So I could've handled that better...

Today (well, yesterday now) was crappy, as you can probably tell from the Undone post. Here's what happened. My friend that I shared this with came here to read. And she had some questions. And, following my wishes, she asked them. Now R is the type of person whose thoughts just pour out through email, blogging, etc in exactly the order and completeness that they pop into her mind. Nothing wrong with that at all, especially if you're familiar with it (as I am). But sometimes those thoughts come out more bluntly than intended, and, already in a fragile, stressed out state of mind, I reacted badly to some honest questions and comments. And to be fair, she did ask me beforehand if I was up to hearing about what she thought of the blog, since I'd spent the previous 15 minutes spewing out some extremely stressed out PMS fueled emails about life in general. I'm the one who said I wanted to talk about it.

The two big things I reacted so badly to were a concern she put forth about this spanking, the length and intensity of it, and a completely innocent and legitimately separate (but maybe a little poorly timed) question about whether or not we spank Morgan. Now she wasn't trying to imply that any spanking she got would be in the same stratosphere as what I get, but I was a little too willing to take things the wrong way. (For the record, we do, on pretty rare occasions, spank Morgan, but it's a last resort and maybe half a dozen or so swats with the hand over her jeans - meant (successfully) to have more of an emotional impact than a physical one. And I get spanked waaaay more frequently than she does.)

Anyway, I got really defensive really quick, which she read as shutting her down. And sooo, her reaction was to tell me that she didn't want to discuss any part of this with me any more, maybe not ever. Which really hurt, because as anyone here knows, I took a big chance letting her in on this part of us. And with the box now opened, even if we were to never speak of it again, I feel like it would always be there in the back of her mind. Probably 95% of our conversations revolve around our marriages, and now that she knows, I'd feel dishonest and fake with the kind of careful editing I always did before this was in the open.

So, she may or may not come back here (I hope she will), but in case she does, I want to try to address some of the concerns she had. First of all, the big bad 500 swat spanking and other similar incidents:

I think when she first heard that Nick spanks me for more than just sex, she had the idea that it was a sort of "jerk the girl up and bust her 10 or 12 swats for a bad attitude" type spanking. And there's plenty of that too. But I don't always post about them here. Five minutes later the sting is completely gone, and something that short is really just about getting my attention.

Most of the spankings I get (and post about here) run from 100 to 200 swats. Why? Because that's about what it takes to get me to let go of stress, attitude, self loathing, whatever necessitated the spanking in the first place. Do they hurt? Well, yeah - we are talking about spanking here. But they're not brutal, or tortuous, or unmanageable. Nick knows me, my body, and just how much pain it takes to actually register as pain very well, and he has no need or desire to take me beyond where I need to go. The aforementioned "500 swat" spanking was much more about resetting my heart and head than it was about any kind of punishment. And here's something that wasn't in the post but is true almost every time: when it was over, I wanted more. I craved it. I wasn't broken and diminished. I was restored, floating and safe, and very glad that he'd done it.

Maybe the tears bothered her. Tears for me aren't usually so much about the pain as they are about the surrender, which is vital for me. I need to let go of all the crap that's floating through my head, and being able to cry is what lets me do that. And usually once the tears start, things that I didn't even realize I needed to deal with get played out and put away. I can't even describe how light I feel for days after a really hard spanking. It's not about me thinking I'm a bad person who needs to be punished hard and broken. Spanking is just the way that I best deal with stress and the resulting attitude issues. I remember our basketball coach in highschool talking about his ritual for when he was really stressed. He had a big stick that he would just whack the crap out of a tree with, over and over until he'd worked out whatever aggression he had. Me - I liked to have my butt whacked until I'm de-stressed.

Another question she had was about the issue of sex and discipline. I addressed this once before on the blog here, but I want to look specifically at what she asked me. Nick and I usually make love after a serious spanking (and pretty much always after a fun spanking - what else is it supposed to lead too? WEG). Her thought was that by having sex right after it seemed like it was canceling out any discipline in the spanking. A lot of people feel that way and refuse to make love the same night there's been a punishment, feeling that it's best to keep the two completely separate. I understand the concept. It just doesn't apply to us. By the time the spanking is over, whatever issue brought us to that point has been settled. If it hasn't, well, I ask for more (hey - read the archives. It's happened!). And so, when Nick's done what I need him to, we both feel the need to reconnect physically. And if we were settling an attitude issue, it just might be the first purely sweet connection we've had for a few days.

To be perfectly honest, I can get both sex and spanking pretty much whenever I want without there having to be fractious feelings involved. I don't need to brat to get punished, and I just don't go there. I made that mistake a time or two when we first started, and it's just not worth the resentment it breeds. Head games suck.

As far as a punishment making me horny, I'll admit, I'm a total spanko. The thought of my husband in stern, taking care of business, busting my butt mode is HOT! But the spanking definitely hurts when it's happening, mainly because of whatever unpleasantness got me in that position. I'm sorry to be there and I regret whatever I did (or didn't do as the case may be) to get me there. I really do try to avoid the serious ones - usually by the time he tells me to bend over I'm almost sick to my stomach. I hate that I've done something to disappoint him. But once those feelings are dealt with and put away, sure, there's a lot of sexiness there. And um, why not? He is my husband, and if this works for us, then who cares if we don't wait a prescribed time before making love?

Anyway, this has really made me think a lot. I really hope she looks around here some more, if only to have a clear picture of why this makes me happy. And I hope she will ask me any other questions she has. But even if she doesn't, I'd love to hear from some of my readers on this, whether it's a question about DD in general or our relationship in particular. If you'll ask me either in email or in comments, I'll answer here in a post.