Bloody hell, for better or worse eh. In sickness and in health. But if our little game has to change, well that's it, toss it all out the window
Sorry to hang my post into yours Daryan, as there have been a few like it, but I feel like this is minimising the situation somewhat.
I try not to label my relationship and I'm uncomfortable with some of the issues I see in the BDSM community so I don't really interact with it anymore. However, if you forced me to label myself I would have to call myself submissive.
Anyway, being an actual sub or an actual dominant isn't (generally) a bit of a kink. There are plenty of people who play with those roles (and the traditional accessories that go along with them) but actually being sub is more like a sexuality I think.
In our sex life my DP and I use very few toys and those that we do are things that loads of couples use. We also have a lot of 'normal' sex that involves no toys at all. However, what all our sex (and to some extent our day to day life) involves is a power exchange between him and me. I give him the 'power', particularly in the intimate part of our relationship. The reasons for this are many and complex. I'm not comfortable with all of them (mostly from a feminist perspective) but I couldn't/wouldn't have an intimate relationship with someone who was unwilling to take part in that power exchange as it just wouldn't be a relationship I felt right in.
I'm not arguing the right or wrong of that BTW - I'm ambivalent a lot of the time about whether this is healthy, but my DP is a good person so I get away with it.
It's not a kink though, it's a dynamic and it's fundamental to our relationship. We also have kinks or stuff we enjoy doing but if we could never do them again (and actually for a while due to an injury he had we couldn't do a lot of kinky stuff) the dymanic between us wouldn't alter. Even if we couldn't have sex at all our relationship dymanic wouldn't change.
If my DP (who I love the very bones of) came and told me that his dominance was a role he had played and he could no longer sustain it, that would have a serious effect on our relationship. I'm not playing a role, my behaviour in our relationship is consistent and part of who I am. If I discovered his was a bit of a 'fun sex game' then that would be a fundamental shift. I don't honestly know how that would work out, but I wouldn't be able to just get over myself.
Also, my sexuality is a massive part of my life and my relationship as is my partner's. There's loads of other brilliant stuff too, but it is a fundamental building block. I lived through a marriage that had no sex in it for 10 years and I don't think I could do that again (health reasons aside).
I know many people on this thread can't understand the difference between kink and lifestyle and I get it, I really do. It's weird and I'd quite often rather be more normal. It doesn't make it not real though.