Monday, June 30, 2008

Positive Reenforcement

No, and not in a "Dommme-ly" "I-can-make-you-want-to-do-this" kind of way.

Only with the slowly dawning realization that every time I go to talk to my beloved about this, the conversation goes so much better than I expected. She is wonderful and loving and I'm incredibly appreciative.

As I implied in my last post, a conversation was in the offing. When nothing manifested by Sunday afternoon, I brought the subject up. We've both been incredibly busy and spent a surprising part of the day napping.

I started with "We need to find a time to talk about this stuff, and not during a walk." Which is where we've talked often in the past, but is an activity she likes, and which I don't want to 'pollute' with the idea that every time we go for a walk, we have to deal with "that..." And not right before we go to sleep, because we're too tired.

Coulda knocked me over with a feather when she said, "I've been thinking about this."

"You have???"

"I think before you come to bed, you should check in with me and tell me the things you've done for me today. That will remind me that we're doing this."

We had a long talk about my ambiguous feelings about "getting credit" for house work. And she said she understood them, and that perhaps in the future we would exclude them from the list, but for now, they should be included.

I said, "Jeez, if we're talking frankly about fantasies, can I do that naked at your bedside." She smiled indulgently and said "Yes."

We tried to line out the practicalities of things - what if she goes to bed before I'm ready (I drop what I'm doing and go up anyway, and afterwards leave the room to complete whatever's keeping me up) - what if I want to go to bed before she does (I ask if it's OK to go to bed, she either says 'Yes', or 'Wait a couple of minutes, I'm going too,' or 'Go and wait for me.') I'm sure we haven't covered everything, but we'll work it out in time.

And after watching some TV, she was tired and wanted to go straight to bed. So we did, though I scurried around doing a couple of chores before I went to the bedroom - in retrospect maybe I should have gone to the bedroom, done the whole ritual, and then done the chores. But we'll figure that stuff out.

Have I mentioned that I love rituals?

Have I mentioned that I really love rituals?

So I have great hopes for this.

On the other hand, I had great hopes for our "coming home" ritual, where I'd wait to be acknowledged by her, but that only worked out once in the last two weeks. I suggested that we really need to fine-tune that one for more situations. We agreed on the possibility of deferring conversations for up to 24 hours if the moment didn't seem right, so that's what we did with this subject.

Which is actually very liberating, because it gives me permission to bring it up again and not feel guilty about it.

I was actually pretty tired during our discussion and not feeling all obsessed and sub-ly, so it was a good moment to have the conversation.

In the event, the ritual last evening felt a little awkward, as well it might the first time through. But I appreciated her doing this all, listed to paltry things I had done yesterday for her, (though I forgot the project about getting the work-stains out of her slacks, which took a while; I'll have to get better at remembering). I also noted that this was also her opportunity for feedback to me, though she didn't have any, she didn't seem burdened by the concept.

Much to my surprise after the light turned out, I spent more than half an hour pleasuring her, at her express request and direction. Mistress Matisse has a riff somewhere on her blog about "Who's running the fuck?" - who's setting the timing and pace of intercourse. That has almost always been me in our relationship, even when I'm pleasuring her with no prospects for myself.

That definitely wasn't true last night, as she repeatedly told me to slow down. I was worried because in the past she's said that if things go on for too long, they're not fun for her, but I guess that was a long time ago...

I was concerned that we had sex after having these discussions because she felt it was "part of the package." But last nights was so "Her in charge" that I'm beginning to wonder if there's an alternate explanation - that she's really turned on by the whole thing. Seems too much to hope for, but a pleasant thought anyway.

So we'll see how things evolve with our new ritual, and our talk today about the "arriving home" ritual.

Life is good.

4 comments:

All For Her said...

Wow! Sounds wonderful!
You know, we hear so much about "topping from the bottom" and what not, but when both partners are first figuring this stuff out I don't think that it's true. Especially if your wife isn't spending hours on the internet reinfocing ideas she already has (like I do and likely you do). So, she is still new to everything. With this being the case for both of us I think it's ok that we bring up things we'd like to do for them, or for us, like rituals. Our wives can take them or leave them, but may not have even considered them if we hadn't brought it up.
It seems like you and your wife are following a similiar course to my wife and I.
Good luck!

Anonymous said...

Great post Jamie - now that you have started to discuss specifics each day, your wife will see what you are doing for her, and it will give her the opportunity to give you feedback and maybe even adjust or dictated to you a little more. It also gives you an opportunity to tell her what you have enjoyed doing for her and how you are pleased to serve her in this way. Hopefully she will see just how much you enjoy it and learn to relax more and take advantage of her obedient husband. I think that this is a great step forward, and with time this should improve things no end

Jamie said...

Thanks for both of your comments. The check-in and conversation part each evening I think will be huge. It may be a challenge to maintain over the vacation, though I'm going to explicitly talk about how I'd like to try doing so.

I appreciate both your comments and tremendously appreciate being able to accompany your journey through your blog, AAT.

Jamie said...

AFH, if you're not in to blogging, how would you feel about chatting via e-mail? E-mail me via my profile if you'd like.

Jamie