Summer Vacation

The summer vacation is coming to a close.  As a teacher, I have about 75 days off during these warm summer months.  It is a time that I use to recharge, reorganize, and plan for the next year.  It has also been the time when Tom and I usually reconnect after the stresses and constraints of the school year.  I look forward to the summer break, and I believe that He does, too.

Of course, I always set myself up with a cart load of summer projects to get accomplished.  Always on that list are things like clean the garage, catch up with the filing, clean the refrigerator, polish the cupboards, etc. In addition, this summer, I was hoping to paint the inside of my condo.  I had the colors all picked, and I figured I'd just chunk away at the work, one wall at a time, until it was all fresh and new again.

Too, coming into this summer break, we all knew that we were facing the hurdles of T's surgery.  The doctors led us to anticipate that being very difficult, with a long and complicated recovery.  So, we were mentally prepared for a medically intense summer.

As it has turned out, this summer has been much different than what I planned, or expected.

The best part of all of it has been the relative ease with which T came through her surgery.  Her recovery, while slow as we might expect from this kind of surgery, has been pretty smooth.  She is reintroducing various foods, one by one.  Most of what she is able to eat at this point is still pretty soft, and we do have to focus on proteins, but so far, so good.

I'll be right up front, and tell you that I have made almost no progress on that list of projects.  To be sure, there has been NO painting going on.  Some of that has to do with a pervasive exhaustion that has settled over our family.  I just haven't had much energy, and I seem to be able to sleep, and sleep, and sleep.  He and I have gotten into a pattern of staying up late, walking well into the wee hours of the morning, and then sleeping until the very late morning.  I have enough of the Puritan in my background to feel just a tad guilty about that, but I also know enough to really listen to my body, and take advantage of the easy days of summer to catch up and take care of myself.

The other side of the summer story is that He and I have dragged ourselves through this summer, feeling our way along and trying to figure out how we might relate to one another on this side of all that has happened. It has been a quiet sort of passage.  We've spent a lot of time together, but often that is time in the grip of silence (sometimes companionable, and sometimes simply empty).  We have held hands.  We have cuddled.  We have rubbed and stroked and hugged one another.  For much of this summer, it has seemed to be necessary to just touch and hold on.

We have, mostly, managed to not growl and snap at each other.  We had one difficult day at the beginning of this last week, but for the most part, we have been pretty gentle with each other.

We are still learning how to live this life we have been given.  Maybe that "still" isn't even really accurate.  It really does seem that we are maybe just beginning to make sense of all of it; finally healed enough to begin to try and sort through what is left, and figure out the way forward.

We've made some big discoveries:

We've learned that Tom has a genetic anomaly called MTHFR (and yes, we do tend to refer to that as "motherfucker.").  This is, apparently, a pretty common set of genetic polymorphisms.  From what we've read, there may be anywhere from 10% to 40% of the population of the US who have some form of this defective set of alleles.  There are several variations,  but only two have been studied very thoroughly.  The short version of what we've discovered about this is that this abnormality interferes with the body's ability to process B-vitamins and folic acid through a process called methylation.  People with MTHFR issues may be processing the B-vitamin complex at only 10%-60% efficiency. It leads to a build up of something called homocysteine in the blood; a condition called hyperhomocysteinemia. There are a number of issues related to all of that, but chief among them are cardiovascular problems, depression, alcoholism, diabetes, kidney and liver issues, anemia, migraine, arthritis, dementia, infertility, ... and on and on and on.  Knowing about the presence of this genetic anomaly gives us some context for the long arc of His history that brought us to this point.  It also gives us a solid handle on a way to intervene in the continuing and seemingly intractable depression that He deals with; has perhaps always dealt with. The prescription supplement, Deplin, that provides the L-methylfolate that His body cannot produce effectively helps to support the production and metabolic processing of the neurotransmitters that help to regulate mood and anxiety.  The trick is that dosing with Deplin is tricky.  We've had to do some "wiggling around" to get it in the right range.  I am thinking we are finally there -- I hope.

His post traumatic stress disorder continues to present challenges.  It is an unpredictable factor in our days and nights.  He can have very good stretches of time during which He feels well and balanced, and life seems pretty good, and then something triggers the PTSD and He falls into a spiral of uncontrollable nightmares, hyper-vigilance, vivid and unwelcome memories, distancing from relationship, mistrust, guilt, and depression.  The layers of His trauma can be a confound as we never know whether He is reacting to traumatic events from His childhood, or from the more recent events of two and a half years ago.  To make everything more complex, I struggle with my own trauma issues, rooted in an abusive childhood, too.  When He gets going, His responses to His own fears can smash right into my tender places, tripping me over into fear and anxiety.  With that going on, we are likely to fall into a nasty feedback loop where we are helpless to support each other.  We can be a thorough-going mess in the middle of all of that.

One hopeful development has come from an unexpected quarter.  I had a parent of one of my students recommend a book earlier in the summer.  She and her husband adopted three children (siblings) from two different orphanages in Ukraine about four years ago.  The oldest boy was about 16 when they first brought them all to the states, and as soon as he turned 18, he headed back to Ukraine.  The younger two, who are now in 7th and 8th grade, have a variety of challenges and issues.  Both struggle with English, although they have made remarkable progress, and surely speak better English than I do Russian.  The older one, who I'll call Alex, has a very difficult history.  As a six-year-old, he was present when his addicted mother (who worked as a prostitute in order to obtain drugs) was murdered by a "client."  Alex and his younger sister were sent to separate orphanages.  I do not know all of the horrors of the orphanage where he lived for years before being adopted, but I imagine it was far from an ideal, nurturing environment.  He has lots of behaviors related to that trauma history and has been diagnosed with reactive attachment disorder.  These parents have struggled valiantly to provide a loving and nurturing home for these children, but it has been an uphill battle.  This book suggests an entirely new, love-based approach to dealing with attachment-

challenged children, and dispenses with the more traditional therapeutic view that advises parents to remain in firm control by the use of logic and consequences.  I feel sure that the methods in this book will help me help Alex and his sister in my classroom, but on a more personal level, the approaches the authors suggest seem applicable within the relationship between Tom and I.  I have mourned the connection that we used to have, and cannot seem to re-establish.  It does seem to me that there is some parallel between an impediment to intimate connection and what is, classically, an attachment disorder.  I am hoping that learning and practicing the sorts of responses outlined in this book can soothe the two of us through the scary places, and help us avoid the spiral into anger and fear that so trips us up.  So there is work to do, but at least I have some idea how to begin.

We've also begun to find some sort of comfort level around our more "switchy" dynamic.  Probably, I am the one who has struggled more with that.  I keep wondering what this new pattern of relating means for who I am.  I cannot seem to turn off the little niggling voice that pokes at me and chants, "not wife, not slave, not wife, not slave, not wife, not slave...," and yes, I do realize that is just silly.  I still struggle with the questions, and there do not seem to be any answers.  If I can let go of feeling like I need to have some sort of definitive identity with regard to that part of our life, and just relax into things, then it turns out that He and I can switch back and forth and spank and get spanked depending on who is where "head wise."  I think it is harder to talk about it here.  There are way more reactions to consider in the back and forth of mutual switching, but it seems to work for us at this point, and it is one of the places where we feel sort of light and playful.  So that is good.

I have one more day, and then it is back to the classroom.  I hope I am ready. It wasn't the summer I would have asked for, but I suspect it might turn out to be a summer that let us do a lot of work that will take us into the next part of our lives together.  That would be worth a lot more than all the painting I might have done -- and what the heck, I can always paint a bit at a time as the year progresses.

swan

Angling

An angler is, most commonly, a fisherman.  Not here, however.  In our household, it seems that Tom has evolved into a full-fledged "angler."  "Angler" in this case refers to the alternative meaning of the word; the idiomatic infinitive "to angle for:"

to scheme or plan to get something; to "fish" for something.

Angling for ... what?  Well, more and more, around here, it is Tom angling for a spanking.  As things have lightened up around us and between us, He has gotten more and more "switchy."  Where He once chose to bottom once in awhile for the broadened understanding that it gave Him for the experiences of His partner, now it is really much more about a desire and drive that is entirely about Him.  He wants to get spanked, and His approach to that is not a simple and straightforward asking.  No.  He schemes and plots and manipulates and maneuvers and brats and hints broadly.  He is a shy and blushing bottom when He is in that place, and it is adorable... just very sweet and very cute.

The angling has introduced a new level of uncertainty and ambiguity into our power-based dynamic.  Now we have to not only negotiate the approach to a spanking encounter; we also have to navigate through the shallows and currents around WHO plays which role.  We are learning to try and balance the energy between us; keeping a sort of informal accounting of who got spanked last, or who is feeling more needy, or more toppy, or...

I'm not too sure what I think of all of that most days.  Not sure that He's sure either.  We are wandering along through a world that seems to have very few boundaries, where what was clearly defined now seems entirely movable and malleable.  Where we once "exchanged" power, we are now more likely to try and power balance.

swan

Moobie Gets on the Table A Lot

Our Moobie has gotten to be quite the character.  Anyone who has ever raised a kitten knows that there is an "adolescent" period during which the once "precious" kitten can be alternately delightful -- and then just pure aggravation (not unlike human adolescents, I guess).  Moobie definitely has her moments.  She is unbelievably curious, and more than just a little bit stubborn.  Wherever we are and whatever we are doing, she wants to be right in the middle of it all.  A lot of the time, that is just fine and not any problem.  She is fun and friendly and very personable.  However, try to sit down and eat a meal when the curious, flying fur beast insists that she ought to be allowed to jump right up and check out whatever interesting things she might find on your plate...  The continual refrain, around here, is "Moobie!  Get off the table!"  It is a command that Moobie routinely ignores, necessitating some sort of intentional move from one of us to enforce the idea that cats do not belong on the dinner table.

When I am home, I can summon up my "mean Mom voice" and scare the heck out of her.  When I get loud and growly sounding, she will head for the hills.  The problem is that I am not here during the daytime.  Moobie and "her Daddy" are here all by themselves all day everyday -- and He doesn't seem to scare her even a little bit.  Somewhere along the line, I joked that I thought the best way to break the cat of her table walking habit was probably going to involve spanking Himself every time the cat got up on the table.  We had a good laugh about that one...  Now, however, it isn't unusual for our Saturday morning snuggling to wind its way around to the point where He will quietly mention that, "Moobie got on the table a lot this week..."  And the truth shall set you free :-)

swan

A Good, Happy, Joyful, Wonderful Spanking

Spanking still occupies a central part of my, and our, erotic and sexual identity.  That part of our relationship has been under stress in these last months.  Even as life (in the general sense) has steadily improved, we've both felt a real tentativeness about the power exchange we've shared, and that has included our SM play.

I wasn't good or easy with our SM life for a long time even before the most recent crisis.  Going back five years to my hysterectomy, my ability to endure, process, and transmute painful stimuli shifted.  While my masochism remains as an essential part of who I am, nothing I could find to say to myself in my head made my body work the way it once did.  I was caught between my own wanting and my inability to actualize that physically.  That reality grew between us over the years as I struggled to accommodate the level of sadomasochistic intensity that we both remembered. 

Then there was that awful trio of  fear and trauma and mutual mistrust -- the artifacts of our explosive, meltdown.  Each time we've come together to try and re-establish that old, familiar connection, we've run smack into the jumbled pile of emotional responses that neither one of us completely understand.  Spanking play is freighted with emotional responses anyway, and the two of us were carrying a whole host of spoken and unspoken feelings that tangled themselves up in our "play."  To say that things have been complicated would be an understatement.

And we have a shoulder.  Well, technically, He has the shoulder, but it is one of those things -- His shoulder has become a shared concern and impediment.  His right shoulder has essentially disintegrated after years of osteoarthritis and a lifetime of hard work.  There really isn't much left of the joint, and the only treatment is a complete shoulder replacement -- actually, what is needed is an even more complicated reverse shoulder replacement.  The surgery is scheduled for June 17, and until that can be done, He has very little range of motion or physical strength in His right shoulder.  More and more and more, He depends on His left arm to perform the most mundane of physical tasks.  Spanking, which is for Him a right handed activity, has become more and more complicated.  He's shifted to the left hand as much as He can, but it isn't easy, comfortable, or particularly satisfying -- the right arm is definitely His preferred and DOMINANT side.

There have been lots of hurdles and barriers for the resumption of our spanking life.  We've been more comfortable switching, with Him in the role of bottom, than we have with our more accustomed D/s roles.  It has been a confusing and disquieting time.

But this morning, things aligned and we spanked.  He spanked me.  I wanted it.  He wanted it.  It was good.  He seems, through all of this, to have evolved to an increased interest in leather implements; more straps and quirts and such -- moving away (to a degree) from His former fascination with paddles.  I've always been better with leather than with plastic and wood; better with straps and floggers and quirts than with paddles.

This morning's spanking was good.  We did it together.  We connected.  We were with each other and enjoying each other.  It was good, happy, joyful, and wonderful.  I was thrilled.  I am not sure that He reached the level of thrilled, but I think He was pleased.  We are, I think, on the road to recovering ourselves.

swan

Taking Off the Mask

In the last month, on three separate occasions, I took implements that He and I have used for SM play through all these years, and used them to severely punish my Master. 

I was obeying His command.

I was convinced that I was acting to save His life and our relationship.

I believed that we had reached a critical point, and that there was no other alternative.

Looking back, seeing where we were and where we are today, I am glad for the changes and happy that He has taken control of His life again.  I know that, had things continued as they were, the consequences for His health were likely to be pretty dire. 

All of that is true, so why do I still feel as if I have somehow violated all the rules, stepped completely out of my place, betrayed my promise?  Why do I think that I can hear all the "true slaves" turning and walking away from me -- recognizing me for a complete and total fraud?  Why do I feel so afraid that in "saving us" I have somehow destroyed us? 

Even He, no... especially and particularly and most importantly He ... speaks of our relationship, acknowledging the new and perhaps permanent ambiguity -- "whatever it is that we call what we are..."

My feelings are terribly mixed -- convinced that what I did was the right thing, but convicted in my mind of a great deception, a huge scam. 

I don't remember which of us first use the words "Master" and "slave."  It was such a long time ago.  I remember that we used them tentatively and only after a good while together.  When we first used those labels for ourselves, for the relationship dynamic we shared, it seemed good and true and right.  I've lived with that set of labels for over eight years, and it feels like an integral part of who I am.

And if I am not ... that, then what am I?  Where do I belong? 

swan

Switching and other Stuff -- swan's View

What you have become is the price you paid to get what you used to want. 

~Mignon McLaughlin, The Neurotic's Notebook, 1960

Years and years and years of dreaming and hoping and wishing and  wanting and imagining -- that was my story at the beginning of my spanking life.  I'd wanted, or at least thought I wanted, a life that included control and spanking and pain, and that wanting reached all the way back to  the days of my very earliest pre-pubescent stirrings.  I thought I wanted it, but I really wasn't sure -- and I was married, "til death do us part," to a man who found that wanting to be disgusting and "sick."


And ... then I found, through an Internet search, sites that described domestic discipline.  It was a version of spanking within an adult relationship that was dressed up in the context of one partner disciplining the other as a way of creating and maintaining harmony in the household.  It seemed, "nicer" and more "normal" than the things I'd imagined, but I was able to convince my husband to try it...  And so, my journey began.


Very early, on a listserv dedicated to discussing the ins and outs of that particular subset of BDSM, I asked what I might expect of the path ahead.  How, I wondered, would this practice evolve?  It seemed to me that IF my spanking life were entirely tied to a disciplinary framework, then it would, necessarily and logically, come to an end.  Spanking predicated on a supposed need of mine for discipline would be a limited feature of my life because I knew that, if I approached it with integrity and intellect, all the behaviors that might reasonably "earn" me a spanking would surely be extinguished.


THAT was a scary prospect.  I could see that, even as I'd found a way to get what I'd wanted for so long, I'd set up a scenario that would rip it all away again.  None of the "older, wiser, more experienced" practitioners could give me any sort of satisfactory answer to my insistent questions about how it would all play out.  It was my first experience with that particular DD mental contortion that allows them to tell themselves it is all about maintaining discipline, while simultaneously sidestepping the obvious long-range implications of the dynamic.

It wasn't long until my own questing led me away from "pure" DD and into the more honest feeling practice of BDSM.  Along the way, I lost my husband.  The intense honesty of the path I was following was just too much for him.


Turning the last page on the "married" chapter of my life, I plunged into the fiery passions and pleasures of belonging to Master.  The early days, weeks, and months of our life together were driven by our mutual appetites -- and we were insatiable.  I didn't think much about the future in those days.  We spanked and spanked and spanked -- and the wildness of those days allowed me to ignore the quiet knowing voice that whispered to me that it couldn't go on like that FOREVER.  Or at least, I mostly ignored it. 

Things change.  Life is change.  We weren't youngsters when we found each other and we were clear, from the outset, that we didn't have time to waste.  We've been the living manifestation of "seize the moment."

Now, well over eight years have gone by.  We've loved and spanked a whole lot.  We've confronted a host of challenges; endured our share of losses.  We've grown and learned -- but the one unchanging truth of all of it has been change.  Change is inescapable.  And, I can still hear that younger "me" from so many years ago asking her questions, over and over -- "what will happen -- someday?"

What I've learned is that there is no way to answer the someday questions.  Things will inevitably be different someday than they are today.  What I've learned is that it is best to live in the right now as much as possible.  There is no seeing into the misty future, and no way to move it one jot even if I could see it clearly.  And, the happy news is that our "right now" is pretty darn good.  I'm liking it -- a lot:

• We aren't spanking like we did -- once upon a time.  We are, though, spanking way more than we did just a couple of years ago, and I'm liking it more, feeling more secure and more sure -- finding my way back to that peculiar sort of masochism that seems to be my own special gift.  I'm waking up, more and more often, and feeling that "I wish I could get spanked" stirring in my gut.
• We're switching, He and I.  We haven't done that for years -- probably 5 or 6, and I'd missed it.  I really had come to believe that it was a part of our spanking lexicon that was gone for good.  The opportunity to act as Top allows me to engage in spanking play from the other end of the power exchange.  It lets me touch Him,  love Him, pleasure Him, communicate with Him, and share with Him using the intimate language which is our common passion.
• We've ventured into disciplinary dynamics, this time with me in the role of disciplinarian, and doing that has radically changed our lives for the better.  It has been terribly hard for us both, and there have been times when we've been sick at heart as we've struggled to navigate those choppy waters.  However, using the disciplinary tool has given us a chance to reinvent our lives together and reclaim our relationship.  I've learned that I DO have the skills and strengths needed to act in that capacity, and it is important for me to understand those gifts.
• We've regained our evenings.  There are an additional three or four hours available to us each night, and that is time we are enjoying with one another.  We spank at night and we make love.  I am really enjoying the nights when I am bundled off to sleep with a hot, stingy butt.  
• We've made adjustments.  Well, truthfully, He's made adjustments in the style of play He usually engages in with me.  More and more, He is gentler and slower with me, and I am better able to catch up and come along and be with Him.  It has allowed me to regain my sense of confidence and joy in belonging to Him.  It is less intensely sadistic, and more sensitive and mutual.  I am aware that we've likely mellowed to the point where we are now officially out of the ranks of "the cool kids," but it is so good to feel safe and secure again about putting myself in His hands when we play.
• We are "in love" again.  It isn't that we ever really were "not in love," but we'd seen our passions and energies banked and dimmed.  Poly people recognize a phenomenon known as "new relationship energy" (NRE).  Most acknowledge that NRE tends to run its course in about a year.  We seem to have been gifted with a particularly long-lived and robust form of NRE.  I don't know why we seem to keep falling in love over and over again, but I am thrilled -- feeling like a randy sixteen year old.

So there's the state of our union on this day.  I don't have any urge to ask those questions about "someday" anymore.  I've learned that "someday" will take care of itself.  It is enough to live this day hand in hand with the One who holds my heart.

swan

Two Switching Related Questions

swan, back in October 2008, looked back wistfully to recall earlier days in our relationship when I used to switch with her -- giving her the opportunity to Top me, and for me to experience, first hand, the joys and challenges of bottoming. This was her post: Switching-Memories. I recall feeling slightly saddened that her desires for this aspect of our former play were unrequited, but too, I had no energy or interest at that point for me to be anything but Master, and Top in SM play/interaction between us, whether as a form of sensual eroticism, or should the rare occasion arise where serious corporal discipline might ensue. I told her I was sorry for her longing, but did nothing to satisfy it either.

Fast forward to this past July. I'd lost my job.......... or more accurately, my career, a month earlier. Fortunately, I am in a position to turn my unemployment into an unexpected, defacto retirement, which while it is earlier than I had planned, is economically feasible with some frugality. The truth is I'm enjoying my permanent vacation and amazed that I get a weekly check, while not busting my butt as I did for 35 years in my professional career, and in many schlep jobs for a decade before that, while working my way through college and graduate school. Suddenly, amidst a wide variety of cascading emotions I was experiencing, I had this feeling, fleeting at first, and then ever more prominent, that I wanted to bottom again for the first time in about five or six years. I have questioned over and over again why this came to be. I didn't want to bottom exclusively...........far from that. I didn't even want to bottom most of the time. I did find myself feeling though an attraction, an itch, to be a bottom partner with my two, not a Top exclusively as I have for the past half dozen years.

The only hypothesis I have, and it is purely hypothetical (I have no evidence to validate it or invalidate it), is that perhaps, losing my job has made me more open to sharing the power exchange in a more egalitarian sense. In my work, I was a corporate CEO of a medium-sized nonprofit advocacy organization. I had 17 staff all of whom directly or indirectly reported to me. I called the shots along with my Board (my board that eventually became so tired of my calling the shots they chose to help me out the door:) I was heavily involved in leading statewide public policy campaigns that required strength, leadership, and huge competitiveness. I was Dominant. Perhaps now that my life does not require me to be nearly so "in control," maybe I am able to relax enough to be able to try both ends of the power exchange continuum.

Many of you have read here for some time, and you know that we share about ourselves and our innermost struggles and our joys about as openly as you'll find in our blog community. Many of you have provided me feedback and insight as well as support that has been invaluable over the past few weeks as we have struggled through my evolution to alcohol cessation due to the effects my gastric bypass surgery on my alcohol metabolism and tolerance (fifteen days abstinent today:) If you have any thoughts about what might have caused me to evolve so suddenly to switch once again, I'd appreciate your taking the time to share them.

There has been another issue that has come to the fore as we have implemented switching as an aspect of our play, and even more as our switching actually led to using sincere and even quite severe corporal punishment as an adjunct to support me in reaching behavior goals surrounding my drinking. When I used to switch, I was generally quite stoic about being spanked. Now admittedly in those days we were generally not using corporal punishment but rather sensual erotically focused SM play. There was a period of time in late 1999 when t spanked me disciplinarily as an adjunct to my achieving smoking cessation goals, and that was effective and helpful, but we had not directed corporal discipline toward me since then.

Even then, while I would find spankings anxiety provoking and motivational, as a form of aversive control and deterrence, I was relatively stoic.

Suddenly I am way sensitive to spanking pain. It seems that implements that we used back then, that I used to take quite readily in stride, now really make me become very reactive.

Swan and I were talking about this on IM yesterday. I was telling her about getting my quarterly cortisone shots in my arthritic shoulder and knee that morning from a physician assistant named Stephen:

swan: how are You? Did you get your shots? Tom: I'm fine: all X-rayed and shot up swan: good hopefully that will help soon Tom: Stephen gave me photo-copies of my shoulder and knee He said I should frame them:) Says they are two of the sorriest joints in medical history can't imagined I am managing to power walk on my knee LOL swan: that's because he is "Stephen" Tom: gave him my standard," I still don't know how to levitate." he said it must be very painful and I must be tough DUH!!!!!!!!!!!! He thinks I need him to tell me how much my knee hurts idiot! ...so, If I have such awesome pain tolerance, how come I've become such a spanking pain weenie:) I'm about like an eight year old little boy getting his butt spanked swan: your KNEE is tough
Tom: have I put all my toughness into my knee and shoulder ? none left over for my butt:) swan: that's exactly it left for the skinny rump Tom: plus too, I benefit at times from the pain in my butt no value to the pain in my knee & shoulder swan: this is true and no emotional content Tom: what we did two weeks ago yesterday was excruciating agony..........and helped me lots... none of that in my joints.......

These excerpts of yesterday morning's chat point to one hypothesis we have. I have continual and chronic pain in my right shoulder and my left knee. Both will be replaced: the shoulder in summer 2011, and the knee in summer 2012. I am realizing today, as my steroid shots are beginning to take hold and I am getting relief, how great a toll that constant pain takes on me. Could it be that one has a finite amount of pain tolerance, and that if one uses it up in one part of his anatomy, there is less to share in terms of tolerance for other pain experiences?

The other hypothesis we have is that my ass is significantly changed. Before my surgery, at 320 pounds, my waist was 54 inches. I had a large, wide, very well-padded, and in terms of a spanking target, quite spacious butt. Now at 160 pounds, with a 32 inch waist, I have this quite skinny, little, not very padded butt. I can't tell you how often I sit on a bench or chair that I was quite comfortable on before, feeling quite "well padded," and now I feel the bottom of my pelvis sitting directly on a very hard surface that is uncomfortable and, at times even, a bit painful.

The Domme who originally undertook to train me in the technical aspects of BDSM play many many years ago was a registered nurse. She had a slave who was a dwarf. She used to explain to me that she had to be very gentle with her in spanking, etc. in that she experienced pain from impact play way more intensely than did "normal" people. She explained that we all had the same number of pain receptors and that the larger our girth, the fewer there were per area, say per square inch or whatever measure. Thus, a large wide bottom experienced spanking less painfully that a smaller and less padded bottom. I at the time wondered if that was a valid explanation. I now find myself going back over those conversations wondering if I now have a more dense concentration of pain receptors in my ass, due to my new smaller size, and if that explains how "wimpy" I am, when I am spanked.

The only other thought I've had is simple aging. When I quit bottoming last I was about 55. Now I am 61. Perhaps old guys just get tactilely quite sensitive.

I will say that this "new sensitivity" I've developed certainly ratcheted up the impact of the disciplinary experience I had two weeks ago. Believe me that morning's whipping, what with my new much lower pain tolerance, communicated a message that was compelling beyond belief and that had a true deterrent effect.

Again, should any of you have any sort of experience with this or a similar phenomenon, or have some other hypotheses as to why I might be reacting this way, I'd very much appreciate hearing from you, as I/we always appreciate it when any of you provide us input or reactions.

All the best,

Tom

Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life you've imagined..

Fred's Side of The Gavotte

A Gavotte, for those not so interested in esoteric historical trivia, was a popular Baroque French folk dance noted for the many varied and dynamically interwoven choreographs that it entailed. It was described by one expert of the time as "often quite fast, but occasionally slow." I often think of the nuances and changes in our clan's relationship as being like a Gavotte. It always involves we three orbiting about each other................often quite fast but occasionally slowly. There are more varied patterns and paths and steps to our "dance" and goodness there is occasionally a wild yawing of tempos from speedy, to almost lethargic, and then back into warp speed, and then we moderate our pace again. This last passage, this period in which we have tackled my drinking and used switching, not simply as an adjunct to SM play, but as a serious disciplinary support to achieving mutually agreed to behavior modification goals, was just such a sudden emergence of an entirely new dance step, pattern, and tempo in our "gavotte." Following up on swan's excellent post, Fred and Ginger, I intend to share some of my reactions and reflections on this period of transformation we have just passed through. I have thought several times of wanting to post some of these thoughts as a series of posts, but each time I do, I get bogged down in determining how to do this effectively. This will be a "catch all" post to tie off a number of loose ends that have been floating about in my mind that I need to see in black and white. Writing here, during this process has been a wonderful outlet for me: an outlet that has not simply been cathartic, but very therapeutic. I have said many times how I have felt supported, bolstered, and at times challenged to move forward by readers' comments here, and that has been true. So not only was this an outlet but a source of moral and emotional support and valuable input. Thank you, once again, to all who have commented here during this period.

My current status in this change process is that I am in day nine of total abstinence from alcohol and I have no intention of drinking anytime soon. It has neither been easy nor horrifically difficult since I began total abstinence. I have never had the kind of "cravings" for alcohol I have often heard described by those who drink too much. If I don't drink, I just don't drink. Sometimes I think I'd like a drink or a glass of wine, but nothing that reaches the intensity of a craving. When I quit smoking I had cravings. There were times I felt like, if I couldn't have a cigarette, I was going to go mad. My relationship to alcohol has never been like that thank goodness.

I have found myself doing some fairly in depth research into the neuropsychology of alcohol consumption and alcohol withdrawal (AW). Fortunately my medical background in Rehabilitation Counseling provides me a strong enough medical background to read and comprehend medical research literature. This exercise has led me to understand that my AW symptoms are fairly typical and very mild (thank god). I have insomnia....both in terms of sleeplessness and sleep fragmentation. In the first few days I had some nocturnal uncontrollable leg movement disorder typical of hyper-excitation of my neurological system, which is a bench mark of AW. I am very fortunate. My symptoms are very mild. I have no seizures, nausea, sweating, shaking, tremors, paranoia, anxiety, or emotional lability. I have at times felt moderately depressed (dysphoria). My last time I was feeling this way (B Cognition: Woe is me. I so enjoy drinking as my "fun" each night. Now I will be bored.), I did some of my most extensive reading in medical literature about this and became convinced once again that in light of the dramatic enhancement of the effects of alcohol on my Roux-En-Y gastric bypass surgery altered physiology, I must really work towards complete or at least virtual abstinence with no significant relapse. I have gone through too much to be healthy and have a good long life remaining ahead to squander it in exchange for some cocktails and wine. I have dealt with, and overcome, too many major health issues which would have by now seriously compromised me or killed me, had I not. Smoking, lack of exercise, diabetes, hyperlipidemia, hypertension, sleep apnea, meuralgia parasthetica, spinal stenosis, are all diagnoses I had, typically in severe forms, which I no longer suffer from in any way. I have gone from taking 27 prescription medications each day down to four each day -- and those are for osteo-arthritis, and standard 61-year-old-guy prostate issues. All those other conditions are cured or in remission, which status is as close as there is to a cure for chronic progressive conditions like diabetes. To do all this and then ruin my health for alcohol......sheesh, I think not! It is ironic that the surgery that altered my physiology to allow me to finally conquer my obesity has, simultaneously, set me up to have a huge crisis in my lifelong love affair with whisky and wine: to make our continued symbiosis untenable. Life is simply too strange.

Anyway, enough for my going on about the medical aspects of my life. It is a curious coincidence, unless in retrospect I find this was some sort of preconscious foreshadowing, that shortly before we embarked on this passage, I had a sudden interest in switching from Top to bottom in SM play with my two, after an about 5 or 6 year hiatus from having any interest in experiencing this end of the power exchange dynamic. Whether this evolution was influenced by the loss of my job and my abrupt unexpected embarking on retirement in June, or was simply some sort of random development, I don't know.

As my behavior late at night became more extreme after drinking, swan and t began more and more to tell me how I was acting, in that I generally awakened unaware of what had transpired. My behavior since my surgery has been way different than before it. I have always indulged in alcohol use since college (well, and in high school whenever I could get away with it). I often drank heavily. I never had a D. U. I. I never beat anyone up. I functioned fine in my work. I often found drinking socially to be a real asset in the very political arena within which I worked. Now, since my surgery, I would drink pretty much as normal. A couple of glasses of wine with dinner. Perhaps a cocktail or two before, or maybe no cocktails until after dinner and then some. It seemed though that after four to six drinks I would flip over suddenly to incoherence. I typically had no memory after that, or very blurry sketchy impressions as opposed to clear memories. And often I was either nonsensical or really unpleasant, even angry and hostile. It typically fell to swan to cajole and pour me into bed. I would awaken in the morning maybe hung over, maybe not, quite lovey-dovey feeling, an entirely different personality than I had been when going to bed. I did not understand that my Roux-en-Y Gastric bypass surgery had caused me to dump raw alcohol into my system such that each drink had the effect of four drinks, that I would become intoxicated at far higher levels than ever before, and moreover that it would take me much longer to recover to sobriety than a normal person. Our conversation progressed and it became clear to me at an intellectual level that my behavior had to change because of what swan and t were having to deal with. I understood and bought into this intellectually. My cognition however did not match my affect. While I knew I had to change, I did not feel like changing. I had encountered this dichotomy in others who had behavioral goals but not the will they needed to accomplish them. It was at this point in the process that I asked swan to become my disciplinarian to support me to accomplish "moderating" my drinking. I felt determined I would not lose my "old friend" alcohol, but that I could still get my consumption and its effects back within controllable limits. In obedience and service to me, she undertook to do that. At first, I think, there was a degree of sensual erotic carry over in this for me. I had only very recently returned to switching. When t or swan and I had played at switching, it had been very nice and enjoyable sort of "slap and ticklishness." As we were beginning to approach this transition, I asked swan to ratchet the experience up a bit as a sample of what it would be like were I to seriously require punishment, for, what in my mind I overtly, thought of as its deterrent effect. While that was sincere, I think too that I wanted some greater intensity in SM stimulation.

I received my first pass at swan's administering sincere corporal punishment -- 25 pretty severe rattan cane strokes, the next evening. It in fact did give me the "taste" I had requested. I was amazed at how emotionally overwrought I became in anticipation of the whipping I got. I also was way relieved that it wasn't that severe compared to what I had feared might transpire. I didn't want to go there again. I had soreness and lasting bruises. I had no taste for more of that, nor, however, had I any less taste for alcohol. I still believed I related to alcohol more or less normally and needed to simply be more moderate, and didn't really have a picture of how outrageous my late evening behavior was. We went on through measuring the baseline of my consumption, to trying to limit it via a drink limit (four per evening plus wine with dinner). We moved to a new phase. The plan was I could only have a drink if swan poured it for me. When she could see me about to "tip over" into the abyss she would "close the bar." It was my responsibility to deal with that limit's imposition with grace. I agreed to this with a whole heart and sincere intent on August 31, but when swan called the limit that night I became furious and was whipped again more harshly. This time involved my being restrained on our spanking bench and receiving a very harsh whipping. swan, who had had little practice in corporal punishment (CP) for years, found aiming her blows in my tightly bound position difficult and tended to whip more my upper legs, thighs, and hips, than my butt. It was very painful and tremendously bruising. I still have the remnants of an almost completely healed bruise on my hip from this punishment. This was no game. There was nothing erotic about it, or its aftermath. I sincerely did not want to ever repeat this punishment again. swan, who in her role as an educator has said her goal always with discipline was to assure she never had to correct a behavior problem more than once, and certainly not more than twice, felt she had likely assured I would not risk having further punishment in the future. I agreed with her perspective at that point as well, believe me. The September 2 post, "Butt Pictures A Different View," depicts the aftermath of this punishment. It was after that, as I anguished over my/our situation, that I first researched the effects of alcohol in the aftermath of Roux-en-Y Gastric Bypass surgery. It was then I first realized that I was not on a level playing field with others in terms of processing my alcohol consumption. There really was a reason this was occurring to me. September 3 we had a good night. I stayed within limits and responded very appropriately to swan's declaration that I needed to end my consumption. We were both excited that progress was occurring. Then September 4, a Saturday night, found swan and I home alone with t up spending the weekend caring for her Mom. When it was time for me to finish my evening's alcohol consumption "within limits" I "went off." We had a lengthy tirade of my angrily assailing swan for imposing this limit on me and not respecting my individuality and lots of other pure "crap." We concluded that there really was no plan and that we would work in the future to develop a new plan. swan went to bed feeling horribly beaten up emotionally and completely discouraged. I of course was simply comatose. Sunday, September 5, dawned and along with it the beginning of a turning point in this process. I remember "coming to" and thinking that it was good we were going to collaborate in developing a new plan. I was thrilled and relieved thinking that it was great that I had not messed up and would not need to be punished. Then as I lay there the fuzzy memories of the night before began to seep into my consciousness. I had said awful and hurtful things............lots of them. I was increasingly distressed and then horribly guilty. How could I have so hurt someone I loved...........not just someone............swan! She awakened and I told her tremulously she had to whip me and I wanted to get it over with. She objected that there clearly was no plan, and there being no plan, there was nothing to whip me for violating. I told her that was horse crap. That we had a mutually developed and agreed to a plan, and my behavior toward her was unacceptable. I told her I would not accept anyone ever treating her as she had been treated the night before, let alone my doing it. As I went to the massage table (we had decided that platform for my restraint for punishment was safer than the spanking bench) I knew I was in deep trouble. I knew swan was adamant that she never would have to punish the same behavior more than twice, and that if she ever did, the punishment would be extreme. This was the third time. I knew too who had taught her how to do corporal punishment. It was me, and I am a very sadistic disciplinary Top. As I laid down and was restrained I was actually physically trembling and my breathing was both rapid and shaky. She engaged in no "warm up" gentle foreplay spanking. The goal here was severity not pain/pleasure. She went straight to the latigo leather viper strap. I'd used that a lot over the years. I certainly had forgotten how intensely it bit, burned and STUNG! Then she moved to the two-tailed wooden handled rubber strap, one of the three or four worst implements in our extensive armamentarium. By this time, I had lost all control. I was crying, sobbing, screeching how sorry I was, begging, and frequently just crying out "Oh Sue!" She went on to a thorough application of the larger of our red acrylic Leathers By Danny paddles, which while somewhat less intense than the last two implements, was not by any means "easy," and was different enough in sensation, combined with the condition my butt was already in, to have me continue my screeching and caterwauling. Thank goodness I was restrained. I was frantically squirming and reaching, kicking, etc. to try to find some sort of respite or escape from the punishment I was receiving. Then she escalated to what amounts to a corporal punishment version of nuclear war. I, in the last year, purchased a matched set of rubber floggers. They are each handmade, weighted-handled floggers of nine, 1/8-inch- thick, very flexible, solid-rubber pipes --each 19 1/2 inches in length. My trembling had begun as I laid on the bench when I saw she had one of those down from the storage rack as she prepared to punish me. She gave me ten lashes with it. It was the most intense whipping pain I'd ever had. I was beside myself. I had plunged and wrestled about so much I had actually managed to somehow get my head outside of the head support on the massage table. She paused and looked at me. I was a crying sobbing mess. She took some time to replace my head in the head support for safety's sake. I lay there sobbing and trying to get to a point of somewhat more regular breathing. She waited longer and I began to hope against hope she was done. God, knows I felt I had learned whatever lesson I needed and I was way ready to be done. Then she said the fateful words that are still emblazoned in my memory, and I think will be forever. With a shaky voice that was near to tears she said, "Ten more and we will be done.....and then NEVER AGAIN! NEVER AGAIN!" I think I may have said something like "No, please." Then she laid on, in fairly rapid succession, ten quite severe rubber flogger lashes that I will never forget.
This picture is of the immediate aftermath:
In the immediate aftermath of this whipping, I was in physical agony and emotionally devastated. I held still and wept while swan took these pictures and then she released my bonds. I lay there for a while as she stroked my back, uncertain if I could move in a coordinated fashion. Eventually with her support I moved to the bed for her to put ice packs on my butt (a mixed blessing of cooling soothing and burning sting). I recall breaking down and crying a couple of times through this period. swan was very caring of me and forgiving, and yet too, quite serious and quite pained herself to have had to do what she had.
This was the last time I have felt angry or lapsed into being vitriolic with swan or t about this problem.......a problem which is clearly mine and in no way the fault or responsibility of swan or t, who have done nothing but try to help support and care for me through this, who only want me to be well. It also, in combination with the several rounds now of research I have done into the effects of alcohol in the aftermath of Roux-en-Y gastric bypass surgery and neurochemical models of alcohol use, abuse, and withdrawal, have led me to my present pretty comfortable peace with abstinence. I keep saying that I don't know for how long I will maintain that. I know I will not drink today, and likely not tomorrow. I can't imagine my drinking this weekend or even in the next month. I am too old to think I ever want to decide anything is forever and I know never is always too long for anything. I am just going forward on that basis and deciding what I want to do.
I am convinced though that there is a high end to the limit of what I might do. I cannot drink at all Monday through Friday until Friday evening. Were I to drink Friday evening, Saturday evening, or Sunday my drinking would be restricted by swan's discretion. Beyond that I may not drink. I am certain,were I to violate that,the whipping the aftermath of which is pictured above would be a day at the beach. If you think that frightens me, YOU ARE ABSOLUTELY CORRECT!!!!!!!!!!! I still can't see those pics without a significant visceral response. I will not go there again. I can still here swan's pained voice saying "NEVER AGAIN!" before she laid on those ten last excruciating lashes that cut into my ass and my soul.
I have attended BDSM conference workshops that have posited that there really is no true corporal discipline of adults. Sure we can role play, but in fact no matter how real and awful it seems in the moment, within a week, you will be fantasizing and masturbating about the intense "scene" you had. I am here to tell you I have lots of sensual/eroticsm invested in spanking and related activities, and that there has not been (nor do I expect there will come to be) any erotic feelings about this whipping, and I doubt there are any on swan's part either.
This process began on about August 25. It has involved an evolution from my engaging in wildly out of control drinking; to accepting intellectually that I needed to slow down, but not wanting to in reality; to projecting this onto swan and t; to empowering them to help me; to being punished rather extremely (although yes, swan, I know you can do much worse if I force you to:); to becoming enlightened about my unique medical circumstances; to now my practice of total abstinence................all in a period of three weeks! Sometimes the tempo of our "gavotte" is warp-speed rapid.
There are those I know who cannot imagine how I, a man who has always appeared to be an innately Dominant personality, could possibly have ever accquiesced to this, to cede limited control to my family, and to actually submit to very real corporal discipline. The fact is, I was out of control due to alcohol. I cannot tolerate that lack of control. Just as when I was out of control in my life due to obesity which was harming my health, I was willing to go to the extreme of undergoing gastric bypass surgery to regain control of my life, now when I find my lack of control regarding alcohol is harming my health and my family's health, I am willing to go to the extreme of being disciplined to support me in achieving my new control. This is not an example of my weakness or my inherent submissiveness, it is an example of how absolutely unshakeable my drive for control is.
There have recently been in this realm of the blogosphere some really fairly infantile discussions about switching by practitioners, who are new to all this, and who don't even really have any sort of real time experience, talking about how men who switch aren't masculine and are simply really bottoms trying to falsely lure women to be with them as Dominants under false pretenses. You know, the kind of discussions that always start off saying, "I really don't mean to offend anyone....but." I'm not sure if those discussions are directed at us, or if our recent experiences were seminal to them, but I'd reassure those writers: to be offensive you would have to have a great deal more standing in the lifestyle for anyone to credit your perspective, and secondly you should get at least five years of real life experience, that is not over the telephone or Internet, before you make judgmental comments.

I am amazed and proud of how my swan has grown as a disciplinarian. I think the take-away lesson about switching is that if a Dominant believes that He might ever switch, He should remember that with each act of Dominance He engages in He is teaching His bottom how to Top Him in the future. It is a lesson I have learned in spades, or more like "in blisters."

All the best,
Tom
Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life you've imagined.

.

Fred and Ginger

Switching in a BDSM, power-exchange context is such an interesting relational trick.  We've done it, over the years, at a lot of different levels of intensity and within a range of emotional modalities.  Most often, our switching has been a very deliberate exercise in mutual satisfaction; driven by our shared hedonistic orientations.  The sort of very intense, disciplinary style switching that we've engaged in in the last couple of weeks is a rare thing, even for us.

I know that there are those who don't get it.  Don't understand the potential for loving and communicating in this fashion, and find the whole notion unsettling.  I know that there are plenty of people who read about our switching dynamic and react negatively, assuming that I must not be "really submissive," or perhaps He might not be "really Dominant."  Our community is just filled with people who harbor very narrow views of what is the "right way" to do this thing we all do.  It always surprises me to find that very conservative, mainstream, missionary-position (man on top/woman on the bottom) belief system parading around all dressed up, metaphorically speaking, in fetish gear.

What we are discovering, as we are settling back into some more normal sort of day to day pattern, is that our relationship feels stronger than it did before.  We feel more connected, and more in love.  The awful storminess that we passed through left us feeling pretty ruffled, but on this side of the storm, it feels pretty good to be together.

The thing that most people don't seem to understand is that switching is a huge venture in trust with your partner.  To do it successfully, you have to be willing to be seen in a different mode than is the norm.  To switch is to allow for a level of uncertainty and vulnerability in the relationship.  Switching forces us to lay down the comfortable garb or our usual roles and take on a whole new part -- for an hour or a day or a week or a month, partners who switch agree to experience the world from the opposite end of the spectrum.

For me, doing that is scary and unsettling.  It takes me out of my comfort zone.  Honestly?  When He first began to get all into bottoming again, I experienced a whole range of emotions -- including something that seemed most closely like jealousy.  Yup.  In a world where there isn't enough spanking energy to go around (at least not by my lights), His desire to bottom seemed likely to suck up even more of a limited resource.  I found myself in my head, talking to myself, and thinking, "All this time I've been worried about all the spanking partners that might take some of "my" spanking goodies, and now it turns out that the most likely culprit is HIM!"  Round and round and round I went with that monster chattering away in my mind -- is it any  wonder that I can seem like a crazy loon upon occasion?

Then, our mostly light and fun switching turned into something serious and heavy.  With the addition of a sincere discipline dynamic, I found myself caught between my usual submissive role and the more situationally dominant role I'd been thrust into .  It wasn't a comfortable time, and I hope there aren't too many situations like it in the days to come.

Still, I found that I could discipline effectively and well -- and not just in the sense of administering a seriously aversive spanking experience.  I found that I could find my way into the sort of headspace that guides and cajoles and insists.  All the tricks He's used on me for so many years?  I seem to have been paying attention. I've learned well.  Someone once said that Ginger Rogers did everything that Fred Astaire did -- only she did them backwards in high heels.  For me, the switching experience is like that.  I find I have to have all the same technical expertise that He brings to our SM play, but I also need to be able to nuance my play, manage His emotions, help Him recover if necessary.  It is an almost delicate endeavor.

I think that those who fuss about switching; who insist that it is not for them, that they could never do it, that it would damage their respect for and trust in their partners; have some real fear that switching might rock them to the very core of their relational beings.  I think they worry that things might never be the same; that they could never come back to the place of softly sinking back into the submissive role.  I think I have worried about that sort of possibility myself at least once.  I am happy to report that He and I seem to be finding our way back to our accustomed places with very little trouble.  He and I played a bit last evening -- a very nice, pleasant, and non-challenging session OTK, and then a lovely night spent wrapped up with one another.  I awakened this morning feeling a longing for more intensity and more high-end spanking.  My asking for that this morning seemed to surprise and delight Him.  We played at a much higher level than we have been in the last couple of weeks, and then finished and made love.

He remains "Master" and I remain His.  It isn't that nothing has changed.  That 's foolish.  Of course things have changed.  We've experienced change throughout the course of our lives together, and will continue to do that.  No one gets to live a life free of change or challenge.  We have grown stronger and closer and better for all the struggles of this last bit.

swan

His Way -- My Way

As He and I have wandered further and further along this path of switching, there have been several almost philosophical things that have cropped up between us and really surprised me. I think that it is pretty normal and natural to believe that when two people live together and love one another as deeply as He and I have for these last eight years, an understanding develops between them. Living in close intimacy, day after day and year after year must lead (I am convinced) to really knowing one another. Wouldn't people in those circumstances come to hold similar world views? Wouldn't they come to see most things in the same ways?

In our usual dynamic, He is entirely Dominant and inclined to be sadistic. It isn't His "role;" it is His persona. Conversely, with Him, I am submissive and masochistic. I don't have to think about that -- it is who I am.

Long ago, very early in our beginning days, He insisted that we switch. It wasn't an easy thing for me to learn to do. I didn't find it technically difficult, but I had a very limited and rigid view of how the Dominance/submission dynamic ought to work, and like many others, I was convinced that switching roles would undermine the primary dynamic.

Master was, in those days, inclined to believe that Dominance and submission were different ends of a continuum. He would argue that the essential character traits that people associate with Dominance and submission (honesty, courage, openness, respect) were shared -- and only manifest in different ways. I remember listening to that line of reasoning and thinking, "OK. Maybe -- but maybe not. It doesn't feel that way to me. Sir."

In the intervening eight years, we've settled in He and I. In spite of all the challenges that life has thrown our way, the dynamic between us has been a constant, steady, reliable foundational reality. I've been slave and He's been Master -- always and all ways; whatever else came our way.

He's a very focused, very natural, very sure Dominant. He likes what He likes, and He expects to have that provided easily and smoothly without much effort on His part. He very much associates being Dominant with being sadistic, and His clear and unshakable belief is that discipline and corporal punishment go hand in hand. In His view, and practice, punishment is an intense and not very nuanced event. He does not hesitate to spank severely for perceived behavioral infractions, and doing that gets Him hard.

I live and love as the opposite half of that power dynamic; submitting to His will and His direction in my life. Submission is something that I do and practice with intent. I expect to be obedient. I expect to be respectful. I expect to be of service to Him. I expect to be honest and open and straightforward. I hate the mere suggestion that I might be topping from the bottom or manipulating Him, and I studiously avoid bratting. I endeavor to behave like a mature woman, and I want Him to be proud of me. If I get into the sort of headspace that causes me to want SM play, I ask for what I want. I've told scores of newbies to the lifestyle that it is simple: submissives submit. It isn't just a throwaway line for me. It is how I try to live my life.

He and I are as human as anyone. Like most other people, we tend to believe that the way we see our reality is THE WAY IT IS. It never occurs to Him that there is some other way to BE Dominant, and I am sure that He just assumes that when I take on the Dominant role, I will do it like Him (only different). Likewise, I just assume that He understands and appreciates the way I do submission, and that since that is true, He'll just naturally do it the same way (only different) when we switch.

As we've actually done some serious disciplinary switching in the last few days, I've been pretty shocked to find that He doesn't submit like me even a little bit. He whines and wheedles and stomps His feet and storms around slamming doors and kicking things. He swears and calls names and insults me in a dozen different ways. He is disrespectful and manipulative. Frankly, He's impossible, and I know there is no way on Earth that He'd put up with any of that behavior from me -- not for two minutes. In the midst of the battling, I have found myself thinking, "What the hell is wrong with Him? Doesn't He know that He's supposed to be SUBMISSIVE!??!?" And, interestingly, even as I've wrestled with my own cognitive dissonance over His utterly unsubmissive behavior, I've noticed that He keeps pushing on me, trying to get me to Dominate Him the way He would dominate me. It is His own private BDSM role : The Dominant submissive.

In the last two days there has been a complete reversal of this behavior. He has been respectful, grateful and pleasant where he was previously defiant and passive aggressive. He is clearly upset and suffering from the punishments he has received at my hand, but clearly too that, plus his character, is coming into play and things have changed 180 degrees from what I described in the last paragraph. We are both working to make this a continuing process, but I/we are determined too that if there is back sliding there will be even more severe consequences.

BTW it is clear to us that there is no erotically sadomasochistic dynamic in the corpoal punishment we have done with this. He is more than capable of bottoming erotically, but this discipline has created nothing but suffering and trauma for us both.

The whole business has had my head spinning. Especially when early on He got going on the "you're in charge, so whatever you decide" refrain while simultaneously undermining every single move I made toward taking control of Him or the situation or just about anything. I have to be obedient to His will -- and that means I have to take control -- and that makes Him immediately anxious -- and that results in Him trying to control my Dominance of Him -- and that makes me alternatively laugh and then want to smack Him.

YIKES! No wonder I fall exhausted into bed every single night.

swan

A Conundrum

Master is feeling switchy these days, and not simply in an erotic and exploratory sense.  He is flirting with the notion of entering into some fairly serious disciplinary and submissive SM activity with me as the Dominant/Top partner.  It isn't entirely new territory for us.  As long as we've known each other, our family has, at least nominally, subscribed to a power exchange model that we've called bDDsm.  For us, that acronym denotes a relational dynamic that includes the potential for "domestic discipline" to be included within the overarching BDSM practice that forms the foundation for our lives together.  Each member of our family is empowered to require accountability for behavior and choices from every other member of the household, and to implement disciplinary consequences if called for.  It is something that has been invoked over the years, although very rarely.

I know that the whole concept of switching is a touchy one within the BDSM community.  There are those who simply do not understand how anyone can move from submissive to Dominant or from sadist to masochist.  Some view the whole business with disdain, while others just dismiss it as some sort of "game" or pretend/play acting.  A similar response can be found in the gay and lesbian subculture with regard to the idea that someone might be bisexual.  So, even talking about switching feels a bit risky, but it is a growing factor in our current dynamic, and looks to be here to stay for the foreseeable future.

I am finding that navigating the depths and shoals of this recently re-invigorated switching dynamic is proving challenging both emotionally and intellectually. 

I can play the role of service Top for Master, and that feels just fine.  I'm more than competent with most of the implements in our collection, and I can read His reactions and responses with ease.  I can create a bottoming experience that is utterly safe and erotically stimulating for Him.  For me, that sort of play feels entirely congruent with our dynamic -- I am serving Him when I play with Him in that capacity. 

Too, I have no doubts at all about the FACT of His Dominance or the FACT of His sadism.  His occasional desire to experience the other side of the power exchange dynamic, or the other end of the sadomasochistic spectrum does not diminish or change the reality that He is, by His very nature, a Dominant and a sadist.  He has Dominant toes, and Dominant chest hairs, and at least one Dominant knee (I'm not as sure about the titanium one).  He is utterly, naturally, implacably Dominant.  Likewise, He does take great pleasure in spanking women, and He is happiest when that sort of play veers into the intense and extreme ranges.  He is what He is. 

Every now and then, however, it is as if some sort of season comes over Him.  He hasn't bee interested in bottoming for years, but now, He is in a more or less continual frenzy of wheedling and manipulating and conniving to get spanked.  He is eroticizing spanking as He has not done for years and years.  It is an interesting and rewarding adjunct to our play with one another, and one that we both enjoy.  We seem to be well into switching season -- for how long is anyone's guess. 

What is notably different this time around is that He is working His way through thinking about entering into a disciplinary dynamic with me as a path to achieving some health and behavioral changes.  That is new territory for us, and honestly, it scares me.  Disciplinary spanking and erotic SM play are not at all the same thing.  For spanking to be effective in creating behavior change, it has to be seriously aversive.  I know that to create the sort of behavioral change He's thinking about, I'd have to get pretty Draconian with Him, and that gives me pause. 

He would have to trust me to judge wisely; to hurt Him without harming Him; to guide Him through the process -- even when He reacts angrily or feels that it is all unfair.  Conversely, I will need to trust Him to keep the fact that I am acting in that disciplinary capacity separated from His feelings about me AS HIS SLAVE.  I do not want to believe that there is some sort of retaliatory component entering into our play.  I think that would break my heart. 

I know there are lots of people who will question if doing this sort of thing negates the M/s dynamic between us.  I am sure there will be people who will not be able to understand how we can move back and forth across these boundaries.  It surely does not fit the "usual" template for these kinds of relationships.  I don't care.  We've never done this in the "usual" way.  If we can come to a place where we really trust each other in this, then I think we will break new ground and explore new territory.  I think we are working our way along just now; each of us dealing with our own fears and doubts.  Knowing what we know about how our love works, I am sure we'll figure it out, and I believe we'll find a way to make it work for us both.

swan

Playing Together -- Switching

Playing together can be fun.  We haven't gotten into the "fun" part a whole lot in the last few years, but then our lives have been wrapped up in lots of other things that sapped our energies and diverted our focus.  Just recently, though, we've begun to regain that sense of playfulness that was once the cornerstone of our SM relatedness. 

Part of that shift back to a more playful style with each other has been the resurfacing of His desire and willingness to bottom some of the time.  That used to be a regular feature of our relating.  When I first came to Him, He liked to take the bottom role on a fairly regular basis; enjoyed the sensations I could create for Him; felt secure enough in His own power, and with me to simply let go and experience some of what might have been exclusively "my world."

When He first asked me to "top" Him, it created all sorts of qualms and questions and fears and worries.  I was "brought up" in a DD world, and in that world the consensus is generally that the HOH has to be "consistent."  A "true" HOH would never, having established the authority and right to be the leader in the family, give over that authority so as to allow himself to be spanked!  Inconceivable!  The notion that a secure and accomplished Dominant might want and enjoy the occasional opportunity to bottom just rattled my world. 

Along with that completely ridiculous baggage, I worried that I didn't have the skills -- I was truly afraid that I'd hurt Him.  Understanding that "hurt" is part of the deal in SM play didn't make me feel any more settled about the possibility that I could, with an errant hit, really injur Him.  I was, honestly, just a wreck over the whole thing. 

But, He was determined.  He wanted this.  I was His, and so...  I learned.  It wasn't as difficult as I imagined, and I mastered the techniques needed to become a pretty competent Top.  I was not ever a particularly sadistic Top, and in time, I learned that I could function in that role in a way that brought us both real pleasure.  We'd often play in tandem.  He'd play with me, and then I'd switch roles and play with Him.  It was a sort of circular exchange that was remarkably sensual and deeply connective. 

Then, He passed through a number of daunting health challenges including a knee replacement and progressing arthritis, spinal stenosis, the bariatric surgery and the bowel obstruction...  In all of that, in aging, in confronting a whole host of life stresses, He simply lost interest in bottoming with me or anyone.  I have missed it on some level...  More than once, I've told myself (as I struggled to hold on through a very difficult session) that He would understand better if He were still switching with me... 

So, I've been heartened in the last few weeks as He's began to circle around the idea of maybe wanting to be spanked -- just a little and nicely :-)  Heartened, but also skeptical.  As long as He was just poking at that idea, I've been sort of dismissive of the whole thing...  "Right.  You will let me know if and when You are actually ready to try that again, Sir."  Shrug. 

It was the night before last when, after I'd had Him on the massage table, after a really good backrub, He said to me, "I think you need to spank me." 

"Really?"  Yes.  And so, it was that we delved back into the intricacies of switching with one another.  There was lots of hand spanking, and some experimenting with a few, fairly light implements.  I also got out that round, BDSM logo paddle just so I could test out my perception of its shape with Him.  Did it seem "rectangular" to Him?  He didn't actually confirm my experience, but did postulate that it was about only perceiving the portion of it that actually lands on your butt...  I guess that makes sense.

He liked it.  Enjoyed it.  Felt happy afterwards.  So, maybe, once again, He and I will find our way into the intimacy of switching sadomasochistically now and then. 

swan

Switching -- Memories

We used to switch, He and I.



When we first met, and began to play together, He occasionally found the idea of bottoming appealing. Part of that was, I imagine, the way He'd been trained when He first entered into His lifestyle explorations... and part of it seems very likely to have been that He was enough of a hedonist to get some pleasure out of the sort of intense sensations that bottoming can bring.



I was much newer into BDSM at that time, and not at all certain that I had it in me to play the role of "Top," but He wanted it, and so it became not a matter of my desires, but rather, His. In time, I became a fairly competent Top. Too, it was my goal, as Top, to please Him, and so I found my way into a style of playing that worked for us both.



It was His belief that the two roles, Top and bottom, were not really opposites of each other, but part of a continuum of experiences and orientations. He used to "lecture" me at some length about the similarities in traits required by partners on either side of the exchange. I don't think I ever really bought the "same only different" theory, but I did, eventually, find a sort of peace and pleasure in the switching that we shared.



For me, it fulfilled a couple of interesting experiential niches: First, it entailed a demanding set of technical skills. I enjoyed finding the mind space that allowed me to use implements with skill, create the experience I desired, and offer pleasure to my Partner. The other thing that switching did for me was to allow me to communicate with Him, very concretely, about my experiences as a bottom. Taking Him through a session, bringing Him the same kinds of pleasures and pains that I endured at His hands, gave me assurance that He knew what He was doing with me, and understood what I was experiencing.



We don't do it anymore. Whatever drove His desire to assume the bottom role from time to time has evaporated. I miss it. It was a connective bridge and a communicative vehicle that is simply no longer a part of our repertoire. He prefers the gentler touches of massage and scratching, and so the more intense forms of impact play are reserved for me alone. It isn't something that pulls at my mind steadily, but I am aware that there are times when I'd surely like to show Him just a bit of what I believe He's forgotten about His "toys."



Oh well. Good memories.



swan