"Pillow Princess": 5 Ways I'm Reclaiming the Title

The orgasm ratio between me and my male part­ners is eas­i­ly over 10:1 — 10 of mine for every one of theirs. I'm hav­ing a good time, and so are they.

So why does the inter­net seem to hate Pillow Princesses so much?

What is a Pillow Princess (or starfish)?

Let's start with what it means to be a Pillow Princess. The term was pop­u­lar­ized in the '90s to rep­re­sent a (usu­al­ly queer) woman who enjoys receiv­ing plea­sure but doesn't often return the favor. In het­ero rela­tion­ships, "starfish" is also a com­mon term to mean a woman who just lays there.

Either way, being a Pillow Princess is all about her. And that usu­al­ly comes with con­no­ta­tions of self­ish sloth and a dull experience.

Yet, I'm loud and proud about being one; I'd like to think my recep­tiv­i­ty to plea­sure makes me any­thing but bor­ing in bed. My Tinder bio men­tions "Pillow Princess" with­in the first para­graph, and I expect my male part­ners to either ask me about it or have looked it up before meet­ing me.

(I'm ver­sa­tile, though. With women, I'm more will­ing to be a ser­vice top — the par­ty who pleas­es Pillow Princesses. That's why most of this post is about being a pow­er bot­tom in my inter­ac­tions with men.)

What does being a Pillow Princess mean to me?

To put it blunt­ly, being a Pillow Princess means that I will nev­er have a hookup where a man comes but I don't. I always come first. (Again, about 10 of mine for one of theirs.) Because we go in with the expec­ta­tion that they're there to serve me.

It means that I've done the work in explor­ing my body to know what works for me, I ask for it, and I receive it in all its glo­ry. It's not about "just" pas­sive­ly tak­ing sex but active­ly con­sum­ing it.

And quite frankly, plen­ty of guys find that hot.

This brings me to my first myth-​busting rede­f­i­n­i­tion of the Pillow Princess lifestyle.

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Myth #1: "Pillow Princesses do nothing in bed and are by definition frigid and boring."

Reframe: Having screaming, shaking orgasms sure as hell isn't "doing nothing"!

I still like to show my part­ner that I'm hav­ing a good time, and that's plen­ty to get them going. Even when I'm lying down in mis­sion­ary and self­ish­ly tak­ing in plea­sure, my expres­sive­ness is overflowing:

• Gasping and shaking
• Eye con­tact when I come
• My hands on the sides of their face or nails dig­ging into their back
• Pulling them in for kiss­es so I can scream in their mouth when I come

If that's bor­ing to you, I don't know what to tell you. Also, con­sid­er that com­mu­ni­cat­ing about sex before and after to debrief about what you enjoyed is an active process.

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Not-quite-a-myth #2 but a philosophical disagreement: "Pillow Princesses don't give head or get on top."

Reframe: To me, being a Pillow Princess is more about the self-​serving state of mind than any specific action.

I expect my part­ner to do most of the work thrust­ing. Still, I'll hap­pi­ly get into cow­girl posi­tion if I think that's the posi­tion that would feel the best for me — and it often is because it allows me to angle and lever­age my hips for deep pen­e­tra­tion and cervix mas­sage.

In a sim­i­lar vein, I don't often give oral — but when I do, it's chiefly from a sensate-​focused point of view: does this action feel good to me? Giving a blowjob feels good to me because of:

• The way the penile glans squish­es and glides against my lips
• Tracing the con­tours and veins with my tongue
• The pal­pa­ble esca­la­tion as more blood rush­es in between thrusts and they get more turned on

I do it for as long as I'm hav­ing fun. While it might give me a lit­tle extra moti­va­tion if a part­ner is close to orgasm, I gen­er­al­ly stop when giv­ing oral stops feel­ing good for me. Beyond that, we switch to a dif­fer­ent activ­i­ty, or my part­ner can go jack off.

(Again, I was very clear about my expec­ta­tions as a Pillow Princess!)

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Myth #3: "Pillow Princesses are inherently submissive bottoms who like being dominated."

Reframe: "Bottom" is not synonymous with "submissive" or "masochist."

I've heard vari­a­tions of, "How can you be a Pillow Princess and a Domme or switch?" And I think people's sex lives would ben­e­fit from expand­ing their per­spec­tives on how dif­fer­ent BDSM iden­ti­ties overlap.

A bot­tom is some­one who receives the action, while a dom­i­nant makes demands dur­ing a scene. The for­mer is about the phys­i­cal act, while the lat­ter is about the psy­cho­log­i­cal role.

In my par­tic­u­lar brand of Pillow Princess life, I can:

• Command my part­ner to fuck me a cer­tain way
• Call him a good boy when he pleas­es me
• Taunt him into giv­ing me more
• Verbally rub it in that he's incred­i­bly lucky to be in my presence

That is Domming while bottoming.

Top/​bottom, Dom(me)/sub, and sadist/​masochist are dif­fer­ent axes, and there are many dif­fer­ent ways to com­bine these facets of BDSM.

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Myth #4: "Everyone wants to avoid Pillow Princesses."

Reframe: There's someone for everyone — including Pillow Princesses and service tops.

I don't think asym­me­try in a rela­tion­ship is inher­ent­ly wrong. The truth is that we're all dif­fer­ent peo­ple with dif­fer­ent sets of wants and needs. And maybe not every­one likes Pillow Princesses, but there are so many great peo­ple to date and hook up with out there, and plen­ty of them are eager to please. 

I'm not ask­ing that they (sole­ly) be sat­is­fied with bask­ing in my pres­ence. I want them to enjoy my enjoy­ment of sex. As long as you're clear about expec­ta­tions and they're enthu­si­as­tic about fit­ting the role, you do you, boo.

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Reframe #5: the overlap with Bijoux Indiscrets' Slow Sex Manifesto

Bijoux Indiscrets is a lux­u­ry body care and sex toy com­pa­ny based in Spain, focus­ing on decou­pling plea­sure from the con­ven­tion­al, male-​centric nar­ra­tives of "nor­mal" sex­u­al­i­ty. Their Slow Sex line, in par­tic­u­lar, strives to rede­fine fore­play — in their words, "Foreplay is much more than just a pre­vi­ous to some­thing that comes next; it is THE thing."

And this Pillow Princess jives with that. Because, too often, we're told that penis-​in-​vagina inter­course is the ulti­mate and every­thing else is "just" extra.

Fuck that; there's so much more to sex than "68 Ways to Blow His Mind." Blow your own fuck­ing mind. Learn about the full pow­er of the cli­toris and how to stim­u­late it from mul­ti­ple angles. Prioritize it with as much brava­do as our cul­ture gives to penis­es. This is the Pillow Princess way.

And if there's a foreplay-​enhancing prod­uct that will ground you and help you focus on your plea­sure, I fuck with that, too. Use my coupon code, SUPERSMASH15 for 15% off your entire pur­chase at Bijoux Indiscrets.

My favorite products from the Bijoux Indiscrets Slow Sex collection

Warming massage gel

Rub it all over your body or your partner's for an effort­less glide. Bijoux Indiscrets' Slow Sex warm­ing mas­sage gel is kiss­ably and lick­ably coconut-​flavored, plus it's infused with gin­seng for a warm­ing effect when you blow on the skin.

Oral sex balm

A plant-​based lip balm made from cas­tor and coconut oils and shea but­ter*, with men­thol for a slight cool­ing effect to con­trast with the warmth of your mouth. It's like lube for BJs but less gel-​like. This balm is wax­i­er for a dif­fer­ent tac­tile bal­ance between fric­tion and glide. A lit­tle of this oral sex balm goes a long way.

* Do not put oil-​based prod­ucts into direct con­tact with con­doms since they degrade latex.

Clitoral balm

Usually, I'm not too fond of cli­toral arousal gels because they're hit-​and-​miss, but the Slow Sex cli­toral balm is love­ly. It has gin­seng extract for a sub­tle warm­ing effect—key mod­i­fi­er: sub­tle, rather than any­thing intense or bor­der­line burning.

Thank good­ness; it's more like a grad­ual, ramp­ing esca­la­tion. Rub it on the cli­toris and labia to get your juices going. Keep it exter­nal, though. 

Full body massage gel

Another mas­sage oil? Well, kind of. This one has a less sticky and thin­ner, more slip­pery feel. It bor­ders on silicone-​like, while still water-​based, and with the same plant-​based emol­lient as Hathor/SUTIL's leg­endary for­mu­la. Most impor­tant­ly, it's less irri­tat­ing** to use internally.

** Compared to glyc­erin and propy­lene gly­col. If you're super sen­si­tive and super super prone to yeast infec­tions, though, I'd rec­om­mend using a dif­fer­ent per­son­al lubri­cant, such as Sliquid Sea.

The Slow Sex Manifesto tote bag

How could I not include it among my favorites? It has the Bijoux Indiscrets Slow Sex /​ UNAPOLOGETIC Manifesto embla­zoned on it, so you can show how loud and proud of a Pillow Princess you are, too.

Bijoux Indiscrets' Slow Sex Manifesto reads:

No fic­tion, no act­ing, no judge­ments, no com­par­isons, no fear, no guilt nor shame. Our plea­sure should be ruled by no one but our­selves and starts with self-​love, self-​respect, self-​knowledge and self-​acceptance. Pleasure knows no gen­der and sex­u­al free­dom shouldn't either. We claim the free­dom to feel and enjoy our­selves beyond any fic­tion­al or social estab­lished sex behaviors.

BIJOUX INDISCRETS

While it's not the exact same thing as the Pillow Princess mind­set, it's sim­i­lar­ly unre­pen­tant about a sim­ple but rev­o­lu­tion­ary state­ment: women can and should explore and enjoy sex, too — what­ev­er eth­i­cal enjoy­ment looks like to them. This is the Pillow Princess way.

(Again, the coupon code is SUPERSMASH15 for 15% off at Bijoux Indiscrets.)

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Disclosure and credits

Bijoux Indiscrets sent me their Slow Sex Experience Box for my hon­est review. This post includes affil­i­ate links, mean­ing that I receive a com­mis­sion at no extra cost to you when you shop Bijoux Indiscrets via my links.

For more ways to support Super Smash Cache:

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