How to vet a submissive

5 top tips for connecting with new and potential Submissives 

Have you just met a potential play partner but don’t know what your next step is? As a Dominant, meeting someone that you can visualise as a potential Submissive can be an exciting feeling, and it’s tempting to jump straight into play, but it’s important to vet them before you take your relationship further. In BDSM, vetting is the process of getting to know a potential Sub or Dom to test your compatibility and make an informed decision about how safely and consensually they practice.  

A common misconception is that there’s no need to vet Submissives because they’re less responsible for ensuring safety during scenes and they don’t need to worry as much about their Dominant’s boundaries. This article will prove that idea wrong by showing you how both parties within a dynamic have a shared responsibility to understand potential risks within a scene, as well as respecting each other’s boundaries.

The Talking Stage

It’s a good idea to learn about your potential Submissive as a person before anything else. You can chat online, over the phone, or in person if you’re both comfortable with it. The talking stage is a chance for you both to explore the non-kinky things about yourselves. What are their core values and beliefs? What’s most important to them in life? Outside of BDSM, what are their interests and hobbies? Discussing these topics proves that you’re interested in getting to know them before playing, which can reassure them and show that you care. 

If your vanilla talking stage goes well and there’s a mutual interest, it might be time to discuss what you’re both wanting out of your potential Dom/Sub dynamic. After all, the BDSM community covers such a diverse mix of kinks and dynamics, you should make sure you’re on the same page. 

The Kinky Questions…

Ask about what role/s your potential Sub identifies with to test your compatibility. For example, if you’re a soft Dom and they’re an extreme masochist, it’s unlikely that either of you will get what you want from this dynamic. Of course both of your roles can be flexible, but you should be somewhat on the same page.

Discuss your kinks and fetishes with your potential Submissive, and ask them to share theirs. Perhaps you have some in common, or perhaps there are some that you’d be open to exploring. It’s not a problem if you have differing interests as long as you’re respectful. Who knows – you might discover your new favourite kink!

It’s also helpful to cover the more logistical questions to make sure that the potential dynamic would be achievable and suitable for your lifestyles. Are you looking for a relationship or a casual play partner? Are you monogamous or non-monogamous? Would you prefer a part time or full time dynamic, and would this be online, in person, or long distance?

It may also be a good idea to ask your potential Submissive about their BDSM journey to grasp an idea of how experienced they are and how they’ve developed throughout their involvement. Here are some possible talking points…

• Asking how long they’ve been into kink and how they began their journey can be an indicator of how much experience a person has, as well as what attracted them to the BDSM community.
• How their roles, kinks and fetishes have changed and developed over time will give insight into how your potential Submissive found their identity and desires through kink.
• If you’re both comfortable sharing, discuss what both your favourite scenes have been so far. As well as this being a fun talking point, it’ll give you ideas about how to play with your potential Sub in the future.
• Ask what online or in person communities your potential Submissive is involved in and what events they’ve attended to learn about how active they are in the kink community and what practical experience they have. 

5 Top Tips for Vetting Your Potential Submissive

• Always organise a vanilla meetup first

Vanilla meetups – aka meeting in-person without playing – are essential to ensure you and your Submissive are compatible and that your connection will stand the test of time. They can be mutually reassuring that you are both interested in each other, and that you’re willing to wait for each other. It’s best to meet in a public place such as a café, bar or restaurant to feel safer. Vanilla meetups are also great for seeing whether there’s a spark between the two of you – something that you can’t quite feel over the phone.

• Ask them about their limits and boundaries

As a Dominant, it’s so important that you know and respect your Submissive’s boundaries. Submissives can only handle so much pain, which is why it’s important to know when to stop. Ask your Sub to share their soft and hard limits, and any kinks they don’t wish to explore. This’ll also help you to assess how well they know themselves and how well they can communicate boundaries. After they’ve shared their limits, share yours too and see how they react.

• Ask them to share any learnings from previous relationships

BDSM is all about learning and growing from your experiences. This is why it’s important for you and your potential Submissive to share your BDSM pasts, hold yourselves accountable for any mistakes you may have made, and discuss what you’ve learnt from previous relationships. Have your potential Sub’s previous partners taught them anything insightful about consent, boundaries or safety? 

• Assess their attitude around safewording and aftercare

Does your potential Sub have a safeword system and would they be confident enough to use it when needed? How would they respond if you were to use your safeword, and what kind of aftercare do they usually provide for their Doms? Your Sub should respect your signals during a scene and provide aftercare to avoid potential Dom drop, which happens when a Dom experiences overwhelming feelings of guilt or exhaustion. Receiving aftercare is as equally important for the Dom as it is the Sub, despite the misconception that only Doms are responsible for aftercare within the power dynamic.

• Assess how they value safety in kink

To discover what your potential Submissive already knows about safety in kink, ask them about SSC and RACK – two helpful ethical frameworks to consider during BDSM scenes. SSC (Safe, Sane and Consensual) encourages play partners to practice kink safely with voluntary consent on both/all sides. RACK (Risk Aware Consensual Kink) also ensures that there’s voluntary consent in a scene, but takes safety risks into account. Check that your potential Sub would be able to understand the potential risks of a scene and ask what they’d do to help prevent them. 

Red Flags:

Unfortunately, you might come across some red flags in your search for Submissive and during the vetting process. Here’s some to watch out for…

• • Can’t express wants and needs: Dom/Sub dynamics are supposed to be beneficial for everyone involved. If a potential play partner can’t express their own desires, will they be able to collaboratively build scenes or will they just go along with everything you suggest?
  • Pushes boundaries: If there’s trust and good communication between you and your potential Sub, it can be fun to explore your soft limits and try new kinks together. However, it could be a red flag if they pressure or guilt you into breaking your boundaries, or if they force you to break theirs.
  • Sub frenzy: When a potential Sub is eager to play immediately, or they tell you they don’t have limits, they may have Sub frenzy. This can happen when a Sub meets a potential play partner or finds a new community, and their overwhelming excitement makes them neglect the important bits of BDSM such as safety and limits.

• Trash talking or blaming previous Doms: It’s okay to open up about past experiences, but needlessly blaming or trash talking previous play partners and exes is not a good look. It’s also a bad sign if your potential Sub kinkshames or goes into detail about their previous Doms’ private information.

• Doesn’t feel the need for aftercare: Aftercare is important for everyone involved in a scene. If your potential Submissive insists they (or you) don’t need aftercare, they might be dismissive of your mutual wellbeing and therefore wouldn’t be ready to play. 

• Irresponsible during play: Unless you and your Submissive have agreed on intoxication as part of a scene, consuming drugs and alcohol to a messy or uncontrollable level can be a red flag. Because of the safety risks involved in some aspects of BDSM, it’s vital that your Submissive stays sober enough to make informed decisions and understand consent. 

Take your time in your search for a Submissive – the right person will come around eventually, and vetting will help you to find your perfect match. Vetting doesn’t have to be as boring and tedious as it sounds, it’s a great process to get to know potential Submissives on your terms and you might feel the spark you’ve been waiting for.