8 Tips For New Donors

Eight Tips for New Donors in the Vampire Community

By Deacon Gray and Jade Oppress © Graveyardpress 1/22/2016

 

Donors are important to the vampire community. This obvious statement is made with the intent of making sure that donors know that vampires do not take them for granted, and to underline to the vampires in the community how precious the gifts are that donors provide. Yet, there is little out there for the donors to really grab a hold to understand the community, and to know what they are dealing with.

The vampire community is a big place. It’s filled with different cultures, different views on what it means to be a part of it, or for that matter what it means to be a vampire. Knowing how complex it is, is a far cry from understanding it, so what does a new donor need to know about it? How does a new donor navigate such a community and come out fulfilled and safe?

A discussion about this was recently the inspiration for this article and I can only hope that it is of some assistance for a new donor, and perhaps an eye opener for some vampires out there as well.

1. Make sure you know what you’re getting into. Donors are amazing people, but some come in with the wrong idea of how things will be. Often they image that every weekend they will be out every weekend in some dark mysterious night club, surrounded by wickedness and unearthly delights. While that might happen in some places like NYC or NOLA, the real hard truth is that most people have lives, and many vampires simply don’t have the time to do that all the time. Some never do it at all.
2. Get to Know Your Vampire. I can’t express this enough. Obviously if you have been around the community long, you know that there are a lot of different types of vampires, but knowing what you are dealing with is really important. Before getting involved with a vampire, get to know who they are and what their intentions might be. You might find that your vampire, isn’t really a vampire at all, or that they are using your desire to donate, as a opportunity to fulfill other desires.
3. The Nature of the Relationship: Some vampires have only one donor, some vampires have a lot of them. A psychic vampire might need a lot of donors over time, and realizing that you aren’t going to be the only one can be pretty important. Sanguine vampires on the other hand tend to have fewer donors, and those they have as donors can range from friends to lovers. However, you need to know if this is going to be the case.

   Sexual vampires are another animal all together. Many have a single donor, but some can’t survive and thrive off a single donor, and if you know this up front it will really help prevent heart ache. At the same time, if you know it up front, you have to be certain you can handle that reality. Once you define terms they might be open for re-negotiations, but many are limited on how much they can flex and remain healthy.
   Of course if you know your sexual vampire, you will know this doesn’t always mean they are stepping out, you should really learn about their feeding type before defining your own expectations.

4. Don’t betray your own values. There have been times where donors found themselves expected to be of value to the whole group or house. It isn’t that hard to image a vampire who plays the V- Card to play the field. In fact there are a lot of people who aren’t vampires who claim to be such for exactly that reason.

   Like it or not there are a lot of dark romantic novels out there filled with charming and powerful vampires, whose allure is designed to make the heart flutter and passions stir. A charismatic individual knows how to play that and won’t hesitate to keep drama a foot to help draw others to them. If a vampire asks you, or tempts you to betray your own values, you should be aware of the consequences to your emotional well-being and self-image.

5. Vampire not Master. The relationship developed between a vampire and a donor is between the two. Heck if you agree on it, enjoy yourselves, but make no mistakes vampires are no better than their donors. If a vampire tries to tell you that they are superior to you, they are playing a game. I have known non-vampires who have a greater mastery of energy, or spell craft than most vampires out there.
6. Ensure you can handle what they are into. If your vampire is into predatory spiritualism, Satanism, or some other “Ism” or whatever, you really need to be sure you are ok with it. Typically this falls under the idea of “knowing your vampire” but some don’t express their beliefs in advance, and if you get trapped in a relationship with a vampire (or anyone) who practices things you can’t abide, it can be really destructive. You might not be able to handle it if you happened to walk into a scene where you vampire just slit the neck of a fuzzy white bunny.
7. Live Your Life. The vampire community, for most vampires, isn’t their whole life and it shouldn’t be yours. I have met a lot of people in the community and some of them have really turned toward the community as their one social endeavor. They allow it to totally define them, to become the only thing of importance in their lives. If you do the same thing, what will you do if your relationship doesn’t work out?
8. Don’t fall into the drama. If you have a vampire that seems to be in constant conflict, where there is always an enemy or someone treating them poorly, you might not be dealing with a vampire as much as a toxic person. Drama is everywhere, but it is our choice on whether to engage in it. Successful people in the community are often attacked, but they have to choose how they respond. Most of the time, it isn’t worth responding to at all.

Your gift is something that the community needs and cherishes, and the majority of vampires out there would never do anything to make you feel like anything but the valued member of the community you are. Still, in any community there are fakes, manipulators, and those with less than noble intentions.
Hopefully these tips can help you, and hopefully those vampires out there that read this will consider the complex situation donors are in when they come in to this community.