I have this friend who is a Dom. He is more experienced with it than I am, been doing it for about 10 years. He says when you're dating somebody that's submissive it's your job to kind of guide them in their life because that's what they really want. I am not really comfortable with that line of reasoning. Seems patronizing. Like Dom in the bedroom, cool. Dom in life, telling your girlfriend what to do etc? Doesn't seem cool.

I'm dating someone who has become an avoidant all of a sudden. She's been really good about communicating for the previous two and a half months but suddenly it's basically nothing. She has said she is trying to sort out her feelings. It's been about 2 weeks. She has not told me how much time she needs and has really communicated very little.

I'm considering asserting some control over the relationship and telling her that I'm done with it for a month or two. I feel completely powerless here and I wonder if it would help her -- because she is a submissive -- if I took the reins and said okay you have a month to sort yourself out and then I'm going to come back and talk to you and we're going to figure out what we're doing next. That does not mean "you have a month to be sorting things out and then I expect you back in the relationship". She seems overwhelmed by feelings. She needs to process her feelings in light of the abusive relationship that she got out of 3 years ago. Plus she has family in town, her kids.

So the question is do you behave differently when it comes to dealing with the normal relationship struggles when you are dating a submissive versus somebody who is not?