It feels great to be back on track with our posting schedule after taking some time off for vacation, and important retreat announcements last week.
We’re getting back on schedule with our guest posting columns this week and picking up where we left off with Shawn & Ellie. If you’re new to their story, her and her husband practice the Spencer Plan/Cooperative Domestic Discipline dynamic in their marriage and, like any form of domestic discipline, have hit a few setbacks along the way but are working through them together.
This week, Ellie shares with us the turning point in their relationship that made her realize maybe The Spencer Plan was right for them after all.
[heading style=”1″]The Turning Point[/heading]
Shawn and I have always had what I consider to be an open marriage, but not in the sense that you’re probably thinking. Our definition of an open marriage is one where we can discuss things with each other without limitations or borders, and that we are open with each other about everything. We don’t have secrets.
After our fall out about the car I really questioned if we were doing the right thing with The Spencer Plan. I wondered what I had gotten myself into, and I definitely wondered how this lifestyle would work if I couldn’t get in the right mindset to punish him, yet he was clearly in the mindset to punish me. It just didn’t seem right. Reading up on The Spencer Plan made it appear so fair and so equal, yet I hadn’t seen that side of it at all.
I was getting ready to put a load of wash into the laundry one afternoon when I checked Shawn’s pockets, like I always do, to make sure no paper, coins, or heaven forbid gum was inside that would ruin the load of wash. When I did, I came across a receipt for a pretty pricey video game system, one that I certainly had no idea about. I wouldn’t say money was tight for us, but we were on a budget, watching money carefully trying to save for a down payment on a larger home. When I saw the receipt, I wasn’t happy, but I threw the clothes in the washer and went about my afternoon.
Shawn came home from work that evening as normal as ever, and while I tried not to give him the cold shoulder, I failed. I was upset, and I felt it to be difficult to show anything other than my disappointment with his purchase, or him hiding it from me. Finally, I asked him about it after many attempts to pry information out of me wondering why I was so upset.
He came clean, and admitted that he purchased the video game system because he thought it was a good price (I disagreed wholeheartedly). I asked him why he didn’t even consult me first, knowing our financial situation, and his answer was that he knew I wouldn’t like it. He was right. But what I didn’t like even more was him going ahead and doing it without my knowledge.
I slept on it that night, and by the next morning it was clear to be that Shawn just wasn’t getting it. He said a quick apology, and was moving on like normal, with the video game system still here. It felt like he didn’t care about my feelings, and certainly didn’t care enough to return the system. When he came home from work that night it was almost worse than the night before for me. I was more upset, at that point, with his attitude than him not telling me. I’d had enough, and decided to implement the Spencer Plan, but how I had no clue.
I still couldn’t bring myself to spank Shawn. I tried, I thought about it, I envisioned it, and it just wasn’t working for me. I didn’t think I could do it. But, I did. It was a short spanking, a few swats, it got his attention, but more so it refocused mine. I felt better, he felt better. And, the video game system got returned.
The spanking was certainly nothing spectacular, nothing like what you would read in a book or what you would envision when it comes to a spanking. But it worked so well. It made Shawn really start to respect me more than I had seen in awhile, and it made me respect him that he cared enough about me, and our marriage, to not spend money carelessly like that again.
It was in that moment, when I was hugging him after it was all over with that I felt my bad attitude melt away, and I felt that this new way of domestic discipline may really be working for us.
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Thanks for sharing with us again this week, Ellie!
We’ll see you all tomorrow for a new Five Things Friday!
The post Learning Domestic Discipline Guest Post Column – Ellie {Week 3} appeared first on Learning Domestic Discipline: The Blog.