Maintenance Spanking sure sounds like an oxymoron to me. What does beating my butt maintain? It’s not as silly as it sounds. As I have read about it, maintenance spanking has two functions: it reminds the spankee of his submissive role, and perhaps more important, it reminds the dominant of her role. It also, interestingly, provides important communication. Of course, the concept of being hurt without any specific reason.
I know that when I read about this, I found the idea unpleasant. After all, Mrs. Lion’s disciplinary spankings are very painful. She always delivers them with cool authority. They hurt and she expects them to hurt a lot. Each time I get one, it is for one or more misses on my part. It’s earned retribution. It’s true that when we first started FLM, she spanked me every night for a week. She did this to help herself learn that it was OK to inflict pain that way. It was a necessary self-training exercise for her. It didn’t make it hurt less to know that, but I had to agree it was a worthy purpose. Ultimately, it helps her be better in her role.
According to my reading, some couples who practice domestic discipline believe that frequent physical reminders of the power balance are needed to keep the surrendered husband under control. This is the FLM equivalent of making men practicing enforced chastity wait very long times between orgasms; it keeps them submissive and obedient. The theory there is that for days after an orgasm, a male will be lazy and uninterested in serving his keyholder. I don’t feel any less willing to serve Mrs. Lion an hour after I come than I do after waiting for two weeks. If there are guys whose docility is affected by getting to ejaculate, then they certainly should be given very infrequent orgasms.
I think it is different with domestic discipline; at least during the first year or two. Very few women will instinctively reach for a paddle and spank their husbands if they break a rule or fail to keep a promise. Yet, the root of domestic discipline is for the surrendered husband to be disciplined severely after any infraction. Mrs. Lion is nowhere near that point with me. That change will take time; a lot of it. After all, it took her many months to get comfortable with frustrating me day after day. It’s not easy for her at all. Disciplining me is ever harder.
To be fair, I am not accustomed to accepting punishment without question. It is easier for me. All I have to do is present my bare bottom. I do try to escape after a few swats. That is certainly unacceptable behavior. There are only two ways we can improve our disciplinary roles: Either I have to have many more opportunities to mess up so that Mrs. Lion has a reason on every punishment day to discipline me, or we have scheduled maintenance spankings with their own rules.
As I see it, I have to be trained to lie still for a very painful spanking, not try to roll over or squirm away. Mrs. Lion has to learn to be ruthless and to spank hard and fast regardless of my displeasure. Both will take a lot of practice. We have to avoid confusing maintenance spanking with discipline. In the case of discipline, Mrs. Lion will tie me down in order to keep me in place for my full punishment. That will get much more painful as she learns to feel good about administering it. Maintenance spankings are a learning experience. My thought, which I know I will regret if Mrs. Lion does it, is that she has me assume the spanking position and administers a number of punishment swats. I have to hold still. If I don’t, she tells me that she is starting again and she does. This repetition continues until I learn to hold still. In the first sessions, I would hope we would start with a fairly small number of swats. Over time the number increase as does the speed they are administered.
To avoid confusing discipline with maintenance, I think we should do maintenance on a different night. If punishment is Monday and Thursday, maybe maintenance is Wednesday and Saturday. That is up to Mrs. Lion. Like many things about FLM, the concepts seem odd and not applicable to us. But as I think about them more, I realize they would help us too.
