50 Shades of Ignorance

Many people are blogging about 50 Shades of Gray, and I read the post on This Thing Called Life, so I just had to throw in my opinion too. For the record, I have read all three 50 Shades books, plus I am 1/2 way through the 2nd book on audio. Yes, I love them, but for different reasons than you may think.

At this point my therapist would cringe and hug me at the same time. I tell her almost everything. Certain things, like the spanking I got the other night that left huge, beautiful bruises on my bottom, I would not disclose to her. She thinks that spanking that hard is going too far and I disagree. Every time I sit down I am reminded of how much my husband loves me. If I look at it in the mirror, I am amazed at how much I can take (or how soft my bottom is). And I want more. Right now. Eh...I digress...

My first impression of the trilogy is that it's hot, even though the scenes are not as intense as the Sleeping Beauty Trilogy (my favorite being The Claiming of Sleeping Beauty). But there are other sub plots going on, all at the same time, that kept me in the story. Most of the D/s play and sex is okay. But if you are reading the books just for that, prepare for some disappointment. Ana had so many subconscious thoughts that peppered the story so thoroughly I almost wonder, when they make the movie will it be a comedy? I certainly hope not. And please, PLEASE let Ian Somerhalder play Christian.

I must say that E.L. James' lack of literary prowess drives me insane. Why oh why does she have to use the term "envisage" so many times? Her writing is trite and I believe that the "big" words she used came from a word-a-day calendar. Some of the things she said about the west coast, especially in Oregon (where I'm from), were erroneous. To top it off, her audiobooks are read by Becca Battoe, who insists on a California accent, with a valley girl quality to it. You will not find that in Oregon. I have more of a northern California accent, and I lived in Oregon for 28 years. We're known for being an accentless people. The only thing that would be more annoying that Becca's inaccurate accent would be this interpretation.

With all this being said, (spoiler alert ahead) Christian has got some serious psychological issues that, while he is receiving professional help from the equally fictitious Dr. Flynn, would not be conducive to having any sort of relationship. After finishing the series, I could look back on the story and see how sick the entire thing was. Of course I felt sorry for Christian. But I also saw the depravity. He liked to beat little girls that reminded him of his mother, and then fuck them and discard them until the next weekend. These women got nothing from the relationship other than what he allowed. And because they were his submissives, they couldn't do anything other than what he said. But he didn't care for them really.

Here's what I got out of the books (as I said, it's for different reasons than you'd think); Ana was very vanilla and just like my Hubby, not very sexually experienced (ok, Ana was a virgin, but whatever). She had a need to be treated gently, wanting the romance of the relationship. Christian, much like myself, didn't want romance, he just wanted to fuck. It took those dynamics in the story for me to realize that I've been treating Hubby very badly. I haven't been respecting his need to make love. No wonder he didn't want to do it more than once a month. I was animalistic in my need for sex. And I'm ashamed to admit, it was all about me. Since my discovery, which I did tell my therapist about, I have tried to make a change to think about Hubby before myself. I can tell you this for sure, it's made love-making so much better. I am finding more satisfaction in pleasing him than in receiving my pleasure. I'm not sure I would've had this breakthrough without the book.

My therapist wants me to warn anyone and everyone I meet to not read the books. She hasn't read them either, so she doesn't even know what it's about. She just knows that several new clients have come in with trauma that will take years to undo, all because they read the books and acted on what they thought would be fun. Of all the ignorance! Even before I started bugging Hubby to spank me, I knew better than to try the things they were doing in the book. With two inexperienced people trying something that dangerous, of course someone is bound to get hurt. If you want to try something in the BDSM realm, do your research first, have clear communication, and go slowly. I wasn't prepared for how I would feel after my first spanking. Even my last spanking had me all out of sorts. So don't take this sort of play lightly! There...you've been warned. My job here is done.

Be good to each other. ;)