The Trust & Thrust Podcast

Read time: 10 minutes.

“Having a solo podcast is like having an OnlyFans for your heart.” That’s how comedian Annie Lederman described her old, solo podcast, Meanspiration, and I couldn’t agree with her more. For that, and other reasons, I just ended The Trust & Thrust Podcast at 122 episodes. Although, the decision has made me sad in a weirdly romantic way, I’m also really proud of the archive I’ve created and I think I stopped at the perfect time.

So, without being pejorative, I want to explain why I started my podcast in September of 2020. Let’s start with some phrases you might be familiar with: “It depends on the person” + “BDSM is all about communication” + “Kink is about consent” + “Boundaries and negotiation are key”. These are phrases that we hear bazillions of times in BDSM and they are not wrong, they are just… very vague.

The truth is, BDSM is emotionally messy from all angles. It’s a study in identity and that is fertile ground for lots and lots of weird feelings, not just the desired feelings of dominance and submission. I’ve heard pro BDSM referred to as ‘black market therapy’ and for good reason. As the facilitator, there’s a lot to learn and when I went searching for content about all this nitty-gritty, ooey-gooey behind the scenes weirdness, I simply couldn’t find what I was looking for. Not within the professional side of things, at least.

I was craving something candid, unsanitized and granular. Something without the caveats and qualifiers and generalizations. I wanted to hear more specific opinions and experiences with less generalizations. I felt like most content was more of a sales pitch intended for potential submissives whereas I wanted to hear more about the real world experience and struggles of someone who works as a Pro Domme, like myself.

Most approaches are born from a myriad of missteps, sleepless nights, hurt feelings and failed relationships so, where are those stories? I wanted to hear other Dommes talk about burn out, feeling insecure, being rejected by subs, making money, and the lack thereof. I wanted to hear the conversations I was having privately, talked about openly. There were so many subjects that felt taboo like service topping, gatekeeping, plagiarism and experiencing imposter syndrome - but so little content.

None of this is to say that there aren’t other Pro Dommes creating insightful content, there certainly is! I just found myself craving something very specific, until I finally realized I felt compelled to add my, specific perspective to the communal story of FemDom.

So, you get the point, I couldn’t find it so I started making it. That’s the main intention behind The Trust and Thrust podcast. Also, there was always a low-key part of me that hoped other Dommes would listen. My subscribers were almost entirely prospective or current subbies but that little wish persisted.

Also, after a little introspecting and a chat with a friend, I realized that a substantial slice of me was subconsciously making this podcast for my former self, Baby Domme Bastienne circa 2015. I wanted to reach back and tell myself about everything I’d learned - all the mistakes, the pitfalls, the revelations, the hard times, where to push through and where to lean in, the good, the bad and the fugly. I wanted to make a realistic and usable roadmap for my former self, and everyone else, to hopefully help navigate through some of the tougher bits.

Yep, cathartic and cute as hell.

So, that’s the origin story, now let’s get to the content! You can subscribe to my podcast on substack for $7/month. That is the only place where the full archive exists. You can also find the free, sampler mini-sodes on Amazon Music, Spotify, YouTube and iHeartRadio. So as a nerd, I’ve gone ahead and organized my favourite posts into a few categories below so please enjoy!

Listener Favourites

These are the episodes that I hear the most about in-person. As someone who loves having epiphanies, I quite enjoy gifting them as well. The problem is, communicating a concept in a way that ‘clicks’ with others is a whole process in and of itself. I’ve had so many experiences where I’ve reiterated the same point over and over for years to minimal avail.

I often feel compelled to experiment with slightly different articulations of the same point until I start eliciting an - AHA! - moment. Sometimes I strike gold with an idea or analogy that seems to hit home with multiple people. It’s my favourite feedback and eliciting revelations from other is an addictive pursuit. So here’s the episodes and the underlying ideas that seemed to stick out to listeners the most.

I’ve said a version of “give up control” or “let me lead” or some other, polite variant of “don’t tell me what to do” a million times but in this post about expectations, I discovered a more direct way of phrasing the same idea that really seemed to hit home with listeners. The concept is simple: Don’t use ‘you can do _____’ phrasing with me, instead, use ‘I would like _____’ phrasing. This is more direct and a lot less power bottom-y.

The next listener favourite is a somewhat salty episode called “Filming Clips". A lot of people who submit to me also watch FemDom clips. That fandom often translates into an excitement and overconfidence that I have to gently (or not so gently) quell. People who appear in clips will often conflate their guest appearance with the role of director, cinemetographer, costume designer, lighting director or some combination of the above.

I’ve learned to accept this behaviour as excitement and perhaps a parasocial relationship with the theatre of FemDom clips but ultimately, it’s annoying as hell and one of my least favourite parts of this job. Whenever I start receiving advice and ‘talking shop’ with a person who has never done my job or any reasonable facsimile of it, my vagina starts drying up and sewing itself shut.

In this episode, I talked all about that as politely as I could manage and, after I posted it, I spent a week fielding apology after apology from subbies who realized the error in their ways after listening to this episode. All apologies were happily accepted and everyone went about their merry way afterwards.

Another popular episode was one called “BDSM Love Story". It’s an episode about how I met the love of my life in a ballbusting session. I get all verklempt in it and I was genuinely surprised by the popularity of this one. The feedback was oddly wholesome.

Another revelation inducing episode was “Trampling & Time Theft”. In the recommendation segment, I give advice to those people who are struggling with the actual practice of giving up control in a real session. The concept of submission is deceptively simple. The experience is subjective, complex and often ephemeral so I like sharing as much as I can about the process of turning theory into practice.

The below screen grab is just another way of simplifying the complex idea of ‘submission’. By gamifying the process and thinking of it as a tally board of yes’s and no’s, it helped some people feel less overwhelmed about what their quantifiable goals in session were.

Excerpt from the episode titled “Trampling & Time Theft”.

Another subject that elicited quite a bit of feedback was an episode all about erectile dysfunction and how you can use it to your advantage in kink. Taking things that are shameful and making them sexy is precisely what BDSM is all about so, in this episode, I walk everyone through the very real example of using ED to elevate your sexy times. The episode is very cheekily called “I put the FUN in erectile dysFUNction!”

And last but not least, I’ve saved the most favouritists of favourites for last! An episode called “The Gayest Fetishes of All” that undoubtedly received the most positive feedback of any episode. In it, I suggest that there is actually a distinction between a homoerotic fetish and actually being gay. There’s many examples of this phenomenon throughout FemDom, check out the full episode to hear all the gay details.

Heart Racers

You know that feeling when you walk into a store and there are a few cash registers open but everyone is standing in one line waiting for just one cashier? You look at the other two, open cashiers and blink a few times to make sure you’re seeing things correctly. You join the long line and wonder how no one else is noticing the other, open lines.

You wait a minute before sheepishly moving towards one of the open cash registers, looking back at the long line to see if anyone notices what you’re doing. As you’re imagining some confrontation in your head, you look up and realize that you were just in the line for customer service. It’s a line of people waiting to get refunds or exchanges.

That is the very familiar and necessary feeling of conformity. As social beings, stepping outside of it, will always be a little scary - and for good reason. Few people want to be wrong, look stupid or want to provoke a confrontation but, sometimes, non-conformity is needed and sometimes it’s as simple as stating the most obvious thing. That’s what this “heart racers” section is all about. These are subjects that made me feel like I was stepping out of line and made my heart beat a bit (or a lot) faster when posting.

There’s lots of positioning and hierarchy management that happens in BDSM. Titles, education, experience, social media stats, membership to / participation in communities are all ways that people position themselves over (and under) others. Once I earned a few of my own stripes, I became disillusioned by the whole thing and made this post: “What is Lifestyle FemDom? and why it (almost) doesn't fuckin' matter ;)”

Another salacious subject: Plaigarism in professional BDSM, which I’ve also posted about here on my blog. How about talking about burn out? That’s a scary one. Or how about talking about getting ::clutches pearls:: OLD?

The subject of getting old in BDSM is a spicy one.

Money has to be one of my favourite (scary) subjects to talk about. I’ll never forget a tweet I saw when I first joined Twitter, years ago. I’ve since tried to find it again but couldn’t so I’ll paraphrase. It was from a Pro Domme and she said something to the effect of: “All the Pro Dommes are out here pretending to be rich and all the rich subs are pretending to be poor.” If it was appropriate to put 75 cry laughing emojis in a blog post, I would, right here.

Anyhoo, here’s my episode about why professional domination costs so much and another one called “Let’s Talk About Money, Honey!” where I talk about the disconcerting overlap between FemDom and financial domination and my decision to add FinDom to my list of hard limits.

Last but not least is a post called, “Escape From the Man Haters Club” where I talk about how FemDom actually cured my prejudice against men. Tis a strange and totally unexpected result of this job that flies in the face of the stereotypical narrative where misandry, female supremacy and women radicalized against men is either the foundation or the goal. I had never heard this perspective before so I decided to make an episode about it.

Inside Baseball

Most people have some level of curiosity about what happens in kink. It seems to be ubiquitously freakish and novel to outsiders. Whether they are bewildered by pain play or perplexed by what motivates a person to pursue certain, seemingly strange activities, almost everyone has some, passing interest in BDSM. Simultaneously, most people are comfortable leaving the majority of those questions unanswered, viewing the whole thing from afar as a kind of, mildly interesting, anomaly.

NOT ME. I prefer to nerd out with my bird out.

I have been utterly transfixed on the mechanisms that animate sexuality ever since I can remember. I have a deep, persisting (slightly annoying) love of figuring things out, particularly concerns of motivation, psychology, intention, behaviour and anything relational.

After almost a decade of deciphering, I’ve created a collection of posts for other kink nerds who are trying to figure themselves, and others, out. Here’s some of the posts that give a glimpse behind the curtain, into what I’ve discovered about the professional BDSM industry.

“A Funhouse Called Control” outlines the ‘real’ motivation of those who are seeking submission and how I work with all kinds of different people to get it from them consensually. “Behind the Curtain” is - you guessed it! - a peak behind the curtain, an opus of sorts, of everything I’ve learned about the actual mechanisms of professional BDSM, beyond the imagery and fantasy.

Next up: A salty rant about the fetishization of female dominance. “Yes, Mistress!” - “Your wish is my command!” - “I worship you, Goddess!” and other generic, vapid, actionless things that people say to me. The intent is good - I guess? Being worshipped is supposedly the best thing in the world, according to those people but did you know it actually kind of sucks? Yeah. The whole thing can be dehumanizing, objectifying and often teeming with power bottom-y communication. It feels like someone ordering for you at a restaurant and insisting, “oh, you’re going to love it!” It’s like - Am I though?

Although my tagline is publicly ‘Toronto’s Playful Dominatrix’, anyone who knows me, knows that my real, low-key tagline is “FemDom for People Who Hate FemDom” and this episode is a perfect, spicy rant all about feeling diminished and powerless by supposed worship.

“I Keep The Wolf From The Door” is an episode where I detail getting manipulated by a submissive when I was less experienced. I wanted to talk about this because it’s a situation that counters the narrative that Dommes should always be in control. We get deceived and, sometimes, even abused too and it’s important to talk about.

“How I Plan a Session” is just a great insight into how I actually curate sessions. I know there’s a lot of mystery surrounding the process but mine is fairly straightforward. In the episode I walk you through what I plan, how I do that and what I choose to improvise.

“The Shame of Being a Domme” is an important one to me because sometimes I feel like everyone talks about the shame associated with sexual submission but what about all the shameful parts of being a Domme? In this industry, people blow a lot of smoke up your ass but, I think, it’s important to not get (too) high on your own supply. I talk about the pitfalls of roleplaying as a narcissist, the silliness of wearing costumes as an adult, the nausea of incessant self promotion and the ickiness of having a phone full of pictures of… yourself.

The episode titled “Bum Sniffing & Blame” includes a couple of gems. In it, I talk about how the end of (almost) every professional relationship I have, inevitably, ends with me being dumped. I talk about grieving for lost subbies while also being happy for them and practicing non-attachment. I also talk about the blame game that often happens after sessions and my constant struggle with educating, particularly inexperienced kinksters, about the difference between a hard limit, a feeling, your problem, my problem, an incompatibility or an opportunity. A big part of my job is teaching people to control themselves above all else and it’s quite the task.

Under The Hood

This section is for submissives who would like a little, extra insight. I love the post called “Next Level Submission” because it totally deconstructs this very common goal. In it I talk about the subjectivity and vagueness of that objective and how easily it can be packaged and sold as snake oil if you’re not paying attention.

“Practice Makes Pervert” is an episode all about the very popular and pervasive fantasy of training in BDSM. Many folks, subconsciously, enjoy the idea of a power dynamic where they are the student and a more experienced teacher molds them into some sort of kinky toy. Most training, in reality, is roleplay. Few folks are actually interested in investing the time and effort into practice outside of sexy times. Tis all good but nice for us nerds to know to avoid frustration and misunderstandings.

I can’t even tell you how many people apologize to me about their bodies. I’ve heard it all from every type of person. It got to the point where it actually started to help me with my own body image because I realized that everyone, and I mean everyone, has some issues with their body. Knowing that it’s normal and part of owning a body is kind of a relief. Listen to the full episode called “Body Scrimmage” here.

There was a period right after the initial lockdowns, sometime in 2021 where I noticed that I was dealing with a massive influx of folks with, what seemed like, ADHD of the dick. BDSM, and sexuality in general, requires a bit of patience and attention to detail if you want to get good at it. In “Cocks with ADHD” I talk about dealing with this frustrating phenomenon.

Before I wrap this post up, I’d like to give an honourable mention to the episodes I’ve done with Aspasia The Great, all of which you can find here. They are among the most listened to podcasts and for good reason. Besides working together, Aspasia and I approach BDSM and kink in similar ways and it’s great to sit down and chat with someone who knows my job inside and out and has at least 10 years of experience on me. Go subscribe to her podcast on substack as well - AspasiaTheGreat.substack.com :)

I’d also like to make a side note here that I hadn’t found the content of Morgan Thorne prior to starting The Trust & Thrust Podcast. If I had, I’m not sure I’d be as motivated to create this content. Tis a moot point now but if you like the subjects I cover, you’ll likely enjoy Morgan Thorne as well. She covers subjects from a more technical perspective and has a medical background and tons of experience. Her YouTube channel is an awesome resource.

So, like I said at the beginning of this post, it was never my intention to keep going forever with my podcast. It was always to express those granular, specific and personal viewpoints that I felt weren’t being talked about. The ending quietly snuck up on me and I was searching for content ideas and getting more and more vague by the end of 2022. I realized that all the nitty-gritty subjects were basically covered and I had slipped into repeating those generic phrases that used to frustrate me before. “It depends on the person” - “it’s all about communication” - all the usuals.

Again, it’s not that those sentiments are wrong, they are just vague and once I found myself in that cycle, I knew it was time to wrap things up. My last episode was posted on February 22nd and although it was an oddly emotional goodbye, I’m also really proud of the archive I’ve created. I genuinely hope that you subscribe and find something useful from all my ponderings.

Thanks for reading!