Poster Couple for FLR Part 6 - What if We Give Up on FLR?

I have posted some pontification on this subject five times before. This is the last installment. “Oh what a relief!” you may say. Here is what I have covered already:

1. I Have Given to Her the Authority over Me
2. She is the De-facto leader
3. She Is not Expected to Do or not Do what I Require
4. She Has the Last Word
5. She Is not Expected to Give me a Life of My Fantasy

My last subject deals with the unthinkable: “What if we give Up on FLR?”

There is always the possibility that one or both of us must do so. I can think of some scenarios, none pleasant or taken by choice. I could see the situation occurring as an imposition by a third party, rather than one of us saying, “I don’t want to do this any more.”

As I said, I am an alpha male of sorts. Not the arrogant bastard who will have his way at all cost, more like the guy who will simply have his way eventually. In our marriage of earlier years I used to be really hard assed about getting things done and mostly doing it my way. What lead us into an FLR, is that at some point I decided that my way is causing a lot of strife, and it was driving us apart. I decided that there would not be anything wrong with just letting her do what she wants for a while. I did, and she did.

Glory be! Our marriage did not disintegrate, our family is as strong as ever, she has more fun and less anguish, and I have on occasion lived my fantasy. She is not burdened with satisfying my craving in any way. I think that I am a nice guy. Even if we were to give up this FLR officially, I still would do what I do now: earn a living, maintain the house in all respects, clean the house, wash the dishes, take care of pets, etc. And when she wishes, I give her all the pleasure that she can take. So, in a sense I am giving her all of this whether or not she is the leader.

Then you might say, “If you are already willing to give her all of this, then exiting this FLR will not change anything.”

That is almost true. In an FLR she has the last word. She can decide on anything and I will abide by it. That may be what she would lose if she backed out. Once we are not in an FLR because one or the other broke the covenant, this rule would no longer be binding. I am not really sure though … over the years I have learned to give and to give in just for harmony and out of love. Let’s take a sidetrack here.

We married with great expectations, willing to love, honor, skip the obey part, and raise a family. From day one nobody obeyed anybody. Yes, there was all the other stuff, but the obey part just did not happen. Looking through my jaundiced contact lenses I don’t think that I really expected her to obey, as in, “Now see here, woman. You will do as I say!” Neither did I see myself obeying her commands, since she was not that way.

We survived, and about ten or so years ago, we slowly began to ease into an FLR, although the term had not yet been invented then. The FLR became imposed on our marriage in an insidious way at first.

Don’t think that all is rosy here. I will act like an ass from time to time. She will have an occasional meltdown. Several hours in a day can be ruined by either of us. But we have learned. Several months ago we had such an occasion, and I thought that our FLR was over. The resolution was, that I no longer have an option of backing out of this FLR. She is wiser than me on this subject, and we reinforced her position in this respect: only she has the option to back out. I think that the way it is now, my ass would hurt in a bad way for a while if I tried. Yes, I know that some of you men think this is just what you want, but it is not really about what I want. It is about what is best for MW, because if it is good for her, it is good for me.

To re-emphasize the theme of this post, I will say this:

• I am committed to her, to our marriage, to our life. She is a good person whom I trust and respect. She is the mother of our children. I chose her to be my wife, and that is not a decision to undo because I am angry from time to time.
• I cannot, and would not abandon a person (her) who relies on me for love, support, and sex, given the above declaration.
• Our relationship may change over time, but my loyalty is unfailing. My wife need not worry about my withdrawing my support.
• FLR is a wonderful superposition on an already successful relationship. If or when FLR goes away, it need not destroy the underlying relationship.

If we revert to vanilla for whatever reason, none of the above will change. That is how I see my Female Led Relationship.

Poster Couple for FLR

Regardless of what I may have claimed or you assumed based on my writing, MW and I are not exactly the poster couple for FLR.

We, in the FLR movement, all have our own idea of what a dominant leading female and what a submissive male should be. Even though we largely agree in principle, I am willing to bet that not two of us would agree 100 percent on the details. The problem is that there are degrees of leaders and followers, and even the ideal combination is impossible to define. So how do we deal with the rest of us? I don’t know, but in any case, it is great fun pursuing, experiencing, comparing, and arguing the details.

For example, MW is not what I would call a typical alpha female. She is not even what I would call a great leader (she will probably have my ass in a vulnerable position for this). In the same vein, I am definitely not less than an alpha male, and I am somewhat of a leader, so I am totally unsuited to be a submissive. But neither comment by me should detract from the wonderful FLR that MW and I have. How can that be? Let me point out the ways.

I will be elaborating on the following covenant that are the bases of our FLR. Please withhold instinctive reactions to throw stones at me until you have read my description of the individual subject. Then comment all you want:

1. I Have Given to Her the Authority over Me
2. She is the De-facto leader
3. She Is not Expected to Do or not Do what I Require
4. She Has the Last Word
5. She Is not Expected to Give me a Life of My Fantasy
   And one final issue based on the above,
6. What if We Give Up on FLR?

I will give you the first installment here. You will have to wait for the others.

Poster Couple for FLR Part 1 - I Have Given to Her the Authority over Me

Oh my, that means that I had the power to do so in the first place!

Well, yes, in a way. A non-violent person does not just take over another person in our society. It takes both persons to accomplish that takeover. So, regardless of who does what to whom, at least in our case, I willingly gave to her the authority over me. That is not true in a legal sense unless backed up by the courts, but then we are not talking about that. We are talking about a loving personal relationship with one of the partners in charge.

This is not the “slavery” position in which I would have no property, no access to possessions, no social relationship, no outside world, unless she provides it. No, this is more of a benign ownership where the owner (MW) has my best interest while making sure that I do all that is expected of me in our behalf. This is easy for her, because it does not change anything outside of our FLR, but within the FLR she has all the rights. It is up to her what rights to exercise and what rights to allow me to exercise.

In a way the situation is comical. To the casual observer I am just a polite fellow. Only MW knows why I still do everything that I am expected to do even when we are with the unenlightened people. She is realistic enough to not expect me to do anything that would jeopardize our way of life, so we maintain a low profile unless we are in assured privacy. Only, MW and I know who holds my balls, so to speak, and I am very happy with it. This is sane and thrilling at the same time.

I will be dealing with the other parts of our covenant later. Do any of you care to comment on this part?