Why do you want to be shrunk?
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So, I’ve been pondering some story ideas for awhile, but I’ve realized I don’t understand something on a fundamental level, something that’s holding me back from lighter content: ladies, why do you want to be shrunk?
It’s just I need to understand a character’s major motivations to write them well, and I don’t get that. I get it as, like, a means to an end: hot person wants you to shrink (which I get intellectually but only see it in SM content, and don’t get the pull of doing it for a man, though I can get the logic), or it’s to save your life, or your family, or maybe you want to be partake in the never ending orgy of being part of in the lonely and somewhat bored shrunken harem of a giant big enough and with enough other bodies to easily lose track of you in the crowd (which is something I’m exploring in a few different flavors).
I can figure out how a SW might use being an SW, and maybe even enjoy parts of it (a cupcake big enough to sleep on!), but so much of my SW logic process revolves around a fight for control against the reality of the situation: use the Big for protection from the world. Make the Big like you so they don’t abandon you. Make the Big want you so they don’t hurt you. Bully a smaller SW so you feel big for awhile.
All of that tracks. But clearly, there’s an element of pleasure to it, something that makes people go, ‘I’m fine giving up my ability to actively do what I want, and instead give my life and death into the hands and involuntary movements of someone else’, or even just ‘all of that happened to me and it’s actually super hot!’
What am I missing?
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This is also a question I’ve explored in therapy with some manner of lucidity, so I’ll offer my personal psychoanalysis as a response.
Without going into uncomfortable detail, I’m a CSA survivor who used to dissociate during unwanted physical contact. Dissociation can feel different depending on the individual but in my case it was rather out of body. I had particular places I could fixate on and those places were often only accessible to something mouse-sized, like under a dresser or a crack between furniture or appliances. So dissociation often put me in these spots, where I felt unseen and safe. I was just some mouse on the floor, not the girl across the room staring blankly at it to get through the next few minutes.
So for me this is two things when not in a sexual context: trust and safety. My therapist suggested that I had reassociated meaning and identity to my dissociated self (my small self) and that meaning was basically “small, unseen = safe”. This redefinition persisted even after I learned to manage that symptom.
The other half of this probably came about later, but my need for a trusted adult relationship overlapped with the need to feel unperceived. It sounds contradictory. However, I find there’s a sweet spot there- if I’m hidden from the world, I feel safe. Now slot in someone I actually do trust to shield and keep me hidden and secret, it pushes all the right buttons.
All said above, I value more one-on-one interactions. A fantasy for me is never being shrunk on a bus, or in a club, or being shared with a group of giants. I want and need one special giant I can trust entirely and will hide me in his pockets when I feel overwhelmed. These intimate encounters fill my heart with something I just can’t replicate any other way. The only truly safe state of being is being tiny and out of sight.
