Reflections on Dominance

I've been doing a lot of thinking about what dominance means to me.  J is not bossy by nature and is always very respectful.  At the same time, he definitely has that 'take the lead' characteristic that I have both come to love and, at times, had mixed emotions about.  I'm a strong-willed woman (guess you could say I'm 'high spirited'....lol).  That being said, there have been many times when I have struggled with being submissive as I tried my best to adjust to our new roles.

I've been known to be both soft and hard (never at the same time, though!).  I was a lot harder (and more often) when we first married three years ago.  This is my second marriage and J's first.  I'd been married over 20 years to my first husband, and during that marriage I'd learned to develop some pretty tough coping skills and defense mechanisms (my ex-husband was emotionally and verbally abusive).  I was a force to be reckoned with in my own right!  I definitely held my own.......until I couldn't.  Until I realized I needed to leave.

Anyway, I've discovered (or maybe I should say rediscovered my softer self) these past few years.  At times she seemed to be in conflict with the hard side -- sometimes it was a downright battle.  Soft me didn't feel like the real me when I was mad or upset about something.  That's when hard me took over.  Our arguments were long, oftentimes carried out over days, with remnants and fragments going further into weeks.  I didn't see that as a problem -- I thought we were just doing what we needed to do to figure it out and find resolve.  J saw things differently.  He said I was always so intense and at the ready to fight.  He didn't understand how it didn't seem to exhaust me (because it definitely exhausted him) how I kept going at it.

I didn't see it at first, but over time I began to understand that my visceral reactions and subsequent behavior were not healthy, and that in fact, they were detrimental to our relationship and marriage.  I was looking on the internet trying to find ways to be a better wife.  Somehow I came upon the Taken in Hand site.  What I read both intrigued and repulsed me.  I kept going back to read more.  Eventually I began to get it and brought the idea of domestic discipline to J (with much trepidation, I should add!).

Here we are in our 3rd year of TTWD, and I'm so glad to say things are much better.  I'm currently on a soft roll, which has been going on for a couple of weeks without incident.  I've been trying to find ways to show my submission better (making him coffee every morning without his asking is one example).  I've asked him to tell me what he expects of me -- I kind of do that on a semi-regular basis because it reminds and reassures me of his dominance.  Like I said, J is always very respectful and it is not his style to boss me around.  He'll ask me to do something and expect it to be done.  Sometimes I just want him to boss me around a little, ya know?

I don't have many rules......obedience is one, which, of course, makes sense in this dynamic.  Disrespect won't be tolerated.  So we've been going along really nicely lately, which is all well and good, except I'm finding myself needing to feel his dominance more.  I haven't been snippy or snarky lately, nor have I done anything to warrant a discipline spanking.  Good, right?  Well, sometimes when I've been snippy, snarky, or even what I felt was downright disrespectful, J has addressed it verbally, but not physically.  It's his call, of course, but what is it about us women who just want to know that our men will deal with us in the manner that WE think we need, even if the thought of getting a hard punishment spanking scares the wits out of us?  I guess what I'm trying to say is that when things move along so well and we're getting along so happily, with me happy to serve him and him being his nice, wonderful self to me.............I don't feel his dominance as much.  Is it because I'm not fighting him on the things he asks me to do?  So I happily (or not so happily, but don't let it show) do them, he thanks me (he often expresses his appreciation for the things I do for him and our family), and on we go.........until I start to feel the need for an expression of his dominance.

A while back J asked me to wear a specific color in my clothing choice.  I liked that!  I told him so, and asked him to do it more often.  He has, even asking me to curl my hair sometimes the way he likes. 

We do maintenance spankings about once a week, but they're often not hard or long enough.  Even though they're not soft or weak swats, I've found them actually comforting.  I've shared this with J, being careful not to 'top from the bottom' or come across in a critical way, but sometimes it has seemed to me that he's just not into giving me the kind of spanking I really need.  That's where I find myself today.  I don't want to do something to purposely earn a discipline spanking, because I truly don't want to disrespect or hurt J.  

There have definitely been discipline spankings in the past that were very hard, definitely distinguishing them from maintenance spankings.  That was when we were arguing more and I was being hard and disrespectful.  Sometimes he spanked me when he was angry, and he felt really badly about it (I was always ok, but I don't like it when he's that mad, either).  He admitted that sometimes he's chosen not to give me a discipline spanking because he didn't want to do it in anger -- he wants to make sure he keeps himself in check.  I get it, and I certainly appreciate that.  But I told him that he could have waited until another time (or day) to administer it -- we've talked about that more than once.  Yet he doesn't do that.  Sigh.

I'm toying with the idea of asking him for a preventive, "this is what you'll get if you act up" type of spanking.  What does that say about me that I want him to beat my butt a bit?  I am not someone who gets pleasure from the pain (the aftereffects of a sore bottom notwithstanding).  In fact, I did bring it up a couple of weeks ago and asked if he thought he would be able to do that for me.  He said he would.  Nothing has happened.  I am frustrated.

I really don't want to act out and make him upset and angry, but I really need to know that he will not let me do it.  What a conundrum, eh?