As many of you know, I offer BDSM Coaching & Consulting services as part of My practice.

A few weeks ago, The Guardian’s Sofia Barrett-Ibarria interviewed Me for her piece on this very topic. The original article is below. Enjoy!

Why I ditched my therapist to hire a dominatrix instead

“My dominatrix life coach isn’t afraid to hurt my feelings – she’s brutally honest and has no time for my excuses“

“I love therapy, but I didn’t love my therapist. She was young, like me, and new – the best I could find with my cheap insurance. I was her first real client, she was thrilled, I was broke and depressed.

Over the course of our six months together, we often sat through extended periods of silence, each of us desperately searching for something to say. Other times, I rambled about how pointless my life felt, the crushing guilt and fear of abandonment that follows me everywhere, and ill-timed thirst traps, just to fill the space. I did my best to entertain her with overshares and regrettable sex stories from my life as a sad yet charming bisexual, and for a while, that was fine, until I ran out of stories and we fell back into silence. I left our sessions feeling worse than I did when I arrived.

I quit therapy because I needed help from someone who knew what they were doing, and possibly even more importantly, who knew what I was doing, or what I should be doing. I didn’t want another therapist; I wanted someone to just tell me what to do, who could kick my ass and tell me to cut the bullshit. I wanted motivation, advice and accountability from a woman who spanks grown men for a living.

So I hired a dominatrix.

In addition to more typical services like fetish play, bondage and corporal punishment, some professional dominatrixes offer life coaching services that focus on confidence-building and improving self-esteem, though many also offer help with anything from fitness goals, dating and professional development.

“Many dommes offer some version of this service,” said the Los Angeles-based dominatrix Princess Marx, whose services include traditional fetish play as well as lifestyle coaching. “Men, women and everyone in between tend to come to me for one of two reasons: to gain new skills for BDSM play inside and outside the bedroom or dungeon, or to improve confidence in non-kinky aspects of life – to learn how to ‘make life their bitch,’ as I like to say.”

Princess Marx conducts sessions with clients all over the world either by phone, video chat, or in person.“I make an action plan with my client that outlines their goals, and we decide on a timeline. We also agree on a set of incentives and disincentives, or ‘rewards and punishments’. Punishments typically do not involve any physical pain, but can if the client prefers. We use whatever is going to be most effective.”

Life coaching of any kind isn’t a licensed profession, which means that coaches aren’t subject to the same requirements, regulations and ethical codes as licensed therapists. “Any coach worth their salt will know when a client’s concerns are beyond the scope of coaching, and would be better served by referring them to a therapist,” adds Princess Marx. “This is crucial, in my opinion.”