The Club - Meeting 443 - Humiliation, Humbling & Embarrassment

Honesty is grounded in humility and indeed in humiliation, and in admitting exactly where we are powerless. - David Whyte

 

Hello all. Welcome back to The Disciplinary Couple’s Club.  Our weekly on-line gathering of men and women who are in, or would like to be in, a Domestic Discipline relationship.

 

I hope you had a great week.  Mine was fine, other than all this f&^%-ing rain.  I feel like I’m living in the Pacific Northwest, but we do not actually live in the Pacific Northwest.  I guess I shouldn’t complain, given how much of the country was suffering from drought conditions this time last year.  But, is a nice sunny afternoon too much to expect? In the middle of June?

 

Our discussion last week was . . . unique?  I’ve had topics flop before, but . . . wow.  90+ comments (counting my replies).  Maybe two even tried to address either of the two topics. Oh well.  It happens sometimes, though I think that one does set some kind of inverse record for on-point participation.

 

Hopefully, KOJ’s suggestion for this week’s topic will fare better:

 

Our culture thinks of humiliation as a very negative thing, but as part of DD it can be particularly effective in driving the point home, changing behavior, acting as a deterrent, etc. And certainly, it has been more accepted and used in other cultures and times of history, such as public floggings, stocks in the town square, etc. As DD husbands, how has humiliation had a positive impact on our behavior? And why do we think it works? I think of the humiliation of baring my bottom for a spanking, of being scolded, of not being able to keep still while being thrashed, of begging for the spanking to stop, of being threatened with punishment in front of others. All of these humiliating experiences enhanced the effectiveness of my wife's punishments. This includes even the positive impact of the idea of humiliation, such as the fear of being found out as a DD husband. How exactly does this work on my brain? I really don't know!

 

A related aspect to my question: I keep saying and thinking that DD was not sexual for me. But in one sense it was: I would shrivel right up while feeling humiliated. I would get noticeably smaller, to the point that sometimes I would "turtle" (disappear into my scrotum). My wife would sometimes remark on this, thinking it was funny. So, I would have this reverse sexual reaction, so to speak. But it is my understanding that some men get aroused while being humiliated. I can't hardly imagine that. What about the rest of you? How does humiliation impact you sexually, both while it is happening and when you think about it afterward?

 

We’ve done topics on humiliation before, though not that often. Probably because it isn’t “a thing” for me personally. Well, not really.  At least, it’s not something I find stimulating in any positive way. Though, that doesn’t mean it doesn’t have value for me, and my attitude about it has changed a bit since the last time we did a full post on it.

 

I tend not to use the term "humiliation."  To me, it has a harsh tone.  I generally prefer “humbling.”  Though, I think this may be more than a distinction without a difference, because I'm not sure whether I mean the same thing by "humbling" that others mean by "humiliation." 

 

The purpose "humbling" serves for me is more conceptual than visceral.  I know that I get myself into trouble due to arrogance, temper, and lack of respect for authority.  Given the number of times those things have created problems for me, some "humbling" seems in order, as a tool to help me exercise more self-control and get a handle on some negative emotional reactions.  For me, it’s about rubbing off some of the arrogant edges and dumbing down my assertiveness, which admittedly can drift into being domineering and probably boorish.

 

“Humiliation” seems to me to be harsher, more cutting, and perhaps more sexually-oriented (for some) than mere humbling. I'm also not sure whether "embarrassment," is just a milder form of humiliation, or something categorically different.

 

For me, the difference between humbling, on the one hand, and humiliation/embarrassment on the other, is the humbling I am looking for is basically a tool for increased accountability, a deterrent to bad behavior, and hopefully a state of mind that helps mitigate some of my problems with temper and lack of respect for authority. There's an element of it simply being part of the natural consequences of the behavior.

Yet, because humbling can, in fact, become humiliating depending on the context, it can also inhibit my willingness to own up to my bad behavior. For example, when I fail to give Anne a required journal entry about a recent behavioral failure, I think it has as much to do with my ego wanting to not own up to that failure as it does with wanting to avoid a well-earned spanking. 

 

 

Similarly, I sometimes would prefer that she get right to a spanking instead of subjecting me to a long lecture.  Why? Because I don’t find the former inherently embarrassing or all that humbling.  KOJ talked about “the humiliation of baring my bottom for a spanking, of being scolded, of not being able to keep still while being thrashed, of begging for the spanking to stop, of being threatened with punishment in front of others.” I don’t beg for a spanking to stop, I don’t thrash around much as it is going on, and I don’t find baring my bottom for a spanking inherently humiliating, though others do, as this Glenmore drawing illustrates:

But, then there is scolding.  A “proforma” lecture or scolding right before a spanking doesn’t do much for me, positively or negatively. But, the few times that she has been really angry and cut loose with a real scolding, did impact me.  At first, not in a positive way. I tended to get resentful and stew about it for days or even weeks.  While, at the time, I didn’t identify that feeling with being humiliated, that’s probably what was really going on. 

 

There is nothing sexually arousing to me about that kind of scolding. Even in retrospect.  But, it’s complicated.  My subconscious seems to like playing with the idea. One of my most memorable spanking dreams was about taken out of a work/family event to be spanked by our office manager (a male), with everyone knowing that was what was going to happen to me.

 

We also have talked here about the embarrassment of someone knowing about a particular spanking or that we have one coming.  Others knowing about the particulars, not just the generality of our DD relationship, does do something for me, and that reaction has something to do with it being inherently embarrassing and humbling.  While I've never thought I was into humiliation, beyond the practical benefits of humbling, I can't deny that there seems to be a pattern of humiliation scenes getting my attention or having free rein in my dreams, including particularly M/m spanking scenarios, being spanked in public, and others being told about a particular spanking. And, in the right context, others knowing about the DD relationship itself creates this weird mix of repulsion and attraction. Something like that seems to be in play for the people who had a reaction to last week's picture of a paddle hanging on a wall.  Here's another.

Then there is my fascination with crying.  When I first discovered the Disciplinary Wives Club website, the stories about husbands being reduced to a sobbing mess were a huge part of the resulting morbid fascination. And, that fascination really was morbid. I found the possibility of being reduced to tears over Anne’s lap both repulsive and irresistibly attractive, and at the root of both emotions was the embarrassment it would entail.  And, because I had not yet experienced a real adult disciplinary spanking, I thought (based on the DWC stories) that it was pretty likely to happen. So far, it hasn’t, and I believe that one of the primary reasons I have not let go and sobbed during a spanking is because of the severe embarrassment that would result.  

 

In fact, isn’t the prospect of humiliation or severe embarrassment part of what fuels many of our DD and FLR fantasies, including crying, witnesses, public displays of her authority, etc.?

 

In fact, this discussion makes me wonder, is it humiliation itself that some of you find alluring or is it, rather, her ability to impose that humiliation on you?  Is a humiliation kink just a female authority kink in another guise?

 

As for Anne, I don’t think she’s into humiliating me, but I think it’s complicated for her, too. 

 

One reason she has been resistant to our (adult) kids knowing about our DD relationship is she hasn’t wanted to risk them thinking less of me as a father figure.

 

Yet, she also admits to getting off on some of the “humbling” aspects of imposing discipline on me. She says she doesn’t get aroused by the spanking itself, but she does take pleasure in ordering me to take off all my clothes and get in position and in watching me comply.  She knows complying with her orders is hard on my ego, and she likes that. 

 

 

How about you?  What role does humiliation or severe embarrassment play in your DD relationship? Does it play a positive role in bringing about behavioral change or enabling your wife to hold you accountable? To what extent is that positive role separate and apart from whatever disciplinary benefits you get from a spanking? Does your partner do things that are deliberately designed to humiliate or embarrass you? Are any of those separate and apart from the spanking itself?

 

How do you feel about that at the time?  How do you feel about it in retrospect?  Does your wife consciously try to humiliate or embarrass you?

 

I hope you have a good week. 

And, while I have tried hard to stay away from politics on the blog, this cartoon was just so appropriate in light of the last couple of weeks’ developments.

 

 

The Club - Meeting 442 - More Strictness, DD and Real-Life, and Untimely Spankings

Men always remember a woman who caused them concern and uneasiness. - Coco Chanel

 

Hello all.  Welcome back to the Disciplinary Couple’s Club.  Our weekly gathering of men and women who are, or would like to be, in a Domestic Discipline relationship.

 

I hope you all had a great week.  Mine was OK, though our weather has been extremely rainy, which is putting a damper on some outside activities, like motorcycling.  

 

Speaking of which, the above meme popped up in an on-line motorcycle forum.  While it doesn’t have much relevance to our debates here about the prevalence of adult punishment spanking, perhaps its appearance in such a vanilla forum says something about the prevalence of FLR-like arrangements or, as KOJ has put it a few times recently, the prevalence of “pussy-whipped” husbands?  In any event, I thought it was pretty funny.

 

We had a good discussion last week. It sounds like, in general, many of us are on the receiving end of our wife's "business-like" demeanor.  Although I do sometimes think Anne should let her emotions rip sometimes, on the whole I think "business-like" reflects both of our preferences.  I even lean toward "abrupt."

 

 

It was an interesting week for me where DD is concerned.  Sometimes, I get in these moods where I want (or think I want) to experience a significant “crackdown” from Anne in terms of strictness, consistency, etc.  I talked to Anne about it after one of my spankings this week, and I think we both generally agree it should happen. But, we’ve had many such conversations over the years.  Though, I’ve come to appreciate that with DD, as with most things in life, timing is everything, and that can include the big-picture context.  For most of our DD relationship, we were both working and had kids around.  This is our first full year where neither of those limiting factors are in play anymore.  

 

Has that resulted in a sea change in terms of consistency, openness, etc.?  Not really, but KOJ’s experiences show how quickly that can change.  He has talked about how open, and downright bold, his wife became after retirement. Last week, I asked whether that was a gradual, iterative process or, rather, something more abrupt.  He responded:

 

“It was shockingly abrupt with my wife, with no explanation. She must have been thinking about it for a long time. She had been hiding her authority over me due to concern about both of our careers. I had no idea that she wanted to display her authority, or at least not hide it. But suddenly she was making the same demands and comments in public that she did in private. I was taken aback. Eventually we talked about it. She was her matter-of-fact self. "You'll just have to accept it like you do your spankings," she said.  I came to realize that power is more powerful the more people know about it!”

 

I admit, her statement--"You'll just have to accept it like you do your spankings,"--stirs something deep inside me.  I suspect that some of KOJ’s comments about how his wife became far more open, bold, and demanding after retirement struck a deep chord and led to some of this week’s introspection about what I really want from this lifestyle. 

 

The introspection also probably resulted, in part, from some old DWC materials I received from Aunt Kay’s husband, including Word versions of portions of the DWC website and some of the old pamphlets.  Most of it wasn’t anything I hadn’t seen before, but seeing it aggregated in one document gave me a few things to ponder, including:

 

·      Unsurprisingly, I tend to think of the DWC mostly in relation to corporal punishment.  But, I think I sometimes I forget just how much Kay stressed the wife’s “authority.” It’s true that she emphasized it mainly in the context of the wife having unchecked authority to determine the “why, how, and when” of punishment.  But, that is pretty sweeping in its own right, particularly with respect to the “why” element. And, it seems to be that she tilts pretty strongly toward the wife making more non-disciplinary decisions as well.

·      She stresses the “maternal” element in her management of her husband (“Jerry” for DWC purposes) and in the DWC philosophy as a whole, more than I sometimes remember. 

·      Her view of the extent of the wife's authority, and the extent to which it shouldn't be questioned once the couple decide to enter into a DWC arrangement, can include being pretty dismissive of the husband’s qualms or concerns.  While she clearly thinks communication is key and the husband and wife should try to get on the same page, there also is a real “if he doesn’t like it, too bad” element in there, very similar to KOJ’s wife’s “You’ll just have to accept it . . .” enforcement of her authority.

 

The combination of KOJ’s comments and the DWC materials was stimulating for sure but also kept me deeply aware that asking Anne to take over more and more could have ramifications that go far beyond getting spanked more often. 

 

For example, when I suggested that her taking more verbal control would probably augment the effect of her punishments, she was very, almost disturbingly, enthusiastic about it.  But, that’s also what I mean about timing being everything.  It’s not like we haven’t talked about her becoming more verbally dominant and controlling before, but this time something seemed to resonate for her with greater force.

 

There also were some minor developments on the “spanked more often” front this week.  As I said to someone here last week, we have talked about the benefits of making sure that each major offense gets a separate punishment, but the reality is most of the time they get lumped together. Or, there is an intention to deliver multiple spankings in the same week, but only one actually happens.  Unfortunately for my butt, that wasn’t the case this week.  In my most recent journal entry (which Anne insisted I do), I reported three separate offenses, though one was fairly minor.  That resulted in two hard spankings, separated by about five days, though her original plan was to do them with one or two days in-between.  So, real life did kind of get in the way, but this time not fully.  These circumstances suggested a couple of topics to explore this week.

 

The first involves the interplay between our DD goals and “real life.”  I feel like we talk quite a bit about how real-world factors—children, family obligations, work, travel, illnesses and injuries, to name a few—sometimes interfere with our goals or desires around more consistency, openness or strictness in the DD and FLR aspects of our relationships. 

 

But, what about the reverse? Does our DD lifestyle ever interfere with “real life” or cause us to adjust other plans?  A comment from Mark got me thinking more about this:

 

“I have to be careful when and how I discuss spanking with my wife as it can result in the offer "do you need a spanking"... cue the rabbit in headlights. I always need a spanking, but I certainly don't want one when it is imminent! Back to your quote - my last caning was especially hard (marks for a week) because one of the reasons for the punishment was for not using my words which is something that she has punished before. She thought that I was quiet on Saturday because I needed a spanking and didn't talk about it. Actually, I was quiet because I expected a spanking (because she had threatened it during the week and they often turn up when she has time on the weekend), and I was horny but damned if I was going to masturbate and then receive the spanking post orgasm!!!”

 

Have there been times I haven’t masturbated because I didn’t want to risk a post-orgasm spanking?  Probably, though honestly, I don’t masturbate very often.  There have, however, definitely been multiple times when I wanted sex but didn’t initiate it, because I knew I due for a spanking and I was afraid that bringing up sex would result in Anne saying, “Sure, but you have a spanking coming first. Go get ready.” 

 

Another, very non-sexual example, is working out.  There have been lots of times that I’ve delayed or skipped a leg day in the gym when I knew a spanking was coming, because I didn’t want the residual soreness of a hard glute workout to cause an upcoming spanking to be even more painful.

 

There have also been times that I skipped happy hours at work or adjusted scheduling social get-togethers because Anne had ordered that a spanking would happen that evening.

 

Another example might be things like doctor appointments and the desire to avoid inadvertent discovery. I don’t think I’ve ever changed one because I didn’t want to risk the doctor seeing a well-spanked bottom. But, I am overdue for a colonoscopy, and I might suggest to Anne a spanking hiatus in the week prior. 

 

How about you?  Are there times when you’ve had to adjust your “real world” commitments or routines because of an upcoming or recent spanking?  

 

The other issue I thought we might explore relates to timing and its interplay with certainty.  As I said, my second spanking this week was five days after the first one. That meant one of the underlying offenses was from almost three weeks ago.  We’ve talked a lot here about it being preferable for the punishment to come immediately after the offense, but I’m rethinking that bit.  A few weeks ago, Alan had this to say about delayed punishments:

 

“The other issue you raise is the length of time before discipline is no longer needed or appropriate. This taps into one of the purposes of punishment that we don’t discuss as often as we do deterrence and behavior modification. I am thinking of “retribution,” which is punishing simply because the person committed an offense where the suffering should be proportionate to the severity of the offense committed -- punishment for punishment’s sake aside from or absent any other purposes of the punishment –and no matter how long it has been since the offending behavior.”

 

It's a legitimate point.  And, maybe we shouldn’t be so quick to dismiss the corrective power of even a delayed punishment.  Yes, when training dogs, and children, it's important that consequences (positive or negative) follow quickly after the behavior we’re trying to reinforce or dissuade. Adult humans, however, are complex creatures with complex brains.  We can and do appreciate negative consequences on a longer time scale.

 

An untimely spanking may not be ideal, but neither is a lack of consistency. Certainty of punishment may be just as important as timeliness, right? 

 

Further, a lot of my need for discipline is tied to feelings of guilt or remorse and to a deep-seated need for accountability.  It is true that as more time passes between the offense and the punishment, I feel less and less need to be held accountable.  However, it’s also true that on some level, feeling remorse and wanting to be held accountable make the spanking easier to take.  Conversely, a long gap between the offense and punishment negates some of the emotional relief I get from being held accountable, which can make cooperating with the disciplinary process emotionally frustrating. But, that frustration itself reinforces my view of her power and authority, and it also serves as an ongoing reminder that I shouldn’t be quick to assume that I’ve gotten away with some bit of bad behavior.

 

I hope you all have a great week.

The Club - Meeting 441 - Demeanor, Maternal Discipline and Weekly Recap

“A lot of people are afraid to say what they want. That’s why they don’t get what they want.” -Madonna

 

Hello all.  Welcome back to the Disciplinary Couple’s Club.  Our weekly gathering of men and women who are, or would like to be, in a Domestic Discipline relationship.

 

I hope you all had a great week.  Mine was pretty uneventful, though between this week and our road trip a week ago, I definitely have some number of spankings coming. That fact highlights a somewhat interesting (to me) development.  

Anne plainly intended to give me a spanking last night, but it was delayed because we had a family member over and they didn’t leave until fairly late.  Anne teased me about that as we were going to bed, commenting that it had been a lucky break for me.  She also made a point of commenting that she was still waiting on a journal entry with a report on my behavior.  I hadn’t really been avoiding giving her one. Rather, I already knew that she was almost certainly going to spank me sometime soon, as she had already called out things that had earned one.  Therefore, I’m not sure exactly why she wanted the journal entry, but she made it clear that she does.

 

Maybe she knows that giving her those entries that I know make a spanking even more inevitable is hard? Or, that it’s inherently humbling?  Or, maybe it’s the closest we can arrange to getting sent home with a bad report card or note from the principal, given this is a consensual adult relationship? 

 

Alan gave us a great topic last week, which resulted in a wide-ranging conversation that covered ground way beyond the topic itself.  Honestly, I love it when that happens.  I was thinking this morning that this blog works best the closer it gets to a real “club,” where people come to a meeting with a particular agenda but end up just chatting and exchanging views and life experiences.  You'll see that reflected in my approach to this week's post, with a lot of the comments quoted (I hope not overly so).

 

Here are a few of the comments that got my attention, for various reasons:

 

“I know for me, it is all about having the DD relationship and about her having the authority. I don't like spankings themselves, though I do think they are hot when thinking about them in retrospect or at any other time other than when they are happening. However, if she never spanked me, the authority wouldn't be real. It is only because it has been and can still be exercised that it feels real.” – ZM

This is true for me as well.  Sometimes we are guilty here of parsing motivations a bit too finely, questioning whether DD is “really” just about spanking, or more about authority, or consequences, or something else.  For me, it’s really “all of the above.”  The desire itself is, for me, rooted in the desire for authority, but no matter how much I might feel psychologically compelled to comply, it feels more real because that authority gets applied in very concrete, painful ways that I genuinely dread. 

“When a woman spanks you in a risky location or unexpectedly when you think she absolutely will not do it, something happens to the male psyche, maybe to the male alphas particularly.” – Alan

 

While this hasn’t really happened with us, I get how it must be extremely powerful when it does.  Being sure that something won’t happen but then it does, or not anticipating something happening and then it did, is itself a powerful demonstration that we didn’t have as much control over developments as we may have thought.   

 

In that vein, KOJ talked about how it felt coming out of the bedroom after his wife spanked him very unexpectedly at a party:

 

“I saw enough looks coming down the stairs to be certain that some partygoers were aware of what had transpired. My wife agreed with that assessment but shrugged her shoulders and said it served me right.”

Again, I haven’t experienced anything like this, but I do think that if Anne ever were to take the extraordinary step of spanking me with others in earshot or, worse yet, in front of someone else, she would have zero concerns about my embarrassment. 

 

As I related last week with the story of the 65 swats, if she is comfortable that I’ve earned what I have coming, she seems to have no concerns at all about delivering it.  The one exception may be kids.  There were many times I avoided earned spankings when the kids were around, even though I’ve always been clear that to me the world wouldn’t end if one of the kids did overhear a spanking.  She was always concerned about whether that might lower my status in the kids’ eyes. Alan alluded to the reality of lost status in relation to being spanked within earshot of his girlfriend’s friend: 

“The second and only other time I was spanked like that I did have to face her after returning to the dinner party. My ego was crushed and didn't find myself spinning any fantasies about " how she reacted". I saw that clearly and felt there was nothing to conceal or deny any longer. I had certainly lost status in her eyes because by that time she knew it was real and I could see that.  But the first time, I imagined all sorts of things about her reaction because I never saw it or was told anything about it until later.”

 That’s the thing about these “witness” fantasies.  It seems like a loss of status is, if not inevitable, then at least a very strong likelihood.  But, maybe that’s a good thing?  As I replied to Alan:

 

“That loss of status is something I think I would really struggle with, if it were to happen in front of someone I know well. But, assuming I was being spanked for something real, perhaps losing status and having to deal with that would be a good thing.”

 

While I’ve never experienced an actual witness, a few months ago I talked about getting spanked after Anne thought I had behaved boorishly while out to dinner with friends and that she had told the other wife (a mutual friend who is the only one [as far as I know for sure] who knows about our DD) that she intended to spank me.  Since this friend has known about this for a while, Anne telling her that she intended to spank me wasn’t horribly embarrassing, perhaps in part because I didn’t know about it until a couple of days later.  Yet, I do still subtly feel a loss of some status just by virtue of that friend knowing both the behavior and the consequences.

 

Every once in a while, a comment takes my mind off on a tangent that reveals to me something new about my own desires and motivations. It was like that this week with this comment from T.:

 

“As far as witnesses go, the only “witness” to our DD is her best friend from childhood. I brought this up to her, after I heard a comment on the phone. My wife said her friend was the only one that knew about our DD. She did admit she told her she thrashes me when I’m out of line. I’ve never cared because she lives out of state. I would be open to my wife spanking me on the phone with the speaker on. I don’t know why the change on my part, because I would never want this out in the open in our lives at home.” – T

 

We talk so often here about witnesses, and so many people seem to be morbidly fascinated with it, I’m surprised that the possibility of someone “witnessing” by phone had never occurred to me.  Of course, it still would require a willing participant on the other end of the line, which for me probably would mean someone associated with this blog in some way. 

 But, the little epiphany T.’s comment gave me was that, the more I thought about it, the more I realized that the comment triggered in me a desire not so much to have someone hear me being spanked (though that was part of my fixation with it), but more so to overhear or witness someone else getting it.  

 It surprised me, because I don’t usually think of myself as a voyeur in that way, and yet something about the idea of seeing another man get a real disciplinary spanking does appeal to me.  I don’t know why I’m that surprised. I clearly gravitate toward drawings and pictures of someone struggling to take a really hard spanking.  But, anyway, thanks T. for giving me a little fantasy fodder and something new to think about.

With that recap out of the way, I wanted to take up KOJ on a suggestion he made for a new topic:

 Dan, could that be a topic? Describe in some detail your wife's demeanor before, during, and after a spanking. – KOJ

 It can be, and it is the topic for this week. But, I also wanted to connect it up to several comments we’ve gotten lately, connecting our current DD attitudes and desires to mothers and maternal authority. I see the two as connected, because it seems to me that so much of the mystique of maternal authority is tied to demeanor.  KOJ made this connection explicit in another comment earlier in the week, alluding to his compliance with his wife’s orders:

 

I think it helped me with my wife that my strict mother brooked absolutely no "backtalk" (which included excuse-making and seeking a reprieve) when she announced a spanking. She expected absolute obedience, and I learned that anything else resulted in more punishment. So I usually gave my wife the same respect.

 

T. talked about his mother’s proficiency as a spanker and, in a separate entry later in the week, about her demeanor during a spanking:

 

“My Mother was a single parent, so she was the only one that disciplined inside the home. I was paddled at school and my best friend's parents spanked me on a few occasions. Although, they were tame compared to my Mother’s. I actually feared her spankings more than the school paddlings I never cried during a paddling at school, but sobbed when spanked by Mom. I think I wanted to Man up during the school paddlings. She spanked long and hard.

 

“I do wish my wife was as strict as KOJ’s was. I prefer my thrashings to be administered like in my youth. She pulls down my pants and underwear, she remains fully clothed and proceeds to thrash my bottom. I’m either dismissed or put in the corner and she carries on. As far as witnesses go, I chuckled at a few comments above. My Mother would always enter the bedroom, close the windows and pull the blinds shut prior to a spanking. My wife now does the same if it’s summer.”

 

GH talked a bit about his mother’s open attitude about others knowing.  My how the world has changed: 

"T, like your mother, mine was not shy of letting people know I was going to be spanked. I think back then it was almost a point of honour for parents to let people know that they disciplined their kids properly, and spanking was the gold standard." 

 

 In another comment, KOJ made another express connection between maternal and marital discipline and also about how reluctant we sometimes are to draw that connection:

 

“We never had the "meta" talk about our DD, at least not to my satisfaction. But I feared that if I probed that she might start questioning whether it did make sense for a wife to treat her husband like a son. She had told me, "I'm not your mother" and had set some parameters at the beginning of our DD (no sex afterward, no total nudity), I think to make sure I was not living out some Oedipal fantasy. Ironically, that meant she spanked almost exactly like my mother! But I made sure to never say that.”

For a long time, I didn’t bring this up at all with Anne, or even really to myself. Though I think I suspected that my need for adult discipline is rooted in a need for what I will call, for lack of a better word, “re-parenting,” I don’t think I really appreciated for some time just how much that desire for maternal authority (or at least “parental”) drives my desires.

 

  

As I’ve become more open with myself about the attraction of maternal authority, so has Anne. She has talked in positive terms about using DD to reduce me to a "teenage boy who needs a spanking from his mom."  She also has compared me to a teenager who mischievously pushes buttons just to do it, then is surprised when she actually does something about it.  What I seem to both crave and resist the most is consistent, no-nonsense rule-setting and direction, and that is all about demeanor.

 

I've noted before that part of the attraction I have to drawings that include a maternal vibe is the "getting down to business" demeanor and the sense of inevitability it conveys.  Sometimes it’s the look of determination on the mother’s face. 

 

 Sometimes it’s that she doesn’t have much of an expression at all.  She’s simply taking care of business.  Sometimes that can be conveyed simply with body language.  Everything about the way she presents herself gives the message that this is just part of being a mother and that doling out a harsh spanking doesn’t give her the slightest qualms. 

 

That is, in a nutshell, the kind of demeanor that gets to me.  Is it the demeanor Anne adopts? Sort of. Sometimes, she can be remarkably business-like.  A few months ago, I talked about an incident in which she basically interrogated me in very business-like fashion about whether I agreed that certain facts about my behavior were as she related them.  When I couldn’t deny it, she said very directly, “Then, you will be getting a spanking later today.  I’ll let you know when,” and then dismissed me.  That was very business-like, and it also felt very maternal.  She wasn’t asking for my input on whether I would be spanked, but more like asking for a teenager to admit to the bad report card or the conduct described in the principal’s note. 

 

 

That approach has a more maternal vibe than a long lecture.  Yet, I also do want to be held to strict standards and even to be talked down to when appropriate. I don’t really associate lectures with parental discipline. When I was growing up, usually you knew what you did, they knew what you did, and things proceeded quickly from there.  

Anne’s demeanor stays pretty steady during the spanking, though her approach has changed a bit over the last few years.  She used to stay almost completely silent from start to finish. Now, she tends to lecture more as she goes along, pointing out again why I’m getting spanked and how I could have avoided it.

 

When she’s done, she usually simply tells me it’s over and that I can get up, then either goes back to whatever she was doing or gets ready for bed.  Though, sex does very often follow our spankings that happen at night.

 

So, her demeanor usually stays pretty direct and business-like from start to finish.  For the most part, I think that works. There are times when I wish she would cut loose and display more anger, but I think that would really work only if the spanking came immediately after some behavior that really did piss her off. As Mark noted, lecturing is probably very hard in general and would become more so if she were trying to recreate an emotion that likely dissipated in between the offense and punishment.

 

What is your wife’s demeanor before, during, and after a spanking?  If you are so inclined, please share any thoughts you have about how that demeanor does or doesn’t match your memories or associations with maternal/parental discipline. 

And, lest we take mothers a bit too seriously, I saw this meme recently. It cracked me up.

 

 I hope you have a good week.