The Club - Meeting 287 - Bratting

“We need to understand the difference between discipline and punishment. Punishment is what you do to someone; discipline is what you do for someone.” -  Zig Ziglar

Hello all.  Welcome back to the Disciplinary Couples Club.  Our weekly gathering of men and women who are in, or would like to be in, Domestic Discipline relationships.  I hope you had a good week. 

Mine was, as is so often the case these days, exhausting.  It was a combination of things this time.  I was fighting a cold all week.  I had bad bouts of insomnia.  And, last night, instead of going to bed to get a start on catching up on sleep over the weekend, I stayed up late watching a movie I’ve seen a hundred times.  And, yes, the movie watching followed an evening of dinner and drinks, followed by a nightcap or two at home.  Though, honestly, while it leaves me feeling bad today, in the moment it all felt like self-medicated decompression.  My weeks are so packed with activity right now, I hit Friday evening and just want to unwind fast and hard. 

But, I’m trying to face up to the fact that there are reasons, and then there are excuses.  And, the former can morph into the latter.  Moreover, sometimes even if you have very good reasons for less than optimal behavior, that bad behavior gets in the way of things you need to accomplish.  In those circumstances, even if there are justifications for the behavior, like being overwhelmed at work, you need to be held to a higher standard.  In fact, it is precisely when you are overwhelmed, treading water and in danger of going under that you need an extra dose of discipline to rise to the occasion you find yourself in.  Ideally, it would be self-imposed discipline, but some of us are  fortunate enough to be in Domestic Discipline relationships in which we are held to that higher standard when we can't seem to do it ourselves.  It's what we need, and so it is what we get.

I’ve talked about my "need" for boundaries many times, but when I think this through, “need” has two connotations. First, there is the emotional need that boundaries meet for some of us; the sense of security that for whatever reason some of us lack and that enforced boundaries can help us attain.  I'm really not "needing" discipline in that sense right now.  When I am operating at this pace, part of me actually gets off on the stress and the crazy level of busyness.  The "need" I have for boundaries right now is really external, not internal. If anything, right now I do not want to be spanked at all; the "need" I have at this moment is not an emotional yearning to be controlled.

But, I do recognize that I "need" discipline right now.  It is an externally centered "need," in the sense of something that is "required" or "necessary" for achieving an end.  I need enforced boundaries right now, because without them I am in danger of not performing at a level that is necessary for this new role I find myself in.   My response to the requirements of that role is to hit things really hard and plunge myself into it with everything I have, but without really eliminating anything I was doing before.  If  I keep at things like this, I am endangering my physical and psychological health through living too hard.  In this sense, the "need" is for discipline as something that is required or necessary to achieve some desired state--in this case performing in a more challenging environment than I have been in for a long time--while not destroying my health in the process.  

It is akin to being spanked hard for a bad report card – it’s something done out of caring and is for the recipient’s own good, regardless of whether it seems so to him at the time.  In fact, it may be the exact opposite situation of the internally felt need.  To continue the "bad grades" metaphor, I may feel perfectly fine in the moment when I am not focusing on what I need to do in order to earn a good report card and, in fact, might prefer to continue with exactly what I am doing.   But, that's short-term thinking. Those of us blessed with Disciplinary Wives get the benefit of someone making us think long-term.  

Well, enough on that for now, though I've had this nebulous idea of "tough love" as a topic on my mind for a while but haven't been able to come up with anything really concrete to explore about it. I'll keep mulling that and welcome any suggestions.

On the topic of topics, I was a little surprised by last week’s topic response, or lack thereof. I thought it was a great topic, but it didn’t seem to get much traction until the very end of the week, and not a whole lot even then.  It's the first time in a while that there were few, if any, comments the first few days it was up.  Though, it could be everyone was just busy earlier in the week. That happens sometimes. In any event, thanks to those who did weigh in and who took the time to put together actual comments responsive to the actual topic. 

Most weeks, I choose topics based on comments from the week before or based on things happening in my own life. That’s not really the case this week.  Instead, I thought of this topic a while back and put it on my list to address in the future,  because I thought some might have experience with it, even if I don’t personally.   

The subject is “bratting.”  I’m not sure I have ever encountered the verb form of “brat” outside the Dominance and Submission and DD contexts (the quote to the right is from a D/s-oriented Tumblr). But, in a nutshell, "bratting" is misbehaving intentionally in order to provoke a response or get attention. 

Bratting could take several forms, and could be a single incident or something that goes on for a long time.  It could be episodic, as in acting up on a particular occasion in order to provoke a response in that moment. Or, it could be something deeper, as in acting up frequently in order to trigger the other spouse to step up into a more dominant role. In fact, perhaps bratting could even be the impetus for the entire disciplinary relationship.  I am a reminded of a comment a few years ago by Holly, which touched on several interesting themes, including "bratting," consent, initiating the DD relationship, and mother/daughter relationships:

“Calling me a bitch was what led to my husband’s first appointment with the strap. He had done it before, but my mom heard it for the first time and told me I was a fool for allowing it. There were other things going on at the time, including his general brattiness and temper tantrums when he was frustrated. It was a big change for me, because I had been determined to manage my own marriage differently than my mom had done. But over a period of time, about three years, I saw the same behavior in my husband that had gotten dad in trouble with mom. When I told him what was going to happen, he gave me almost no resistance. That makes me think he wanted me to take charge and his brattiness and tantrums were his way of asking for it. He knew how mom had run things, and I think that made him want the same thing from me. The strap transformed him into a sweet loving husband. I don't think that would have ever happened if I had not acted, or to be honest, if mom had not pushed it."

I can honestly say that I don’t think I have ever intentionally acted badly in order to get a spanking or provoke a response from Anne.  At most, there are times when I’ve caught myself in bad behavior, or felt a sense of being out of control and not really able to rein myself in, and gotten frustrated when she didn't step up or wondered why she was not literally whipping me into line. But, I don't think I have ever taken that next step of continuing or amping up the bad behavior in hopes of triggering a response.

How about you?  Is bratting something you engage in?  If so, how has that worked out for you?  Is it an example of, “be careful what you wish for, because you just might get it”?  For the Wives, do you think your husband sometimes engages in bratty behavior intentionally to get your attention or to provoke you into a strong disciplinary reaction?  If so, what do you do about that?  Is the solution to make him very sorry for both the behavior and the bratting, basically making him regret this form of "asking for it"?  Or, do you have some other method of dealing with it?  Regardless of which end of the paddle you are on, tell us all about any personal experience you all have with this bratting phenomenon.

Have a great week.