Dom Lord Something-o-ruther

I've decided that ME/CFS -- actually, ANY chronic illness -- is like a really demanding top. Not the sweet but strict sort like my beloved A., but rather like those doms who call themselves Lord Something-o-ruther and refuse to use safewords and say something is for your own good but really it's just to satisfy their own sociopathology. The illness dom gives you an impossible list of tasks to complete and if you fuck up in any way -- or even if you don't -- the illness will punish you. Savagely. And before you know it, you're never allowed to see your friends or spend time online because you belong to Lord Something-o-ruther and he must have every moment of your time, every ounce of your energy, every breath of your being. The illness locks you in and takes the key with it, leaving you to watch as the life you could have drives off in a red pick up truck.

Okay that last bit I lifted from an old, haunting story Mija wrote about a girl who suffered this fate at the hand of her top. I reread the story the other day after thinking how much I was starting to feel like a ghost-girl, albeit one who has had even less choice in choosing my circumstances. It's not just that the illness makes me feel like shit all the time, but illness also includes a never ending list of bureaucratic issues - appointments to make, transportation to schedule, prescriptions to order and manage, Medicaid & Food Stamp re-certification with receipts and letters and bank statements to sort through, Home Care Worker to hire, Home Care Worker benefits cut due to the state budget shortage, state officials to lobby, medical clinic changes narcotic pain management policy, doctor decreases narcotic meds even though my pain has not decreased, doctor tries out other meds with varying effectiveness, surgery to have, surgery to recuperate from (successful on both accounts), Home Care Worker benefits restored (yay!), Home Care Worker to hire (but now without A.'s help), medical clinic refusing to relent on pain meds, more tinkering with meds (sleepy, nauseous), Home Care Worker hired (yay! oh please work out this time!), letters to be written to medical director and state pain commission, pain meds going down...down...pain going up...up.

For the last month and a half, the bureaucracy has been like climbing a vertical face.*

I'm probably starting to sound like Eeyore on Twitter anymore. With a brief break in the woe a week ago to celebrate -- sorta -- the recent finding that the connection to XMRV made last October has been confirmed -- sorta -- by finding retroviruses related to XMRV in another group of ME/CFS patients (aka the Alter/Lo paper). On the one hand, any hope right now that there might be real treatments for this illness besides lots of narcotics, expensive supplements, and extortionate experimental treatments is helpful. But knowing that it's still a few years away whereas this Saturday I begin tapering off the Vicodin I've been on for years now makes it all a bit...inadequate.

Kink and any energy to write about it jumped out the window after I posted that first of a two part post that I thought I would quickly follow with a second (I just knew that was going to happen if I posted the first part without have the second definitely done!). Lord Something-o-ruther didn't even let me post anything when the six year anniversary of this blog (August 10th) came and went (can you believe it's been six years already? can you believe it's only been six years given all that's happened?). A couple of weeks ago it did let me take my post-surgical pelvis/abdomen for a spin (like any dom, it only allows me to masturbate with its permission). I wanked and came with little pain - certainly none of that horrible, feels-like-I'm-ripping-something pain I had pre-laparoscopy. So, you know, very cool! But as the horrible, feels-like-someone-is-burning-me-from-the-inside-out pain that I live with every second of every moment of every hour of every day in my arms and legs was increasing because my doctor was required to reduce my narcotic medication, Lord Something-o-ruther had tied me up and locked me in the closet again.

Until this weekend. Natty came back. Mostly because my doctor was able to switch me back to my earlier narcotic dose -- but start tapering down again -- as well as try an increase in an anti-seizure medicine I also take for pain so that my pain has been back to being quite manageable for a couple of weeks. Sure, I also wanted to sleep more. But laying in bed in a drug-induced reverie was the first moment of freedom from Dom Lord Something-o-ruther I've had for awhile. I could actually think about something besides it. I could be little again. At first Michelle was having none of it. My grown up self was still climbing the vertical face -- which is clearly not an activity for kids.

Or is it?

I've been wanting to write about the dominance of my grown-up self (the real Lord Something-o-ruther?) versus my Natty self (along with the legion of other topics I've thought about while laying in bed -- alas, the dearth of posts is never because I don't have anything to say). And I don't know that I'll get into the full analysis I've been pondering over the last few months tonight. But as I've been vomiting out all my white-knuckled frustration of the last month and a half onto this Blogger compose interface, it wasn't until I wrote the above paragraph that I remembered how much I need Natty. Many years ago my therapist told me to treasure her. But lately I've wondered how to do that. Or even if I should do that. I mean, isn't she just this way I escape reality when I can't handle it? Isn't it healthier to just learn to live with life the way it is rather than hide away in some overactive part of my imagination? You know, embrace the present, yada yada yada (which is also what that therapist said)?

And then I remembered the last bit in that first post with which I began this here blog those six years ago about rediscovering Allie (proto-Natty) when I was first getting sick and disabled ten years ago.

I realized how much I needed her back. Her emotional energy. Her willfulness. Her playfulness. Her immature selfishness. I need her to feel the feelings my intellect has long ago explained away. To temper my endless caregiving with the demands of my own needs. To stamp her foot and say, “it’s time to play.”

I actually (with tongue somewhere in cheek) list as my occupation "personal care coordinator" as that really is what I do all day when I'm not sleeping or trying to eek out a social life online. And Personal Care Coordinator Michelle needs a break. She needs Natty to help her play. Especially as the coming weeks are going to be hard. Distraction is an important pain management tool and after next Saturday I'm going to need to use every non-narcotic tool even more than I already do (meditation, yoga, qigong, physical therapy, massage therapy, acupuncture, heat/cold, supplements, non-narcotic prescriptions, warm baths, guided imagery...). My doctor has me on a list to have my case reviewed by an Opiate Review Board, but I have no idea when that will be or if it will be successful. I feel hopeful that at some point we'll get me back to an adequate narcotic dose or find some other medication to help (not that we haven't already gone through just about every anti-seizure or anti-depressant that's also used for pain that my insurance will cover) for no other reason than I can't imagine being in that much pain for an extended period of time.

So Natty plays. A. gave me my first tele-spanking in months the day before last. It was just a handful of quick strokes and yeah, my shoulder was quite sore the next day (that's why a quarter of my freezer is devoted to ice packs!) but I'm hoping we'll be able to play some more over the phone this week. And, of course, A. and my illusory Nanny are already helping me manage my activity levels since overexertion exacerbates my pain and gives Lord Something-o-ruther an excuse to lock me away in a dungeon that's anything but a playground.

Hmm...Maybe that's another way Natty helps me with illness....Oh dear, speaking of managing my activity level, I've just got so carried away with my de-facto journaling here that I totally lost track of the time. Like, wandered away from the track and the field and have been following a butterfly so far into the woods that the roads no longer have those green street signs but wooden posts with numbers... 


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*And just to make life even more fun than it already is, I found out last Friday my apartment building is being remodeled in November requiring us all to move out for a week. They are hiring third party movers to pack and move our stuff (which is good cuz I can't do shit!), but I'll have to unpack everything once they're done. All 1200 books, etc. that took months to unpack... ::sigh::

Note: September is Pain Awareness Month. If there is anything I've realized from this experience with the change in narcotic pain management policy at my clinic is that nobody with chronic pain in this country is safe from interference with their narcotic pain medication. I always thought that because I did everything right and I had a caring, competent doctor, I was fine. But not only is the War on Drugs locking away people who don't need to be and crippling us economically, but it's also keeping sick people from getting the treatment they need. Yes, pain builds character but chronic pain also atrophies the brain and may increase your risk of death from any cause by as much 49% - up to 68% if just looking at cardiovascular-associated mortality. (I keep meaning to do a post(s) on the science of pain and spanking...) The next time you see a story about prescription narcotic addiction, remember all the people who are are not getting their pain adequately treated (or treated at all) because of the overhyped fear of narcotic addiction. Yes, addiction happens (though to less than 1-2% of those using it for pain). Yes, narcotics will kill you if you don't use them right - as does my Coumadin.

::stepping off soapbox and off to bed::

VibeReview Fantasy: Under-the-Bed Restraints, Pt. 1 - The Fantasy

Normally with my review of VibeReview products I begin or end with a fantasy in which the product plays a starring role -- mostly to assuage my guilt over my commercial whoring by making the review as hot as possible. However, after this fantasy spent several months in my subconscious lulling me to sleep over many nights, it became so damn long I've got to post it as a story all on its own.

Please note that this is my first attempt at debporn and is a story involving the touching and punishing of genitalia of a teenage girl by her parents. If you get squicked by that sort of thing (and god knows, it is disturbing) you might want to skip this story. I want to be very clear that no real children were harmed in this story. This is a fantasy in which I imagine me - who is very much an adult - in this situation. The only possible connection to reality this might ever have would be in roleplay between me (again, an adult) and another consenting adult. I do not support the spanking of real children, and I sure as hell do not condone in any way behavior such as this from real parents.

oOo

The Fantasy: Restraints of Biblical Proportions

I suppose I’ve always known they’re a bit strange in the bedroom of a teenage girl. Whenever my friends come over, I always stuff them in between my mattress and boxsprings. Most of the time, I hardly notice them. Except at bedtime, of course.

Every night after I brush my teeth and wash my face, I lay down on my bed over a pile of fluffy pillows and Mother uses them, the Under-the-Bed Restraints, to tie me down. She pulls my nightgown up and my panties down so that I’m ready for Father and my Purity Inspection. He’s been doing them every night since I started my period. He says this way he’ll know if I’ve been thinking unclean thoughts or worse.

Most nights he inspects me by poking his gloved finger into my womanhood. Tracing his finger up to my rosebud. Back down to my womanhood. And my bottom hole.

If I’m moist, I get the strop.

And I’m always moist.

Father takes off the rubber glove and Mother hands him the coffee-brown razor strop. He always tells me how disappointed he is that I’m not keeping my mind on “whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report...” He slaps the strop down on my quivering cheeks while he continues quoting Philippians 4:8. “If there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things.”

Of course, the only thing I can think on at that moment is how much I hate that strop. And how helpless I am pinned to the bed in the restraints.

When he finishes with that verse, he moves on to I Corinthians 6 while whipping the well-oiled leather against my increasingly angry red bottom and thighs. “Flee fornication,” he’ll call out like he does from the pulpit. “Every sin that a man doeth is without the body; but he that committeth fornication sinneth against his own body. What? know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own? For ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God's..”

Because of the restraints, I can’t even squirm and wiggle like I can when I’m over his or Mother’s knee. Mother always cinches them as tight as she can without pulling out a limb. The most I can manage is to rock my pelvis a bit.  And cry into my pillows until it’s over.

But I’m always glad Father never inspects me afterward. I don’t understand it. I hate the strop but for some reason I’m always even more moist after my punishment. And I always want to touch myself. Touch my womanhood.

On Saturday night, after Mother has strapped me down to the bed, she holds my cheeks apart while Father more thoroughly inspects my bottom hole with his fingers to make certain I have not allowed it to be violated. When he is sure that I haven’t, he takes the tip of his belt and lashes my bottom hole. “Mortify therefore your members which are upon the earth; fornication, uncleanness, inordinate affection, evil concupiscence...”

It’s agonizing. I used to beg Father for mercy, but he only reminded me that to do so would show that he does not love me for “he that spareth his rod hateth his son...” And Father never spares the rod. Ever.

After the belt, Mother hands him the red hot water bottle connected to a long white tube and nozzle. She spreads my cheeks again and puts some Vaseline on my raw, throbbing bottom hole. Father pushes the nozzle inside my bottom and fills me up with warm, soapy water. When all the water is inside me, he plugs me up with a large rubber plug. If I have been particularly willful during the week -- talked back to Mother or was sloppy with my chores -- he plugs me with a large chunk of ginger root, its burn reminding me of the eternal fires of Hell.

While I hold the enema, Father gives me his Saturday evening sermon. Sometimes the topic is a shorter version of the sermon he’ll give on Sunday at church. Other times it’s a spontaneous one on a topic specifically for me, like resisting temptation, honoring my parents, or remaining clean and pure.

Sunday night is slightly different. Mother uses the Under-the-Bed Restraints to fasten me down on my back, my knees bent and spread apart. She holds my legs down while Father shaves my womanhood. Not only does this keep it clean, he says, but it more readily exposes any sexual immorality. Father reminds me of what a precious jewel my womanhood is, a gift from God that I will give my future husband and lord -- but only if I carefully guard my purity. “Always remember the words of Paul in first Thessalonians four, three through five:  ‘For this is the will of God, even your sanctification, that ye should abstain from fornication: That every one of you should know how to possess his vessel in sanctification and honour; Not in the lust of concupiscence...”

To remind me of the eternal hellfire awaiting whores and fornicators, Father whips my freshly shorn jewel with the wooden yardstick we use during Home School. Better for me to feel a little burn now than the all consuming burn of eternal damnation. Though I can’t imagine a worse burn than this. When Father first began to discipline my womanhood, Mother had a hard time holding my legs down. But over the years she’s gotten very strong. Between her arms and the Under-the-Bed Restraints, I’m practically paralyzed. Except I can feel everything, of course.

I used to hate the restraints. I hated feeling so helpless. Vulnerable. Dependent. I hated being completely laid bare and exposed and unable to hide anything. After a while, though, the Under-the-Bed restraints began to feel...right. Almost comfortable. I mean, my parents only do this because they love me and don’t want me to go to Hell, right? In a way, it’s like the restraints make me feel loved and protected. Even safe, in a way.

Except they also make me feel...wicked. Just thinking about them or the strop makes me...moist. Clearly you can see why Father has to do Purity Inspections. Why my parents need those Under-the-Bed Restraints, along with the strop and the washing outs and the shavings. I must learn to possess my vessel “in sanctification and honour; Not in the lust of concupiscence.” It’s what good, Christian parents do, right?

oOo

I'll have Part 2, the actual review, posted by Monday.

Push-button spanking

From the February 14, 1898 edition of the New York Times:

I always though spanking chairs were for sitting on while turning a miscreant over your knee -- or bending them over to spank. And talk about lazy-ass wardens. Can't even spank their naughty charges themselves!

Though I must admit, I do want to know what ever happened to this spanking chair.

Kindergarten was the first time I had ever heard of spankings at the push of a button. My teacher, Mrs. W. always threatened us with time in her mysterious, unseen spanking machine. Except she was so sweet her threats only made me slightly concerned rather than fearful. And very, very curious. Oddly enough, I always imagined it being similar to the above spanking chair, except inside a machine that looked like a hollowed-out R2-D2/over-sized vacuum cleaner.

Will be posting the first part of my newest VibeReview Fantasy tomorrow, which will be of particular interest for fans of debporn*. I say first part because the short fantasy I usually write to go with my review became a bona-fide story after spending months in my subconscious. So I'll post the story first and then the review the next day (or two...ish).

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*The old FAQ for the soc.sexuality.spanking Usenet group defines debporn as "a particular type of story post featuring severe, family setting discipline and/or humiliation including very raw anal/crotch spankings. May or may not include sex. Very intense." Based on the stories of Debbie Ann.

Putting Natty to bed

A. was just putting me to bed.

Except after he had tucked me in, I realized I hadn't taken any Melatonin. As I got up to get a new Melatonin bottle in the hallway cupboard (I finished the last bottle yesterday), I found the new bottle of NyQuil and box of Sudafed I got for A. in my last drugstore.com order. Since I knew he needed them, I pointed them out and handed them to him before throwing away the wrapper around the lid to my Melatonin bottle along with some bits of trash on the table by my bed. While walking back into the bedroom, I noticed A. had left his beer on the other bed table. So I took it out to him in the living room.

"You could have asked me to come get it," A. said after thanking me.

I shrugged and made my way back to the bedroom. Except I noticed A. following close behind.

"Making sure I get to bed this time?" I joked.

"Yes, actually." A. stated.

"Oh." With a sheepish bite of my lower lip upon suddenly feeling like a five-year-old.

After taking the Melatonin, I grinned mischievously as I slipped under the covers. Again.

"Okay, I'm really in bed."

A. bent down and kissed me good night. Again.

"You need some serious discipline," he said, shaking his head before closing my bedroom door.

Except spanking has been unavailable as a method of serious discipline for almost two weeks now because of some serious sciatica that started in my left leg but has now settled so badly in my right leg I can barely walk -- another reason I shouldn't have been wandering about. It seems like it's a tad bit better today, so hopefully by the end of the week A. will be able to fulfill my apparent need for serious discipline.

D'oh! I just remembered: I forgot to take my probiotic before bed. Wonder what A. will do if I get up to take it?

Who's on top?

By pinching my nipple A. could read my thoughts. I was laying against his chest last night, shirt up to give him access. He was fondling the creamy, abundant breasts bulging inside my black bra. Tenderly -- at first. Then he pinched my nipple, gradually crushing it between his thumb and forefinger. Instead of protesting or retaliating (his boys are much more sensitive than my girls), I simply whimpered.

"Somebody's in a subby mood," he announced.

I hadn't intended to show my cards so soon.

He had just been telling me that he was in a mood more amenable to subbing if I still wanted to top. We were going to play the night before, but he had been feeling under the weather with the cold that won't go away. And I had been far too groggy from an epic four and half hour nap (despite my normal twelve-hour slumber that night), even though I had fallen asleep while planning a night of sadistic delight.

Suddenly he was suggesting all sorts of nasty things to do to my ass: ginger, the cane, a hard punitive ass fucking (it's what dirty sluts get for being, well, dirty sluts, right?). All of which was making my cunt gush.

As is so often the case however, my cunt and the rest of my body were at total odds with each other. The sciatica in my left buttock kept throbbing, despite much icing. The muscle spasm in my right foot would not stop pulsating. My bummy hole has been rather tender of late with, um, ::cough:: hemorrhoids ::cough:: (I hate the stuff my doctor gave me to treat them). And the lower right abdominal pain that I've finally agreed to let a surgeon take a look at was as distressing as ever. Indeed for the last few months I haven't even been able to come without a sharp, violent pain there at the moment of orgasm -- hence the reason I've finally agreed to the laparoscopy after dragging my feet for three years with multiple bouts of physical therapy and every other kind of therapy you can think of.

Even as I dreamed of punishment during my rest period, of being vulnerable and violated, I knew it was not to be. Perhaps A. began the evening with the right idea in the first place. My legs could use a good massage -- and maybe even my foot and glutes.

"I'll have a bowl ice cream, please," I ordered A. after handing him the creams and oil I wanted him to use for my massage.

When he returned with my ice cream, he shook his head.

"How did we end up here tonight? What happened to me fucking you up the ass?"

You know, the question I was asking in my last post. The funny thing about switching is, you never know who's going to end up on top.

From top to bottom

So, I was going to top last night.

But then A. found out his favorite sweater had been shrunk in the dryer -- the second favorite sweater to suffer such a fate -- and he was in no mood to be ordered about. So he came in, sat down on the bed next to me and suggested a nice Daddy/little girl incest scene. All while stroking my hair and calling me his little girl.

Bastard.

I tried to resist, dear reader. But...but...I really like being his little girl. Especially if there's a bath and ice cream involved -- the ice cream my reward for being such a good girl in the bath. Though, truth be told, I was too wiped out to splash him even if I really really wanted to (which I did).

There wasn't meant to be any spanking necessarily. Just lots of heavy petting sweet, innocent cuddling. Except at one point when he had me lay over his lap to rub my bottom (and my soaked clit), he started asking me questions about how I was doing with my schedule.

Don't ask me about how long I've been on the computer. Don't ask me how long I've been on the computer... I mouthed to the bedspread.

"And how long were you on the computer today?"

D'oh!

See, this was the deal. I woke up too early and couldn't get back to sleep. I decided to try and fix the ending of a (non-kink) story but when I became tired enough to sleep again, the next door neighbor started hammering away on the other side of my bedroom wall. I was too tired to actually do something productive, but couldn't sleep because of the hammering. So I started websurfing and reading more about the Israeli raid on the Free Gaza flotilla and before I knew it four hours had passed (in my pre-illness life I was a specialist in the Israel/Palestine conflict). This is supposed to be a light computer week for me meaning that I'm not supposed to spend more than three hours in total on my Mac.

When A. isn't here, it's been very easy in that sort of situation to simply not count those hours. And I initially intended to do that even with him here. But as the day wore on, a moral tug-of-war between me and my conscience ensued. And when he actually asked me point blank, it became a lot harder to lie than it is if I simply write a number on a piece of paper or Numbers spread sheet and, with the cushion of several days, quote that back to him.

So, I told him the truth: 4 hours before I got up, 2 1/2 intermittently afterward.

"But you told me a minute ago that you were doing fine with your schedule?"

And then I confessed how initially I wasn't going to tell him.

"Now I have to spank you," he said almost dejectedly. "And that's a stroke per minute."

Which, of course, I had completely forgotten about while I was ignoring my time limit.

Gulp.

"Well there were extenuating circumstances..." he said contemplating.

Yes! Very extenuating!

"And I wasn't actually intending to spank you tonight..."

In the end I got far short of 210 strokes -- 12 with the despised ruler and many more with his hand. A very stern warning followed: next time he would most certainly enforce the stroke-per-minute penalty, even if it was 210 strokes.

Such a merciful Daddy.

I did wake up today a bit disappointed that I'd let him bamboozle me out of my Princess Natalie night and determined that I would reassert my dominance again soon.

Of course, I also determined to be a good girl on the computer. At least for the rest of the week.

Rock of submissiveness

I just told A. that I'm topping tonight.

"That's not right. You're still supposed to be in subby mode with your schedule and your pigtails..."

"You switch at the drop of a hat," I pointed out.

"Yes, but that's me. I'm Even Stevens. While you...you're my rock of submissiveness."

Except the rock in his trousers showed who the submissive one was. You know, at least for tonight.

Why does it have to hurt so much?

Do you ever find yourself, the night after a spanking, thinking that spanking really hurt. Can I have more please?

Last night I got spanked at bedtime. It was the first day of my new schedule, and I failed pretty appallingly. Instead of only being on the computer for three hours, I think it was well over five (I blame the Israeli government for that too!). Instead of taking breaks after every one of those hours, I completely disregarded them. I totally forgot to lay down for one rest period, much less for the three 15-minute periods I was supposed to. I did remember to do some yoga and physical therapy, but forgot my meditation and QiGong. And, of course, I was late to bed -- seven minutes past the grace period.

In short, I blew it.

So A. administered the ruler* after pulling down my jammie bottoms while I buried my face in my pillows. Quite severely too. At one point I thought he was going to break it. Needless to say, it hurt. A lot.

But upon waking up this morning (yes, it was really in the AM too - 11:30!), all I could think of was how much I really want a good, long spell over his knee. I just wish it didn't have to hurt so much. Except, of course, if it didn't hurt, I wouldn't feel very satisfied.

Why does it have to work like that?
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*This ruler is no namby-pamby love-pat stick. It's 24-inches and stings like a motherfucker.

Crashing into Natty

Crashing has a way of putting me in a very Natty mood. And last Wednesday, after a long Mother's Day, a longer ME/CFS Awareness Day, and a trip to the acupuncturist, I crashed. Every noise became too loud. Every light too bright. Television was painful. My cells felt like they were shaking as their vitality drained into oblivion.

All my haughtiness and dominance of the day before melted into dependency and submission. I wanted to be taken care of. Petted. Told what to do, especially as I was too exhausted to figure it out for myself.

Obviously I needed to rest, which I did without protest that night. I woke up the next day promising to continue resting rather than pushing through the exhaustion as I usually do....just after I checked my email. But with the bed adjusted to near zero-gravity and the Mac agreeably on my lap, the temptation to check a few more things was too much. Before I knew it,  A. had gone out and returned again two hours later to find me still on the computer.

He didn't say anything until bedtime when he asked if I could manage a spanking -- something I had not yet been able to tolerate since his arrival because of pain in my sacro-iliac joint and lower right abdomen.

"As long as it's a surface-y implement," I replied. "Like the belt."

"What about the ruler?" Twenty-four inches of deceptively light but terribly stingy wood.

"Yes." I swallowed a scowl. "The ruler would be okay." Even though I much prefer the feel of the belt.

I pulled down my jammie bottoms and laid down on the bed.

"I'm sorry I didn't rest this afternoon," I said as penitently as possible, hoping my apology might reduce my impending punishment.

"I'm sorry too. You needed that rest," was A.'s quiet, grave reply.

That stung almost as much as the ruler. 

When I'm irritated with the limitations illness imposes, I've come to find refuge in my "Princess Natalie" mood, as A. and I have begun calling it. Relishing every wet, bawdy moment of dictating my will and dishing out pain. Feeling imperious and demanding obeisance.

But when I crash and I'm too weak to be irritated, it's all Natty. Meek. Dependent. Child-like. Craving absolution from the guilt I feel for being feeble and useless. Desperate for structure to guide me through my fatigue-induced disorientation and forgetfulness. Hungry for cuddles and sometimes even a spanking to reinforce for me that there is no shame -- and much to be gained -- in resting.

A dommey vignette

A. is clearing up the apartment at the moment. It never has been fully ordered since I moved in at the end of January. He just picked up the 24-inch wooden ruler off the floor between the foot of my bed and my dresser.

"Hmm...and what might this be doing here?" He raised his eyebrow and slapped the ruler against his palm.

"I used it to beat you with the other night," was my casual, haughty response.

"Ah...right." His eyes fell and he shook his head. "I just can't get you out of this dommey mood, can I?"

I grinned. "Nope."

Hairbrush night

I usually never watch "Til Death" on Fox, but I just turned the TV on a few minutes ago to see what was on. Within 30 seconds, Brad Garrett's character was asking Martin Mull's character to stay after he got up to leave. When Mull's character said he needed to get back to his wife, Garrett's character asked "What are you afraid of? Is she gonna spank you -- or not spank you?"

Mull's character grins sheepishly, "Well it is hairbrush night...she gets really angry if I'm late." At which point he sits back down.

Unfortunately, that seemed to be the only funny part of show. It was followed by yet another unfunny episode of The Simpsons. Thank God for Seth McFarland - who manages to do both spanking references AND comedy well.

But liked the "hairbrush night" bit. Nice touch.

Why domestic discipline is not domestic violence

Last week (at least it was last week when I started this post) I read Jessica Wakeman's piece over at The Frisky about her first D/s relationship and was going to write about the similarities/differences with my own first spanking relationship. Except that within the essay was a link (that didn't work but I found eventually) to Amanda Marcotte's post at Pandagon about that article Jessica wrote for Bitch Magazine regarding domestic discipline two years ago featuring, among others, yours truly and my dear friends, Mija and Pablo (see this post for my thoughts on that article). Needless to say it rather distracted me from the post I intended to write.

I'm not sure how I missed Marcotte's post as I was reading Pandagon fairly regularly at the time (and would be now if I was awake more), but it was probably a good thing I did miss it as most likely I would have taken it quite personally ("these people are fucked the fuck up")*. Instead I shrugged off it and its comments as sort of like watching and listening to random people in a bar discuss an event they saw on TV in which you actually played an intimate part. Plus the idea of A. (or Pablo) as an ideologically-motivated pater familias or a misogynistic wife beater made me laugh.

At least, initially I shrugged it off. But...it kept bugging me. As it's been two years since her post, it seemed just a bit late to write a post in response.  However the more I continued to think about it, the more I began to feel that a post addressing why domestic discipline is not domestic violence had a great deal of merit.

Definitions: domestic discipline vs. domestic violence

Domestic discipline is planned, contained, sexually-oriented acts of power exchange with regard to real life deeds that may include physical violence between two people who have explicitly consented to those acts, the violence, and the mutually-defined structure of power exchange.

Domestic violence is behavior that seeks power and control through physical and/or psychological coercion over a partner who has not consented to being controlled (staying with the partner is not consent) and frequently includes spontaneous, unrestrained emotionally-mediated outbursts of physical and/or psychological violence.

Domestic violence is about manipulation and focuses exclusively on the desires of the abusive partner, whereas domestic discipline is far more centered on the needs and desires of the submissive partner.

Within domestic discipline, both partners create a construct in which one partner gives authority (in varying degrees) to the other partner in a way that produces sexual arousal for both. Within this construct the dominant partner will speak and act in ways that would be cruel, unfair, and absolutely inappropriate outside of the construct. Nobody ever really, truly requires a partner "take them in hand." When the submissive partner says he or she "deserved" his or her punishment or the dominant partner beats the other with a rattan cane, both are fully aware that they are acting within the construct they have both chosen and actively participated in constructing.

Safe, Sane, and Consensual

I failed to see how it’s much different from domestic violence, except that the women in this situation tend to minimize the conflict through stylizing the violence and submitting to it in a tacit exchange for their partners’ agreeing to have a limit on how much beating and abuse is handed out.

The difference is quite simple and stark: consent.  Just as in any BDSM relationship, the motto remains safe, sane, and consensual. Even in the "consent to non-consent" relationships, it always begins with consent. With discussions of fantasies and limits (hard and soft) and safe words.

Part of the process of breaking a victim down is slowly introducing her to this narrative in bits and pieces while depriving her of her independence...

Except that in domestic discipline, the overwhelming majority of the time it's the submissive (male or female) who is the one who introduces the domestic discipline narrative to his or her partner and pushes him or her to "be stricter." Or the two partners meet because they are both interested in the same narrative and join a spanking-fetish group of one sort or another. This is markedly different from the bullying that occurs in domestic violence where the abuser's narrative is forced onto his or her victim.

Some abusers will indeed use spanking as a form of violence, particularly when one partner is into spanking/DD and the other isn't. Such was the case in this situation I wrote about where the guy was (and may be still, alas) "disciplining" his girlfriend without any consent on her part because he thought "she needed it." No consent = abuse.

I've also seen situations where one partner wants the other to spank him or her and seeks to get him or her to do so by engaging in greater and greater deliberately provocative behavior (aka "bratting for it"). It's one thing to "brat" with someone you know is into spanking and may view it as a form of foreplay (though a lot of spankos are just as likely to find it annoying as hell). But doing so with someone who is not into spanking or DD is also a form of non-consensuality. Do note, however, this does NOT excuse the non-spanko partner from responding with violence (you have agency, asshole). Bratting for it may work in John Wayne movies and spanking stories, but it's not going to turn someone into a spanko anymore than a girl in a bikini will turn a gay guy straight.


It's all about sex

DD is not BDSM, which is a sexual game, though some DD couples do also enjoy incorporating BDSM elements into their relationships

This is absolutely false and indeed Jessica made a point of linking domestic discipline to sex in her article ("each and every one considers herself a 'spanko' whose fantasies have long revolved around being spanked."). DD is a sub-fetish of BDSM.  It is why you find DD groups at places like FetLife or SpankoLife. Or why DD groups on Yahoo are considered "adult." It is true that those in the "Christian Domestic Discipline" community are probably markedly uncomfortable admitting that what they do is connected to gay leathermen. It is also true that there are some Christian DDers who have a difficult time acknowledging DD is about sex. But even evangelicals who believe in the "headship" of husbands look down on domestic discipline as a sexual fetish. At the end of the day they are simply using a traditional, religious, patriarchal narrative to make palatable what is very much sexual. And we feminists who practice DD are pretty shameless in declaring that what we do is directly related to our clitorises.

...It seems that domestic discipline is a way of thwarting conflict in your relationship by assuming that every conflict or problem in the heterosexual relationship is the woman’s fault (because she’s childish, scattered, rebellious, whatever) and that it’s up to her man to discipline her.

This sentence requires unpacking, and I'll just start at the beginning.

Her point about thwarting conflict in relationship is an important one that deserves far more discussion in the domestic discipline community than it gets. I am always disturbed when I hear couples say they are using DD to avoid arguments. Conflict is a part of ANY relationship, healthy or not. Spanking (or sex, job, exercise, etc.) should never be used as a substitute for good inter-personal communication skills. Ever.

That said, once the conflict is resolved, DD couples will use spanking in the same way that non-kinky people use intercourse to make up. It may not be the way you have sex, but it includes all the aspects of love, intimacy, and affection that one associates with sex.

It's not about gender 

And I use the androgynous term partner because it could just as well be a woman as a man. Marcotte insists that one, domestic discipline only exists within hetero couples, and that two, the man is always dominant. Now based on reading Jessica's article, I can see why she thinks this. While I thought Jessica's description of domestic discipline was very perceptive on a number of levels, she made a crucial mistake in stating that female-dominant or same-sex domestic discipline is merely "theoretical." There are plenty of couples in which the wife is the one disciplining the guy (I really could have linked to a bazillion places for F/M couples). And there are also women disciplining women (if I ever find my Nanny Bea, I can add my name to that list) and men disciplining men. One very astute commenter at Pandagon pointed out that

it’s actually my impression that there’s long been more female-D/male-s than visa verse. My assumption has been that that’s because male-D/female-s overlaps with traditional gender roles, so people who like that sort of thing don’t need to go to a subculture to find it.

Indeed that's exactly been my experience as I've started switching. It took me a little while, but once I found the F/M community, I found more blogs and websites than I could ever possibly visit even if I was healthy and had all the time in the world. And I think Jessica's own male-D/female-s interest kept her from looking for that subculture, leaving the reader to falsely assume that DD is about male superiority by default.

That is not to say misogyny is lacking within the DD community, as well as in the larger BDSM community. Yes, there are men (and women) who engage in domestic discipline (and D/s)** because they believe all women are meant to submit to men (we all know that guy[s] who thinks all dominant women are just waiting for the right dominant man to submit to -- who would be him, of course!). There are men (and women) who are disturbed by feminism and find domestic discipline to be sexually, and yes, politically and religiously attractive. Add thousands of years of patriarchy and a society which is still rife with sexism, and it can make the distinction between ideology and wank fodder difficult.

My first draft of this post was snarky, sarcastic, and downright indignant. Marcotte and her commenters come across as condescending and distinctly uninterested in DD as a form of sexuality. However after more reflection, I had to acknowledge my own lingering discomfort with the language of domestic discipline -- so much so that I don't even like calling what I do "domestic discipline" because of its 1950s "Father-Knows-Best" connotation, preferring to use "punishment fetish/kink" or "What It Is We Do" instead -- even if the fantasies that make me orgasm most often involve domestic discipline. It's because of that discomfort that I almost never read fiction that includes domestic discipline, and when I do, it usually features female-dominant or same-sex couples. Or it's real-life accounts from couples where I know sexism is not the motivation. It's hard for me to not take a "sexist-until-proven-innocent" approach so I can imagine how hard it must be for people outside of our community to hear that my boyfriend spanks me when I go to bed late and not think something terribly sexist is occurring even though it really is true that gender has little to do with the disciplinary arrangement I have with A. 

I agree with Marcotte that feminism is being defined too much these days as choice and not enough as empowerment, especially given the growing climate of dis-empowering women regarding their reproductive rights or equal pay. And I'm not going to suggest -- as I often see women in the BDSM community doing -- that embracing my choice to engage in DD is some grand feminist act, anymore than my eating Cheerios for breakfast is. Domestic discipline is sex and sex is...sex with all of the love, intimacy, transcendence/spirituality, and personal fulfillment that it involves. It's not feminist or misogynist. It's certainly not a movement to return male-female relationships back to the 1950s (even if it may mean that for some who practice it). It's sex.***

But I will say that making women feel bad about the kind of sex they have contributes to their disempowerment. And that is most definitely NOT a feminist act. 


_______________________
*It is also quite possible that I knew about it at the time but deliberately chose not to read it because I suspected this sort of response and now, two years later, forgot that I wasn't going to read it. As you might imagine, my illness-induced poor short-term memory makes reruns far more interesting. ::grin::

**The line between DD and D/s is a murky one. The best way I would differentiate between the two off the top of my head is to say that DD includes a sort of parent-child dynamic while D/s has more of an adult master/slave dynamic - PG vs. R-rated, if you will (or perhaps Freud vs. Hegel). But, of course, there is enormous overlap between the two. Indeed in Jessica's article in Bitch, as well as in The Frisky post that originally sparked this post, she uses the terms interchangeably. But I'll save that question for a whole other post.

***I am fully aware that sex is political and among the many ways the patriarchy has traditionally sought to control women. In this case, it's other women -- not the patriarchy -- trying to control women and so while yes, DD may be political, engaging in it is not an act of sticking it to the Man. Unless, perhaps, it's a female-dominant relationship.

The Birch swings no more

During our last exchange, Alex Birch and I were having a very emotional debate on the soc.sexuality.spanking Usenet newsgroup about terrorism and the requirements for a liberal society. Try as we might to stay on topic (i.e. spanking), politics is never far from the list of current discussions on the newsgroup. That particular discussion did not end with any sort of agreement between the two of us. Indeed his conclusions left me in despair. Had I known it was going to be our last conversation, I sure as hell would have talked about something far more cheerful. Far more related to spanking.

We never had the pleasure to meet in person, though I always assumed we probably would at some point. When I was better and could get on a plane and go to England finally. He and A. would talk about football and the Midlands and we'd all talk about spanking and his library of out-of-print spanking fiction.

Not that we had the lengthy, ongoing Conversation that he and Mija had. I've only been reading and posting to the newsgroup for eight years (on Saturday), making me a newbie compared to them. While I'd read plenty of his posts on SSS, we didn't really interact all that much until he was setting up his wonderful blog in 2005. As I had -- at least in his mind -- already mastered blogging on Blogger, he asked for my help, earning me far more gratitude from him than was worth my certainly earnest, if not always helpful, assistance. After that I felt more comfortable talking with him both on the newsgroup and in email, though it had dwindled over the last year or so, as have most of my other correspondences, due to illness. Meaning that I didn't know about his illness...

I can't imagine the newsgroup without him. The stories. The arguments. The jokes. The arguments. The encouragement (scolding?) each and every summer to do your part in the annual Short Story Contest. The arguments.

And where will the spankosphere get its fix of out-of-print spanking fiction and pictures of spanking models from the 1970s?

I hope he's somewhere with a sassy lass across his knee, giving her the hiding they are both enjoying.

"The naughtiest person ever"

So now that the stomach flu that had me throwing up so much I broke a bunch of blood vessels in my neck is over, and whooping cough (or mycoplasma pneumonia - my doctor wasn't sure but it responded to the second antibiotic he put me on) is over, and moving into my new ginormous one bedroom, brilliant-view apartment (but not the unpacking) is over, it's time for me to do some blogging already. And I thought a nice Nurse K. anecdote might be a good way to get back into the swing of things.

As many of you know, I'm on the blood thinner Coumadin after I developed blood clots in both lungs three years ago. Because Coumadin is a rather dangerous drug, I have to get my blood tested frequently (by Nurse K) to make sure I'm not going to bleed to death or start clotting again. She (or rather a machine that she uses) measures a number called an INR, which for me should be between 2 and 3.5 (i.e. therapeutic range).

For the first two and a half years we had a hard time getting my INR to stay in the therapeutic range. But then they learned a handy trick: they had me take a daily Vitamin K supplement (if you really want to know the science behind that, email me). Once I started taking the Vitamin K, my INR stayed therapeutic for 16 months -- until last week when I broke my run of perfect INRs with an INR of 4.1 (which meant I could bleed too easily).

Why it suddenly jumped up is complicated, but most likely involved three different supplements of which I had recently changed doses (Coumadin interacts with over 180 different foods, medications, and supplements -- a real bitch), as well as the fact that I lost some weight over the last two months from being so sick. While I wasn't really bothered about the potential for bleeding (it was still unlikely), I was annoyed that I was going to have to start going in for more frequent INR checks again. As much as I love Nurse K., and as much as my entire social life at this point consists of Twitter and seeing her and my acupuncturist (yes, my life is that pathetic), it takes a lot out of me to go to the doctor's office once a week instead of once a month.

But return a week later I did. As I sat in the exam room with her yesterday, she asked me about those supplements that I was supposed to stop.

"I was a bit naughty..." I said with a wince. "I kept taking the higher dose of the CoQ10 because it's helping me so much."

"Yes, you are very naughty," Nurse K. said in a mock condemnatory tone. "You're very naughty, Michelle. You're the naughtiest person ever!"

I sat there blushing and giggling like I do when A. tells me I'm naughty. Indeed had he been there, A. would have teased me mercilessly about just how much I was blushing and giggling.

The fun ended there, however. She recorded my CoQ10 dosing. Took my INR. This time it was too low: 1.8. And that was probably a result of me being naughty for real: I took some extra Vitamin K to compensate for what I thought might be the decreased clotting time effect of the CoQ10 even after Nurse K told me not to do that last week.

I think because I was naughty for real, she stopped teasing me. "At least you're being honest -- that's the important thing." And she returned to typing in my chart.

I suppose having to return in a mere week (rather than in two) is a fair punishment for my arrogant defiance of her instructions.

And if I'm lucky, maybe Nurse K. will tell me I'm naughty again.