Dom/Sub? nope Just Always a slave

I recently posted on my Facebook about a medical challenge that I faced. You can find the full article here but in short, I’ve been going through some issues and ended up having to ask my doctor for a second opinion, as well as, report a facility for very inappropriate and unprofessional practices. And one of the comments in reply to my post was about how when it came to something like this, I had to be Dominant and not submissive and how you just couldn’t be submissive in this sort of situation. 

And that got me really thinking. First of all, I’m a slave, not a submissive, and for anyone who’s met me I definitely have a dominant personality, so the entire comment seemed ridiculous to me. Yet it’s been bugging me ever since I saw it.  When I think about it I think the reason it bothers me is, I did not see this as a dominant or submissive thing. I am a slave. I am always a slave and I acted as a slave in handling this. In reporting inappropriate behavior and in asking for a second opinion I acted like a slave.  

Now some of you are going to ask, “how on earth is doing these very aggressive things slave like?” A couple of the things about slaves in my community is that people do not want week slaves. They are looking for slaves who are strong, capable, and who will add something to their life other than a lot of work.  Very few Owners want a slave who they are going to have to micromanage all the time.  This takes a lot of work, effort, and timeout of their day. It’s very stressful and exhausting for an Owner to do this, and it requires a lot of them.  

When we talk about Master/slave,  Dominant/submissive, Owner/property relationships. These are all exchange relationships. Some of us call them Power Exchange relationships sometimes they’re called Authority Transfer relationships, but there’s always this concept of exchange.   It is a relationship where both people get something out of it. Now for someone who is self-owned, like me, how does this translate? How does this compare? 

Simple, when I reported the inappropriate behavior, I was serving my community. Just because it was only slightly traumatic for me and I have my PTSD under control enough that it was an annoying interaction, rather than a triggering interaction, does not mean that the next person who goes in won’t end up fully triggered or traumatized for the first time by inappropriate and uncaring medical professionals. As a slave, I serve. I serve my Owner, my friends, my family, and my community. If I didn’t report these inappropriate actions, I would not be serving my community. When it came to asking for a second opinion, again it was a service-based decision. One of the things that has been very difficult for me to embrace but I am learning to is that in order to serve, I need to be at my personal best. The closest to perfect health, perfect mental health, and perfect financial health that I can be.  The more I have, the more I can serve others. I can’t help someone in need if I don’t have the money or resources to be able to assist them. I can’t teach as many classes if I’m in constant agonizing pain from a condition that the first doctor did not treat. So again it was a service-based slave decision.  I can’t serve my community if I don’t get this taken care of, so in order to serve them, I need to get a second opinion, stand up for myself and my medical rights and get this taken care of now. The second doctor has been phenomenal and I suspect inside of two months we will have this completely taken care of. She is very proactive and definitely on my medical team. 

For those of you who don’t know or have forgotten, I have fibromyalgia. It took seven years of going to different doctors and being referred around and being told it was all in my head or that it didn’t happen for me to finally get the diagnosis of fibromyalgia. I was during the time that biro as a diagnosis was just being recognized. I still remember being in my PCP’s office and her telling me we’ve got one more test to run and if you are lucky you’ll have lupus. When I asked her why that would be lucky she said,  “because I know how to treat that otherwise it’s fibromyalgia and I don’t know what to do for you.” Unfortunately, I don’t have lupus. Or perhaps fortunately because of those 7 years of struggling,  being in pain,  suffering from something nobody knew about really,  I learned a lot about the medical system.  And in the following years, I continue to learn about patient advocates when to ask for referrals or second opinions. Because when you have an” invisible illness” or an illness that isn’t understood and you suddenly end up in agonizing pain and have to go to the ER and they don’t know what’s wrong with you. Often times they start treating you like a med seeker and you have to ask for a patient advocate in order to be taken seriously. Now I’ve only actually spoken to a patient advocate twice because asking for one suddenly increases the care all the doctors and nurses are willing to give instantly.

So for those of you who are uncomfortable trying to take care of your own health or demanding from the medical system what you need in order to care for yourself remember that you cannot serve to the best of your ability if you are not in position for you. Now my peak condition varies a lot depending on how my fibro is doing.  It varies from day to day, hour to hour, and even minute by minute.  And that’s okay.

One of the best pieces of advice I have ever gotten is:” try to be your best self in this moment, and this one, and this one, and… I think you get the idea. It’s simple, It’s not about being dominant or submissive. It’s not about what you identify as. It’s about finding what value(s) you want to live your life by and choosing to find a way to do that no matter what. For me the value is service. What value do you have that helps you live your life?  That drives you to get up out of bed each day and to live a fulfilling life instead of just surviving? If you don’t know, I am creating a values card deck where you can sort through multiple values and play around with them and see which one fits so sign up for my Patreon or newsletter to know when it is ready. Thank you and I hope you all have a wonderful day!