The Life and Thoughts of Me.....

When my husband is inconsistent, I absolutely need to listen, but it’s really hard sometimes. It usually comes about like this: we’re going along just fine. Everything happens as it should, and I feel good – great, even! Then a spanking session is put off for one reason or another. I expect the spanking will be good and hard the next day, but it’s lighter than usual, or I receive fewer swats. Okay, no big deal; he’s just tired. The weekend is coming and we’ll make up for it then. But the weekend comes and goes, and he forgets to tell me what to wear. I don’t say anything because I’m sure he’s just exhausted, and it’s actually not that important. I want him happy, and I really, really don’t want to be a bother. Maybe he just needs a break. Over the next few days, little things are missed here and there. I break a rule, and there’s no consequence. Spanking begins to feel like a chore. I have to talk myself into kneeling by the couch for him, afraid of the disappointment when it feels like he’s just going through the motions, and then the extra disappointment when he pulls my pants back up and my shirt back down. My tension and anxiety are growing; it’s gone on long enough that I don’t know how to say anything without preparing a five-mile long list, and then my anxiety explodes because he doesn’t seem to notice since he hasn’t said anything, either. He finally asks what’s wrong after a week or two like this, and it all comes pouring out of me like some kind of toxic sludge.

Holy hell. You can imagine how spectacularly unproductive this is. I’m sure you can see all the various points in there where I should have said something, and I ought to have asked how he was doing, but I didn’t. You can probably also see the various opportunities my husband had to speak up, too, but he didn’t, either, afraid to hear how he’d been letting me down.

That’s the rub right there – neither of us wants to be a burden to the other, but by remaining silent, we become exactly that. Hindsight is an amazing thing, shining a light so clearly on the things we did wrong. But in the moment, when doubt and anxiety begin to creep into the cracks we thought were tightly sealed, it’s not clear at all.