Sex Gets Real 195: Former pro dominatrix Mona Darling on kink, pet play, & orgasm control

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Mona Darling is here to talk all things kinky. As a former pro Dominatrix with over 20 years of experience dominating folks in the kinkiest of ways, she has some fantastic advice on how to get started in kink, the skills most people overlook that actually make kink juicy and meaningful, and how to find your inner Domme if you’re just getting started.

She has a new kinky activity book that’s soon to be published and helps me field listener questions on how to do punishments and rewards in a 24/7 dynamic and also for newbie Daddy/Little Girl dynamics.

It’s a fun, kink-tastic chat.

Psst – looking for more details on working with me? Check out my coaching details now!

Follow Dawn on Instagram.

In this episode, Mona and I talk about:

• Mona’s weekly stream on O.School which is Kinky Conversations with Mistress Mona.
• Why kink has this image of being super serious and how Mona started as a pro dominatrix, and what happened when she started approaching it as something goofy and silly. Kink is funny and ridiculous! Let’s honor that.
• Mona is creating a 200 page kinky activity book. She tells us all about it, and her approach to kink is right up my alley.
• The most important thing when you’re getting started in kink. It might surprise you because it’s not skills with rope or whips or torture devices. It’s something much more crucial and oft overlooked.
• How Mona works with couples to find common ground in kink and sex when they seem to have very different interests.
• Emotional needs and kink are where it’s at. But that requires talking, communicating, being uncomfortable and awkward, which is something so many of us avoid.
• Mona’s single most important piece of advice for anyone curious in kink. It can be really difficult to do this, but it can make all the different in having those amazing experiences you dream of for yourself.
• Pet play! Mona talks about pet play – what it is and why people do it. She loves it and offers such a sweet, tender look at it.
• Mona gets very excited when we talk about orgasm control and orgasm games. Let’s get mean and tease-y. The pro Domme comes out during this piece of the discussion, for sure.
• The bullshit that is blue balls – just stop. It’s so sexist and so misogynistic. Get over it dudes.
• Chastity, edging, CBT – oh my!
• How can someone try out being a dominant? I get a lot of emails from women whose partners have come out as submissive and want these women to be dominant, but they don’t know how to get started. Mona has terrific advice.
• Women need to find what interests them and what gets them excited, not only what a partner wants. Finding mutual space to place is so much easier when both people show up knowing what they want.
• Sexual pleasure and how reciprocal it can be.
• Why someone’s sexual expectations can kill a scene and why Mona specifically does NOT fulfill those fantasies for everyone’s benefit.
• A listener question from someone who wants tips on how to be a good dominant outside of the bedroom. How can you be a good Domme outside the bedroom in the day-to-day of a 24/7 dynamic? Mona has thoughts!
• Consequences and punishments from the brain of Mona Darling. Yum.
• Fox’s Lil Chu is brand new to a Daddy/Baby Girl dynamic and would love some tips on how to make it juicy especially around rewards and punishments.

About Mona Darling:

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Episode Transcript

Dawn Serra: You’re listening to (You’re listening) (You’re listening) You’re listening to Sex Gets Real (Sex Get Real) (Sex Gets Real) Sex Gets Real with Dawn Serra (with Dawn Serra). Thanks, bye!

Happy New Year, listeners. Welcome to this week’s episode with Mona Darling. We have some kinky, kinky fun goodness. And also, a heads up to Patreon supporters, I have an exclusive little chat with Mona that’s just for Patreon supporters who support at the $5 level and above. We talk all about why women should work with pro dom’s and sex workers, and what Mona loved about working with women when she was a sex worker. So, you’ll definitely want to check that out. It is actually a really fun, delicious little chat that we have. So be sure to check that out and if you don’t already support the show, just go to people patreon.com/sgrpodcast. And you can support the show, too, which I love every single dollar that all of you so generously offer. 

Dawn Serra: Also, don’t forget to check out my upcoming O.school streams. They are free and happen every single Wednesday. This coming week on January 10th 2018, I am streaming all about death, sex, and Twilight. The entire stream is going to be all about the Twilight movies and books, and what they offer us about love and sex and romance. So if you are a Twilight fan or if you absolutely can’t stand Twilight, everybody’s welcome. It’s free and live and you can chat with me. 

I also have upcoming streams on O.school on pegging in Hollywood, on kissing and a whole bunch of other really fun topics – John Hughes and ‘80s movies. Ryan Gosling, The L Word, Buffy – and it’s all free. So head O.school – that’s the URL, and make sure that you sign up. They’ll email you every day with a list of all the free streams that day. You can support me and all of the other pleasure professionals. 

Dawn Serra: So this week, there’s a fellow Oschooler, Mona darling. We chat all about being dominant, pet play, orgasm control, and orgasm denial, getting started in kink, how she found her way to being a successful pro dominatrix, and a lot of other really fun juicy content – including a couple of listener questions about how to be a good dominant outside of the bedroom in a 24/7 dynamic. Plus, getting started in a daddy-little girl dynamic. 

Mona Darling is a former professional dominatrix who now teaches women and couples to discover, embrace, and communicate their kinks. So here is my chat with the incredible Mona Darling.

Dawn Serra: Welcome to Sex Gets Real. I’m super excited for kinktastic conversation today.

Mona Darling: Kinktastic, yay! I love that word. Thank you so much for having me on.

Dawn Serra: You’re welcome. We got connected because we are both pleasure professionals over at Oschool.

Mona Darling: Yay, Oschool!

Dawn Serra: I know. So, hopefully people will go and check out your stream because you’re doing some awesome conversations over there.

Mona Darling: I am, I hope. I like to think so. I host kinky conversations with Mistress Mona every Monday from 6 to 8pm. And every week there’s a loose topic, but as with all good conversations, we don’t always stay on topic. But it’s always fun. I tell lots of stories from my experiences in the dungeon and as a professional dominatrix. I answer a lot of questions and we have a lot of laughs. 

Dawn Serra: That’s important. 

Mona Darling: Kinky sex is funny.

Dawn Serra: Yeah, it is. And I feel like so many people take it way too seriously. It should be fun and playful, and all the things. There’s such a range of experiences you can have with kink. But it doesn’t have to always be super super, super serious.

Mona Darling: Yeah, I’m not a super serious person and I tried so, so hard. When I first got into kink, it was the late ‘90s – back in the day. All the advertising was for these Ice Goddesses that were just stunning and beautiful. And I felt like the dorky little nerd girl and like, “I don’t think… I just can’t be like that.” And I tried. But the more I tried, the less my clients enjoyed their time with me. The less clients I had repeat their time with me. And the less fun I had. So then I became the goofy, weird dom who – I was a switch actually, at that time – who did a lot of comic book role play and just weird games of chance with a 10-sided die. 

Dawn Serra: Awesome. If the 7 comes up, it’s CBT time. I love that.

Mona Darling: Indeed. Someday, I’m going to design my own gamer die and they’re going to have little designs on each side that represent different things. And it’ll come in a set because you have to know how many minutes you’re going to have to endure this, right? 

Dawn Serra: Oh, that sounds like a delicious game.

Mona Darling: Yes.

Dawn Serra: So because you love gaming and play and being your lovely self, I know that you’ve been working on something that I’m super excited to see burst into the world, which is like a kinky activity book. I would love to hear all about that.

Mona Darling: Oh my god, I’m so excited about this. I’ve been working on it for so long. It’s getting so close and it’s like that last – the finish line is in sight. It’s a very whimsical book for people who are interested in exploring BDSM – that are new to BDSM. If you have more experience, you’ll get something from it as well. But my primary audience are people who are new, who are curious about themselves and BDSM and kink. And it’s modeled after a kid’s activity book. So there’s paper dolls on the back – kinky, of course. There’s color pages and mazes. Because we all try to take a lot of wrong turns while trying to find ourselves. So it’s a lot of fun. There’s a lot of really useful information. And then, there’ll be word finds where you get to look for the new words that you’re adding to your vocabulary. It’s 200 pages of fun. 

Dawn Serra: Wow, 200. 

Mona Darling: I know I was actually sort of surprised about that, too. I was thinking, “Oh, this will be a fun little pamphlet. It’s big. It’s 8 and a half by 11 full size.

Dawn Serra: Oh my God, that’s so fun. 

Mona Darling: Yeah, I want it to be fun and I want people to have fun exploring. But the other thing that I really, really want to emphasize for people that are getting into kink and BDSM is that the very, very most important thing is not how to give a good spanking, hold your hand like this, hit here. It’s actually to get into the mind of the person you’re playing with and find out what their emotional needs are, and where they want to go. Because you can give the greatest spanking technically, but if emotionally you haven’t connected, you’re just missing the point. 

In the game’s section, every game starts with a description and then the emotional needs that can be met with that game. And the emotions that that game plays with and how to address those, and then it goes into a physical.

Dawn Serra: I am so glad you said that because I think that’s something that’s missing from a lot of conversations about kink 101. I’ve certainly been to my kink 101 nights at local dungeons, and it’s largely skill-based. It’s largely, “Here’s how you throw a whip” or “Here’s how you use a violet wand,” or “Here’s how you do fire play.” And I think those skills are super important. But, I’m so glad that you’re focusing on the emotional and the mental aspects of it, because in my experience and my experience is paltry compared to yours. But in my experience, the juiciest times that I’ve been in any kind of kinky situation as a submissive or doing any kind of pain play, has been when there’s a connection. 

When we’ve taken the time to craft something that would take me emotionally through a journey or the person that I was playing with to give them some kind of really juicy yummy either support or expression. And those are skills that I think a lot of people would love to be able to have and play with, but they don’t really know where to start. Because just culturally, in general, we’re pretty terrible at emotional intelligence and communication. You kind of have to be able to talk to someone to find out what their emotional needs are. So I love that you’re doing this.

Mona Darling: It started because I kept talking to people– I do coaching with couples and one of the couples would be like, “Oh, I don’t – I can’t be into that. They’re into this and I just don’t, I can’t do it.” So then when we start talking about it, it’s easier to come to a– Very often, we come to a common ground once we start looking at the emotions behind things. And I’m so used to keeping secrets. It’s hard for me to give examples sometimes. I’ll use gags, for example. Gags – people think the gags, “Oh, you just shove it in your mouth – your submissive’s mouth.” But there’s so many nerve endings in the mouth. There’s so much emotion in the mouth. Does the person want the gag to muffle their voice? Does the person want the gag to choke them? Do they just want to feel something against their lips? Do they want to have their mouth held open? Do they want their mouth played with while the gag’s in there? 

A gag is such a simple thing. But once you start looking at the emotional needs, is it a playful thing? Is it a sexy thing? Is it a threatening thing? When you start looking at those and then looking at the physical, it’s much more involved, even as simple gag is so involved.

Dawn Serra: And to approach it from the emotional needs, and also the emotional wants and desires, sets you up for so much more success.

Mona Darling: Once you start exchanging those emotional needs, you start building trust or maybe you start building trust and then you start sharing those emotional needs, actually. But when you start sharing those parts of yourself and examining those parts of yourself, because some people have these interests, and they don’t quite even understand. As a pro dom, I cannot tell you how many times I’ve had people be like, “I want to be dominated.” “What does that mean to you?” “Well, I want you to put on my panties.” “Okay, well, why?” What is your interest? And sometimes it’s because people don’t realize – well, of course, everybody wants to be put in panties because they want to be humiliated and panties are the most humiliating thing that you can do – that you can wear. So people just don’t understand that there are a lot of other emotional connections to these activities.

Dawn Serra: For people who are new to kink, for people who pick up your activity book and they’ve maybe done a couple of things or they’ve read a couple of books, based on all of your experience as a pro dom and as an educator, what do you think are some of the most important pieces for people to even start asking themselves or to start thinking about as they look ahead towards engaging with others and trying things out, and maybe even initiating some scary conversations with partners? For newbies, what do you most wish people would inquire within and start playing with first?

Mona Darling: I wish that people could understand – really, truly understand that there is no right way to do anything. There’s only what’s right for you. And that is especially important in kink and BDSM. Because, as we were talking at the beginning, we were talking about me trying to be what I thought I was supposed to be as a pro dom – aloof Ice goddess. That just didn’t work for me because that was not me. And when I started being who I truly was – a little more authentic, even though that was what most people thought of when they thought of as a pro dom, that’s when my sessions and my playtime started working really well for me. It’s the same thing with anybody going into play. It’s not something that you do a certain way. There is no right way to do it. The right way to do it is to look at the things that really interest you, the emotions that really interest you, and to be honest with yourself, which can sometimes be hard. And to be honest with your partner and some of those emotions– 

Women who are strong feminists and who run their own companies or just amazing stay at home moms or they’re just really amazing feminists. But in the bedroom, they have rape fantasies or submissive fantasies, and it’s really hard for people to come to grips with like, “There’s nothing wrong with me for having these feelings. This is something that I can work out and that I can play with a safe partner as long as I communicate everything and I’m honest with myself, and it’s not abusive and there’s consent involved.” It doesn’t take away from the fact that you are a strong, amazing woman.

Dawn Serra: One of the things that I have definitely gotten questions about in the past, and I know you have a stream coming up about it, I believe, correct me if I’m wrong, is people expressing some interest in pet play. What is it? Why do people do it? How do I get started? And so I would love it if you could talk a little bit about what pet play is and why people do it, and why it might be something interesting for people to try if it’s something that they’ve never considered or they’ve kind of wrinkled their nose at?

Mona Darling: Pet play is really fun. It’s unfortunately one of those things that I think TV shows like CSI sensationalize like adult baby play. But pet play is, oh my gosh, it’s so fun. From the point of being a pet, there’s that affection that an owner shows their pet. This innate sense of belonging, of ownership can bring a closeness. And no kink necessarily has to involve pain, but with pet play, it’s like an owner giving affection in whatever manner to their pet. Affection can be a belly rub, a treat, and a walk in the park.

From the submissive point, they get to be nothing for a little while, except for an adoring pet. They don’t have to worry about taking care of the kids, worrying about work, worrying about deadlines. Their only job is to receive affection, sometimes discipline, and to entertain their mistress or master -their owner. Pet play can be basic cuddling and name calling like, “My little kitten.” It’s so innocent and sweet to call somebody your little kitten and have them come over and curl up with you and stroke their hair, and it’s just very intimate. It doesn’t have to be all insertable puppy tails and pony carts and all of that. Although it can be, that’s always great fun too. But, with a lot of kink and BDSM is just all about escapism and letting go of your day to day obligations and playing. When you’re a kid, you play. You explore your body and the world around you. And then you’re sort of expected to stop doing that when you’re an adult and sex becomes this orgasm-centric event when it doesn’t have to be.

Dawn Serra: I love that you mentioned it can be as simple as a nickname like kitten, and the cuddling. I had a lover a couple of years ago whose nickname for me with kitten and as time went on, it became very very special. And anytime he used that name, it was almost like a caress of I love you. It was just something that created a really intimate dynamic between us and became super powerful. And it was an unintentional thing that started happening but then it became a really important part of how we communicated, and how we cared for each other. So I love that you’re offering that up as one example of it can be all the gear and all the activities, and all of the fun that comes from new outfits and new skills. But it can also be this incredibly intimate, quiet, beautiful sharing of creating this little world that’s for the two of you. And it can run the gamut and be both or one or the other – just the flexibility and the options that are available in that, which kind of comes back to your there’s no right way to do it, you get to make it your own and it can feel however you want it and need it to feel.

Mona Darling: Yeah, exactly. You can be a top who enjoys spankings once in a while. You can direct your submissive how to flog your fist you or how to do activities that are generally associated with being submissive. So mix and match and definitely do what works for you. You don’t have to be over the top kinky and you don’t have to spend a lot of money. In fact, there’s something just terribly fun about shopping for pervertable at the local kitchen store.

Dawn Serra: Did you know that I do one-on-one coaching with both individuals and couples? I know, technically, that’s two-on-one coaching, but you get the idea. I am now accepting new clients. I love working with couples. I’ve completed both level one and level two in Gottman method couples therapy, as well as Terry Real’s Relational Life Therapy, which is counseling for couples. And I love working around places where you feel stuck, helping you to find new ways to communicate, to navigate conflict, to explore desires and fantasies, to connect around the places where you feel so disconnected and finding new ways to introduce play and joy.

I also work one-on-one with people who are struggling with body image, trying to find ways into fat acceptance and self-acceptance, solo pleasure – all kinds of deliciousness that you could use support around, that’s what I do. I work with couples, with women, trans and cis, well as queer folks. So be sure to head to dawnserra.com/work-with-me. The URL is in the show notes. If you would like some one-on-one coaching. I have hour long sessions as well as quick little lightning sessions that are 20 minutes, which are great if you just need to process something really quick. So check it out, and I will talk to you soon.

Dawn Serra: So I would love to shift gears a little bit. There is something else that I know you’ve taught about and talked about, and certainly worked with clients around that I have also gotten emails and comments about on the show, and that is from people who are Interested in orgasm control.

Mona Darling: Oh, yes.

Dawn Serra: I’ve gotten questions from people about why and then I’ve gotten questions from people who were like, “I really want this but I don’t know how to bring it up with a partner or how to make it happen.” And so, can we talk about orgasm control a little bit?

Mona Darling: Anytime. See, that’s another one of these games that are played so often in a professional dungeon. But, I never see classes about this at the local sex shop and I really need to start offering this class. Orgasm control and orgasm games can be incorporated into any activity: pet play, extreme kink, extremely fetish, pain play, servitude. There’s literally no game in kink and BDSM that you can’t incorporate orgasm control. It can be as simple as just tease and denial, which is just such an amazing game for me. Because women are slut-shamed so often. And in tease and denial, you get to be a slut. You get to be as sexy as you want to be. You get to tease and then you get to say no. We just had this conversation about blue balls and are blue balls really a thing?

Dawn Serra: Oh my god, I so want to talk about that.

Mona Darling: That came up on my page on Facebook. Wow, okay. So society has this thing where a woman cannot give blue balls to a man. Oh my goodness, she’s got to take care of that. And with tease and denial, the whole thing is that you give them blue balls.And the bigger and the bluer, the better.

Dawn Serra: It will not kill you. And in fact, some people love it.

Mona Darling: My God. What can happen in those situations is if you’re playing with your lover and you get them totally turned on. And then you say, “No, I’m done. I’ve come. I’m good. I know you didn’t come and you’re not going to. Let’s go to dinner.” You’re sitting there at dinner with a partner that is reliving their 15 year old self – just so wound up and turned on and every little thing, every innuendo, every like glimpse of skin is going to make them all excited and it’s just a really fun powerful feeling to have that kind of control over somebody. And then, there’s also orgasm games that you can play with edging or brinking, which I actually just had a quote in Playboy. Living the dream. Finally a Playboy. But edging, which is the act of bringing yourself or your partner to the very edge of orgasm and then backing off and this can go on for an afternoon, a day or two, a weekend. I’ve assigned people edging with the dice, of course. Every morning, roll the dice you have to edge as many times as it comes up on there. I’ll assign them to do that every day for a month before they come to see me. Do you know how fun someone is to play with when they have been edging every day for a month?

Dawn Serra: Oh my god. The power your single finger can have. 

Mona Darling: Oh my god, a smirk. It’s all it takes. And then there’s chastity cages that you can fit onto your male partner. There are some for female partners but I’ve not found one that is comfortable to be in for any length of time. I have known females that found that discomfort to be erotic. So, I’m not discounting them. I’m just saying they’re not comfortable. I have a lot more experience also with the male chastity devices because as a pro dom, a vast majority of my clients were men.

Chastity devices are awesome. Because if you’re holding the key to somebody’s chastity device, they suddenly do not have any contact with something that has been a source of comfort to them since they were a child, basically. And ironically, it doesn’t take the need away. But it makes them obsess over the fact that they don’t have access to that anymore. And that can also be great fun, because then you get to be like, “Okay, so let’s see. What are you going to do to get this key back?”

Dawn Serra: What won’t you do to get this key back.

Mona Darling: You get to be as mean as you want to be. It’s in an envelope taped to a mile marker on highway five.

Dawn Serra: See in a few hours.

Mona Darling: Or another one that’s fun is to get a big 2-liter – a milk carton, basically. And drop the key in there and fill it with water and then freeze it. 

Dawn Serra: Oh, that’s so mean. I love it.

Mona Darling: Yeah, orgasm games. Love them so hard.

Dawn Serra: So really quickly, I want to circle back to the blue balls conversation and then talk a little bit about domming. I’m so glad you had this on your page and I’m so glad the conversation that happened in the comments. But for people listening, culturally speaking, blue balls is a very accepted thing, and it’s very misogynistic and sexist. Basically, culturally, what it means is if you tease a guy or you get him aroused, and then you say no, you’re giving him blue balls, and that’s not fair. 

Mona Darling: Even if you don’t mean to, even if he just happens to get turned on by what you’re wearing.

Dawn Serra: Right. Now he’s suffering and you have to be the one that takes care of it. You owe it to him, blah, blah. The conversation was so wonderful because, can you get aroused and can it be uncomfortable? Sure. Will that kill you? No, so stop being a jerk and some people pay for this.

Mona Darling: I even had an ER nurse speak up and say, “I work in an ER and I can promise you that nobody has ever died from this.”

Dawn Serra: Exactly. Because I can think of 1000 circumstances when someone might be super, super, super turned on and right on the edge of orgasm and a kid walks into the bedroom mid sex or a parent walks in on you while you’re masturbating. And you have to kind of stop really quickly and nobody died after that. So this cultural expectation that we place on women and feminine folks to “fix the problem,” when really it’s not on them to fix.

Mona Darling: What about blue labia?

Dawn Serra: Right.

Mona Darling: Can you imagine a situation in which a man turned you on and you got to say, “Hey, you need to fix this.”

Dawn Serra: Right. 

Mona Darling: I would love to imagine that situation. In fact, I do imagine that situation often in my private lady-time. 

Dawn Serra: “So, you’ll be fixing this problem and you’ll be doing it well.” Kind of in that realm of that delicious bossiness, I get so many emails from women, specifically, who have a partner who’s expressed that they’re submissive. And, they so want this person to step into their inner dom and to take over and become the dom that they always dreamed their partner would be. That could put a lot of pressure on somebody, especially, who has never done this before. 

For people who want to explore what it’s like to be a dom, and maybe they’ve never done it before, especially if they’re a woman so it might feel a little uncomfortable to think about taking on that role. What are some recommendations or some tips that would help someone start tapping into that side of themselves in a way that’s authentic so that they’re not playing that head to toe latex, whip cracker, unless that really is who they are? So I would love to know  what you recommend for people who are like, “Where do I even start?”

Mona Darling: Well, in a couple months, I will recommend my book, which will be called “Kinky Sex Tips for Curious Girls.” And hopefully, even by the time this is… Hopefully it will be out. Oh, my god, details. They will be the death of me. The first thing I always recommend is knowledge is power. When you’re going into a situation like this, where your partner is expecting a lot from you and you have no idea where to begin, how to do anything. You’re very off kilter. The first thing I suggest is to get the knowledge to learn about your partner, but also yourself. A lot of people– You can go take classes on what your partner is interested in. But I find that sometimes that gets people to be even more self-conscious, because they’re not sure that they’re doing it right now they know. Before they were just like, “I don’t know what to do. So now I’m nervous.” And then they go to a class and then they’re like, “Oh, so now I know that there’s a way to do it and I’m not sure I can do it right. I’m even more nervous now.” 

So what I really suggest is to read erotica together. Watching erotica is great. Watching porn together is great, but I find that reading or even just sending stories back and forth to each other. It helps your partner understand what it is emotionally, always go back to the emotions, about being submissive or dominant that attracts them. It can be a little scary for somebody who’s not kinky to have the partner say, “I want you to dominate me.” And they’re like, “Oh, I know what that means.” But once you start reading erotica, you can see what your partner is getting interested in and you can also find what you’re interested in. And then try to find a common ground between those two.

Mona Darling: While playing to your partner is great, I always suggest that women find what is really truly interesting to them. I think that women way too often end up interested in the kinks and the sexual habits that their partners have. Because women are shamed for having too much interest in sex and especially any kind of non-traditional, non-vanilla sex. So, once the woman starts understanding a little more about what it is that her partner is looking for and she’s understanding what she’s looking for, it’s easier to find a common ground. 

A lot of submissives also – the thing that really, really, really turns them on and really gets them off is making their dominant happy. So if they really have a foot fetish and they want to be dominated with your feet. But you’re reading about this and you’re like, “Okay, I sort of have a spanking fetish and I really want to spank you.” A submissive is going to be like, “Oh my god, you want to spank me? It turns you want to spank me? Okay, you spank me and then I can worship your feet.” You can work with those things. I don’t know if that makes sense. I end up just getting all excited and talking. 

Dawn Serra: Well, I think one of the things that I love so much about what you’re saying is, I have a listener email in front of me that I would love to read because it builds on this a little bit. But before we get to that, I love what you’re saying about the submissive gets to ask for what they want and have all these fantasies, and to want to live these things out. And, the dominant gets to find what they want to do and what works for them, and then the two of you get to collaborate on ways to make that a yummy space. Because so many of the emails that I get are, “My partner wants XYZ and I’m trying really hard to do XYZ. And I’m not sure that I’m succeeding.” So often I have no idea, “Well, what is it that you want to do? Or what do you want to explore? I’m trying to meet this other person’s needs and feeling like a failure.” 

So I love this invitation that you’re offering of – you can certainly work towards that and try it on. But you also get to find out like, “If I’m going to be dominant, what’s my version of dominant?” And it might look really different than what this other person is expecting out of me. But you get to do what feels good for you and then find that place where the Venn diagrams all overlap.

Mona Darling: Yes, and the thing is that when you are doing something that you are really interested in, your partner is going to enjoy that and they’re going to enjoy your pleasure. Most people in sexual situations, get sexual pleasure from watching somebody else get sexual pleasure, or knowing that they’re involved in giving somebody else sexual pleasure. So it becomes a very reciprocal situation. And that doesn’t matter what the activities are. That activity can be just watching each other masturbate and everybody gets all more and more turned on to spanking and tying up. 

The other thing that I want to mention is if your partner wants you to be dominant, once you are starting to know what it is that you want to do, it can be very hard to do what it is they want you to do – to do what it is that they’ve been fantasizing about you doing. So don’t do that. Even as a professional, I would have people come to me and be like, “I can’t believe I’m finally meeting you and looking at your website for 10 years and I just finally am in town and I get to meet you. And I’m so excited and I’m so excited to play.” There’s no way that I could live up to the expectations that they’ve had after 10 years of masturbating and reading my website. 

Mona Darling: There’s no way that someone who’s new to kink is ever going to be able to live up to what’s going on in their partner’s masturbatory fantasies. But the thing is, once you play and you do the things that you want to do with your partner, and you create your own memories and your own erotic events that are based on you, the top – your interests, in addition to your submissive interests, you create a something completely different. You’re never going to be able to create what is going on in their head. Don’t try. Create your own thing.

Dawn Serra: So speaking of, I received this listener email that says, 

“Hi, Dawn. I just wanted to begin by saying I love the show. I just started listening and it’s been very entertaining and educational. Recently, I connected with an old flame. I’ve always known he was kinky, but he’s finally trusted me enough to tell me a few secrets. He’s interested in a DS relationship where he is the submissive. He wants me to take control in all aspects of the relationship, in the bedroom as well as out. I have a very dominant personality in the bedroom, but I’m having a lot of trouble taking control in the day to day. So I’m very curious about how to make this a lifestyle. Do you have any tips? Thanks. Anonymous.”

Mona Darling: So that can be a lot of responsibility for a top – to have responsibility for somebody 24/7. So, the first thing that I always suggest is, the top needs a failsafe. The top needs a code word or something to communicate that they are not in the space that they need. They need downtime. I have had women who have worn a certain scarf when they needed downtime or a certain piece of jewelry, or going the other way, depending on whether you’re playing more or playing less. That piece of jewelry or that scarf can mean you’re in the mood. It’s a visual signal so that you’re not constantly saying yes or no. And you’re not constantly micromanaging.

The other thing is to set up assignments. Assignments can be what they eat for breakfast. It can be, “Anytime I walk into the bathroom and you’re in the shower, if I peek in the shower, you better have an erection.” Little things like that. And they should always be re-evaluated fairly often, weekly even, with the new rules that go into place. Because otherwise, it just becomes another obligation. So if you have a list of a list of games, shall we say, like breakfast control, what you’re wearing, if you have a list of those and then every week you implement two or three of those. And then at the end of the week, you pick two or three different ones so that you’re constantly mixing it up. 

Mona Darling: There’s also ways to just always have certain things. My submissives were always supposed to walk on my left when we were out in public. If they were on my right, I got to slap them, hit them, or back hand them. Yay.

Dawn Serra: Yay!

Mona Darling: When you’re in public and you do that to somebody, they catch up with you. They remember after that. Another thing that I always had them do is having to wear a white button down when they came to see me or a certain not being aware allowed to be out in public with me with t-shirts with slogans and stuff on it. So pick little things that are symbolic of your relationship, that fit into your lifestyle and reevaluate often. Because otherwise, you don’t want your erotic behavior to all of a sudden become like, “Unload the dishwasher, fold the clothes. Make sure that somebody’s masturbating in the shower but not coming.” It takes all the fun out of it. 

Dawn Serra: Yeah. So, on a very similar vein, I got this other email about a daddy-little girl dynamic. Do you mind if I throw it at you too?

Mona Darling: Okay, let’s go. 

Dawn Serra: So, I got an email from Fox’s Little Chew. And it says, 

“Hi, Dawn. I absolutely love the show. I just started listening on a move across the country about two months ago, and I’ve now listened to just about every episode. I came to it because I’m in the beginning of my first daddy-girl relationship, same for daddy. And I’m trying to learn about what all of it means. Daddy has been in the community longer than I have, but I’m his first submissive as well. So we’re taking it slow and trying to learn together.” And then there’s some wonderful other comments about coming into her sexuality and getting connected with her body But her question is, 

“My relationship with daddy is new for both of us. I’m a good student and a good researcher. So I’m diving into as much material as I can get my hands on, and we’re starting to give each other homework to learn more about each other – how this works and the history of the community. One of the things we’re looking for is more resources regarding punishment and rewards for a daddy-baby girl dynamic and anything on training since frankly, we don’t know what the fuck we’re doing. We read this here and are taking things into consideration as we dive further into this but none of it has said anything that we couldn’t have guessed. So if you have any advice for us, in terms of training and punishment and rewards or other resources, we would love to hear it and check them out. Thanks for everything you and your guests have done and are doing to change the culture and conversations around sexuality. I had no idea how much I needed it. And I feel like I’ve converted to a new way of life that I’m so excited to share with others.”

Mona Darling: Oh, that is such an awesome, amazing sweet letter. First thing is it sounds like they have a thirst for knowledge, which is awesome. It’s amazing. Never lose that. But it sounds like they’re also taking it slow and learning about each other. And sometimes though, it’s just about continuing to learn and continuing to adapt what works for you and not worrying about doing it right. Finding community online through Fetlife or through your local munches. If you want to take it further and learn more, depending on the age of your baby girl. I like to pervert things. So I spend a lot of time on homeschooling sites. There’s a lot of activities that you can pervert – some of them are in my book. That’s where I got some of my activities from. So you can do that. Just like when you have a puppy that you’re training – a human puppy. You can go to the dog training sites and like, “Oh, learn how to use a clicker.” Clicker training and do clicker training with your puppy out in public. With baby girl training, it can be the same. Go to the homeschooling sites, find fun little activities – pervert them. 

There is no right. Read as much as you can, as much as you want, and take what you want and what you need from it. There is no right way to be a daddy-daughter. There’s no right way to do any of it. It sounds like they’re doing everything safely and learning about each other. As long as there’s consent, true consent, not baby girls doing things because she knows daddy wants her to. If there’s true consent, you’re doing it right. So, high five!

Dawn Serra: High five! I know and so excited for this new adventure. And I love the fact that they’re giving each other homework to learn more about each other. Because I think that’s so important of, it’s not only on the submissive to do all of this emotional labor.

Mona Darling: No.

Dawn Serra: Yeah. So that, to me, indicates at least the potential for a really healthy, juicy dynamic where you could go a lot of places.

Mona Darling: One thing that they can do that I’ve done with clients is, keep a private blog. And if each of them can keep a private blog and find a 30-day prompt, especially around November, the National Writing Month. But there’s a ton of other places where you can find writing prompts and some of them can be more intimate writing prompts about self-discovery. I wish I had a link to send. Maybe I can find something for the notes when you do publish, but you can each write separately and compare notes afterwards. It can be a really great way to learn about each other. But that’s also probably one of those things that they already knew. Because it does…

Dawn Serra: I know. It makes such a difference and I just love that they’re on this journey together and that you’re giving them these beautiful places to go without it having to be about copying what other people have done. It’s not like there’s a checklist of here’s how to do daddy-baby girl dynamics. Learn a little bit and meet with community but ultimately find what works for you. I mean, the punishment that feels like punishment for 99 other baby girls might not feel like punishment to you and things that feel like rewards, might feel like punishments.

So, the opportunity to just play in that space, I think, is really exciting and to create something that’s meaningful for them both is the point.

Mona Darling: Yeah, and a lot of it is really about knowing your partner’s quirks. Punishment-wise, if they are somebody who’s has amazing handwriting, punishment can be to write something out with their left hand a sentence – Bart Simpson style with a crayon.Give them shit because they can’t write very well, “I can barely read that. Try harder.” Some of it is knowing your partner and knowing their quirks, and being creative and quirky. 

Dawn Serra: Yeah. Well, to Little Chew, I hope that that’s helpful and that you and your daddy continue to this beautiful adventures together. And we have reached the end of our hour. So, Mona, I would love it if you could share with everyone how they can stay in touch with you, how they can find your Oschool streams, and follow along with all your classes and your book.

Mona Darling: Yay. All things Mona can be found at darlingpropaganda.com. And from there, you can find links to me on Twitter and you can find me on Facebook. And you can find a link to my community which is a women only female-identified Facebook group are we talking about sex and kinky sex, and sometimes our kids and sometimes movies, but lots of sex. 

Dawn Serra: Yay. Well, I will have links to all things Mona darling at sexgetsreal.com/ep195 for this episode. So please be sure to check it out. Also, be sure to head O.school and to support both of us in our lovely streams that we do every single week. We love interacting with people in the chat and it’s free.

Mona Darling: Yes, and there’s always something interesting. I mean, this week I’m going to be talking about pregnancy tests. I am a dominatrix. I just have experience with pregnancy tests. So it’s not it’s just – all things sexy. There’s amazing things on Oschool. 

Dawn Serra: Yeah. So to everybody who listened, thank you so much for tuning in. Of course, you can always send me questions at dawnserra.com. There’s a contact form and you can send them in anonymously. I want to thank you so much for being here with me, Mona. This was delicious and juicy and so delightful. So thank you.

Mona Darling: Thank you so much for having me. This was awesome. 

Dawn Serra: Yay. Bye, everyone. 

Mona Darling: Bye.

Dawn Serra: A huge thanks to The Vocal Few, the married duo behind the music featured in this week’s intro and outro. Find them at vocalfew.com. Head to patreon.com/sgrpodcast to support the show and get awesome weekly bonuses. 

As you look towards the next week, I wonder what will you do differently that rewrites an old story, revitalizes a stuck relationship or helps you to connect more deeply with your pleasure?