The Club - Meeting 499 - The Power of Asking for What You Have Coming, and Anger's Role in Spanking Timing

“Love implies anger. The man who is angered by nothing cares about nothing.” - Edward Abbey

 

Hello all.  Welcome back to the Disciplinary Couples Club.  Our weekly meeting of men and women who are in, or interested in being in, Domestic Discipline and Female Led (FLR) relationships.

 

Once again, before we get started, I would like to thank the female commenters who have recently joined us and to extend an invitation to all others who may be inclined to move from “lurker” to “commenter” status. We like having you around.

 

Before we kick off this week’s discussion, I wanted to highlight a fun development.  I’ve mentioned a few times lately that I’m trying to compile a book using some of the best comments from over the years. It’s actually going relatively well, though it’s been a much more laborious process than I envisioned when I started plowing through every topic beginning with the very first.

 

In thinking through publishing logistics, I gave some passing thought to cover art.  I figured I would have to pay someone to create something original, since I have zero artistic ability. But, almost on a lark, I reached out to the artist who distributes his spanking art under the name RedRump and asked whether he might consider letting me use one of his pieces.  I have been a huge fan for many years, but I had no real expectation of even receiving a reply, since he hasn’t been publishing new works recently. And, I thought if he did reply it would likely be a polite “no.”

 

Thus, I was shocked when, a couple of weeks later, I got a positive reply.  His only request was that I publish a couple of his newer works.  I was more than willing!  I love his stuff and am honored to publish anything he gives me. Here are the two works he passed along. One is brand new. The other is a new version of one that has circulated in colorized form for a while, the colorizing apparently not his doing.  So, enjoy!

 

I was intending to do a new topic this week, but something happened that made me decide to further explore some additional angles on some things we’ve talked about over the last couple of weeks.  I don’t do many personally revealing posts, but this one will get a little introspective.

 

As I’ve talked about, we’ve been stuck mostly at home for two months, dealing with Anne convalescing from a big surgery.  A couple of weeks ago, it became clear that the stress of the confinement and having our routines disrupted was showing, when we got into a big argument.  That doesn’t happen very often with us, and this one was harder to move past, because we both thought we were right.  That went on for several days.

 

Then, we were in bed one night, talking a bit during the pre-glow of our first sexual encounter in well over two months, when I steered the discussion toward getting the DD and FLR aspects of our relationship back on track.  At first, I didn’t detect a lot of enthusiasm.  Then, I said something about her spanking me for the recent fight, and she perked up very noticeably.  I told her, in that conversation and in a follow-up journal entry, that I didn’t think I was in the wrong in our argument, or maybe it was that we were both in the wrong, but I did recognize that the way I argued was wrong and should be punished regardless of who was right on the merits.  

 

The mere act of taking responsibility worked a major change in her mood, and she became downright enthusiastic about getting our DD back on track. Maybe even more so the FLR aspects, as I learned the next day when I got home from the gym and found a list of chores she wanted done that day. 

 

So, things were going in a good direction. Then, I once again did something really stupid.  Without getting into too many details, I did something that was basically “roughhousing,” but without thinking about its possible impact on her surgical recovery.  It wasn’t malicious in anyway.  It was just incredibly, unthinkingly careless.  This time, I not only accepted that I was in the wrong, I felt terrible about it and apologized profusely. 

 

She seemed to accept that, though her demeanor was notably cool the next day.  I don’t blame her and, in fact, totally understand if she remains pissed off and lets me know it.

 

 

These two incidents highlight the intersection of anger and timing.  Last week, there was some discussion about “spanking in anger.”  Those discussions almost always involve the scenario in which the wife is angry, but in our case it’s often my post-argument anger that creates a timing issue. It’s very rare that we get into big arguments but, when it does happen, it can take several days for passions to cool, including mine. Until my own anger and resentment taper off enough that I can at least accept my own role in the argument, a spanking won't accomplish anything constructive beyond simply imposing punishment (though, I recognize that alone could serve her purpose.)  But, at some point, I almost always come around to accepting my role in causing or escalating the argument and am contrite about it and ready to take what I have coming to move us both past it.

 

In my journal entry, I suggested she might try doing something Alan I discussed here a couple of weeks ago.  I has posted:

 

“I've wondered whether it would add a distinct humbling element to our usual DD rituals if, instead of her telling me when to get ready for my spanking, she ordered that one would happen in the next day or two, but left it to me to come in and ask for it when I was ready.”

 

Alan replied:

“We have never done this but I am going to discuss it with my wife. It could be a powerful tool for her I want her to know about. As I think about it, it may be some cultures have used something similar as part of the punishment process.

It does check some boxes. It would almost guarantee that you spent time thinking about what happened and what is going to happen. The point when you go to her and say you are ready means you are taking responsibility for the behavior and ready to pay the price. My former girlfriend liked it when I came to her after she had decided to punish me. But not so much when I asked for a spanking or told her I needed one without her first deciding it was going to happen.”

 

I think this idea of coming to her when I’m ready to accept responsibility is powerful.  Although she could end an argument by ordering a spanking, it would probably work only during the course of fairly minor arguments.  When we’re both really angry and in the heat of battle, even if I complied I think I would be incapable of learning any real lesson from it.

 

But, in those situations where we’ve both cooled off but I’m not quite contrite yet, I think it would be very humbling for me and very empowering for her if she told me something like, “You are going to get spanked, not for the argument itself but for your attitude and lack of respect. It must happen in the next two days or you will get an additional spanking for each day you make me wait. But, you come to me and let me know when you are ready for it.”

 

 

I think something like that would accelerate my accepting responsibility, since I'm usually on the cusp of doing so anyway. And, it would be incredibly humbling to have to go to her and tell her directly, face to face, that I want her to spank me then and there.

 

It doesn’t, unfortunately, fit our current situation, where I was very contrite and genuinely sorry from the very beginning, but she may need to stay angry a while.   

 

Just like there is a sweet spot where I’ve gotten over my anger but haven’t totally moved on from the situation, there probably is a sweet spot for her where she’s still pissed off at me but has cooled enough to see spanking as a way to make sure I am not only sorry but as sorry as she wants me to be and in a place where a spanking may get her over the anger she’s justifiably carrying instead of possibly reinforcing as might happen if she spanked when she was still very mad.

 

Something that did surprise me a bit about both these incidents was how much better I felt just from accepting responsibility, even before any spanking has taken place.  Accepting responsibility really is hard.  A couple of weeks ago, I talked about a “moderate drinking” app I’ve been using and how weird it was that I found it difficult to be honest in “reporting” to a disembodied app with no power to hand out aversive consequences. I think it’s hard for the simple reason that admitting to ourselves when we’ve screwed up is almost as hard as admitting it to someone else.

 

Anyway, I don’t have a concise topic description to go along with this but welcome any more thoughts you may have about spanking in anger; being spanked while angry or when not yet accepting responsibility; and, reaching that point where you not only accept responsibility but take the next step and come to her humbly asking for what you have coming.

 

 

Have a great week.

The Club - Meeting 498 - When Should/Does a Domestic Discipline Spanking Stop?

“Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced.” ― James Baldwin

 

Hello all.  Welcome back to the Disciplinary Couples Club.  Our weekly meeting of men and women who are in, or interested in being in, Domestic Discipline and Female Led (FLR) relationships.

 

Once again, before we get started, I would like to thank the female commenters who have recently joined us and to extend an invitation to all others who may be inclined to move from “lurker” to “commenter” status. We like having you around.

 

Well . . . that week was quite a year, wasn’t it?  It’s very hard for a political junkie like me not to comment in detail, but what’s the point at this stage?  I’m really an “I told you so,” kind of guy anyway, so I’ll hold my fire for a more opportune moment, which is inevitably right around the corner.

 

 

It was a little quiet here on the forum last week.  I wonder what else people had going on.   

 

Anyway, while the conversation was a little slow, it still was good.  One of the best, in my opinion, didn’t really have anything to do with the actual topic but was, rather, a great statement on how putting one person in charge can, paradoxically, lead to more collaborative and inclusive decision-making.  It was this from Jackson:

 

“I believe my wife and I already had a close, good marriage. We have been together for over 30 years, but only a little less than 2 years have we introduced FLR with DD. I have to say it has greatly improved the way we treat each other…not only am I much more respectful, calm and better behaved in almost every way, She treats me better too. She asks my opinion and consider it more often than She used to before DD. I think it’s because She has more confidence knowing that She will ultimately be the Decider…so She feels less need to sell Her point of view or dig in on Her positions. Knowing that I will stay in my lane and after voicing respectfully any disagreement I will conform to Her wishes or face the consequences which are now very clear because of DD. Before DD consequences could be the silent treatment, sleeping in a different bedroom, withholding sex…all of that is gone now…and settled with the paddle and strap.”

 

I think that’s a great point about how people who are confident in their decision-making authority can actually be more open to the kind of input that leads to better decisions.  It seems like kind of the opposite of a Femdom model.

 

This week’s topic comes from one of our group members but, unfortunately, I wrote down the topic suggestion but neglected to write down who made it.  Anyway, here it is:

 

“When should a spanking stop?  Bruised?  Spotting (remember ZM's observations)?  Signs of surrender? Tears? Numbing?  Time limit? Number of swats?”

 

In our household, there is a big difference between when a spanking “should” stop and when it usually does.  Many here have noted the irony so many of us experience in which, while we are over her knee or draped over her favorite piece of furniture, we can’t wait for a spanking to end.  Yet, when it does, we often feel like maybe it should have gone on a bit longer.

 

 

To me, when “should” a spanking stop probably depends, in the first instance, on her purpose in giving it.  We don’t do maintenance spanking and have only very rarely done preventative, and those obviously might have a different end-point than a punishment spanking because they have a different purpose.

 

Assuming we are talking about punishment spankings, however, for me the the answer would be that a spanking should end when she believes her message has been received and absorbed and/or when she’s determined that he’s gone from saying he is sorry to truly being sorry.

 

So, when do spankings end in our household?  Eight times out of ten, it’s the condition of my bottom.  Bruises don’t really set the bar because they usually don’t appear until well after the spanking is over.  

 

 

Often, it’s the “spotting” that ZM has talked about in previous posts, i.e. tiny, tiny droplets of blood.  I don’t think of these as real “bleeding,” because the skin often isn’t even noticeably abraded, let alone broken. It’s more like tiny droplets were forced up through the skin from the force of the repeated swats.  Now, I don’t know whether that is the mechanism, but I do know that often she will tell me that I’m “bleeding,” but when I get up and go to the bathroom, a tissue reveals nothing at all.

 

 

 

Some spankings end because of numbing, but I think that too is probably too early a marker to set.  As some have pointed out, the pre-numbing swats are the immediate punishment, but post-numbing swats still serve a purpose, as they result in that deep-seated reminder that you feel multiple days later.

 

I conflate “tears” and “signs of surrender,” though they might be distinct for others.  I’ve never gotten to tears despite some very hard, long spankings.  But, I know some of our commenters have said they got to tears precisely because the wife let them him know in advance that she expected tears and that the spanking would not stop until she got them.  

 

As far as I remember, we’ve never set a timer for a spanking, and I personally lose all sense of time when over her knee.   

 

 

As for setting a number of swats, in the very early days we had a system that prescribed a minimum number of swats per designated offenses.  But, she gained confidence as a spanker so quickly, that system didn’t last very long.  If she now has a particular number of swats/strikes in mind when she starts spanking, she’s never told me that, and I think it would not be helpful if she did.  If she told me in advance how many to expect, I think I would have an even harder time surrendering to the message she is trying to convey and, instead, I would be counting down each swat and trying to gut it out.

 

 

One end-point that wasn’t on our commenter’s list was when I don’t think I can take anymore.  That’s never been a part of our dynamic and, in fact, for us the whole point is for her to give me a spanking I don’t think I can handle so I am maximally incentivized not to repeat the behavior that caused me to be over her knee. 

 

 

How about you?  When do you think a spanking should end?  Is there a difference between when it usually does in and when it probably should?

 

I hope you have a great week.

The Club - Meeting 497 - Self-Disclosure and Asking for a Spanking

"The ability to have a choice in what you do is a privilege.” - Anton Yelchin

 Hello all.  Welcome back to the Disciplinary Couples Club.  Our weekly meeting of men and women who are in, or interested in being in, Domestic Discipline and Female Led (FLR) relationships.

 

Once again, before we get started, I would like to thank the female commenters who have recently joined us and to extend an invitation to all others who may be inclined to move from “lurker” to “commenter” status. We like having you around.

 

I hope you all had a great week. Ours was, honestly, not so great.  I got covid and flu shots at the end of last week.  The day of, and the day after, I felt fine.  Then, two full days later I got what felt like a full-on case of the real flu, complete with fever, chills, body aches, etc.  It left me pretty sapped for a couple of days.

 

Then, Anne and I got into a real row that began with something I said that probably was sarcastic and unsupportive, but I also felt like the reaction was over the top.  The details aren’t important and, honestly, I’m not sure they even mattered that much at the time.  We’ve basically been stuck together at home for the better part of two months, which probably made some kind of blow up inevitable, especially given my introverted inclinations that tend to go into full meltdown mode if I don’t get time to totally to myself (though dogs are allowed), every few weeks.

 

I feel like being housebound also inhibited my enjoyment of Halloween a bit, though honestly that feel probably had more to do with the fact that until about a week ago, it still felt like summer around here.  The day of Halloween I did see this picture of a lawn display that totally cracked me up. I swear I’m going to buy a riding lawn mower next year just to replicate it.

 

 

Before we get started, those of you in U.S. please, please, please remember to get out and vote if you haven’t already done so. The quote at the top of the page is one I’ve used before to reinforce a DD-related message, but this time it’s about remembering how privileged we are in having our election-related choices, even if some rounds those choices are more attractive than others.

 

 

We had a good discussion last week regarding DD’s efficacy in dealing with “big” issues.  What it reinforced for me was how differently we each define “big.”  But, I don’t think anyone was of the opinion that DD can’t address bigger issues, though several agreed with me that it might require taking things up a notch with respect to consistency and/or severity.

 

A few weeks ago, Norton suggested this topic:

 

"One topic we may want to discuss is how much self-disclosure we do. That is an issue I am dealing with now, as last week I did something she wouldn't have approved of, but I haven't mentioned yet. It will probably come up during our next check in, which is tomorrow.”

 

I thought we had done this one pretty recently but, when I reviewed past topics, it’s been at least a year since we dealt with this one directly. It’s probably tangentially related to my posts this spring about our check-ins for helping me get “unstuck” on life goals, but they aren’t quite the same thing.  So, let’s do it again.

 

Self-reporting, and its twin—asking for a spanking directly to address a particular incident—is something that always seems beneficial to me in theory but I really struggle to implement in practice.  I know that it almost certainly would help with consistency, which has been our DD’s historical weak point, yet when push comes to shove, I have a really hard time reporting bad behavior in a straightforward matter, let alone coming right out and asking for a spanking even when I know I richly deserve one.

 

Why? Well, the easy reason would, of course, be that spankings hurt a lot and, thus, I really don’t want to bring one on myself.  And, that really is what I would be doing if I made a habit of self-reporting.  The closest I come is probably when journaling, and even there it’s sometimes hard to be fully honest about all relevant behavior, and harder still to come out and ask for or suggest one, even though for all intents and purposes that’s what I’m doing.

 

Although an obvious answer, I don’t think that the pain of a prospective spanking really gets at the heart of my reluctance.  Instead, I think I find a direct, face-to-face confession of bad behavior to be very humbling, in a way that exceeds the spanking itself.   

 

The fact that I’m confessing something means I know I did something wrong, and admitting it straightforwardly and in person emphasizes a failure, whether that failure is meeting some personal standard, or an agreed-upon rule, or simply a failure to obey something she has told me to do or not do.  I see myself as a high-performance person, and having to confess to a specific problem demonstrates that, in that particular case, I didn't live up to a standard, whether mine or hers.

 

In the past, I also saw self-reporting or, as Norton called it, “self-disclosure” as potentially undermining my deep-seated need to have the sense that she is imposing discipline on me, as opposed to accommodating my request for it.

 

But, I’ve kind of come around on that one.  Around this time last year, TB posted something regarding his wife’s expectations that really stuck with me for a while.  He said:

 

“I now explicitly 'own up' to failings and request that she addresses them via a spanking has moved her sense of power and control (she says) to a new level. If I miss anything she will point it out during the pre-spanking 'talk'.

 

 

 

I was a little surprised that his wife felt a greater sense of power and control, since some might see it as him controlling the process more via reporting and asking for a spanking.  He explained:

 

“The only behaviors that she is interested in punishing me for are disrespect, moodiness, etc. - behaviors that impact her directly. She is, therefore, already aware of anything that I 'own up' to (and would usually take action to address either specifically or as a general 'reset').

 

She does see that my recognizing and admitting to the behavior before she takes action is another level of submission and self-awareness. In fact, although we have only been using this approach for a number of weeks, if I don’t ‘own up’ to some failing that was obvious to both of us, she will take extra spanking time to highlight that particular issue. A virtuous circle of sorts, in that I am encouraged to document my own failings even though I am aware of the consequences, because if I don't there is a very good chance that the next spanking session will be increased to cover the omission.

 

She is a big fan of the new approach, and she enjoys matching my journal view of my behavior with her own recollections. She also feels that it takes some of the pressure off her in deciding if/when a spanking is due. It helps me in that I dislike the delay & uncertainty between offense & punishment - if punishment is due then I am always keen to get it over and done with. My behavior has definitely been better for the past few weeks, mainly because I now feel that if I misbehave, I have to submit a 'confession'.

 

In theory tattling on myself does leave me in control. Yet, what TB says resonates with me.  The plain fact is, telling on myself ramps of the feeling of vulnerability.  Also, I’ve always said that DD works better when the consequences seem to arise inevitably from the behavior, and it’s certainly true that in confessing I make receiving the consequences much more inevitable. 

 

Therefore, it shouldn’t be surprising that in those very rare instances when I have not only disclosed something that but suggested it should be punished, I have felt less in control, not more so. And, in the tiny number of instances in which I have flat-out asked her, in person, to spanking me for something, I felt very vulnerable and not at all in control.  So, for me this a concrete example of why I hate the BDSM concept of "topping from the bottom" as applied to DD, especially when it is suggested that confessing for asking for a punishment constitutes such "topping" behavior.  There really isn't a time when I feel less in control than when I confess to something she didn't know about or suggest that something that probably was not going to earn a spanking really should.  To me, that's simply laying out the information, then letting fate take over from there.

 

I’ve also had some recent experiences, in a currently non-DD context, that highlight some of the complex psychology at work in self-reporting.  A few weeks ago, in response to one of Jackson’s comments regarding drinking, I said that I had been using an app that is popular in the “conscious drinking” movement, where the goal isn’t so much to stop but to moderate by making more fully-aware choices. It’s a pretty robust service. At the beginning of each week, I enter into a plan for each day, including goals for the number of dry days and specific limits on non-dry days. Each afternoon, I get a text reminding me what the goal was for that day. Every morning, I get a text asking how many I had the day before.  Every week, in preparing the weekly plan, I get a report of how I did for the preceding week and (supposedly) AI-generated suggestions for the upcoming week.

 

The thing I found the most interesting was how resistant I was initially to reporting honestly when I had failed by exceeding a daily goal. I’d get that text in the morning and, particularly if the failure was a big one, I’d struggle hard with being completely honest.   

 

 Now, the only one getting my “self-disclosure” was some computer program, and the summary reports went only to me, and there was no adverse consequence associated with any part of this reporting. Yet, I still really struggled to answer honestly!  I’ve made myself do it, and it’s gotten easier over time, but I am fascinated by how hard it was even in the absence of an actual consequence, such as a hard spanking.

 

And, the app has objectively helped in lowering my number of drinking days (though they were far less than daily already) and, to a lesser extent, the number of drinks on those days There is a principle in psychology called the Hawthorne Effect, which documents how people change their behavior simply by virtue of knowing that the behavior is being observed.  To some extent, that’s probably what’s going on with this drinking app, even though the only “observer” is a computer. Yet, I think it is actually something about the whole reporting process and the way it forces me to regularly think about my own behavior and set related goals.

 

Notice that the app has a few features that probably enhance the power of reporting. It is consistent. Every day, I get a reminder.  More importantly, every day I have to engage actively with the process by providing information. It is also certain.  If I answer honestly, I get a report that lays out the monthly calendar identifying how I did each day, and if I make bad choices it will be an ugly picture, even if I’m the only one that sees it.

 

The one thing it lacks is anything resembling coercive, adverse feedback, like a spanking. In fact, kind of the opposite. On good days and weeks, it provides some positive textual pats on the back, and on “failed” days it tells you not to judge yourself to harshly and encourages you to get up and try again. Honestly, I think it would work better if, at some point, the message would get a bit more “in your face,” like “Hey, that’s the third fail in two weeks. Are you even really trying?  Get on it.”

 

Circling back to this week’s bad behavior with Anne, I do think that having to affirmatively ask for a spanking would add a significant deterrent to future bad behavior.  Like TB’s wife, she obviously knows that the bad behavior (our argument) happened, so self-disclosure wouldn’t add anything in and of itself.  But, it could add a lot if she told me that she expects to come ask for a spanking to deal with it.  (Setting aside whether that’s physically doable right now; though it’s definitely getting closer if not there yet.)  Outside the context of something big, like a fight, I've wondered whether it would add a distinct humbling element to our usual DD rituals if, instead of her telling me when to get ready for my spanking, she ordered that one would happen over a given day or two, but left it to me to come in and ask for it when I was ready.  Honestly, just writing about the prospect gives me butterflies in my stomach.

Anyway, I’m interested to year your answers about how often you self-disclose and whether that self-disclosure rises to something like TB describes in which you are expected to not only ‘own up’ to the misbehavior but suggest or ask for a spanking to deal with.  If she requires self-disclosure of some sort, what is the consequence for failing to do it?

 

And, again, get out there and vote.

 

 

The Club - Meeting 496 - Domestic Discipline Spankings for "Big" Issues

“The difference between a successful person and others is not a lack of strength, not a lack of knowledge, but rather a lack in will.” ― Vince Lombardi Jr.

Hello all.  Welcome back to the Disciplinary Couples Club.  Our weekly meeting of men and women who are in, or interested in being in, Domestic Discipline and Female Led (FLR) relationships.

 

Once again, before we get started, I would like to thank the female commenters who have recently joined us and to extend an invitation to all others who may be inclined to move from “lurker” to “commenter” status. We like having you around.

 

I hope you all had a great week. Ours was pretty sedate, but given our recent medical challenges, sometimes it’s the little things that count.  We went out to dinner this week. That’s obviously not a big thing in and of itself, but it was the first time we’d been out together for anything other than medical appointments in about seven weeks.  Light at the end of the tunnel.

 

 

Fall also finally really committed to coming to our area. Took it long enough.  I don’t know why I love this time of year so much, but I do.  Well, maybe some of the reasons are pretty obvious.  I maintain Halloween is by far the sexiest holiday, as borne out by the fact I have way more Halloween themed spanking art and memes than I can ever use in one season.

 

 

Well, I accomplished what turned out to be my not-so-little project of plowing through all my old posts and the associated comments.  All 608 posts and 72,000 comments.  Although there were no big surprises, maybe a few things are worth mentioning, though I hit on a few of these in the last post:

 

·      I knew there was more female participating in the early years, but I had forgotten just how much more.

·      Many of those female participants seemed to be very aggressively in charge.  We can debate what an FLR is but, however you characterize it, many of those early female commenters clearly exercised, or aspired to exercise, very significant control over their men.

·      I wondered whether there was some change in the blog that drove the women away. Honestly, one big factor may have been way more pedestrian.  There was a period when Google’s “captcha” sign-on verification became damn near unworkable. I remember how hard it was to leave comments on others’ blogs.  Several people complained on mine, and it was right around that time that many of the female comments stopped.  My guess is, being very practical creatures, they had better things to do and just gave up. We also had a couple of serious “troll infestations” around that same time, and it’s possible those turned off some of the female commenters.

·      The political exchanges in 2020 and 2021 were nastier than I remembered.  Although I have no doubt it contributed to total readership falling, it’s hard to detect any impact on actual participation.  I’m staying away from political comments more this election, but not because I give a shit about total readership. I’m just kind of resigned to “what happens, happens” this time around, and I'm perhaps more realistic about the prospects of any discussion changing anyone’s mind.

·      From very early on, there were problems with men masquerading as women and individuals posing as couples.  It was impossible to police back then, and it’s just as impossible now. 

·      Topic interest comes and goes. There were topics I did early on that flopped but did quite well when I tried them again a couple of years later. 

·      It was interesting seeing how certain “features” of the discussion were introduced over time.  I had forgotten that in the earliest posts, I didn’t reply to most of the comments; that didn’t really change for several months. When I started introducing memes and spanking art, at first it was very sporadic, then only one per post, then finally several per post but each tailored to illustrate a particular point. 

·      My concerns about confidentiality and being “outed” were so paranoid, I would fudge the details on big things going on at work or in my personal life so thoroughly that reading them now, years down the line, I can’t even remember what some of them were referring to.

 

Of course, my biggest take away is just how long some of you have stuck around.  Thanks for sticking with it all these years and through so many repetitive posts.

 

Thanks to all of you who participated in last week’s open-ended discussion about how “FLR-ish” our respective marriages are.  My only big disappointment is that I was hoping to get more input from the wives. But, that’s a work in progress.  In the meantime, I felt KOJ (Yah, he’s back!), gave perhaps the best summary, with a couple of caveats, of what this thing we do includes and perhaps excludes:

 

“I would describe your blog as "F/m Domestic Discipline (DD)," with the following definitions:
F/m -- a woman has some authority over a man.
Domestic (for your blog) -- heterosexual, adult, live-in.
Discipline (for your blog) -- Includes spanking where sexual gratification is not the primary purpose.”

 

I think that’s mostly right.  My two primary caveats would be that I don’t feel like the “domestic” in DD necessarily excludes relationships that aren’t “live in” as long as, as Donn later noted, they are “committed,” which I would define as long-term and stable.

 

The other caveat for me personally is, when setting up the blog and managing it over the years, I've never intentionally excluded gay or trans relationships. It just never really came up.  I wouldn’t have a problem having one or both members of a gay couple participate, as long as the dynamic was basically the same as we talk about here, i.e. a domestic relationship with one partner in a lead or "top" disciplinary role holding the other partner accountable by imposing disciplinary measures including corporal punishment. It would probably be subject to a test run to see how in impacted the group dynamic, but I don’t have any reason to think that a gay DD relationship would be very different from a hetero DD dynamic.

 

 

The whole discussion of what factors influence whether a relationship is an FLR did take me in a direction I’ve previously resisted.  We often talk about DD and FLR being a spectrum, but I wonder whether they really are.  It seems to me they represent separate but adjacent lifestyles that overlap to a lesser degree for some and a larger degree for others.  In the past, I’ve been really resistant to seeing DD as a sub-set of any other relationships dynamic, but I do think that, given that there is some power shifting going on in even the most narrow forms of DD, it’s reasonable to classify it as one variant of a Dominance/submission dynamic, and one in which individual relationships incorporate various degrees of dominance. Though, I also can see maintaining that any form of Dominance/submission violates KOJ’s third factor, i.e. that sexual satisfaction not be the primary purpose.  As KOJ said, it's probably impossible to define, and that’s fine.

 

Now, on to this week’s topic. New commenter “Jackson” left this recent comment and topic suggestion:

 

Drinking more than allowed and sloppy behavior has been a continuous, persistent issue. Although discipline has improved it a lot, I think with an occasional pegging and brutal spanking it might be permanently resolvable with FLR/DD alone. Drinking is a large and complex problem, and I used to think those were not really solvable with FLR/DD, but since we have made certain every spanking is a brutal, memorable event with surrender and submission at its end, I think I could be disciplined to moderate drinking. I am much improved already. Maybe pegging is what is needed (but rarely). Dan maybe a topic sometime is “Can FLR/DD solve big complex issues?”

 

So, let’s get into that.  Can the discipline that comes along with a DD and/or FLR relationship solve big, complex issues?

 

I’ll start by observing that what each person sees as a “big” problem is inherently individual.  And, even for each individual, it may be a complex analysis. 

 

Perhaps his forgetfulness around financial issues usually isn't a big deal, but what if it results in her incurring a bunch of extra time or having to deal with a big unnecessary headache?

It also may hinge on particular outcomes, right?  Everyday procrastination might not be a big problem, but what if it results in not paying bills on time, thereby ruining the couple’s credit rating?

 

 

I don't think of speeding tickets as a big deal, but I know others do. And, even I concede they could become a big deal if cumulatively they resulted in a license suspension or a big jump in insurance rates. Or, in today's environment, god forbid a road rage incident got out of hand.

Or, maybe carelessness becomes such a chronic problem that, while one instance may not be a big deal, cumulatively the damages adds up. Or, it could be like what happened with a couple of motorcycle trips I’ve discussed in which I failed to do some basic preparation and, while no disaster happened, it could have and, regardless of whether it actually did, it stressed me out, cost us additional money to fix mistakes, etc.

 

Are those “big” things? In isolation, some might not be. But, they may be part of a larger pattern. And, there is the fact that sloppiness on things that don't matter much still creates habits that can lead to sloppiness on things that do.

 

The best statement I’ve found among our blog comments was this from ZM, which began with an observation about how hard it may be for wives to be strict with regard to “small things”:

 

“I think this is a common problem, especially as wives are gaining experience, because in order for it to be a real punishment for an adult, a spanking must be quite hard and long. This is especially true if the recipient is an adult who may fantasize about spanking. Pretty much EVERY punishment is going to be relatively big, and this doesn't seem quite as fair for seemingly "small" things.

 

It is only by the wife seeing the bigger picture and realizing that by addressing the small things, she is also addressing the bigger issues, that the whole thing seems in any way fair or proportional. Is it fair to spank me to tears because I leave my socks on the floor? Of course not! On the other hand, is it fair to spank me to tears because I continually let deadlines slip past, ultimately jeopardizing our quality of living? Sure. Is it fair to spank me tears because I eat a hamburger and too many fries? Probably not. Is it fair to spank me to help me change my eating habits and massively improve my health, greatly increasing the chances I can live for many more years and enjoy life, family, etc.? Of course.

 

So only by seeing that the small things and the bigger things are all just parts of the same picture can she feel good about consistently monitoring these little day-to-day things and enforcing seemingly minor lapses with severe enough punishments that they can help to effect real change.”

 

Jackson’s question referred to drinking too much, and that is the problem I’ve talked about the most here over the years. It undoubtedly has led to more spankings over time than any other offense. Yet, is it really my biggest issue?  That’s debatable.  To put it in context, in the month of September, I drank only three times. 

 

When I look at the big picture, there is a strong argument to be made that other behavioral failings, such as procrastination, carelessness, inattention to detail, and a reputation for being difficult to manage were much bigger limiting factors where work success and overall quality of life were concerned than drinking ever has been.

 

But, of those three drinking occasions in September, two of them involved “a few” becoming “a few too many,” and that’s been an ongoing problem for me. And, I've always recognized that it's not really the over-consumption that itself is a problem but, rather, the potential impact on other commitments or goals.

 

So, while perhaps it’s not the biggest issue, it’s still big enough.

 

So, can DD help with big issues?  Personally, I believe it probably can but it may require bringing the whole panoply of disciplinary tools to bear.  That could include cranking up the frequency and severity of the spankings, giving more preventative spankings, doing more check-ins and monitoring, and exploring alternative punishments.

 

To illustrate, one big problem with using DD to root out my particular issue with binge drinking is that the problem isn’t consistent, so it’s hard to say more consistent spanking alone would help.  As I said in reply to Jackson:

 

I've come to doubt whether DD will do much for it, though in fairness (a) I do think it has some modest role in imposing some guardrails, even if I crash through them every once in a while; and (b) we've never achieved a really high degree of consistency and certainty. In some ways, that reflects the nature of my issue. I'm not remotely close to a daily drinker. It's just that when I do drink, it can turn into a binge. Since the drinking is so episodic, the spankings have been too, only more so.

 

In other words, while consistently spanking for each instance of excessive drinking might help, it’s hard to see how consistency would have resulted in more than an incremental improvement when the problem itself is so inconsistent.

 

But, maybe that isn't the primary consideration when judging efficacy.  Maybe more consistency would have imposed some real limits and guardrails, even if the problem still occurred episodically.

 

On the other hand, let’s look at something like smoking. I started using chewing tobacco in high school, graduating to cigarettes in college, and eventually came to use both in copious daily amounts. I tried to quit many times, but I was very, very physically addicted.  I eventually did kick the habit cold turkey, but only after multiple failures.

 

It's probably not a coincidence that my successful effort to quit happened after Anne and I got serious, even though that was a decade before we started DD. I knew she hated the smell and taste of smoke, and that disapproval may have given me the extra incentive I needed.

 

In that case, and maybe paradoxically, because my dependence on nicotine was displayed multiple times a day, I do think that had we been into DD at that time, it might have made one of those earlier failed attempts successful if, and only if, Anne had been determined to take consistent action to root it out.  If her mere disapproval helped me kick the habit, how much more so would disapproval combined with a severe paddling each and every time have helped? My guess is . . . a lot.

 

So, the nature of the “big” issue may be very important to how amenable it is to solving with Domestic Discipline.

 

It also may be the case that, despite the numerous serious spankings Anne has given me for over-indulging, there hasn’t been enough of a “whatever it takes” approach.  As I've confessed here, when I go out with a friend for happy hour, after the second drink I sometimes forget all about the possible consequences. But, would I forget if I knew that one binge incident might result in a week’s worth of daily spankings? Here is an older comment from “DWC Fred” that suggests that the wife's level of sheer determination and willingness to be extraordinarily strict do matter:

 

“Ann has only spanked me for “big” things three times in recent years. [Once was] for being upset with her and expressing myself and carrying on badly. A couple of days later I apologized, and we spoke about it. I was in tears because of how I had spoken to her and made her feel. After our discussion she sentenced me to a spanking every day, for four days.

 

They were horrible. From day two on I was crying as I pulled down my pants and had difficulty calling Ann to tell her I was ready.

 

Four days in a row is a whole new ballgame, both from an emotional perspective and the pain perspective. Anticipating the increased pain and the additional embarrassment of crying from the time I pulled down my underwear, and getting even more out of control by the time Ann was done spanking, made days 2,3, and 4 successively worse.

I’ve never repeated any of those offenses.”

 

I also strongly suspect that my failure to think of likely consequences might be reduced substantially if some consequences were imposed in advance via preventative spankings.  

 

So, while I do think some “big” things may be resistant to a traditional “one regular spanking per one offense” approach, that doesn’t necessarily means spanking is inherently insufficient to address serious problems. Rather, maybe the seriousness of the sanction needs to be cranked up to match the seriousness of the offense or the number of times it has recurred.

 

How about you?  Have you used to DD to address “big” issues?  What worked? What didn’t?  If they haven't worked, was it a matter of spankings' inherent limitation, or more a lack of will and determination to make them effective? Are there things that could be added to DD spankings to make them more effective in resolving bigger issues?

 

Have a great week.