It is very possible to abuse and eventually burn out your top, and it will almost inevitably lead to the dissolution of a relationship if you are not considerate of your dominant/top partner's emotional needs because you are pushing too hard to satisfy your own.

Some dominants/tops find that they enjoy "punishment" scenes, where they must maintain their authority forcefully in the face of rebellion. Others seldom or never want to spend their time and energy "forcing" an unruly submissive to obey them if loyalty and trust are not given willingly and freely.

It can be physically and emotionally exhausting to maintain your authority as a dominant/top in the face of constant rebellion and challenge, and the majority of the people I know in the scene simply aren't willing to play that way for any length of time, and certainly not in a relationship with their primary partner.

There is a well-known phenomenon in the BDSM community which has been called "burnout" or "dom burnout". In some situations, one partner (or one person with multiple partners) must constantly function as the strong and dominant individual, may take physical and/or emotional responsibilityfor the well being of their partner(s), and is always the nurturer and caregiver hirself.

If this person has no balancing factors in hir life and nowhere that sie feels that sie is able to relax and recieve care and nurturing hirself, it can easily lead to "dom burnout".

Practicing BDSM does not excuse anyone from practicing normal consideration and care for your partner in a relationship, no matter what gender or sexual/BDSM orientation you are. I wish I could double-bold emphasize these words and shout them from the rooftops, because I have seen more relationships destroyed in my community for lack of this understanding.

The negotiated rules of a BDSM relationship do not replace the normal standards of mutual caring and respect and compassion that exist in any primary love relationship; they stand beside them and enhance them deeply.

Even in relationships that are structured as secondary or tertiary, where the only relationship that does exist is the D/S bond, what we term "normal" caring and consideration for your partner is what carries these relationships through harder times and makes them endure.

I have seen many "submissives" so deeply hungry to have their own needs to submit or to bottom satisfied that they treated their tops like fantasy objects which existed to fulfill their needs and not as human at all. Some may confuse fantasy with reality and claim to be lifestyle submissives when their actual desire is to bottom masochistically and their temperment unsuited to actually submit as opposed to bottom for occasional pain play.

Dishonesty, whether deliberate or the inadvertent result of inexperience with one's own real needs and desires, is a poor basis for negotiating a relationship or even a scene.

Your dominant/top is a human being as well, first and foremost; and if you forget this and attempt to use hir as merely a blank stone wall to bounce your fantasies off of, you are not likely to keep hir as your dominant/top for long. Or perhaps worse, you may end up in an unhappy and unhealthy co-dependent relationship in which neither partner is really fulfilled and at least one partner feels constantly drained and pushed and stressed by the demands of the other.

Traditionally, the role of the caretaker and nurturer in the relationship is assigned to the dominant partner, but this does not always have to be so. In fact, if you can seperate these dynamics at least some of the time, your relationship is almost certain to be the stronger for it.

Even in the most TPE (total power exchange) relationship, where one partner is always and forever dominant and in control, the status of permanent Master or Mistress does not imply a lack of humanity and normal human susceptibility to stress and hard times.

If your dominant comes home from a very hard day and is obviously physically and emotionally exhausted, it is definitely a poor time to play rebellious slave and demand to be punished. Try offering a hot cup of tea or a footrub instead, and be willing to be totally undemanding and to allow hir some quiet time alone if that is what is most needed.

Demanding attention and caretaking for yourself is permissible at times, but you must be sensitive to when it is appropriate and when it might put more stress on your partner than sie needs at the moment.