Collaring - Is it necessary when already married?

Collaring. What does it mean and why is it significant in a D/s relationship? These are the two questions I have been asking myself for a few months now. Why do I feel the need to collar my submissive when he is already my husband? Doesn't his wedding ring already tell him, and the whole world, that he "belongs" to me. Well, kind of. Our wedding rings are very important to me. They do show the whole world that we are committed to each other legally. For some reason traditional marriage is really not taken that seriously in today's world. That holds true for our marriage over the past 12 years. Oh, we have stayed married, but both of us broke our vows in one way or another. I broke the vows to always honor, respect and love. To cherish and obey. He broke the same vows and then some. I think the only vow we didn't break was "till death do us part" (which was a hard one because I almost killed him last September!).

Now that we have decided to stay together and transform our marriage to a D/s marriage it is only natural to make it official. Just as if we were engaged and getting married. When I solidify the decision to formally collar my husband, the meaning and significance will mean so much more than a traditional marriage means. In order for my husband to wear my collar he will freely give me so much more than his last name. In accepting my collar he will be giving me all of himself. The trust that has been broken over the years will have to be replaced. The respect that was tossed out the window will never be taken for granted again. The indifference to my wants and needs will be forever gone. By accepting my collar he will accept that I am his world. His whole purpose will be to serve, love and respect me. He will have to believe, with all his being, that I will never do anything to hurt or harm him. That he is my prize possession, that which I love and honor more than anything. He will have to welcome and even encourage my protection and guidance. It is a big step.

For me, the responsibility of collaring a submissive is huge. The dynamic we have with each other will shift even more. By collaring him I will be saying to him that I will not only love, honor and respect him but that I will guide, correct and protect him. I am reading all I can find on collaring and talking to everyone I know. It is so strange, I am nervous just like I was when we were married. I guess I feel like it will take our D/s relationship and totally make it real. Even though it is already real it still feels like we are just living together. I can break up and move out if I want to and that will be that. By collaring I need to make sure I am really serious about this whole thing. Back in late October when we first started all this I came across info on collaring and I wanted to collar him right away. It just seemed like another one of those symbolic things you do in BDSM, no big deal. I am so glad I didn't collar him back then. It would have trivialized it.

I looked up the basic meaning of collaring and I came across this:

For a little help on the subject I turned to Tom Davis, the owner of Daycollar.com. An expert on the BDSM lifestyle, Tom says, “the collar is really a symbol of devotion to one whom you have agreed to partner with. The exchange of power between a Dominant and submissive is a mutually agreed upon unbalancing of control. It is a akin to the traditional wedding ring in non-BDSM or ‘vanilla’ relationships, except a lot sexier.”

So, with that said I think that it makes perfect sense to collar your husband. It represents the D/s commitment between the two, just like wedding rings represent a vanilla commitment between the two. The next question is what kind of collar should I have my husband wear?

Obviously a traditional leather play collar will not do. Neither will a bulky chain necklace with a big lock on it. I can just hear my husband trying to explain the thick chain necklace with a lock. So then, what are my options. One of my good FemDom friends chose dog tags as her husbands collar. She got him a regular necklace and then had dog tags (like in the military, not for a real dog) engraved. When you see him with his "collar" on it looks like a regular necklace with charms. I thought that was really cool.

This is what I am looking into getting for my hubby. A regular curb necklace in white gold with a nice white gold dog tag that reads "Property of Mrs. Claudia." Then on the back I will engrave something personal to show my love and devotion. Then I will have the regular clasp removed from the necklace and replaced with a simple, small nickle lock that closes the chain in the back. No one will ever see the lock because it will be covered by his shirt collar. (Here is a picture of the dog tag I am looking at.)

Well there are my thoughts on collaring your husband. I am planning on a formal ceremony in the next few months so I will keep everyone posted on how it goes. I never got a honeymoon with my wedding so maybe this will be like a "renewing of our vows" and then the honeymoon trip we never got. I will take any excuse to take a vacation.