Imma be honest with you: when I saw “how to be a dom woman” was one of the most-searched femdom terms on Google, I felt a bit skeevy about answering it.
I get where, you, the searcher, is coming from. You probably find being a dominant woman to be kinda hot or your partner has asked you to do it. So you’re here, attempting to figure out how to be a dom woman, in the same way that you’d search up how to deep clean your dishwasher.
The problem is…”how to be a dom woman” is all about getting what you, the dominant, want. That’s what happens when you’re in charge.
So giving you a how-to guide to, step-by-step, fulfill some random jerk-off playbook isn’t really teaching you how to be a dom woman. In fact, it’s only exacerbating the idea that male masturbation fantasies are the only reason for female dominance. Which, like, ew. Vomit.
So let’s start with the basics:
What is a Dominant Woman?
You’ll hear a partnership, where the woman is in charge, called a multitude of different things:
- Dom woman
- Dominant female
- Female dominant
- Femdom (we shorten it for easy typing!)
- Femdomme
- Domme
- Female Led Relationship (FLR, for short)
- Female Head of Household (HoH)
These all describe ever-so-slightly different types of relationships, but that’s getting into nuanced weeds at that point. The most important thing to note: they all feature a woman in charge of what’s going on and a partner(s) who agrees that the woman is in charge. Consent is important. :)
This woman-in-charge set-up can operate at different levels of permanency. Sometimes, the woman may be in charge, occasionally, just for sex. Sometimes she’s in charge for all sex but nothing changes outside of the bedroom. Other times, it extends outside of the bedroom, with the woman in charge of all of the “typical” heterosexual male things, like controlling money, having final say on what’s going to happen that night, assigning chores, and things like that.
(A dominant woman can be dominant in any gender-pairing relationship. Lesbian dominant woman relationships are a thing too: lezdom. However, this article will mostly focus on heterosexual relationships as this is, statistically, the type of relationship you’re likely in.)
Why Would My Partner Request This?
In a lot of societies, everything you’ve ever learned might tell you that men want to be in charge. Being in charge gives you power, status, and the ability to disregard the minutiae of whatever you’re managing. (There’s a really great essay, “I Want a Wife” by Judy Brady that really outlines some of the very stark differences of wife versus husband in heterosexual relationships).
But let’s be honest here: societal expectations don’t always feel great for you, and as a fellow human, we can assume that sometimes they don’t feel great for them either.
Some common reasons a male partner in a heterosexual relationship might request you to be a dom woman:
They want to see you happy. Genuinely. A lot of partners want to see you happy, and having you, quite literally, tell them what you want can be a really nice shortcut. If we’re being honest, this also takes a lot of the onus off them. “If you can tell them to do anything and you still aren’t happy, guess there’s nothing they could do to make you happy.”
They want you to want sex. Honest, but yep. A lot online relationship advice encourages a dominant female dynamic because it puts the ball in the woman’s court. Having the “power” over when sex happens can lead to you, eventually, not feeling like sex is something just “required” of you. Getting away from the constant frustration of “having to put out” and moving more towards “I get sex when I want it” can be really helpful for getting someone to feel more positively about sex.
They’re tired of doing “wrong”. This is a big one for my partner. Previously, he would do what he thought I wanted, and I’d get upset because it wasn’t what I wanted. It wasn’t working for anybody. Now, instead of guessing what I want, he is simply told what I want. This reduces a lot of back-and-forth, but it also makes both of us happier.
They’ve watched a lot of porn of it. Let’s be honest: jerking off is a thing, and your partner may have encountered some porn of female domination. They want to try something new, sexually, and they want you to be the ringleader of it. This is a common reason, and it’s definitely a frustrating one as most female dominant porn tropes just show a woman giving the man exactly what he wanted while pretending it was exactly what she wanted. She’s just a 3D sex doll at that point.
They don’t want to be in charge. Just as being the household glue was foisted upon you, being “strong, powerful leader man” was shoved on them. They may not identify with that identity at all – and having you take that role feels more natural to them.
How to be Dominant as a Woman
So, you can see, learning how to be a dom woman is a little more complicated than just following a script. It’s all about actually getting what you want.
Which sounds amazing in theory, but in reality, well, uh, most of us have been conditioned since birth to make others comfortable and compromise to keep the peace. I know I have. This can make actually stating your demands – and requiring they get done – to be ridiculously difficult. It’s like another task on a to-do list which we definitely don’t want this to feel like.
How to Be a Dom Woman: Learn What You Want
Step one in being dominant as a woman is simply having an idea of what you want. You’ll note that I say to “learn” what you want. You might be so used to compromising all of the time that you might not actually know what you want.
You might also be so used to running on “Family comes first” that you actually don’t really bother to think about what you want. Who cares what you want when Timmy needs to make it to soccer practice and your husband has a dental appointment he’s going to forget about and you haven’t bought groceries for the week and…
You get the idea. Sometimes, it’s easier to simply stop worrying about your own preferences when the act of “having things you want” means realizing you never get them.
Wow. That was a sad sentence to write. But not inaccurate.
One of my favorite thought exercises is this: “If you had an assistant handling all your errands this week, and money and time weren’t an object, what is it you’d want today or this week?”
You’re probably busy AF right now anyway, so consider thinking about this when you’re driving between destinations or trying to get five minutes alone in the shower.
If learning how to be a dom woman in the bedroom, you might want to focus these questions on sexual acts. If, as you’re trying to think about what you want sexually and realize you don’t actually want to have sex until some of the workload is reduced from you, that’s also something you want. And if your partner approached you, asking you to be a female dominant for them, that’s something you can require of them before you consider going down this path of being in charge.
After all, that’s the point of being in-charge. You’re supposed to get what you want (again, within reason and consent).
How to Be a Dom Woman: Think About How to Make It Happen
So, your wishlist of things you want might have been relatively simple or it might have been more complex. You might simply want a night to drink wine, be alone, and read a book. You might have fantasized about being serviced by seven willing men at the same time. Both are technically possible, but you’ll have to figure out how to get there in a relationship-friendly way.
If you wanted a night to yourself, you’d ask your willing partner to take the kids out for the night. If they’ve asked you to be a dominant female, this should be within the realms of things they’re willing to do.
If you’ve wanted to be serviced by seven men at once, well, that one is a little harder. If you don’t want to try to arrange an orgy (a hard endeavor, to be sure), you might be better off purchasing some sex toys and talking to your willing partner about using lots of those sex toys on you at the same time. Even better if they’re happy to talk dirty with you, back and forth, about how hot it would be to be one of those seven men while they’re doing this for you.
Is it fair that you’re “in-charge” and that requires planning the logistics of how to make your fantasies happen? Not entirely.
But it’s also really important that you have a game plan. Having a plan lets you figure out what pieces need to be moved around to make space for you to enjoy what you want.
I find this is really important because there are a lot of unspoken expectations when women have a fantasy for something.
When you say “Mmmm, getting a massage sounds amazing”, you don’t necessarily mean “Getting a massage while the other 20 tasks I have to do today don’t get done, the kids don’t get picked up from school, I come home and we missed an important delivery, and I have to do 40 things tomorrow instead now”.
But if you tell your partner that you want a massage, they will book you a massage…and then pat themselves on the back. They gave you exactly what you wanted. They don’t understand that you haven’t scheduled yourself a massage because you’re just too lazy to do it – it’s because there wasn’t time in the schedule when something else wouldn’t be neglected.
Is it fair that you have to take on this emotional labor to get what you want? No. But if you’ve always done it, your partner isn’t going to be a mind-reader or even understand what needs to be done. Baby steps here. If everybody really wants to learn how to be a dom woman and make this a regular thing in your lives, this will be something your partner can pick-up and learn over time. Making these lists now, and figuring out what needs to be done to get what you want, gives you a concrete list of things to “train” your partner to know and do when you request this again in the future.
Channel your Inner Confidence
You’re not likely used to demanding or commanding other people do things for you. That’s entirely normal.
However, think about hiring a high class Frankfurt escort. She would show up with an innate level of confidence, showcasing the fact that she knows you hired her for her effortless confidence and attraction to her. She would know what she is and isn’t willing to do while simultaneously focusing on her connection with you. Was she always this confident? No, of course not. It’s one of those “fake it until you make it” types of things.
That’s the type of confidence you’re going for. This is something your partner has (likely) requested, and you have to remember that as you’re wading through all the little details. Don’t feel too embarrassed or like a burden. Making you happy is what they’ve requested.
How to Be a Dom Woman: Think about Something Sexual
Imma be honest here: if your partner approached you and asked you to be a dominant woman, they are, 1000% times a hundred, wanting it to include something sexual. Even if they genuinely love you and want you to be dominant so that they can make you happy in and out of the bedroom, they definitely want something sexual too.
Which, if you’re like me, when I’m stressed and a horny man tells me that he wants to give me “exactly what I want”, I want to tell him all I want are the chores and stress off my plate. Not exactly sexy.
But, back to our thought exercise: “If someone took over all of your errands, household care, and childcare for the week, what WOULD you want out of sex?”
If you’re like most women, more foreplay is probably top of the list.
“Actually having an orgasm” might be on the list too. “Not feeling pushed into it” might also be up there.
Luckily, if we’re talking about how to be a sexually dominant woman, this is actually a sphere where your partner is probably more-than-happy to listen to demands. This isn’t doing the dishes. There’s sex involved!
So what would make you happy? Fuck off with whatever you think your partner wants or “needs” from sex. This is about you. Really. Their orgasm is not even important here.
Your desires might look something like:
- A hot make-out session after a flirty dinner where we devour each other with our eyes
- Cuddling up on the couch during steamy “suggestive” TV dramas while I occasionally pet him over his pants
- Curled up against one another with glasses of wine while you casually stroke him through his pants with no expectation for things to go further
- Receiving oral sex straight from the shower or bath and being allowed to lie around, basking in the post-orgasm afterglow
In fact, in many of your fantasies, actually having intercourse may not be involved at all. If you’re touched out or feel pressured into penis-in-vagina sex all of the time, the idea of having intercourse at-all might be a turn-off.
Intercourse Is…Optional?
So far, I’ve told you to:
- spend your time thinking about what you want
- making plans to get what you want
- convincing and instructing a partner in all of the small details that will help you get what you want
So, there’s been a lot of work here. Sorry. To be fair, being in charge involves work.
But one of the cooler benefits of learn how to be a dom woman is the fact that you set the rules when it comes to sex – and in almost all cases, if your partner asked you to do this, they actually WANT you to. They WANT you to tell them “no” to intercourse. They WANT you to be sexually satisfied. They WANT you to take control and tell them what to do in hopes that it’ll make you approach sex more positively and enjoyably. (In fact, a lot of porn of the dominant woman porn trope is exactly that: putting a woman’s pleasure first.)
This means, once you’ve figured out what actually sounds hot to you, you get to make that happen. If it doesn’t sound sexy to you, you just don’t do it. This includes intercourse which, may or may not, feel pleasurable or enjoyable to you at the current moment.
Granted, we, ideally want to make this rejection/refusal part of the play. Remember: this is supposed to be about having a playful back-and-forth while you’re in charge. Most of us remember that vibe: back when you were first dating, and you weren’t ready for “more”, but you liked teasing them with the possibilities for the future. ;)
We want that same sort of energy here. Being a dominant woman is generally about bringing some of that playful, flirty energy back to your relationship by getting more of what you want and using your partner’s willingness to help to make that easier.
So some phrases I might consider would be:
- “Oh, you don’t deserve that tonight. Let’s see if you can impress me for awhile first.”
- “Awww, you’d interrupt what I was enjoying? Be a good boy/girl and do what I want.”
- “There’s plenty of time for that later. You want me to get what I want, right?”
- “Can’t control yourself when you’re around me. I know it’s hard, but you’ll have to be patient.”
If you actually think what they want (intercouse, a blowjob, whatever) could be fun and you’d like it but there’s something you want to do first, part of female domination is that you get to say that upfront. In fact, you can demand it. Things like:
- “Oh, you want inside me? It’s cute that you think you deserve it before you’ve done X.”
- “Blowjobs are for men who have done X. Have you done that for me yet?”
- “Go do X. Then I’ll see if I feel like letting you fuck me.”
- “Mmm, having you inside of me sounds great. But I expect to cum before you do. If I don’t, you won’t get inside me for a month. Be good.”
How to Be a Dom Woman: Learn As You Go
Imma be honest: if you’ve spent your whole life trying to keep your family together and compromising on everything, learning to be in charge is going to be hard. It’s going to feel like frustrating work sometimes.
I’ve been doing this for years, and I still occasionally get pissed off by how it sometimes feels like female domination is adding more work to my plate. Why can’t everybody just know what I want and do it without thinking about it? I swear, that’s what I try to do for others.
So have some grace with yourself. Realize your interest (and time to do this) is going to ebb and flow. Sometimes your partner, who may have requested this, might get pissy over doing something they don’t want to. (Ferns has a guide about when your partner says “no” – though it might be a little more structured than the dynamic you’ve crafted. It’s still good reading!)
Remember that they can also help set up some relaxation for you too. Literally tell your partner that you want them to plan a surprise date night for you. That’s within your power now – and very much recommended for your own sanity. I like being in charge, but sometimes, it’s really nice to have someone else take care of me for awhile. You can have that too. You’re not a sex robot; you’re allowed to take breaks from any persona.
Update: January 2026, November 2025, October 2025, June 2025.
