Q&A: Is My Dom the Problem or Am I?

by Kayla Lords · Published May 27, 2024 · Updated May 24, 2024

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A submissive has a recurring issue about aftercare with their Dominant partner and wants to know: are they the problem or is it me?

Here’s the question:

I’ve been dating a dom for about a year, he’s poly, and has a committed relationship with someone else, I am not his priority. He is the first person I´ve had a kinky relationship with, while he has been doing this for 6 years.

While seeing him, I noticed that he does not enjoy closeness after sex. We don’t engage in anything too rough, I never have any physical wounds or bruises to attend to, but I’ve let him know that I’d enjoy closeness after sex and he will sometimes initiate it, but more often than not he will want to simply leave and keep it very short. Before sex we chat and share openly about other dating experiences and life in general, and he always tries to be supportive when I share life struggles.

Last time, before we met, I asked him if we could spend time together after sex. He said of course and after we had sex he suggested we leave the house and get some cake and coffee. He also said that I needed to decide in the next 10 Min if I wanted to do that since we had to get the bus. I was completely overwhelmed and not really in the right headspace to make that decision but I just said “okay let’s do that”. In the cafe I realized that I was not doing well and I told him that I really would have needed aftercare.

His response was that I should have communicated that to him right after sex that I needed longer aftercare and that aftercare is a thing that is always assumed to be a given, but nobody ever asks him if he enjoys it, and its a way of putting my own needs on him. He is usually able to read my body language and I was not doing well, at some point I showed him that I was shaking. I said that it was very unfair to expect me to be assertive right after having sex while being in the submissive role and that I needed more time to recover. He said that if he lays down after sex he will just fall asleep.

We ended the conversation by agreeing that he will try to take longer aftercare more into consideration and I will try to communicate it in the right moment, after sex. I also had not eaten well that day and this caused me to be more exhausted than usual. He said I should tell him this, then he will make a meal for me. I am starting to realize that it is not easy for me to communicate these things because I do want to please him and not annoy him.

But when I got home, I realized that his position and comments about aftercare really annoyed me, regardless of the way we left the issue, and that his general lack of concern and distance after sex has caused me to trust him less, especially since it was a total switch to the way he acts before. I also was hurt, because I felt that he was looking down at me for lacking communication skills and not taking responsibility of my own needs, instead of maybe just showing empathy that I wasn’t feeling so great.. In many ways I felt like he was being that arrogant poly person that mansplains himself into not taking responsibility or dodging around the issue. Because isn’t aftercare his responsibility as a dom? And even if there is no one way to do aftercare, am I really putting my needs onto him by expecting that he takes the responsibility? We never agreed to skip aftercare. We also will cuddle for maybe a minute or two but he has already moved on to the next thing. He probably considers this aftercare, while I don’t.

I sent him a pretty in your face text message. I told him that I would like a deeper connection with him and that being submissive without aftercare is exhausting. I asked him why closeness after sex is so difficult for him. We basically got into an argument and he said that he expects people who have a deeper connection to him to be able to communicate directly what they need. I said that I need to be allowed to communicate the way that I can, not fulfill his standards, everything else is unrealistic and doesn’t honor my whole being with my weaknesses and strengths. I feel like he doubled down on his assholeness and confirmed that he WAS looking down on me for not communicating right away. He also said that he wanted to meet to talk about this in person and not via text and told me when I can expect a meeting and if I needed to talk it out beforehand we could chat on the phone.

He also said that for him a deeper connection hadnt evolved yet, that it takes time and he doesn’t have that with every person. I don’t really think that this connection is going to last and I don’t even know if I want to explain to him how not okay his behavior is. But there is a part of me though who thinks, what if I AM not taking enough responsibility? Am I being a teenager who expects my mind to be read and then putting my being miserable onto him?

I did send him that in your face text because I was feeling hurt. I probably would have never said it to him like that in person and I can’t tell if it was overkill or if I was simply able to communicate my feelings honestly because I could write it out. I do feel like his expectations of me are unfair and that he is exploiting the fact that I am submissive and therefore struggle with displeasing him, so he can get away with not doing a lot of aftercare. At the same time, am I using my identity as a submissive to avoid direct communication and standing up for my needs? Please help!