Wednesday, February 17, 2010

needles

This is something deeper and less clear to me. It's something that I have always thought was very, very strange about myself, but I never had any context to use to even try to figure it out. But it is certainly there, whether I understand it or want it, or not.

I read every moment I could as a child. I much preferred to be immersed in stories others had created than to sit and daydream. When I did have mental free time (I'm old, this was pre-electronic entertainment), if the option was not there to read something, I did daydream. My reveries were likely not as imaginative as many; most often they were merely extensions of whatever make believe world my current novel had created. Very few of my daydreams related at all to my real world. I never imagined growing up, or getting married, or my wedding day, or any of the triumphs that seemed to be important in the world of that age.

But my mind did wander to needles, often. I would recall getting shots - a common enough occurrence for a child that age, I would dwell on it in my mind, the way a child worries a loose tooth with her tongue: it hurts to push it around, it calms to a dull throb if you stop, but that doesn't feel quite right, so you push and twist to make it a more immediate pain. This was what my mind did with needles. I would dwell on the memory of it, and on the idea of it. And the memory and the imagining seemed to be as much in my flesh as in my mind. I was allowed to get my ears pierced for my 10th b-day and I created that scene and reveled in it in my mind for months beforehand.

Even then, I wonderered that, of all the real world things my mind could choose to dwell on, this seemed to be the only thing it did. I was convinced that this all meant that I should be a nurse or doctor when I grew up. Ironically, I went into a health care field which involves no invasive procedures at all. I never did put it together that, in my daydreams, I was receiving, not giving.

I am reluctant to use the word fantasy about this. I was certainly well younger than puberty when this started. Even as I got older and began to incorporate the sexual into daydreaming, I really don't think I put the two together, certainly not explicitly or that I recognized. In fact, the imagining about needles subsided greatly as I moved through my teens, I had always thought that it was replaced by the typical teen obsession with anything sexual. And it probably was.

I don't know how much pre-pubescent day-dreaming is or is not sexual at its root. I am learning that pain is very intertwined with my sexuality, something I would not have imagined a year ago. Reading about the masochist's experience of play has a very distinct effect on me. But the first time I read about needle play, it was like a kick in the gut. It knocked the wind out of me. Memories came flooding back, memories which suddenly had a context. Of course it also had the the effect of being overwhelmingly arousing, and something maybe more that I can't quite put my finger on.

7 comments:

  1. So do you want to try needle play in real life or is this just a nice fantasy?

    FD

    ReplyDelete
  2. FD,
    It is just something about myself that I discovered, or learned, or maybe saw some meaning to where it never made sense before. I'm not sure I would even still call it a fantasy, but there is just me and my husband, so I have to imagine it is one of those things in life that will remain only in my head.

    ReplyDelete
  3. As one who plummets to the floor whenever needles are brought out, this is one where you get to have all the fun and then tell me about it. :-) But I had a similar experience with the thought of being controlled. I used to fantasize about it in a very naive way when I was young. Kind of went away as sex became reality. But when all these pennies dropped, the memories of those fantasies came flooding back.
    And, oh yeah - got acted on. (w00t!)

    ReplyDelete
  4. sometimes the fantasy is better...but sometimes the reality is waaaaay better.

    Needles used to freak me out, but I've made friends with them and they're now a welcomed part of play.

    hugs,
    mouse

    ReplyDelete
  5. Jz,
    That's really the point of the post I think - a thing that i always thought was weird or wrong with me - makes more sense now. Although many may argue its still just as weird or wrong - who knows.

    Mouse,
    There are a lot of things my husband is finding he likes, others he is learning to be comfortable with, but I'm pretty sure this will never be on either of those lists - so I think I will just continue to read about this one - of course now I am even more intrigued after reading your comment.

    ReplyDelete
  6. I think it's cool that you now have a context for 'bits' of your biography. There's a sort of spiritual illumination that comes when something 'clicks" into place and you get that "ah-ha" moment.

    ReplyDelete
  7. ~~doll~~ Thanks, it is cool - this knowledge doesn't necessarily change anything - but self discovery can be worthwhile for its own sake.

    ReplyDelete