Sinclair Sexsmith

There are many elements of my submission that only come out when a dominant brings them out of me. I only like calling people “Daddy” when there’s someone in my life who has earned that title, for example, and I only fantasize about kneeling to lick the boots of a select few. Dominance and submission are very context-dependent!

That’s why it took me so long to become interested in protocol, I think. I’m defining “protocol” here as a specific set of rules and routines agreed upon by a dominant and a submissive, usually with a particular trigger and outcome: “When [x] happens, you will [y].” I had read about protocol in Sinclair Sexsmith essays and elsewhere, but wasn’t sure it was for me. But when my current dominant partner started discussing it with me, I realized I felt very positively about it – with him, anyway!

Part of the difference, I think, is that we’re long-distance. Protocol is a way for us to feel closer to each other throughout our day-to-day, even though we only get to see each other in-person once every month or two. It’s a way for both of us to confirm to the other that we think about each other often, consider each other in our decision-making, and respect and value the relationship and D/s dynamic we have co-created. Isn’t kink romantic?!

We have several different protocols, all lovingly enumerated in a shared note called “Sir and little one” that syncs to all our various devices, because we’re nerds. Here are three I’m particularly loving lately.

Little one must prepare 3 “interview questions” to ask Sir for every pre-planned (i.e. 3+ hours’ notice) phone call.

This arose from the early days of our relationship, when we learned about each other with ravenous curiosity. He would sometimes teasingly call me out for asking probing follow-up questions aplenty during our conversations. What can I say – I’m a curious weirdo with a J-school education, and when faced with an interesting person, sometimes I go into “reporter mode”!

Asking him questions serves a number of different purposes that make both of us feel good. It makes me feel smart, incisive, and useful. It reinforces our DD/lg dynamic, by making him feel older/wiser and making me feel small/naive. I get to learn more about this person I love, and when he turns the question around on me (which he always does), he gets to learn more about me, too. It deepens our connection in a way that feels really satisfying, which is (IMO) exactly what protocol should do.

The questions are whatever I’m curious about: they’ve been anything from big philosophical queries to small specific ones to sexy ones. I keep an ongoing list of these questions stored up in a Google Doc and move them to an “already asked” list once they’ve been used. Here are some examples, so you can get a sense of what kinds of things I like to ask:

• “What’s the last thing you did that was really out of character?”
• “Which friend of yours is the most different from you, and how does that affect your friendship?”
• “What do you think distinguishes a kinky person from a vanilla person?”
• “Have you ever stolen anything?”
• “What are some of your hidden talents?”
• “Where and when do you get your best ideas?”
• “What’s your favorite font?”

Sir gets the first taste of all little one’s drinks (excluding water) while they’re together.

My Sir is a cocktail nerd, so when we’re out together, he always chooses my drink and orders it for me. This protocol seemed like a natural extension of that. When he brought it up, he said he wanted to set this rule because a) he always wants to try my drinks anyway, to see what they’re like, and b) he wants to make sure the drinks are good enough for his little girl. Aww.

I like how deferential I feel when this protocol comes into play. Sliding my just-delivered cocktail across the table to Sir for his approval, before I even taste it myself, makes me feel small and powerless compared to him in a way I enjoy.

Protocols involving the control of food or drinks could be triggering for some folks who have struggled with eating disorders, alcoholism, etc. in the past or present, so tread carefully and communicate impeccably if you’re thinking about implementing a protocol in this category. I’m very into ours, though.

Little one must ask Sir permission to come if she’s thinking about or having sex with him, unless he’s going down on her.

Orgasm control is a big kink of my Sir’s, so from our very first sexting and phone-sex sessions, he always wanted me to ask permission before coming. When we wrote up our protocols, we made this rule official.

I was initially very hesitant about this one. My orgasms are sometimes elusive, so when one suddenly felt within reach, I didn’t want to derail it by taking a moment to ask, “May I come, please, Sir?” I worried that if I backed off for even that one moment, I’d screw up my orgasm trajectory and maybe miss out on one altogether. That seemed frustrating and pointless to me.

However, like anything, it’s gotten easier with practice. Now I’m usually able to squeak out my request without losing any headway on the path to orgasm – and I’ve developed enough trust with my Sir to know that he almost always grants me permission pretty quickly. In some ways, this protocol even lessens my preexisting anxieties about taking “too long” to come, because I know I’m not allowed to come without permission and that means my Sir wants to enjoy me wherever I am on the journey to orgasm.

We added the “unless he’s going down on her” caveat recently because my orgasms from oral sex are much more elusive and easily lost than ones I have through other means, so I’d rather focus completely on those without the distraction of having to ask first. There is something hot, too, about oral sex being a “loophole” through which I get to have “freebie” orgasms. It makes me feel even more motivated to relax into those sensations and get off that way.

Bonus: Here’s a protocol we tried that we ended up nixing because it wasn’t working for us:

Little one must show Sir any selfies that she plans to tweet before she tweets them. If she forgets, she must take another photo just for Sir that matches his specifications.

We thought this would be cute because it would make my Sir feel special to get a “preview” of my selfies before the whole internet saw them. I was a little wary, going into this one, that it might make me feel too owned – it felt uncomfortably close to how a monogamous ex of mine demanded I refrain from posting nudes online, even though I wanted to, because he considered that a violation of our monogamy. (That’s a totally fair boundary to set if you both feel great about it. I didn’t.)

However, as it turns out, the owned-ness of this protocol wasn’t what made it hard for me. I have a lot of anxiety about “bugging” my partners by texting them “too much” or at times when they might be busy (say, with another partner), so I found that sometimes, when I wanted to tweet a selfie, the thought of texting my Sir first was too challenging so I just… didn’t. And that meant I was posting fewer selfies and feeling kinda sad about that.

We implemented this protocol for a trial period of 10 days, at the end of which we talked about it to decide whether we wanted to keep it. I was willing to continue with it, but Sir didn’t like that it had become a deterrent to my selfie-posting, so we opted to eliminate it. It served as a good reminder for me (and maybe for you, too) that it’s okay to try protocols out, adapt and shift them as necessary, and sometimes get rid of them altogether. They are never set in stone, and that’s a good thing!

What are your favorite protocols you’ve tried, or wanted to try?

Additional resources on protocol (mostly Sinclair Sexsmith, ’cause I love them):

• View From the Top: It’s Protocol
• View From the Top: Polka Dots, Packing, and Protocol
• View From the Top: Five Favorite Protocols
• How rife & I Created Our D/s Protocol
• Kink Academy Podcast: Sinclair Sexsmith on Protocols
• Bex on event-specific protocols