An Uncomfortable Twist in My Life's Drama

I've always prided myself on being a private person, which is why I only now admit this after the dust has settled. I'm in my 50s and was recently out of a long-term relationship with a colleague named Sarah, someone ten years younger than me. We dated for three years, and everything seemed great at first, she was intelligent, charming, and always knew how to make me feel young again. But there's been this nagging feeling in the back of my mind since we broke up, gnawing away at what I thought was a stable dynamic between us. The issue? Sarah never seemed entirely comfortable with her role as 'the girl' in our relationship, and she had an unusual interest in CNC (consensual non-consent) play scenarios. These weren't light-hearted games to me; it felt like crossing a line, especially given how I was handling my own feelings. Whenever we engaged in these scenes, the intensity of her reactions would often leave me questioning if there was something else going on beneath the surface, a feeling that she might have been playing into this idea of me as an authoritarian figure or some sort of fantasy role. After breaking up, I've been left with a lot of self-reflection. It's not easy being 50 and in what feels like a perpetual identity crisis, especially when you're still trying to teach courses on moral philosophy. Looking back at the whole relationship, it seems like I was partaking in some sort of kink fantasy for her while failing to recognize my own needs and desires. I don't regret our time together but confessing this to myself has been a sobering experience. It's forced me to question how well I understand my own boundaries and what exactly I wanted from the relationship. Am I really just looking for someone to cater to an idealized notion of control, or was there something more meaningful we could have built if only I had listened better? It feels like a chapter has closed, but now comes the hard part, figuring out who I am without Sarah's influence and whether my next relationship will be as much about myself as it is about her. This confession might not change anything tangible right now, but at least it makes me feel slightly less alone with these questions.