Happy (Belated) Birthday to Us!

Welcome back everyone!  I am one of those husbands/fathers/sons who would chronically miss every anniversary and birthday if not for  electronic calendars and alarms, and even then I still screw it up more often than not.  Therefore it came as no particular surprise when, after saying in a post that this blog was "almost" a year old, I checked the date of my very first posting and found that the first birthday of The Disciplined Husbands Forum actually came and went a month ago.  Time does fly, doesn't it?

So, let's reflect a little bit on where we are.  We've gone from a tiny handful of readers to over a thousand on peak days.  Not bad.  While our number of weekly comments still doesn't approach that of some other spanking blogs, in the last couple of months we've had several people become fairly regular posters.  While participation by disciplinary women remains pretty low, we do get the occasional comment from women who haven taken their problem-child husbands firmly in hand, so to speak.  So, all in all, this group has come a long way, and I want to thank all those who come back every week to see what we are up to and perhaps contribute a line or two.

We also have learned a little bit about the people who comprise this little community.  Here are the final results of my year-long, totally unscientific poll, which included 949 total respondents, of whom:

607 (63%) identified themselves as disciplined husbands
35 (3%) identified themselves as a disciplinary female
250 (26%) are "disciplined males in waiting"
18 (1/%) are "female disciplinarians in waiting"
6 (< 1%) are disciplined females
75 (7%) are just curious

Now, again, this is a completely unscientific sampling.  In the time this blog has been up, there have been over 200,000 page views, but less than 1,000 took the poll. But, it may provide some interesting clues to the composition and motivations of those involved in TTWD.  First, it is clear that the number of men who visit this kind of blog dwarfs the number of women, by a factor of 20x.  What isn't as clear is whether that means more men are interested in domestic discipline, far more men are interested in F/m domestic discipline than are women, or do men just spend a lot more time than women visiting blogs and particularly blogs with "kinky" content.  It would be depressing if there are 20 times more men looking for disciplinary relationships than women willing to accommodate them, and thankfully the numbers do not quite seem to bear that out, given that 63% of those who took the poll indicated that they are men who actually are being disciplined in their current relationships.  That would seem to indicate that the skewed poll results come from a skewed readership, i.e. there are just a lot more men seeking out and finding this blog.  Of course, the fact that the masthead identifies it as a forum for men might have something to do with that.  Duh. See below for more on that.

We've also learned a little more in the last few days about origins and how we came to be in or to want this kind of relationship.  Here, the trends surprised me a bit.  Based on other blogs, communications with other contributors, etc., I have assumed that domestic discipline relationships usually begin with the man requesting it.  Some of the recent comments here, in the Guestbook, and on a couple of other blogs I follow are leading me to question that assumption.  People seem to be finding their way to these relationships in a variety of ways.  One began with a spanking by a mother-in-law.  Some were instigated by the woman taking control at the beginning of the marriage, and those seem to regularly involve multi-generational F/m relationships, i.e. the new disciplinary wife grew up in a household where her mother was in charge.  Others transitioned into domestic discipline after years of traditional marriage, often because the tradition wasn't working.

As for the interest in spanking, there does seem to be a common, though not universal, theme of it starting early in life.  But, as I said, it's not universal.  I had no interest at all in spanking or DD until well into my '30s.  And, there doesn't seem to be any real pattern with respect to why people become fascinated with the idea of being spanked or with receiving female discipline.  Some were spanked in childhood.  Some were not.  Some had early encounters with female authoritarian figures.  Some did not.  Some associate the need for discipline as an adult with getting it as a child, while others think that they are interested in it as an adult precisely because they did not get it growing up.

In short, I've learned a lot over this year, and I hope you have, too.  One really important thing I learned relates to my own motivation for doing this and what I want this blog to be when it grows up. When I wrote that very first post, I was not really sure where I wanted to take it.  I knew that I wanted it to be very participatory and inclusive.  I also knew that I did not want it focused on me and my own experiences.  I wanted it to be a discussion, not a journal.  But, some contributors said they wanted to hear more about my own views and experiences.   And, a part of me does sometimes want to share a particular event in my own DD life, or some frustration that I'm experiencing, etc., and to experience some real communication about what is going on in my own DD life.  Though I still shy away from that to some degree.  But, I think the recent interactivity in the comments is working pretty well, with some real discussion and exchange of views taking place, and I'm trying to share more about my own life without this becoming a confessional about the bad acts that often result in me making that trip to our basement "woodshed." 

I also have learned that I really want this blog to be a resource.  Without getting all self-important, I do think that there is a very powerful transformational element to F/m domestic discipline.  I believe there are lots of real world examples of it empowering women, helping men become better husbands, and helping previously dysfunctional couples take their relationship in a more positive direction.  At first, I was a little leery of taking the blog in the direction of a "how to" website for domestic discipline relationships, to a large extent because I did not want to step on the toes of the Disciplinary Wives Club, which was a great resource that played a major role in helping my wife and I figure out how to experiment with this idea of her exercising more authority over our marriage.  My reticence on that front was much reduced when the DWC closed earlier this year, and I now feel like there really is a void out there that needs to be filled for couples who want to explore the possibility of changing the power dynamic in their relationship by empowering the woman to take control and exercise her authority over her man, often by making him bend over her knee or otherwise prostrate himself to receive a well-deserved dose of discipline!  In that vein, just yesterday I got this very gratifying comment on the Guestbook from a Disciplinary Wife named Colleen:

"Your site has been a great help to us. I enjoy the questions you pose, and the comments that follow are very insightful. Ed approached me a few years ago about his need to be disciplined. Through your site and the things said by those who have commented, I understand a little better what needs to be done so that both of us can grow in the areas that need special attention."

That pretty much sums up what I want for this blog.  I want it be an inclusive resource, where people interested in this lifestyle come together to share ideas, experiences, tips, etc.  And, I really hope for more participation from the Colleens out there, i.e. the Better Halves reflected in the 600 men who identified themselves in our poll as "disciplined husbands."  With that in mind, what would people think about changing the name of the blog to something like the Disciplinary Couples Club, or something that better reflects something that is not just a forum for men, but something to be shared by men and women alike, though keeping the focus on the F/m variety of DD?  Of course, such an effort might flop regardless, given that the poll results do tend to indicate there just are not a lot of disciplinary women seeking out these kinds of websites.  But, again, is it because the title of the blog has indicated something not so inclusive?

In order to emphasize the little manifesto set out above regarding group participation, in lieu of a weekly topic this week, I want to ask everyone (including some of the silent majority who drop by each week but never say "Hi" even with an anonymous post) to go to the Guestbook tab above, and enter a comment.  The Guestbook has a series of suggested questions, but they are just that -- suggestions.  You can answer them or not, but please just drop a line or two about yourself, your interest in DD, and also let me know what I can do to make this blog better as we get further into year two.  Thanks again for making it a great year one!