Last night I was poking around FetLife and came across a question about who pays on a first date in a power exchange. I had to read all the comments and add my 2 cents. lol If you know me at all you’re not surprised. ;P
I was delighted so see the first several comments talk about healthy relationship development and the D/s dynamic being solidified after a first date. Yay! Boundaries are such a good thing!!! 😉 Daddy and I met on FetLife and established our dynamic before we met. Every rule has an exception.
My mother was born in 1932. She was 38 when I was born. Needless to say, I was raised with some really old fashioned values and morals. The realm of dating is certainly one of them! It’s also one of the areas I’ve chosen to hold onto what I was taught. When I didn’t, I reaped what I sowed.
So alas, who pays on a first date? From my hetero standpoint, the man… always. I was raised that if a man can’t afford to date you there is no way he is ready for a wife and family. My mom was a 1950’s housewife. She was married in 1952 when women didn’t work and kept the house. There wasn’t really another option. I don’t view myself as dependent on my husband by any means. I do see value in dating a man who has his life together enough to buy me dinner now and then. Past the first date or two there is a natural rhythm which takes hold of sharing expenses. I am an independent feminist as heart, afterall.
I’m curious as to how others handled dating when they were single or how you do it now if you’re single.
Succulent Savage Says... 
Seems i have always paid. Now with Mistress Kate , She handles all the expenses. i did pay for the man pedis. I offered a few times when we were out. She did get upset with me, when i paid at one of the nicer places. i excused myself to use the rest room and happened to see the and paid.
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It’s such an individual choice. I like the varied answers. 🙂
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I definitely believe in the man paying on the first date. It’s not a matter of a man being “dominant” or the prospective gf/wife being submissive, but a man needs to show that he has the ability to provide for his family. Whether or not the man goes on paying after the first date, or on most dates, becomes the dom or sub to me is all beside the point because paying on the first date is just a good-faith show that the man will do his part to keep the family viable.
I’m the (sex) sub in our marriage, but financially we’re both equals. My wife and I have gone back and forth on who makes the most money. She’s pushed things so that our finances are equal between us regardless of who is making more at the moment. We both have strong white-collar careers that earn respectable money, but she wouldn’t have touched me if I didn’t show that I could hold my own financially as a family man… I proved that to her partially by paying for our dates.
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That’s exactly how I feel and my husband, too.
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I’ve always preferred to pay for my own food/coffee/whatever the first date was. That way there was no expectation of anything happening because someone felt entitled to it because they paid for me. The only exception was with Daddy as our first date was a weekend visit and I took/paid for a bus from NYC down to MD so I didn’t mind him picking up a meal or two to sort of even things out.
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I get your reasoning totally! When I’ve paid on a first date there’s been something wrong and I pay to separate myself from the guy. I flew from San Francisco to Boston for a week with Daddy when we first met IRL. 🙂
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Yeah, especially at first I don’t like having anything someone else can hold over my head. It’s just a survival tactic that my folks taught me.
That definitely makes for a neat and unique first date story! ^.^
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In 99% of dates, the guy has always paid for me. Normally a first date has been either a coffee or a glass of wine. There was no awkwardness, they took the initiative to place my order and pay for it. In the vast majority of cases nothing physically happened (I dated a lot of frogs before finding a prince).
But one date stands out in my mind. It was awful on so many levels. First of all, he was very fussy about where we sat. He picked a table near to the toilets. 😦 Then he told me he would “guard” our table, while I went and bought myself a drink, and then afterwards he wanted me to “guard” our table while he bought himself a drink. I remember standing in the queue thinking “this is going to be painful!” and noticed he was leering at my body.
That date was one of the worst I have ever been on. I have rarely come across a person with such a dull life and when he began to talk about his political views – I just knew there was no way on earth I ever wanted to encounter this man ever again.
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lol!!! My best worst date story was the guy who spent the entire date talking about his comic book collection and his ex-wife. I’ve never laughed so hard in my life. The guy was pathetic to an all new level. The stories he told of his ex were horrible… she walked all over him and still does. We both chose not to call each other again.
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I have always paid for first dates. After that sometimes we’ve gone Dutch and sometimes I’ve continued to pay.
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I don’t know I’ve never been on a normal date I don’t know how paying etc goes
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