Thursday, I go back for surgery on my left eye. About four months ago I had an operation on that eye to relieve pressure. The day after the surgery something bled into the eye blocking my vision. Over the first month or so, the blood in the front of my eye cleared. Unfortunately some blood got into the jelly in the back. It’s slowly been clearing, but at the rate it’s improving, I won’t have vision in that eye for another year. This latest surgery will be to remove the blood and surrounding jelly. It should restore my vision in that eye. Meanwhile, last week’s surgery on the right eye while successful, takes a while before my vision will clear. I’m left with blurry vision in the one working eye.
I’m using voice to text software to write this post. It isn’t perfect and very often makes amusing mistakes interpreting what I dictate. Since I am not able to reliably read the screen, Mrs. Lion proofreads and corrects these errors. It was good to read her post yesterday and learn that she misses our active, disciplinary relationship. More correctly, she misses being able to continue my education with her paddle collection. In a perverse way, I miss it too. It’s not that I’m trying to earn punishments. I’m not. But as she correctly observed, the stress of impending surgery and moving are high enough to make me forget some of my rules. Unfortunately, the rules I am most likely to forget involve doing things that truly annoy her, like interrupting and making pronouncements like a know it all.
I get no pleasure from immunity to punishment. It’s not like sneaking out of school and not getting caught. When she growls at me for interrupting, for example, I feel sad and guilty. I know how much she is doing for me, more than anyone is ever done for me in the past. The last thing I want to do is upset her. This is where I think there is misunderstanding with some of our readers. I truly don’t want to interrupt her. I want us to have free-flowing conversations without irritating her. The last thing I want is my anxiety to cause her distress.
She knows this. We’ve both learned how powerful our disciplinary relationship can be in terms of relieving stress and guilt. While it might not be a conventional path, what we do keeps us on an even keel. The big misunderstanding is that physically punishing me is the source of satisfaction for Mrs. Lion. It’s not that simple.
Our disciplinary experience includes first and foremost, the ability for Mrs. Lion to establish groundrules. She doesn’t have to write law books. She does have to know when I do something she doesn’t like. Before we began our female led relationship with discipline (FLRD), she was much more likely to overlook things that annoy her. At some point, the annoyance would bubble over and she would stop talking to me. Both of these behaviors are passive-aggressive she gets no satisfaction and has nowhere to go with her anger.
Since we agreed that she would be my disciplining wife, she knows that it’s her responsibility to notice when I do things I shouldn’t. I let her know that I’m glad that she’s keeping a close eye on me. That represents a positive feedback loop. Add to that her ability, no, her responsibility to punish me for infractions, and we have a way to safely ground the emotional currents that can sabotage a relationship. Negative feelings that have nowhere to go can torpedo an otherwise loving relationship. What we’ve done seems to have come a long way toward solving this.
Another puzzling part of our equation seems to be my focus on making things worse for myself. Actually, that’s not what I’m doing. We’ve discovered that for this disciplinary relationship to be effective, the discipline has to be meaningful. There is no standard for adult physical punishment. Neither of us got into this with a clue of what we would eventually end up doing. For example, in my post this morning I offered suggestions on just this topic — apparently making things worse for myself.
A key component of a successful disciplinary relationship is positive feedback from the disciplined male. Odd as it might sound, my input and approval are necessary for Mrs. Lion to feel good about what she is doing. By offering ideas on how to make my punishments more effective, I am expressing approval of what she does and I’m asking her not only to continue but to become stricter. In an extremely perverse sort of way, she knows that by becoming an effective disciplinarian she is making me happy. In fact she is.
It’s not that I like painful punishment spankings. I don’t. I like that my lioness works hard to become a better disciplining wife. She gets my approval in many ways. When I tell her how proud I am that she’s expressing her feelings and making me accountable, I’m letting her know that I not only accept her punishments, but I value them as an important part of our relationship. I’m not just the passive, submissive recipient of capricious punishments. I am an active participant cheering her on as she grows in her role.
As an adult, I understand the benefit of what we are doing. I also understand that ultimately I control this. All I have to do is follow my rules and the only paddling I will receive will be for fun. I think it’s a long way off before I get to that point. Meanwhile, I think it’s important that you understand that the value of the all this activity isn’t spanking me. It’s a feedback loop that insulates our love from interruption by aggravation.
Mrs. Lion knows why I am misbehaving. She knows that I’m distracted and fearful. She also knows that this is no excuse. Actually, it’s a plea for the lifeline of her leadership. It’s way too easy to focus on the physical aspects of this. Of course, the physical part is necessary. Meaningful punishment is a major component in expressing and releasing negativity. But it isn’t the entire story. It’s also the security of knowing that I’m loved enough to be worth the effort to observe and correct misbehavior. At times like this when physical punishment is really not possible, it becomes very clear just how important our disciplinary roles have become to us. Mrs. Lion is taking advantage of my physical inaccessibility by learning to growl and even scold me.
It’s very clear to me that we are both absolutely committed to FLRD. We are not insane and Mrs. Lion is not a bloodthirsty sadist. We’ve adopted an unusual-but-effective way to eliminate negative energy. We both miss being able to express this fully. If the surgery Thursday is successful, we are within a week or two of resuming physical punishment. As my eyesight improves, my behavior will as well. Mrs. Lion will make sure of that.
