Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

...to want to say 'honour and obey' in my vows?

521 replies

SteelyMindedLiberal · 08/05/2014 13:46

Background: we're both feminists. He's a strong personality, very intelligent, very loving, considerate, supports my career, does (more than) half the housework, cooking etc. We're not Christian or conservative.

But...

I am completely submissive to him and he sets the tone in every aspect of our relationship. Obviously there is a strong (and very hot!) BDSM undercurrent to all this. But it goes way beyond the bedroom: he leads, I follow, it's obvious and noticeable, and we both love it.

He's 'in charge'; never controlling. I am always listened to, and feel completely equal. I just do as he says and trust him to do the right thing. We're not ashamed of how we are, it's fundamental to us and because of that we want it to be included in our vows. He says it's up to me but he would like it very much, and I really, really want to say it.

BUT: it would mean outing our 'activities' to all our family and friends. I don't want our wedding to become all about that one line. Maybe no one would really care or give it any thought? We're happy to simply say: 'that's our dynamic and it works for us', to most people, but he has a 20-year-old daughter and it's her we're most worried about. She's sassy and worldly and she'd get it at once and probably be fine with it in private, but might find it really embarrassing and awkward... argh!

Help! It's the whole please ourselves or please others thing, I suppose...

OP posts:
CorusKate · 08/05/2014 23:34

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

BumpNGrind · 08/05/2014 23:40

Yes, Steely thank you. This isn't something I have ever had a knowledge of, and I suppose that if you were to describe my relationship if would probably be vanilla and it deeply meets my needs. I haven't ever felt a desire towards an alternative format and if I'm honest, what you describe doesn't appeal to me one bit (and I'm sure you would say the same about my relationship style). In my mind I see it as being very different from being lesbian, gay or bi but I would hate to see discrimination towards anyone for being in a loving committed relationship that makes them happy.

To go back to your original question about vows, I really think that promising to obey won't portray the relationship you describe but I think your vows could possibly include a line which expresses your love and style, subtly, discreetly but in a deeply personal and private way, (you don't seem keen to be open in your wider circle).

I wish you a very happy marriage, you a very different life/views to me, but none of us have a monopoly on happiness and I hope you have the day you want.

ICanSeeTheSun · 08/05/2014 23:40

It doesn't sound like you are in a d/s relationship.

Take the car for example. If you wanted a certain car that had no safety features and was a really bad choice of car I would expect a dom to say no.

But a dom job in the relationship is to protect his submissive, I really don't see how forcing you to drive an unsutiable car is how a dom acts.

Pregnantberry · 08/05/2014 23:41

Oh OP, we are the same, you and I.

I wouldn't have twigged though that you were into BDSM from hearing your vows.

On a lighter note, now I will be twirling my metaphorical moustache with a twinkle in my eye the next time I hear someone say "honour and obey" in their vows.

MrsC1966 · 08/05/2014 23:47

I said them at my wedding. In return I get worshipped by my husband! 15 years on, I'm very happily married so if it works for you too, go for it.

whatever5 · 09/05/2014 07:35

OP, you're being over dramatic and immature. Nobody cares what you do in the bedroom and nobody cares that much what some stranger on the internet wants to say in her wedding vows. You asked for an opinion though regarding the wedding vows so people told you what they thought. I personally think being submissive in the bedroom is one thing but wanting to extend that to the rest of your life and saying that you will obey your partner in your wedding vows is rather pathetic and strongly against feminism.

Saying that you are being persecuted and discriminated because people are giving you their opinion after you asked makes you seem even more pathetic and also immature.

WyrdByrd · 09/05/2014 07:49

If that's what floats your boat, go ahead and use those vows.

In all honesty if I went to a wedding and the bride used them I would probably think WTF, but I wouldn't question her choice to do so and I certainly wouldn't make any sexual connections with it well I wouldn't have until I read this thread Grin .

Martorana · 09/05/2014 07:50

Worshipped? Isn't that terribly exhausting?

Original poster
SteelyMindedLiberal · 09/05/2014 08:03

Go back and read my earlier posts please. I can't keep repeating the same thing over and over. Much more exhausting than any amount of worshipping!

Bowing out now. Won't be saying honour and obey! Thanks all.

OP posts:
noddyholder · 09/05/2014 08:58

What does being worshipped involve?

Martorana · 09/05/2014 09:03

Sorry- my comment about "worshipping" wasn't directed at you.

If you are going-before you do, please listen to the words of someone old enough to be your mother.

Be very careful- this man is much older than you and has a lot of control over you. I can see that that feels exciting, and simultaneously safe-being looked after is lovely. But people change, and power corrupts. Make sure you have escape routes. Do not give him control over your money. Do not let him cut you off from your friends. And if you do have children, that is a time for a complete renegotiation. He can oh longer be your priority. And you may find he does not like that one bit.

MrsC1966 · 09/05/2014 10:23

Lol, you'd have to ask my husband to find out if worshipping is exhausting! In the wedding vows, worshipping is what the man promises in return for the woman honouring & obeying. It seemed like a pretty good trade off Grin
I really don't think anyone really questions it if a couple chooses that particular wedding vow rather than a modern version, and it certainly doesn't imply anything sexual. If anything it says that the couple are traditionalists and perhaps a little old fashioned (which probably describes my husband and I perfectly).

Martorana · 09/05/2014 10:29

No. I mean isn't being worshipped exhausting! My Dp had a tendency to do this after each of our children was born- I had to ask him to stop..........

Montegomongoose · 09/05/2014 10:36

Liking certain kinds of sex, isn't sexual orientation. We are taught by a patriarchial society what is "sexy". Patriarchy teaches women to eroticise our own oppression.

Beautifully put.

There will come a time when you both need to face a tricky situation where your (clearly a current source of fascination for you both) sexual preferences are going to be irrelevant.

Please be careful that you have not allowed your game to set a precedent where you no longer have a voice in your relationship.

I also think you're so aware of this preference that you are assuming it will be obvious to everyone else. Please don't make it so that your guests are embarrassed, particularly his daughter. It's not very dignified or polite.

kentishgirl · 09/05/2014 10:57

I know of quite a few women in 'submissive' marriages because of their religious beliefs.

What I found very unpleasant about it was that they would laugh about it and say 'the man is the Head of the Family, but the woman is the neck that turns the head' and they were all experts in manipulation and using their 'feminine wiles' to get their own way really. They didn't really have genuine respect for their husbands at all. I found it all just so fucked up.

turgiday · 09/05/2014 11:19

If you have to be manipulative to have any power, you are in a pretty powerless situation. And people often laugh at awful circumstances they are in. It is a way to deny the full horror. That can be very useful if you are having to deal with an awful situation you have no control over e.g. terminal illness, but in a situation you could get out of, it often simply helps people to stay in those situations.

bunchoffives · 09/05/2014 11:48

Very wise words imho Martorana

I agree with everything you said. Everything.

I think you are putting this man on a pedestal OP. You are idolizing him.

It's one thing to have built up trust in him. But remember, he is only human. And all human's err.

traininthedistance · 09/05/2014 13:11

Liking certain kinds of sex, isn't sexual orientation. We are taught by a patriarchial society what is "sexy". Patriarchy teaches women to eroticise our own oppression.

^^ This. And this is why feminism is about equality, but it really isn't about the spurious valorising/fetishising of choice, but rather about being able to see how what appears to be naturalised as "choice" is often inflected by deep structural and unconscious demands on us as subjects.

So much of this thread puts me in mind of contemporary anti-abolitionist or anti-female suffrage arguments - eg. why abolish slavery, when what is really required is that all masters be good masters? For if we could only ensure that all slave-owners treated their slaves as equals, there would really be no need for slaves to have the formal legal rights to be equals. Or, again from similar 19thc. arguments against women being granted legal status: if only all husbands were good husbands, who treated their wives as equals, women would have no need for legal equality. Because we all know how well those kinds of arguments turn out.

traininthedistance · 09/05/2014 13:16

Pressed send too soon! But I was going to say that the fetishisation (clearly literally, in this case) of the "good" master as benevolent, and "good" slavery as natural and inevitable ("this is a part of me, this is natural to me, I can't change who I am") is all well and good for those who like it. But what is is most definitely not is anything to do with feminism, which if it shows us anything is how to unpick the ways that structures, societies and individual people defend and naturalise certain kinds of power relations under the twinned demands of "choice" and the "natural".

Itsfab · 09/05/2014 13:21

I said honour and obey in my vows and it outed nothing other than I am an old fashioned person Hmm.

turgiday · 09/05/2014 13:30

Itsfab - I wouldn't think someone saying that meant they were into BDSM either. I am now wondering about my DP's friend wedding we went to. They are devout Christians and the woman said she would honour and obey. I will look at them in a very different light now Wink

Itsfab · 09/05/2014 13:41
Grin
bunchoffives · 09/05/2014 13:55

I think promising to 'obey' would definitely say something to me about the one who promised.

Why, why would you promise to obey another person? What for?

Because you feel deeply inferior?

Because they made you say it?

Because you want to create co-dependency?

Because you don't want to be responsible for yourself?

I really don't understand the urge to subjugate yourself.

Montegomongoose · 09/05/2014 13:58

Am also fascinated by 'we're both feminists'

I had a relationship like this.

I was desperate for someone to love me and make my life calm and sexy, which happened when I allowed him to control everything.

He, retrospectively, was a controlling pervert with a fancy line in patter who dressed up the need to dominate as our 'hot' secret.

Not a feminist bone between us.

violetlights · 09/05/2014 14:25

I think people are getting confused about the term feminism. Choice isn't what it's about - it's about belief.

If you CHOOSE to agree to men having control over you (or that they have a dominant voice or anything else over women) it means you're not a feminist. That's the point. If you buy into the idea that men should have control over women (regardless if you reach that idea independently) then you are not a feminist. It's very simple IMHO.