Confused about sex..

[eastpaint]

hi. i’m new here so i’m not sure if i’m allowed to ask questions like this. I started having sex with my boyfriend and i went on birth control pills as a backup to condoms. we’ve had sex three times so far. the thing is before I went on birth control, we’d have sex and he will say how much he loves me, how beautiful I am, how lucky he is to have me and how he never wants anyone but me. i love it. he’s really romantic during sex. nothing wrong with that.
well since I started on the birth control, its shifted my sex drive and my sexual desires a bit. so now (and i‘m shy about saying this even to people that don’t know who I am) i have fantasies about him being rougher with me i guess. more like submission and domination. we’ve talked about this kind of sex during dirty talk and we both enjoyed it. but i dont know how to ask him to do it during actual sex. i’m even nervous about saying it up here and i’m anonymous. we’ve been dating for a little under four years so i’m very comfortable with him. sometimes i still get shy about being sexual with him in fear that i’ll make a fool of myself or i’ll look weird or i’ll feel insecure. also i dont know if he’ll be comfortable with shifting from being romantic to being rougher (ahhh the embarrassment). but i really want to try it to satisfy my own needs and his. H E L P!!

[Heather]

You certainly are, and welcome to the boards.

It's very unlikely that this change in your desires was caused by the pill, in case that's a thing you were confused about. The kinds of sexual desires we feel are much more psychological and social than about just a couple of hormones.

It sounds like what you probably need before anything else is just to do some reading up about BDSM in general. That way you can get more comfortable with the things you want, find out what you need to talk with partners about with this and how to negotiate this kind of play, the works. Would you like us to suggest some information both on the site and outside of it, including books, so you can do that?

[eastpaint]

well we’ve done some research together before about it and we know what we both like and our limits. but the thing is i don’t know whether or not i should ask him to try it with me because i’m worried he’ll be frustrated trying to switch from being romantic to trying bdsm

[Heather]

Those things don't have to be mutually exclusive! They aren't for a lot of people who are in romantic relationships where BDSM is part of their sexual lives. Can you give me a sense of why you think those things are mutually exclusive?

Maybe also fill me in on what you've read so far on this (it might be what you've read about this isn't good or just isn't in depth enough to cover things like this)? Just knowing what you like and what you don't want to do sexually isn't much information, after all.

[Heather]

(Just FYI, I'm not actually on the schedule to work today, it's my day off, but I just wanted to come in and take care of everyone waiting. I'm heading out for now, but if someone else doesn't grab your next response, or doesn't feel able to give you some resources around this, I'll be back tomorrow and can do either or both!)