this probably isn’t going to be super well-written lol but I’m a sub (22F) and I’ve been into kinky stuff for the past three years or so now. The other night, I met up with a couple (33F and 35M) who were definitely the kinkiest people I’ve met so far — they had a lot of tools (canes, whips, toys, sensory deprivation tools, ropes, etc.) and had a pretty heavy dynamic. They’re both pretty big into sadism/masochism, and I’ve always thought of myself as a masochist but I realized after my session with them (which I overall enjoyed, they’re great people who are super knowledgeable about kink, and respected and encouraged my use of safe words) that maybe I’m not into pain as much as I thought.

I guess what I get confused about is that during the scene, in the moment, I feel like I try to take as much pain as possible before I have to tap out and use the safe word. But I honestly can’t tell if I’m enjoying that pain while it’s happening, and in the case of my recent session the pain canceled out my arousal and it got to the point where it wasn’t turning me on anymore. Idk, do other subs have experiences with this? Am I always supposed to get pleasure from pain? Am I really a masochist or am I just tolerating things that I don’t actually 100% like because I love to please? I also have problems speaking up for myself in everyday life, so that could be contributing to me agreeing to things that I’m not 100% sure about with kink too.