Spanked for something I never expected..

This has been a rough week, and a great week, all at the same time.
For a long time now (since before we moved to the east coast, before we had a child, etc) I have been wanting to build our dream house. For whatever reason, we haven't been able to do so yet (although we have talked about it). Well, finally this week, we decided to make it happen. We spent a ton of time researching areas, neighborhoods, schools, and lots and finally picked the perfect one. We're now in the "picking a builder" stage. It has basically consumed our lives these past few weeks and between this big decision and my husband being "full swing" into his new job, life is crazy.

Within all the craziness, I've still managed to do the usual (take care of our son, clean, laundry, errands, etc) but I've neglected one kind of important thing- eating.

When we first began DD, I never expected that I would hear "you're getting spanked for not eating" coming out of my husbands mouth. I don't "love food" or overeat, or anything to that respect, but I've always been good at eating when I'm hungry and not forgetting to..until lately. The hectic state that our life has taken on has really got me neglecting things like eating, and sleeping, and thus in turn has effected my health. Thankfully, not in a major way, but it still makes me dizzy or get headaches if I go all day long without any sort of food or drink and 2 hours of sleep. Needless to say, I'm beyond burnt out right now.

So, when my husband repeatedly said, day after day, "you need to eat lunch while I'm at work", guess what I didn't do? Eat lunch. I forgot, pretty much every day except the ones when I had to (he was home and we ate together). Over the course of a few days of basically not listening whatsoever to that, I got spanked.

I guess there's a first time for everything, but I really hope this is the last.

The "age old" DD question.

"How does being in a DD relationship not make you feel like you're being treated like a child?"

I'm almost convinced that every single person against DD has this swirling around their head. Not that there's anything wrong with that (necessarily) but I've heard this countless times.

This is one of those topics that makes perfect sense in my head, but putting it into words seems so difficult. I think/hope those that already practice DD know exactly what I mean about it not making you feel like a child without me even having to put it into words, but I don't know for sure.

Rules and consequences are everywhere in the world. Not just between a parent and a child. There are rules at work, school, public places, virtually everywhere. There are also consequences (usually in the form of the law but not always). Society has to have boundaries in order to function, that's just the bottom line. It really baffles me why some people have such a hard time grasping that husbands create rules boundaries for their wives. I guess I'm weird.

I can't speak for all women in a DD relationship, but in mine, I've never felt like a child. I think the biggest reasons for this are..

1. The emotions involved. Domestic discipline, in general, requires a lot of really strong emotional ties. These ties become even stronger, and more apparent, when punishment (primarily spanking) takes place. The emotions involved are significantly different than a parent punishing a child. They are the same emotions applied within a marriage, or serious relationship. 
2. The discussion before hand is different. The discussions (or lectures, or whatever you want to call it) my husband and I have before hand are structured in a sense where there are a lot of open ended, thought provoking, and adult-themed. It isn't "you really shouldn't have done ___. Now you're getting punished." type of thing.
3. It's consensual. Parent/child discipline is not consensual, but DD is. In my marriage, I'm free to "withdraw consent" from this being in our marriage at any time (and so is my husband). Although I never have (and either has he), it's an option if either of us ever feel we need it. With that consent, I agreed to everything that comes with DD (the ups, the downs, the punishments, the rules, the rewards, the trust, the bond, the love, the emotions, and so much more). I chose this.

This "you're being treated like a child!" thing never really made much sense to me, to be perfectly honest. My husband and I are married. He doesn't parent me, or raise me. I think SOME parental elements are there (he protects me, he loves me, etc.) but, in my opinion, those elements are there in any strong marriage (whether DD is present or not).

If your husband is making you feel like a child, I would strongly recommend reevaluating your DD relationship and pin pointing what areas are making you feel that way, because, in my opinion, that isn't healthy and DD wasn't created to be a parenting mechanism. It was created to strengthen marriages, and in my opinion, it does just that. 

Misconceptions

First, thank you to everyone who emailed, commented, sent me Twitter messages, texted me, and called me with well wishes for our little boy. I'm happy to say he is doing much better! He is still not 100%, but we are making progress, and I'm so thankful for that. Thank you to everyone who helped make a tough time a little easier on us!


Second, if you aren't yet a member of the Learning Domestic Discipline Social Network, there's an awesome Valentines Day special going on! You can find out more about it on my husbands blog.

I thought of just about every excuse possible to not write this blog entry. I think the best excuse I came up with was that I didn't want to feed into the drama that, for God knows what reason, seems to circulate through DD blogs (and emails, and comments, and so on and so forth). 99.5% of the time, I'd really prefer to just stay out of stuff like this, but I guess here's where the .5% of the time where I feel the need to actually do something comes in.

I feel like there are a lot of misconceptions swirling around in the "DD community". Misconceptions about me and my marriage and misconceptions about DD in general (usually from those who have never practiced or heard of DD before, and that's understandable).

These are just 4 of them, but I'm sure there's many more, and I will maybe get to those in the future. But, for now, here's my take on 4 of the "why you practicing DD is so horrible" reasons that I hear all the time (and I'm getting a little sick of it).

Misconception #1: "You haven't been practicing DD long enough to give advice".

Just when I think the world is getting smarter, I see this statement.

There is no rule saying "you have to be practicing domestic discipline for over __ years in order to give advice", first off.

Secondly, I think the length of time isn't necessarily what dictates whether the advice is good or not. People come to me/us and ask for advice, and I/we give it out. I've asked numerous DD friends/people in the community for advice over the years and some of the best advice I've gotten has come from those who have only been practicing DD for a few months, while other good advice has come from those practicing for over 20-something years.

To clear it up: My husband and I have been practicing DD for over 4 years. I'm almost positive that some people think we started practicing after we got married (which has been almost 2 years ago..) but we haven't. We have been together for several years, began practicing DD 4 years ago, and got married almost 2 years ago. If that doesn't meet peoples "qualificiations" I don't know what to tell you. :(

Misconception #2: DD is abuse.

My husband wrote (what I consider to be an excellent) blog entry on that here.

Misconception #3: Women in domestic discipline  have no freedom.

Speaking personally, I have plenty of freedom. I'm allowed to make whatever choice, or decision, I want to. But, some of the choices/decisions have consequences behind them. Still, no one (except me) is stopping me from doing whatever I want to do, when I want to do it, and how I want to do it. What DOES stop me is the fear of consequence, thus why domestic discipline works so well.

I can't speak for all women in DD relationships because I know everyone practices domestic discipline differently. But, in every DD relationship I've seen, the wife is free to make whatever decisions she wants. There is plenty of freedom involved.

Misconception #4: It makes the women feel degraded.

Unless degraded means loved, cherished, and protected, then that would be incorrect.

Once again, I can't speak for all women in DD marriages because it's very possible that somewhere out there there is a woman in a non-consensual DD relationship who feels that way. But, for everyone I know, that couldn't be further from the truth.

I think one of the best things about domestic discipline is the emotional feelings involved with it. For me, it makes me feel protected and loved. That would be the furthest thing from degraded.

Just some sentences.

Disclaimer: This is just a bunch of random sentences thrown together because I want to get them out. If Blogger had a "make this entry non-viewable because it has zero point whatsoever" feature, I'd use it on this post.

I think, in the 26.5 years I've been around, this is probably ranking up in the top 5 of the most stressed/overwhelmed I've ever been, and it's showing. My attitude has probably been less than spectacular these past few weeks. By some miracle, I've only managed to get in trouble like once last week.

I'm averaging maybe 2 hours of sleep on a good night. Today, we wound up in the ER with our son, who now has RSV and pneumonia.

I just keep telling myself everything will be fine but so far I can't convince myself of that.