Twenty Years Into Our DD-FLR Relationship, My Wife Still Surprises Me
A recent spanking illustrates how real disciplinary spanking and power exchange relationships are almost always a work in progress
When I started posting articles about Female Led Relationships (FLRs) and Female/male disciplinary spankings here on Medium, I wasn’t sure what people would be interested in. I’m still not. But, my initial thought was to write about discreet topics, keeping personal anecdotes to a minimum.
But, sometimes an anecdote can illustrate things that come up in “real life” disciplinary relationships.
A couple of weeks ago, my wife delivered a discplinary spanking that wasn’t all that remarkable in and of itself, but that reflected how even very established disciplinary relationships can change over time and that also illustrated a few topics that seem to come up for other couples.
Asking for a spanking is always freaking hard.
We’ve been practicing this lifestyle for almost 20 years and, yet, sometimes some small thing happens that seems like a big change. Or, at least it seems like it might become a big change if it became a regular practice.
One thing that doesn’t change is this — sometimes you know you have a spanking coming. You know you should ask to get it over with. Yet, when you get to that moment of owning up to your bad behavior and asking her to address it, it’s easy to put your head in the sand and hope she will forget whatever it was that earned you your licking.
This is about one of the few times I overcame my own cowardly instincts.
There had been a period a few weeks before when we’d gone through a bit of a rough patch. One of my biggest character weaknesses is having a cynical attitude, and I’m prone to caustic comments. Well, my mouth had gotten me into trouble a few too many times. We both knew I had a serious “attitude adjustment” coming.
Then, fate interceded on my behalf, in the form of a fairly bad back strain in the gym. Because of where it was located, a spanking just wasn’t safe and would have been over-the-top painful. (Yes, even in “real” disciplinary spankings there is “good” pain and “bad” pain, though the “good” kind is good in terms of efficacy but never enjoyment.)
It took close to a month for it to heal, and near the end of that time period she made some comments that made me think she was really hankering for an opportunity to start taking out her frustrations with me on butt again.
Finally, I very reluctantly took the hint and told her that nothing physical stood in the way of us getting back on track. This wasn’t exactly asking for a a spanking, but you come to learn in these relationships that often just bringing up the topic or ratting yourself out about bad behavior is, in fact, the functional equivalent of asking to be spanked.
That’s why self-reporting and openly talking about the prospect of being spanked is hard. Every. Single. Time. Because, it many, many cases, it is going to lead inevitably to the kind of spanking you would really like to avoid.
Disciplinary wives often come to enjoy the role, but they sometimes struggle with asserting their own interests.
I also screwed up my courage to finally just ask outright whether I was right in intuiting that she’s been missing the domestic discipline (“DD”) part of our relationship. She said she had.
I told her I’d also gotten the sense lately that she didn’t just want to get things back on track, but actually seemed to be looking to set the bar higher and spank me more often.
She came right out and admitted that was the case. She said she’d been particularly frustrated lately with my tendency to be snarky and sarcastic and that she recognizes that she needs to be much quicker to deal with those issues and to deliver a spanking immediately when they happen.
The thing is, we’ve had these discussions about her stepping up the level of consistency and being especially strict about disrespect (usually in the form of snarky or sarcastic comments) a hundred times before, but it never seems to happen.
I’m not sure why exactly this is the case, but I’ve heard the same thing from others in this lifestyle. A wife may come to spank readily for some bad habit or bit of bad behavior that doesn’t affect her that much.
Yet, that same wife may hesitate to punish harshly for things like disrespect or bad attitudes that she does, in fact, bear the brunt of.
I assume it’s some perverse bit of societal conditioning that makes it hard for some women to find their voice and full-throatedly demand the kind of treatment they want and deserve.
After twenty years, my wife makes me pay for mouthing off.
Well, the very next day, right before dinner we were talking about a problem I’ve been having that’s kind of like tennis elbow. She asked where the pain was after I’d already pointed to it (twice).
Without even thinking, I cut loose with something to the effect of, “The same place it was when I pointed to it the last two times.” Like I said, I have an unfortunate tendency toward caustic, biting comments.
This time, however, no sooner had the words left my mouth than she responded:
“There you go with the snarky tone! Just last night we talked about you not getting away with that anymore! So, guess what? After dinner, you’re getting spanked.”
It ended up being delayed until almost bedtime, and at one point I thought that maybe she actually had gotten wrapped up in something else and forgotten the whole thing.
That suspicion was reinforced when, about 15 minutes before our usual bedtime she changed into the nightgown she almost always sleeps in. Very functional and not at all designed for sexual titillation. And, she invariably spanks me fully clothed, wearing whatever she happens to be wearing that day.
So, as the clock inched closer and closer to bedtime, I became more and more certain I’d gotten away with it. My wife is a pretty forgiving, happy-go-lucky person, and it’s not at all uncommon for her to get angry about something and then get over it almost instantaneously. To the point that it’s not uncommon for her to say I’m going to get spanked but she later completely forgets about it.
Well, not this time. I wandered into our bedroom to get ready for bed, and she looked up from what she was going and told me to get ready for my spanking.
Rituals become ruts.
Since our kids grew up and moved out, even though we have the house to ourselves, virtually all our disciplinary sessions happen in our bedroom.
This time, however, she decided to conduct it in the guestroom because, of all things, one of our dogs was hanging out in our room and she decided she didn’t want to kick him out.
Just moving to another room increased my anxiety around what was about to happen. Routines, even inherently painful ones are reassuring. Plus, the change in scenery was yet another data point that she was thinking about the DD aspects of our relationship and shaking things up in ways big and small.
Others knowing used to be a big deal. Now, apparently it’s not.
I preceded her into the room and started to close the window shade. She was following right behind me and, when she entered the room asked emphatically, “What are you doing? Why are you closing that?”
This was an extension of some changes that started happening a few months ago. Most of our sessions happen at night before bed, but a few months ago she ordered a spanking in the middle of the day. I went to our bedroom and started to draw the window shades, but she ordered me to leave them open.
It was embarrassing and greatly increased the vulnerability I feel before and during every spanking. I mean, what if a neighbor could see??
But, realistically, those neighbors probably couldn’t see. The windows in our bedroom face into our backyard, and the nearest house is a good 75 yards away, with trees in both yards blocking a clear line of sight into our respective bedrooms.
And, even if those neighbors could see, we don’t know them at all. I wouldn’t know them if I passed them on the street. Therefore, there was little chance of them seeing anything and even less chance of subsequent encounters that might leave me embarrassed and wondering about it.
However, with the neighbors adjacent to our guest bedroom, it’s a completely different situation. We know them well. If the wife was to catch a glimpse of me being spanked, I’d have that in mind every single time I see her and stop to chat. Worse, what if her husband saw? A woman seeing a man spanked is one thing. But, another man seeing . . . talk about humbling!
Worse, their house is separated from ours only by two very narrow side yards. So, unlike with our other neighbors, it is VERY possible that a spanking in the guest bedroom WOULD be seen.
I didn’t say anything in response to her question about leaving the shade open, but I didn’t move either. She thought about it, and remembered that the neighbors on that side of the house have teenage kids. Adults seeing something is one thing. Kids? Very inappropriate and wrong.
So, the spanking proceeded with the shades down.
Yet, the fact that she initially was unconcerned about the prospect that even adults might see seems like a big deal.
After twenty years, my wife learns moderation and, perhaps, discovers her own agency.
Having lowered the shades, she sat on the bed, motioned me to get over her legs, and got down to business.
The swats with her bath brush came hard and fast, but she stopped after two or three solid minutes, which is maybe 1/3 of a normal spanking for us. She told me I could get up, saying:
“Since it was a moderately snarky comment, I’ll let you go with a moderately long spanking. This time.”
That in itself is a new development, as my wife has always been very “binary” in her approach to spanking. Regardless of the seriousness of the offense, all her spankings are more or less equally long and hard.
Although one could argue that she again let me off easy when the offense was something personal aimed at her (disrespectful, snarky comments), in reality I think it was a reflection of her becoming more and more aware of her own agency, including her ability to choose exactly how each offense should be dealt with.
We both are becoming more comfortable acknowledging some previously embarrassing things. Embarrassing for me anyway.
A couple of nights later, I brought up the recent changes in that last spanking.
I told her that somehow they added up to a spanking that felt both unusually “business-like” and, at the same time, unusually maternal. She said that was exactly how it felt to her too, characterizing it as being like a mother who was tired of dealing with a mouthy teenager and, therefore, took matters in hand without a bunch of ritual or drama.
She did it in her nightgown, right before bed, using one implement, in a room that, unlike our bedroom, has no mental associations with sex.
It was like she was crossing one more item off her daily “to-do” list.
I observed that part of the “maternal vibe” for me was her blasé attitude toward neighbors potentially seeing something.
It was so much like how mothers approached discipline when I was growing up, in an area of the country where corporal punishment was the norm. It was not at all uncommon for a mom, dad, or authority figure to take a misbehaving kid out of the room, deliver a spanking, then come back as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened. Because nothing out of their ordinary had happened.
It might be embarrassing for the recipient, but from the disciplinarian’s standpoint, it was no big deal.
She agreed it had that vibe, but added something to the effect of,
“You could also think of it as a wife who has had enough of certain conduct and has decided she will do literally whatever it takes to make you decide it is in your best interest to stop. If that means the neighbors find out, maybe you’ll find that sufficiently embarrassing to change your behavior.”
I know some women in these relationships are turned off by the notion of disciplinary spankings having a “maternal” vibe. I get it. Few women want to play “mommy” to their adult husbands.
And, for a very long time, I too was embarrassed about being subjected, as an adult, to discipline that almost inevitably carries with it some mental and emotional associations with being subjected to parental authority.
But, the fact that an OTK spanking has some undeniably maternal aspects, at least with respect to some 1950s and 60s motherly archetypes, that doesn’t mean he wants you to be his mother.
While I used to avoid the whole topic in order to avoid turning anyone off and embarrassing myself, I’m increasingly open to myself that being taken over a woman’s knee, naked, and given a hard disciplinary spanking — being taken completely out of my own control and spanked until she decides I’ve learned my lesson — definitely does have a maternal feel to it. As does being subjected to a woman’s control in general.
While where all this goes over time is unknown, it does seem like a spanking that was one of the mildest I’ve received in a while might be fairly momentous in terms of what it may portend. Only time will tell.
If you would like to discuss these issues directly but don’t feel comfortable leaving a public comment, feel free to reach out to me directly at dwc_husband@proton.me. Or, leave a confidential comment in Medium.
