of us to leave.

[00:18:35] Whereas the new boy, he's here for two nights and he's 48 hours of just intense subspace. And then boom, you know, you've gotta go back to work. So we are trying these transition periods of saying maybe in a couple hours, let's start winding down. Let's start thinking about other things that aren't kink. And having conversations that are not necessarily kink related, because I've never seen someone have drop this quickly. Like you said, when people come to this, they wanna jump in.

[00:19:05] They just wanna jump all in. And so I've had to tell him, be mindful. Like I understand that you wanna drink all this in you're getting that kid in the candy shop sort of thing. Right? You can overdo it so to speak and burn out. And so I don't wanna make that any more detrimental for him than it has to be. And myself, cuz I also was experiencing top drop and, and still experience it.

[00:19:27] And I normally don't experience top drop or con drop until it's after a kink convention or until it's after a really intense scene. And so it's been interesting for me to kind of feel myself have top drop again after short encounters like this. And so it's definitely self-serving, finding a way to make the transitions feel a little bit better.

[00:19:47] Gwyn: Yeah, that makes sense. What do you do for your top drop?

[00:19:52] d20Domme: I usually get myself something really nice to eat. Like something really decadent that I can look forward to. I also like to just go inward, so I'm all about the self-care. I like to get a massage or go get a pedicure. I'm really into my nails as you see. So I often go get my nails done as well.

[00:20:11] And for his end, we've created a little drop kit. I let him take it home and it's a little kit for him that's like a shirt of mine that smells like me, some candy, like a nice card, a little stuffy. And so that's been really helpful for him to be able to have, cuz he said I pretty much kept the shirt in the bed with me. And it was nice to be able to like, have your smell next to me even though you weren't there. And so we're trying to find ways to mitigate the effects of the drop.

[00:20:38] Gwyn: Yeah. That's really nice. I wanna real quick touch again on the, on the slave aspect versus a submissive

[00:20:47] d20Domme: Mm-hmm.

[00:20:48] Gwyn: In my mind, a slave is someone who gets genuine enjoyment from doing the will of their master. That that is the thing that brings them fulfillment. Whereas a submissive sometimes gets fulfillment from that, but also has a whole lot of their own things. And sometimes they wanna say no and they really mean no.

[00:21:12] d20Domme: Sure. Yeah. So I always say a submissive is a volunteer, A slave is not. And that's the biggest difference for me. Even now, you know, I've got this person that I'm hoping will become a slave. We're both very serious about this.

[00:21:27] We keep saying, we wanna go and see how far we can take this, how far it reaches, but before we can get there, you know, you've gotta crawl before you can walk. I refuse to call him my slave. We don't use that word. It's not something that he's earned a couple of times. I may slip it in if we're playing, but it's not what I refer to him as.

[00:21:50] And so I've told him, and he agrees he must be a good submissive before he can be a great slave. I am of the mind that not all submissive are slaves, but all slaves are submissive. And so with the volunteer wording that I'm using, like you said, a submissive can say uh, and trust me, my sub loves being like, mm, mistress and whining, but my future slave is not of that mentality.

[00:22:19] I've seen him push himself to the limit for me, and I've not known that's his limit and been like, Hey, don't do that. And he's like, no, no, I want to. And so the big difference is that hopefully I'd like to get to a point where no is not in his vocabulary. We've talked about the symbolism of, if, you know, he gets to be my slave, I want him to give me his word. No, I want him to take that out of his vocabulary for me. I don't want him to be able to refuse the things that I am asking of him.

[00:22:50] And for submissives, I feel like there's definitely a range of submissive. Maybe they only have a desire to do certain things. Maybe they only want a sub in a certain way or a certain dynamic. Whereas I feel like a lot of slaves are willing to kind of run the gamut, right? They, they kinda want it all, so to speak. They're, they're an open book. They're a blank slate. And so I love that he has the mentality that he wants to go further and that there is no reward.

[00:23:22] A lot of submission comes with reward things. Even if it's a delayed reward. I do this thing, mistress is gonna play with me. We have a reward system they know if they get so many punches in their card, it means this. But the slave doesn't get that. Right now he's getting points and he's able to cash those in for certain things like soda or beer or a massage from me.

[00:23:45] But he knows that eventually that's gonna taper off. And there are certain things that even six months ago he was doing for me and being rewarded for can no longer come with a reward. And so I really like how you phrased it, that it's just someone who is getting the pleasure of doing the will of someone else.

[00:24:02] Gwyn: I love that you have a reward system that sounds very much like a chore chart.

[00:24:08] d20Domme: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. We use an app for it, and we just track it like that.

[00:24:13] Gwyn: That's so fun. What are some of the rewards that they can cash in on?

[00:24:19] d20Domme: Oh my gosh, what do they have? So at the beginning of the month, I always update, we call it the mistress stock. It's the NASDOW here in the house. They have some pretty interesting rewards here. They've got like some documentary, they can watch documentary with me. They can receive back massages. They like to hold onto their points for the big ticket items like pegging sessions. My favorite one is when they spend their points on the D 20 decides. And so that means either I decide or an actual D 20. We have so many of them in house, the roll of D 20, and they have to consult a different chart of what that reward means in the D 20. And so that's just a random reward. And so I like when they use that.

[00:25:04] Gwyn: Oh my gosh, so fun.

[00:25:08] d20Domme: I heard them discussing points the other day. I heard my puppy telling the new kitty boy who's like, okay, look, so this is the thing. You're getting 10 points for that and I'm getting 20 for this. But if we do this, then we can both have a beer.

[00:25:21] And I was just like, on the other side of the wall, like, bless them, look at them, they're sharing points. And so it's been nice to see them kind of work together as a team. But they also gang up on me now as a team. So lots of lots. The future slave is funny because he is not a brat, and my puppy is very bratty and my future slave has been trying his best to like ride the line.

[00:25:46] And so he'll just chime in with a totally neutral thing that isn't necessarily on my side, but it's also not necessarily on my puppy side. And I'm like, I see what you're doing. But yeah, the, the point system has worked great for us so far.

[00:26:00] Gwyn: That's amazing. I love it. Like legit, like, wow. So , We're gonna switch gears a little bit. I saw that you do coaching and human behavior stuff

[00:26:12] d20Domme: yeah, so I used to have a section on my website, mundane miss.com, where you could sign up for Kinky Coaching. You could sign up for submissive coaching, or dominant coaching, or alternative relationship slash lifestyle coaching. But when the pandemic hit, I got flooded with new customers and new clients who were like, I gotta talk to someone. And I just had too many people and so I had to keep referring people out.

[00:26:43] And so I've actually taken that section off of the website, I think for a bit. Because I just, I have such a huge spread of people right now that I'm helping coaching. That I don't have any, I'm, you know, there's a six month wait list right now for any new client. I don't think people understand, like therapy is like $150 generally, but then when you are looking for someone who's poly aware or kink aware, you're looking at over $200 and if you wanna see someone per week, that adds up really quick. That's not really viable for a lot of people. And so I started offering coaching services heavily discounted for anyone in need in the kink community who wanted help doing whatever.

[00:27:23] I've helped people quit bad habits, feel more secure in their submission, recognize roles within themselves, realize I'm actually not submissive, I am switch, I am this, or trying to navigate new dynamics. So I've been able to have my hand in it all. If people will come to me and you know, I have the skills for it, then I'm happy to help.

[00:27:42] Gwyn: And you're coming to it from a human behavioral mindset, right? You said you have a PhD in that?

[00:27:48] d20Domme: Yeah, so my doctorate and everything is in human psychology. And so I love the brain. I love how the brain works. And that's why a lot of my like core kinks are all heavily rooted in like, how can I get in your head and make this work?

[00:28:03] And so, I'm hoping that when I'm coaching, I'm using all those skills from my years of working with human psychology for marketing and a bunch of other things, that I'm able to use those skills and help people apply them to their life. Cuz that's the biggest thing, right? A lot of people know what they should do or could do, but they don't know how to do that or they give up very easily. And so I try to use a lot of my training to figure out why you're thinking the way you are and how we can stop you from thinking the way and how we can help focus on how you wanna think and keep reinforcing that.

[00:28:40] Gwyn: And are you using the other CBT, the cognitive behavioral therapy for that?

[00:28:46] d20Domme: I, I use a little bit of the CBT, but I use a lot of NLP which is the neuro-linguistic programming. So it's a psychological approach that involves analyzing strategies that have been used by other people who have been successful in what it is they're trying to do and applying that to yourself so that you can reach a goal.

[00:29:04] And so when we do that, I'm talking about your thoughts, I'm talking about the language that you use, the patterns of behavior that you have learned through different experiences so that we can try and get you to a specific outcome. So the biggest thing is language. I'm a huge language nerd and the things we tell ourselves are often so much worse than we would ever tell anyone else. And then we would want to hear from anyone else. And so that's a big thing that I get to help people with is like, stop talking about yourself that way. Don't use that language.

[00:29:36] Gwyn: So are people coming to you for uh, "help me get a promotion" or "help me have better study habits?" As well as kinky and lifestyle related things.

[00:29:49] d20Domme: Yeah. There's been some people who have come who have, you know, we've done career coaching or I'm helping them get ready for interviews for certain things. I think what I was surprised by was that there were kinky people coming to me for what I consider vanilla coaching. And a lot of it was just so that they could release that mental burden.

[00:30:08] You know, we were talking about the mental shift and the mental pull that being in DS can take on you even if it's something that feels good. It's nice to not have to watch your language when you're explaining something to someone. And so being able to say, well, my master told me I need to do this is very different when you're talking to me versus a traditional life coach or a therapist.

[00:30:29] And they're like, what? Who told you to do what? And so I, I was surprised by so many people who were like, I just want help with this. I also am a sub, I also my dom. And it just never really came up. It was just, I noticed in the language that they were using, they were able to just relax a little bit and let that guard down.

[00:30:46] Gwyn: Yeah. Yeah. It's definitely a lot more comfortable to speak with somebody who has a basic intrinsic knowledge of where you are as a person as opposed to having to hide that or

[00:30:58] d20Domme: Yeah.

[00:30:58] Gwyn: Put it in the closet as it were to get something that, something as intimate as coaching help with. Cause even if you're coming for very basic things like career coaching, it's, it's a part of who you are. And to be able to have that in all the myriad of facets that you can provide, I'm sure is a relief.

[00:31:20] d20Domme: The thing is I love that I'm able to help people in this way. And the only reason I even went down this road, you know, I was done with school, I was like, I'm not going back. I'm finished. My vanilla partner and I were in therapy. We were in couples therapy many years ago. And we were part of a medical study we'd been going for about a year, and we were thinking, okay, we might wanna keep using her after this study. We were like, okay, now's the time to reveal to her that we're poly and that, you know, my partner was like, I hate that you have to speak around this.

[00:31:53] And so we told her about the poly situation and she told my vanilla partner flat out, she's like, she doesn't love you. She doesn't wanna be with you. She's using this as a way to ease her way out of this relationship to find other people. And at this point, we've been together for seven years.

[00:32:08] Gwyn: Oh my goodness.

[00:32:09] d20Domme: And I'm, I'm sitting there like shaking my head like, no, no, no, that's not what I mean. And she's like, subconsciously it is what you mean. And I was like, do you even know what polyamory is? And so from that moment, I was like, I don't want anyone to ever feel like that again. If I can help it. If there's just a little bit that I can do, then I'd love to provide that for some people because we were shocked. We thought we can trust her. She's, you know, we've been talking to her for a year and it was just totally nope. Didn't have the skills to understand what we were trying to explain to her was a consensual decision.

[00:32:44] Gwyn: That's painful. I'm sorry you had to go through that.

[00:32:47] d20Domme: Thank you. Thank you. It's one of those things where it was eye-opening. I've heard about similar things. I just had never experienced it. But my coaching is for everyone. And I don't want anyone to feel like they aren't being heard or seen as the individual that they are because of the choices that we're making. So I try to practice a really like no judgment environment. I'm gonna tell you if I think you're doing something stupid, but I'm not a therapist. You don't have to take what I'm saying. I will often say like, Hey, this is what I think, but please, you do what you think is best. But if you want me for your coach, then like, I'm gonna be here to be honest with you and to get you on the right track.

[00:33:25] And so it's been great. I've helped some kinksters get jobs. I've helped a kinkster relocate for their submissive and they now have a budding lifestyle together. I've helped a couple of kinksters close some contract deals that they were working on for work as well as like anxiety and insomnia and general things of feeling comfortable in your role i s a big one that I see people about. Just trying to make sure you're honoring that part of yourself and not ignoring it.

[00:33:55] Gwyn: Yeah, that's a big one from where I sit too, as a sex coach. And our society is so shut down to so many different things that we get a message and it might not even have been an accurate message way back when, and it just sticks with us and grows and festers and then you get stuck in this reality that isn't even real. But our brains make it think that way.

[00:34:21] d20Domme: I love that you said that. I am. So, especially with the pandemic, it really, I'm all about like crazy big thinking. I like the thoughts that are terrifying, but also I wanna figure them out. And the big thing I learned during pandemic, obviously time not real, but a lot of people were kind of like, who am I without this office that I'm going to or these work friends.

[00:34:46] And for me, I'm a extrovert. I was an extrovert, but since the pandemic I've recognized maybe I'm an ambivert, I like going out with certain people in groups, but then certain things seem to drain me. And so I think a lot of people trying to figure out who they are during this time really helps. And again, finding out those patterns and the way you think about yourself, the way you think about your life is a really big thing.

[00:35:13] I am of the mind that thoughts become things. There's so many things that steep into our subconscious, we don't realize it. The commercials that we watch, the music that we listen to, the television shows, all of this that you're putting in your brain, even if you are not conscious of what remains, there's a big old box in the back of your brain that's holding some random stuff, that you don't know about.

[00:35:36] And so it's really important that you are careful with what it is you're consuming, what it is you're brushing off as like, nah, that doesn't matter. Cuz it does. Everything that we perceive that's in front of us, that's in our vision, our hearing, everything. It kind of has an effect on us.

[00:35:52] Gwyn: The culture we grew up in.

[00:35:54] d20Domme: Yep. Yep.

[00:35:55] Gwyn: The churches that we went to all of it. And there's so much of it that we don't even recognize was implanted by something like that. That Auntie Jo made an offhand comment when you were seven years old and now forever that's the way it's.

[00:36:10] d20Domme: Yeah. Yeah.

[00:36:11] Gwyn: So what led you into studying the brain?

[00:36:15] d20Domme: I come from a journalism background. I was an interviewer. And so I love talking to people. I love meeting people. And when I myself started to fully be like, okay, I'm a kinkster. This is way more than just a hobby. It was like a light bulb. It was like, ah, this explains why everything before this was so fucking difficult. Now I've got it right.

[00:36:37] And since then I've been like, on an upward journey and upward path for myself feeling like I know myself more and more. And so for me, I kind of wanted to figure out what prevented me from getting to this place? Why wasn't this so obvious to me?

[00:36:52] I consider myself a very aware person, a very astute person. And so I wanted to know what was blocking me from finding that out. And I just kind of went on a different rabbit hole and my work was like, we like where this is going. We're we'll pay for you if you wanna keep studying how people think.

[00:37:10] And I was like, I do. And you know, I kind of was like, it's gonna make me a better interviewer. And so they were like, yeah, yeah, sure. And so for me, I just wanted to understand how we miss such. What I think sometimes are obvious parts of ourselves. I just wanted to know how we get to the place that we are sometimes when there's so much that's just out of our peripheral about ourselves.

[00:37:32] And so that led me to wanna know more about the human brain and sexy stuff is sexy. And so I kind of just pivoted towards finding out about kinksters as well. Cause I love hearing kinksters origin stories and things like that. I love seeing how kink manifest in each person.

[00:37:48] Gwyn: What was your dissertation?

[00:37:49] d20Domme: It was really about if alternative lifestyles are more about environments or if they're more learned or more inherent. And so that was the study and I was kind of using myself as well during that. And so I know there's a lot of kinksters who have this like moment where they're like, I knew I was kinky from this moment, or when I was younger, I was doing this.

[00:38:14] I never had that. I never had anything in my life that would make me think I was kinky. I didn't pursue this until I got to college. And so I now look back and I see some things that I'm like, Hmm, I wonder how much of this had an influence. My father was very strict. Like things had to be a certain way.

[00:38:35] That was that, because no questions asked. And I am very similar. I also was raised in a household where there was corporal punishment. This is a cultural thing. I think you were talking about cultural things. I had no problem with that. My sister, oh my gosh, she like hates that she got spanked as a kid. I don't, I also ask, is this why I like spanking people now?

[00:38:58] Because I used to get spanked and like, what does that mean for me? And so I didn't have that light bulb moment. I just kinda came into this and was like, oh, this is cool, this is cool. And then just I was like, I kind of belong here. I think. I like all the things I'm doing. I like how it feels. I like the responses I'm getting from people. How long until this isn't interesting to me anymore? And it's just never, never stopped being interesting. So I'm still here.

[00:39:25] Gwyn: So if you could nail your dissertation down into one reasonable sentence what would you say that you proved?

[00:39:32] d20Domme: That your upbringing heavily influences your sexual identity?

[00:39:40] Gwyn: That's extremely concise. Thank you. . .

[00:39:44] d20Domme: You're welcome.

[00:39:46] Gwyn: And I, I would love to see a panel of people who disagree with that. And you,

[00:39:52] d20Domme: oh, there were tons of people. I mean, this, this was about 250 pages, the dissertation when I was done with it. And I wanted to talk to people who didn't think this was true. A lot of religious people wanted to tell me why this wasn't true. And so I was trying to find some commonalities between people who didn't know each other, saying similar things and where that was coming from, why they may all sort of believe this same thing.

[00:40:19] Gwyn: And did you find commonalities?

[00:40:22] d20Domme: Religion? It's a lot of passed down information, and especially in the religious context. Things are presented in such a way that you don't feel like you can question it, right? You feel like, well, this is the way it is, this is what I'm being told, so I'm gonna believe it. And I came from a religious background as well, but I stopped. Being religious. As a teenager, I was kind of like, ah, this sounds like a lot of work.

[00:40:46] And for me, I was kind of, of the mind, I am an extremist in my thinking sometimes. And so I thought, well, if I'm going to be religious, I wanna be like actually right? It's like, I wanna do it by the book. And I was like, oh, there's no way. I don't think I could live my life like that. And so I kinda was like, eh, just fuck it. I'll figure it out. I'll do what I need to. And so for me it was interesting to see so many people fall back to the religion aspect cuz a lot of it kept coming back to like, we were made a specific way and if you're not doing that, you're going against how you were made, how you were created. And so that was interesting for me to find a lot of people using that as their straw man. Pretty much argument for me.

[00:41:30] Gwyn: Yeah. I mean, you know, I haven't studied it. I have a bachelor's degree but I feel that everybody has some inherent characteristics and that it can certainly be nurtured or ignored, but is still there.

[00:41:44] d20Domme: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

[00:41:46] Gwyn: And it sounds like what you're saying is that the nurture has more to do than the nature?

[00:41:52] d20Domme: I think so, yeah. I think because you can be in most envir, like just take a typical family home, right? I think it's definitely going to depend on the response you get when you try to do something that maybe doesn't align with what your typical family does and so that response is what's going to tell you it's okay to keep doing things like that or like, no, no, no, nope. I can't say that.

[00:42:20] I must repress that, and that's not the right way. And then if you start getting that feedback from the people who you care about, who are in charge of you, you know, your parents and things like that, you are, even if you're religious, your pastor, people telling you that the things you're doing are wrong and you've trusted these people guide you up until this point, it's hard to feel like you wanna go against that.

[00:42:42] And so I definitely think the nurture is a huge part of our sexuality. If you're able to find those expressions or have someone to talk to, that's definitely gonna make a huge difference.

[00:42:54] Gwyn: Interesting. When I'm in a distressed state, I always ask why, why is the first question right out of the five, who, what, where, when, why, and how. I always ask why. And a lot of times, some of the time I've realized that it doesn't matter why. It's irrelevant. Like I can have the answer to why, but that doesn't change or fix or whatever it is that I'm looking to do to alter the situation, who I am why I want peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.

[00:43:25] I mean, you know, whatever. And so to me that would say sort of the opposite of your thesis, that I feel that nature has a huge piece of it.

[00:43:34] d20Domme: Mm-hmm

[00:43:35] Gwyn: and that nurture contributes somewhat.

[00:43:38] d20Domme: Mm-hmm. I think of nurture as well as like internal nurture. It doesn't always have to be an external nurture, but you mentioned earlier when we were talking you said when there's a problem and when we're in distress, the brain wants to like figure out that.

[00:43:52] And so a lot of people's mind instantly will get hung up on that. Why, why, why, why? And they can't get past that. And so you strike me as someone who's quite self-aware and, and knows that the why doesn't matter, but for a lot of people, they cannot move on to anything else until they get to the why, until they can feel ok with the why.

[00:44:12] And I'm with you. I don't think the why matters, but our mind doesn't know that all the time and is not trained to not know that. That's why uh, whodunits are so popular. Like, we just like to know, we like to figure things out.

[00:44:25] Gwyn: Ooh, yeah, that's a really good point. And I hadn't really thought about it that way, so Yeah. That's, that's really useful.

[00:44:32] d20Domme: And this is broad speaking. Obviously there's gonna be tons of people who don't fit in that spectrum. But a lot of people I feel like get stuck on needing to know why versus how does it make you feel? How are you like accepting this into your human profile? Right? We get stuck on the why, and that's been a big reason, at least for me, why I don't really have a pertinent kink, light bulb moment because I didn't ask myself a bunch of whys. I just kept being like, well, let's see what happens here. Well, let's see if I do it like this, and what if I keep doing this?

[00:45:07] And so at a certain point, maybe about 10 years ago, I was like, wait, why do I like that stuff? Let me try and figure out why I personally, I know why other people, I've talked to so many other people, but what, what drove me here? Why, you know, why do I like to do this? And so I feel like I have my why, but it just, it seems too simplistic.

[00:45:29] Like I just, I love being in control. I love having a hand in things, especially when they're successful or fun or I like knowing that like, hey, I helped make that happen. And so that's kind of it for me.

[00:45:43] Gwyn: So, okay. If you could gift the world with one thing that might help somebody out of a sticky situation, whether it's a technique to use or a question to ask, what would that be? How could you help the random Jane?

[00:46:02] d20Domme: I have two things. I know you asked for one. Sorry.

[00:46:05] Gwyn: I'll take two

[00:46:06] d20Domme: Us dominants can't listen, I'm sorry.

[00:46:09] Gwyn: Give me all the things. I just didn't wanna be greedy.

[00:46:14] d20Domme: So the first thing is just, ugh, this is always, this is like my life motto. What someone else thinks of me is not my business. And I try to really live my life like that. That's not to say that I don't care what people think. I absolutely care what the people who are important to me think. I take what they have to say on board, but that doesn't mean I'm necessarily going to always change my course of action because I've heard from them.

[00:46:44] So I think it's really important that people remember what someone thinks about you is not really your business. That's their own private thoughts. And a lot of times what people think about us is not actually an accurate representation of us. It's who they think we are. We often, even on this podcast, you listening, Gwyn you here with me, you guys are only getting a very small facet of the individual that is deep point.

[00:47:10] And so a lot of times we forget that like when we've interacted with people, they're not getting anywhere near a full picture of us. So I don't like to see people hanging on to what people think about them and taking that internally and really beating themselves up because the general public doesn't like them.

[00:47:29] So that's my first piece of advice is remember what people think about you. Totally not your business. The other thing I would say is when things get stressful or you need some sort of anchor to center yourself. For me, I have a phrase that I say a lot and that is, this is how it is right now.

[00:47:51] And that's super important because nothing lasts forever, not even us. And so I try to remind myself that if something's shitty or if something is amazing, this is how it is right now. And so if it's something bad, I try to steal myself and go like, you know what? This is temporary. It's gonna pass. And if it's something good, I try to tell myself, really take this experience in and absorb it cuz this is how it is right now, but maybe in a week you're not gonna be on this island for vacation. So just enjoy it right now. And so that's a phrase I've used pretty much every day for some reason or another, is to tell myself that this is how it is right now. [00:48:30] Gwyn: Beautiful. Yeah, absolutely.

[00:48:33] d20Domme: Cause life is all about our reactions, right? It's all how we react to things. We're all experiencing different things, but it's really our reaction to things. We attach the good and the bad to situations. Otherwise we could be neutral, but we often aren't. And so it's important to remember that how we are perceiving it, it's how it is for us.

[00:48:52] That doesn't necessarily mean that's how it is, that's how we're viewing it. And so if you can take that step back and see like, let it go, it's not that serious. A lot of things are not that serious. Like it's . I see a lot of people stressing out over things that I'm like, Hmm, just let it go. It's not that serious.

[00:49:09] Yeah.

[00:49:10] Gwyn: I mean, so much of life is that stressing out over things that, that really don't require.

[00:49:17] d20Domme: Yeah. Yeah. And you can't control a lot of it. And so I always say like, can I influence this? And if I can't, I just have to make peace with it. Have to make peace with that.

[00:49:26] Gwyn: yeah. The way I like to end a podcast is by asking what excites you. So d20Domme, what excites you?

[00:49:36] d20Domme: This sounds really cheesy. Submission really excites me. I can't even tell you how many orgasms I've had in the last 48 hours because yeah, I've just been getting good submission and I don't know, there is something exciting about knowing that you have someone you can do anything to. And so that's where submission excites me, yet I love knowing that I have a literal play thing.

[00:50:09] Gwyn: That's lovely. That's really beautiful. I truly, truly appreciate that. Thank you for coming on the show. This has been amazing. I am so delighted to connect with you.

[00:50:21] d20Domme: Thank you too. I've had a blast chatting with you.

[00:50:24] Gwyn: Oh my goodness. There was so much more we could have talked about. If you would like me to bring her back on, please let me know. We didn't even touch on her list of amazing kinks or hypnosis or any of a bunch of other stuff that we could talk about. In the meantime, there are two ways you can learn more.

[00:50:49] You can, and should visit her website at mundanemiss.com and you can come over to our Patreon where there are lots of bonus bits, even ones that you can hear for free. Of course, if you would like to join as a Patreon member, there is even more. Plus all the other great perks. You should totally do that. You can find a link at whatexcitesus.com.

[00:51:17] But what is most important is that you are subscribed to What Excites Us so that you get to hear more of these fun conversations. I would even ask that you consider talking about it with a friend. The more conversations we have, the easier they get and the easier it becomes to normalize all of this.

[00:51:36] What excites us is produced, edited, and hosted by me, Gwyn Isaacs. All music is used under the Creative Commons attribution license. The opening song is The Vendetta by Stephen Kartenberg, and this is Quando by Julius H. I still haven't really thought about a signature sign off. If you have any ideas, go ahead and let me know.

[00:52:01] Until then, thanks for listening. I totally appreciate you. Rock on