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My Magazine > Editors Archive > Sexpert > DRessed As a Girl
DRessed As a Girl   by Cleo Dubois

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In her 20-plus years of kinky experience, Ms. Cleo Dubois has studied ritual piercings among primitive tribes, acquired expertise in rope bondage, and developed her own special fire at the end of a whip. Cleo's DVDs, The Pain Game and Tie Me Up, are seminal works in the field of BDSM education (available online at http://www.cleodubois.com/video.htm). Cleo presents seminars and weekend Intensives around the San Francisco Bay Area. In fact, her reputation for intense workshops and in-depth understanding of the rituals of BDSM has made Ms. Dubois a favorite guest presenter at major leather conferences throughout the country.

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DRessed As a Girl (D.R.A.G.)

Much like BDSM explorations, gender fluidity is becoming more visible and gaining some recognition. I was so happy to see the Golden Globe best actress award go to Felicity Huffman for her role as a transgendered woman in TransAmerica. I loved this quiet independent film that, along with Brokeback Mountain, shows how our culture is changing. The night I saw it, the packed audience of everyday folks burst into applause as the end credits rolled.

It made me flash back on the narrow view I used to have on matters of gender, from playful cross-dressing to trans-sexuality. When I came out into the Scene, I did not understand why some submissive men wanted to wear lingerie in the dungeon. Over time, I learned that, for some, dressing in soft fabrics, nylons and sexy panties is a fetish that turns them on, and for others, it is humiliating in a hot, erotic sort of way.

I came to respect the men who desired to let out their genuine inner feminine personae. I saw how that exploration allowed them to experience service and surrender at my command. However, I do recognize that gender play can radically push boundaries, yours and those of your partners. Yet, we all have a feminine and a masculine side and fit all along the gender spectrum from femme fatale to macho man and transman to transwoman.

Unlike transsexuals, who might seek gender reassignment, cross-dressers are not interested in permanent transformation. Yet, sometimes the experience they have playing with gender roles affects other parts of their lives in ways they never imagined. Like Richard, from Nebraska, who reads my column here and sent me his reflections of the last time he visited me:

Dear Cleo,
I'm just writing to let you know that I think of you often, because you have taken me often to a very special place. A place where ropes cinched tight around stockinged legs still the trembling of knees that totter on high-heeled feet. A place where the corset laces are pulled hard by your hands, stiffening the spine for what is to come.

The lipstick, a bruised red, was the finishing touch. You smell of leather and a dark perfume as you smooth it out with your finger and tell me to stand, turn, and face the mirror. I gasp at the demure figure with the long blonde hair in the mirror before me and feel transformed and yet utterly myself, another side of myself. "What a lovely sissy slut you are," you say admiringly. "Shall we begin? Follow me to the dungeon.”

Kissing your whip, I shiver in anticipation, my aroused nipples hard against my corset. “Breathe,“ you remind me, and my feet steady for the tomcat, which whistles through the air, its slap driving me forward, until the bondage restrains me.

As my body begins to glisten and glow, you lower the corset’s bra cups, putting clips connected by a chain on each quivering nipple and pulling me to you. My nipples are ablaze.

"Are you my little slut girl?"

"Yes, Madame,” I reply.

"Your clit is so hard," you observe, rubbing the silk below. I am choked with desire and submission at your touch. My nipple explodes like a drop of water on a hot skillet as you remove the first clamp, then the other. As you roll them roughly between your fingers, moans escape and my lips murmur, "Thank you Madame, thank you Madame" like a mantra as my cock/clit bursts into flame.

You always took me to a place that was more exciting and complex than I had imagined, a place where my skin was alive from head to toe and I was moved by feelings and desires I did not previously know, as a man, that I possessed. You named my inner sissy slut Suzie. You gave me her to take home, cherish, and appreciate. Now, after suffering a heart attack, I realize that it is Suzie who helps me get into a trusting space with the skilled people who want to take me somewhere else (in this case to better health). I thank you for what I learned as your “girl,” made up, bound and corseted.

Thank you still,
Richard


Letters like that touch my feminine heart very deeply. I admit that I am a true femme. I wore blue jeans and a flannel shirt only once and that did not feel right to me. On the other hand, my very close friend, a bisexual married woman whom I have identified in this column before as my boi Sam, finds going out shopping in a skirt and sweater more than mildly humiliating!

As she says, “In high school, they called girls like me tomboys. As a teenager, I never understood why I had to cover my nipples when guys didn’t have to. I have never been femme. My only female role models have been Mae West and Katherine Hepburn: definitely female, but with a toughness that exudes masculine power. Now when I look at pictures of me from the 6th grade, I can see the boy inside and it looks like I am, as Shakespeare wrote, in ‘drag,’ dressed as a girl.”

Sam recalls, “one night, I went to a party in San Jose in jeans instead of fetish wear. When I arrived, there was this St. Andrew’s cross on a stage at the far side of the large room. Instead of being seductive and sensuous like he usually is, my husband tied my hands roughly and yanked down my jeans, and all of a sudden this bad boy came from somewhere deep inside me and said, oh yeah! I kicked and fought and made it as tough for him as he was making it rough for me and we opened a brand new door in our SM relationship. We had the hottest sex that night!”
In the years since, playing with that boi persona has given Sam newfound confidence. “I feel like I have definitely connected with one of my core archetypes. I am fortunate, too, because he loves the boi in me, and encourages me to explore my masculine energy in every way, including the tickle of my growing mustache.” They have found the joyous eroticism of strap-on sex, just like this wonderful couple who I recently coached in D/s skills and protocol in the privacy of my dungeon.

They, too, loved each other and were interested in making their long-term relationship hotter in the bedroom. As I told them, playing with your inner erotic personas increases your acceptance of each other and spices up your sex life.

When couples come to me to explore their gender and BDSM dynamics, I assist them in creating mutually satisfying play. Though they tend to arrive at my door nervous and unsure, by the time they leave, they’ve got a bounce in their step and big smiles on their faces, ready for their next adventure. What a joy!

Join me next month when I will share with you my secrets for ethically negotiating hot, fulfilling kinky play.

In leather pride, with heart,

Cleo Dubois

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Here's what Cleo has coming up:

1) The Erotic Dominance Intensive Weekend for Dominant Men & Men Who Switch
February 4-5, 2006
The SF Citadel, San Francisco
Meet & Greet Friday evening February 3
Hands-on training, Limited to 8 students - Enrolling Now!
Teachers: Cleo Dubois and Eve Minax
http://www.sm-arts.com/mens-intensive.htm
http://www.sm-arts.com/mens-application.htm

2) The Erotic Dominance Intensive Weekend for Dominant Women and Women Who Switch
March 25-26, 2006
The SF Citadel, San Francisco
Meet & Greet Friday, March 24
Hands-on training, Limited to 8 students - Enrolling Now!
Teachers: Cleo Dubois and Eve Minax
http://sm-arts.com/players-course.htm
http://sm-arts.com/players-application.htm