After the Spanking and the Strictness -- Seeing Her in a Different Light (Meeting 521)

 “A lot of people would say 'sexy' is about the body. But to me, 'sexy' is a woman with confidence. I admire women who have very little fear.” - Allegra Versace

 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 thought I wouldn't be posting this weekend but ended up having more time than I anticipated today.  I'd pre-drafted a couple of posts, so I decided to go ahead and this one out.

 

I hope you all had a great week. We had a special family event, which was great, but I'm now totally exhausted. 

I’ve been getting a lot of mileage out of a single comment from a few weeks ago, but here is another snippet from a commenter going by “DD”, which I’ll use to introduce this week’s topic.  He left it when we were talking about “zero tolerance”.

 

“My wife was the one who was very strict out of the gate and she has continued to be strict. I get spanked somewhat less often only because I am better behaved. I would never try to force my wife to enforce a zero tolerance policy but she is that way on her own. It took some adjustment initially and it certainly changed our relationship dynamic to something more FLR, and I see her differently than I used to. I have a new/different respect for her and see her as the authority in the relationship. She says she still sees me the same but she does treat me differently in her role."

 

The highlighted portion of DD’s comment resonated with me, for a couple of reasons.  

 

First, in our discussion regarding “zero tolerance”, we talked about one of the ironies of many DD relationships: The wives may be concerned that being strict or showing her authority strongly will be perceived as being “bitchy” or overly controlling, yet many of the husbands fantasize about a wife who exercises that sort of strictness and displays a dominant kind of confidence.

 

Second, I feel like after so many years of doing this, Anne and I are again on the threshold of a step-change in her exercise of authority and the strictness with which she approaches disciplining me.

 

DD’s wife apparently came to strictness naturally, though it also seems that being subjected to it over time has increased, or changed the nature of, his respect for her, culminating in him seeing her as “the authority in the relationship.”

 

That’s what Anne and I are expressly aiming for; a relationship in which we both see her as “the” authority in the relationship.  She's been carrying through with it lately, and it definitely has me feeling a different level of respect.  Not that I haven't respected her over the years. But, this feels . . . different.

 

We’ve talked about it many times over the years, but it’s never quite seemed to gel.

 

That’s not to say that she hasn’t gotten more confident in exercising authority over the years.  She has. But, it’s been incremental and inconsistent.

 

Some women are born empowered and dominant. It sounds like DD’s wife may be one of them. I’ve had female bosses, and female executives as clients, who exuded power and authority. It seemed to come naturally to them.

 

On the other hand, others must learn it.  And, I do believe that confidence can be learned, authority can be taken up as opportunities arise, and a taste for power can be acquired. 

 

As I've said before, my wife is not a naturally dominant person.  Between the two of us, my personality is by far the more brash and aggressive. 

 

But, largely because of our domestic discipline relationship, her confidence in herself and comfort level with her own power have grown and developed over time. 

 

However, because “getting in my face” doesn’t come naturally to her, we’ve had to try to create the right conditions and “permission structures”, if you will, to drill it deeply into her heart and soul that I really do want her to be more strict and powerful in dealing with me.  We've talked a lot about how she needs to make herself "expect respect."  And make my bottom pay the price if I revert to form and fail to respect her place in the hierarchy.

Submitting to her disciplinary spankings is a virtuous circle.  As she orders spankings more often, and sees me submit to those orders over and over again, her confidence in her own authority builds. In exercising power, she grows more powerful, and she learns to enjoy exercising that power. More precisely, she starts acknowledging to herself, and to me, that she enjoys power and being in charge.

 

Including exercising more and more power vis-à-vis me.

 

 

As I said, it has been a work in progress for several years. Paradoxically, one way she gained confidence early on entailed limiting her discretion temporarily. We were brand new to disciplinary spankings, and neither of us had any real feel for our limits or, despite the descriptions on the DWC website, what a severe spanking really entailed. 

 

So, we agreed to non-discretionary rules.  Certain offenses would earn a spanking, and we each such offense would earn a certain minimum number of swats with the fraternity paddle. She could give more, but not less.  For the first several weeks, the number of swats was around 6 at the low-end to 20 at the high end.  Though, given that it was a heavy fraternity paddle, twenty was not trivial.

 

Then, I had one especially bad week.  I swallowed hard as I tallied up that week's offenses and realized it came to 60!  I told her that I wasn't sure I could take that many.  The previous weeks of practice had apparently hardened her resolve.  Without missing a beat, she replied, "Then, I guess you shouldn't have behaved so badly.  You will take every single swat you have coming."  And, she delivered. 

 

I still recall that spanking, and I remember having a disquieting feeling as I pulled my pants up over my bruised bottom.  It was the first time I had felt the implications of the fact that, under the sort of DD arrangement we had adopted, the nature or our relationship had, in fact, changed.  

 

She had been empowered, and I had been disempowered.  Given the radical change in the dynamic, I could not help but see her—and myself—in a different light after that spanking.

 

There were other incidents in which I was confronted—via a sore and blistered bottom—that she was changing and was becoming much more willing to enforce her will over me. I recall vividly one time that she spanked me very, very hard for what I saw as a minor issue. I don’t remember the spanking itself very well. What I remember is that I was surprised at how hard she had spanked me and, again, feeling unsteady physically and emotionally as I pulled my pants up, like the ground had shifted under me. 

 

In both those instances, feeling so concretely one’s own disempowerment and loss of autonomy wasn’t pleasant. “Disquieting” is the best word I can come up with, though “humbled” would also be part of it.

 

 

However, that feeling of disquiet was, in the coming days, enhanced—not replaced—with an increased admiration and respect for her personal power and authority.

 

I felt a deference to her that I sure as hell never felt for any boss at work, and it had something to do with her expressing her power regardless of how I felt about it.  

 

Yet, a few nights ago, as we had a discussion about what increased “strictness” would look like, the archetype that seemed to resonate for both of us was that of a boss. 

 

Bosses don’t need to be mean or nasty. But, good ones have a confident demeanor that lets everyone know they are in charge.  They set the rules and can be rigorous in enforcing them.  They know that sometimes an employee needs to be kept on a tight leash and subjected to progressive discipline until they get their act together. They can, and at times should, make an employee nervous, or at least very conscious of their place.

I could give her concrete examples of being strict but, in the end, it wasn’t easy to articulate because so much of it is about attitude.

 

I want her to treat me in a way that displays that she believes to her core that she is in charge of my discipline and that, while we may make major decisions together, she has unlimited authority where my behavior is concerned.  It’s about not just exercising power, but knowing inside that she has it, to such an extent that it kind of radiates.

 

It's about both of us accepting that she is the authority in the relationship, as DD put it. 

 

That’s how “seeing her in a new or different light” plays out for us and what we are consciously trying to grow and reinforce.

 

How about you?  Has the DD relationship as a whole, or some particularly strong show of authority or especially painful spanking, caused you to see her in a different light?  Has she come to see herself in a different light? How so?

 

I hope you have a great week.