Dominance, Submission, and the Power of Saying Yes
- Jun 9, 2025
- 4 min read
Written by Kellie Sheldon, Trauma and Sex Counsellor
Kellie Sheldon specialises in helping clients overcome childhood and complex trauma, as well as sexual difficulties, to find their voices. Using human connection and evidence-based frameworks like EMDR, she boldly addresses the shame and stigma around trauma and sex, promoting healing and empowerment in her practice.
Let’s say it plainly: submission isn’t surrendering your worth. It isn’t weakness. And it isn’t anti-feminist. But it gets framed that way a lot, especially when we talk about Dominant/submissive (D/s) dynamics.
There’s a common feminist narrative that sees submission, especially when practiced by women, as a betrayal. A symptom of internalised misogyny. A lack of power.
Something to grow out of.
But that view often misses the point and worse, it misses the person.
Because what many people experience inside D/s isn’t oppression. It’s a choice. And for trauma survivors, neurodivergent folks, or anyone who’s spent their life on high alert, that choice can be profoundly regulating, connecting, and healing.
The fear: “If you submit, you’re repeating the patriarchy”
This fear doesn’t come out of nowhere. Many women were raised to obey, please, or stay quiet. It makes sense to be cautious about anything that looks like giving up power.
But D/s isn’t about being told. It’s about choosing.
Submission isn’t the absence of power. It’s a form of it. The submissive leads through boundaries, consent, and pacing. Nothing happens without their agreement. That’s not weakness. That’s agency in action.
In fact, someone withholding their “no” every day might be more disempowered than someone confidently saying yes to submission within a consensual dynamic.
D/s and Nervous System Safety
For many clients I work with, D/s dynamics aren’t about taboo or rebellion, they’re about relief.
There’s safety in structure. In knowing exactly what’s expected. In being able to let go of control without fear.
One client told me the first time her partner took the lead, she didn’t dissociate. She didn’t analyse her every move. She finally felt present in her body.
For people who are always in charge, always scanning the room, or always anticipating others’ emotions, submission can bring a sense of rest. That’s regulation, not repression.
And for neurodivergent clients, D/s can offer routine, clarity, and predictability. It removes the grey area and replaces it with safety.
In a healthy D/s relationship, there is clear negotiation, emotional check-ins, boundaries, and complete permission to stop at any moment. It is not about control. It is about care, delivered in a different language.
Submission through a trauma-informed lens
We talk a lot about boundaries in trauma recovery, it's about learning to say no. That’s important. But healing also means learning to say yes and feel safe doing it, sometimes that yes is to surrender, to sensation, to power play.
When chosen with intention and trust, D/s allows people to reclaim what was taken: agency, voice, control, and safety. It changes the dynamic from “this is happening to me” to “I invited this, and I can stop it at any time.” That’s not trauma re-enactment. That’s a nervous system learning it’s safe to stay present.
“But isn’t this just a re-enactment?”
This is a question I hear often. Especially from survivors. “Why do I like being restrained?” “Why does being led turn me on?” “Am I repeating something harmful?”
There is nothing wrong with you, you are not re-enacting. You are not unsafe.
You are exploring something in a way that finally feels safe. You are doing it with clarity, communication, and consent. You are staying connected to yourself and that is the difference.
Submission as a feminist act
Feminism is about autonomy. It is about the right to choose your own path, your own expression, your own relationships. To suggest that submission is inherently disempowering is to strip people, especially women, of their right to define empowerment for themselves.
There’s nothing radical about replacing one set of rules with another. Feminism isn’t about erasing power dynamics. It’s about making sure they are consensual, flexible, and freely chosen.
What it looks like in therapy
In my practice, I use the kinkWISE framework to support clients exploring power exchange and kink. It focuses on:
Wisdom: learning the truth about kink and D/s, free from shame or myths
Integration: allowing the desire to sit safely alongside identity and nervous system needs
Safety: building emotional, physical, and relational safety
Empowerment: returning choice, voice, and control to the client
To read more about kinkWISE, you can refer to my previous blog on kink and trauma. We also move through the cycle of education, experimentation, and endurance.
Clients learn, try, reflect, return to safety, and continue, in their own time and on their own
terms.
If you’re questioning what you want
You’re not less empowered because you like being led. You’re not broken because you enjoy surrender.
You’re not betraying feminism because structure turns you on. You’re allowed to explore power play and intensity.
You’re allowed to feel held and calm inside a dynamic that looks different from the outside.
You’re allowed to define safety, pleasure, and expression for yourself. You don’t need to justify what turns you on.
You don’t need permission to explore what helps you feel present. You’re not failing.
You’re finding yourself through choice.
I know this concept may be hard to sit with, it goes against the grain of everything we are told about empowerment. The reality is, it is about empowerment. Your Dominant is never allowed to go outside the lines you give them. Remember that.
Read more from Kellie Sheldon
Kellie Sheldon, Trauma and Sex Counsellor
Kellie Sheldon specilises in helping her clients move through childhood, complex trauma, and sexual difficulties to find their voices. She uses psychodynamic (exploration of childhood), the body, emotions, and memories to remove the shame and stigma that is often found around complex trauma and sexualities.
Her university education, as well as practice-based evidence, has led Kellie on a mission to work with clients in a unique way that empowers her clients to find their lost voices and build a life of joy and resilience. Her bold methods of working attract those who are tired of living in the shadows.
