Communication (or Lack of Thereof) is a Bitch

Frustration is setting in. I have tried several times to encourage my Knight to tell me exactly what he wants from our FLR. I want to know what it is he needs and expects... what motivates him to strive to meet my expectations and what makes things more difficult for him. I want to understand the whys and hows of this whole thing in his head.

But all I ever get is "I just want you to be happy, Babe."

Yeah. I get that. And I appreciate it, and it's one of the things I so love about him. BUT... there has to be more to this that his desire to make me happy.

Doesn't there?

I want to know what makes my Knight tick. I want to know where his head wanders when no one is looking. I want him to share those deep thoughts that he thought he'd never share with anyone else.

Yeah, I'm asking a lot. But I'm not asking anything I'm not willing to give, and I don't think I'm being unreasonable. I want to know these things so that I can use them to grow as his Queen, help his dreams and fantasies come true and ensure we're BOTH happy and content in our marriage.

Maybe I'm not asking the right questions? Maybe my Knight really does not know the answers? Maybe he still does not trust me enough to share these things? (that last one seems unlikely but the thought of it bothers me a lot).

I am doing my best to set aside quiet time every evening so that we can talk and explore his thought and ideas of where this should go. Every evening I get the same answers.  Maybe I need to try a different tactic.

My Thoughts on Chasity Devices

I've thought about locking my Knight. Sometimes I like the idea. I've even gone "window shopping" for a device online. The thought of restricting access to his cock so that the only sensations he feels are those which I allow is interesting. I find myself wondering how he'd react. How his actions would change if I asked him to lock it up for me.

 But I also like knowing that he maintains chastity because I require and expect it. It's a huge turn on to know that he's unlocked and free to do as he wants, but that out of love and respect for me he won't.

At the same time I've read blogs written by quite a few guys who enjoy their devices, physically, mentally, and emotionally. I talked to one guy for quite a while. He told me that he would feel like he was missing something important if his wife was not his keyholder. It seems that a lot of guys feel that way.

I guess part of my reluctance is that I'm just not sure how my Knight would react. He's still not comfortable and open with talking about his submissive tendencies. Or.. he's not aware of them to the same extent that I am. He honestly does not see how he is different than most other guys, and he doesn't understand guys who are NOT submissive to their wives. In my Knight's head it's simply the way it's supposed to be- a guy should follow his wife/girlfriend's lead because that's his role to protect her and make sure she's happy.

Given that, he's probably wear a device if I asked him to. But I'm not intrigued by the idea to push the issue. I trust him not to play alone, so there's no real need to make him wear a device.

If my Knight ever brings up the subject, or seems interested in being locked, I will get him a device. Probably not a CB, though. I don't like the way they look, even though I do like the idea of his cock being completely encased and blocked from all sensation except what I provide and allow. I don't know.. maybe one of these days I'll try it and see how he responds.

What's the Key?

On I'm hers there is a very honest discussion about the importance of the words used to make requests of a sub. It's got me thinking about the words I use. Most of the time when I make a request of my Knight I phrase it as a polite request.  Saying something like, "Baby, would you take the pan out of the oven for me, please"  or  "I need you to have the dishes done by the time I get back. Thanks." are both fairly typical for me. It's rare that I feel the need to order my Knight. He responds so quickly (most of the time) to my suggestions, requests, and even to my off-handed comments that oftentimes I only need to mention that I'm thinking about completing a task and he volunteers to take care of it for me.

We both understand that my requests are really just politely phrased directions, and my Knight would never dream of saying no. First of all it's not in his nature to refuse anything I ask him, and second we've discussed it and it's understood that requests hold the same expectations as demands. Occasionally I do make demands, if the situation calls for it. A few days ago my Knight was washing dishes and I asked him to take the trash out because the dog was paying too much attention to the chicken bones therein. My Knight said he'd take care of the trash as soon as he finished the pan he was washing. I told him, "No, I want it done now." So, of course that's what happened. Sometimes my Knight tries to do too many things at once and I need to stop him and tell him what he needs to finish first.. That only happens when I've been lax in giving directions and he's not sure what he should be doing.

I have noticed that almost every time I order instead of ask (whether it's in email or in person) his answer is somewhere along the lines of   "Do you have any idea how much I love you?"

So, I find myself wondering if I should give direct orders more often instead of asking. Maybe I'm missing a vital component by asking instead of telling? Many of the blogs I read would certainly suggest that to be the case. Should I phrase requests more directly when the kid are not around? Should my email and text requests be commands instead of questions?  Maybe. It's hard to know for sure without an in-depth conversation with my Knight and he still has a hard time talking about the details of our FLR. We talk about things regularly... I make it a habit to ask him if he's enjoying the arrangement and if there are any changes he'd like to see.. anything he might like to do differently.

And.. every time we have this conversation he tells me that things are fine... that he's happy with the arrangement and doesn't want to change a thing. He still doesn't like the term "submissive" and says he isn't sure what he'd getting out of the arrangement emotionally except that he feels more secure with us and is happy we're not arguing anymore. I've noticed that while he seems more dependent on me for direction he's more independent and more confident in a lot of areas. I'm not sure that makes much sense but I don't know how else to explain it. It's like he has finally found his place. Actually, he's said that a couple times-- that he no longer feels like a third wheel.

So.. I know that the FLR arrangement is helping my Knight and he's happy with it. But what I can't seem to find out is whether it's a turn on for him or where those buttons are. I've asked, but like I said, it's hard for him to talk about.

I've asked him to write a page or two about how he feels the FLR had changed our relationship and what the arrangement does for him. He even said that he thinks writing it out will help him sort out his feelings and needs, so hopefully it will give me a little bit of insight. I have not decided if I'll share his writing here or not. It  will depend on how comfortable he is sharing this very personal part of himself. I think this whole thing is a bit scary for him. I'm not sure what part of it scares him though because looking back at his past relationships. he's always been submissive to the women in his life. So, that has always been there.

I can't claim to understand, but I am trying.

Things Are Going Well

We seem to have recovered nicely from our little set back a few weeks ago where my Knight thought I was mad at him. We've fallen into a comfortable routine where (I'm pretty sure) my Knight understands what is expected from him in the evenings and he's been making sure to do those things I consider vital. It's been good.

Last week my Knight was away on a business trip. I was a bit concerned about whether or not he'd stick to the no porn, no masturbation rules while he was gone. We talked about it a bit before he left, and I sent him one email reminder his first night in the hotel. But, I was needlessly concerned. He told me he would never even think about intentionally breaking one of the rules. And you know what? I completely believe him. Naive? Maybe. but I know my Knight. He is physical and mentally incapable of acting against what I've asked of him. As long as the rules are well defined and crystal clear, he will follow them. The only real time we run into problems is when he is unsure of what's expected, he misunderstands me, or thinks I'm angry with him.

Before he left on the business trip I made it clear that I expected him to follow the same rules regarding erotica and touching that he follows at home. I left no room for misunderstanding or questions. It's simple- the rules don't change just because you are not at home. My Knight said he understood that and would stick to the rules.  It was obvious to me that he didn't do anything he wasn't supposed to and we had an amazing tease session when he came home.  Tease and denial and orgasm control have become a regular part of our sex life and we're both enjoying it. When I first introduced orgasm denial into the mix, I expected my Knight to complain. And he did whine a little bit at first, but that didn't last more then a day or two. Most of the hesitancy was mine. At first withholding his orgasms felt like I was being unfair and depriving him. A large part of me was afraid he would come to resent the simple fact that I orgasm often and repeatedly while making him wait an undefined (to him, anyway) period of time. I expected him to get moody and maybe even a little irritable when I teased him and kept him on the edge of orgasm until I thought I had pushed it far enough only to bring him back down and start over again after only a few minutes break. I thought he would become impatient with me when I pulled him into our bedroom and played with his cock just long enough for him to get hard and then asked him to complete some chore or another.  Honestly, I don't think I would like it much if those roles were reversed, and going into tease/denial and orgasm control I expected he would not like it much either.

I was wrong. He loves it! My Knight has never been more completely absorbed in the sensations I'm giving him than he is during a tease session. He's at peace with the idea that he is not to release without my permission and I completely enjoy the power I have over him. He is so much more attentive, secure and just plain happier when I take the time to play these games often. I've noticed that when I get busy and neglect the games he becomes less sure of himself.  It doesn't take much... a flirty comment, a brush of my hand, and clear directions from me.

I think it's a combination thing.. when I'm not being active in his orgasm denial it's usually because I am busy and my mind is elsewhere and I'm being less than an ideal leader. Those are the times I expect him to do what's required without much direction from me. In other words, I fall back into a more typical 50/50 arrangement instead of taking the time and mental energy required to give instructions and  follow up to make sure those instructions were followed.

Who knew that FLR took so much energy! But.. it's in a good way. I'm learning a lot about myself and about my Knight. What makes us both tick and what we both *really* need. My Knight needs me to be a strong leader who gives clear, consistent direction.

I am setting a goal for myself for the next 30 days. And that goal is to not allow myself to get so caught up in the day-to-day that I forget to actually lead.

Money and FLR

The other night my knight and I were talking about new bio-medical treatments for Autism. His son has Autism and I have been using Biomed approaches with him since I came into his life 7 years ago. The kid has made wonderful improvements with the supplements, diets and herbs I've tried him on over the years. He's gained speech, motor control, social skills and expressive language skills under my care. I am fine tuning his diet, supplements and other biomed stuff so that he can reach his full potential. I mentioned to my Knight that I wanted to add a few things based on some new research I read. My Knight didn't object to the additions except for the cost.

We've been on a pretty tight budget these last 3 years because my Knight was laid off from his programming job and ended up stuck working tech support. I have nothing against working tech support, but there is a substantial difference in the pay scales between tech support and database programming. And we went from the mid to high end of the programmer pay scale to the low mid end of the tech support scale. It's only been very recently that my Knight returned to programming, and the higher pay scale. So, his objections based on money were understandable, but no longer relevant. After arguing for a few minutes over spending the extra money on this, I turned to look at him. "You are no longer responsible for the budget, remember? I took that over when we started FLR, so unless you have an objection to the approach, I'm doing this and the money I spend on it is not your concern."

My Knight just kind of looked at me and sighed. Later he tried to explain that he didn't mean that he didn't want me to make the changes, just that he was worried about spending the extra money. Every penny has counted over the last 3 years and things have been really tough. He's having a hard time breaking out of that mindset. Okay, fair enough. But.. again I reminded him that he doesn't have to worry about it, because it's not up to him anymore.

You know... he seemed sort of relieved.

Something to Think About

I’ve been quiet since February for the same reasons most of us stop blogging -- life got busy. My husband changed jobs; he moved from night shift to day shift and from tech support back to programming where he belongs. A pipe under the house clogged requiring super-human efforts to unclog it, another pipe broke, flooding our basement, and because of all the plumbing problems my washer spewed its watery waste all over my kitchen floor. TWICE. The van started acting up and threw the serpentine belt. And during all this my Knight started acting like a rebellious teenager.

The  job change is a good move. My Knight likes the work environment and he’s happy to be back doing what he loves and making the amount of money he’s used to making. But he seemed to have a slight attitude shift with the job change. All of a sudden he started ignoring requests, “forgetting” things again, spending money without getting my approval first, not making my coffee in the morning ( my only morning requirement of him), he even started to forget to kiss me when he came in. The changes lined up perfectly with his job change. I talked to him and he denied that anything had changed. I am a mental list taker and I was able to to rattle off *every sinngle* rule he had violated over the previous 2 weeks. He made a bunch of excuses like not having time to do things and saying the he wasn’t clear on what I wanted from him. I called bullshit and told him I was not willing to go back to the way things were before. I stopped our bedroom games completely. Told him I wouldn’t even touch him until he stopped his bs and started doing what was expected. I informed him that just because he’s making a decent paycheck again our rules have not changed. He is subject to our FLR agreement regardless of how much money he’s making. He swore that was not what was going on.. that he likes the FLR arrangement and doesn’t want to go back to the way things were.

“Then why are you acting like a rebellious teenager?!” I asked him.  My Knight continued to insist that he was not.  I was beyond frustrated with him and started to really consider making him sleep on the couch until his attitude changed. But.. the kids would notice and it would spark questions and worried kids, so I didn’t.  I started searching for answers.

Because the problems started the day the washer blew up on his first week on the new job, my theory was that now that he’s no longer bringing in half the money he’s used to making that he no longer felt like he was letting the kids and me down. My Knight believes in his heart that if I am in the position where I have to bring in money in order to help pay bills, then he isn’t doing his job as husband and father. I don’t hold that belief and I certainly don’t mind working to help support my family. But for my Knight not bringing in enough money is almost an unforgivable transgression.  Because of that single issue, the past 2 years have been hard on him emotionally. I assumed his change of attitude was because he was making more money. I let him know in no uncertain terms that I like the FLR “thing” and I had no desire or intention to change our arrangement. Once again my Knight assured me that he didn’t want to change things either. So then.. what was causing the change in behavior?

*Finally* he told me. “You’ve been mad at me since before the washer leak,” he said.

Huh? No.. I didn’t start getting angry with him until a week later when I had to move the washer and deal with the towels and shop rags he used to sop up the mess. These towels and rags were soaked with drain cleaner so strong some local farmer had used it to clear a pipe of an dead animal. I did NOT want to mess with that stuff and he knew it. But... he didn’t do it after several requests and reminders, and it needed done, so I got stuck with it. That’s what pissed me off....well that and him leaving the dryer in the middle of my kitchen for a week. I finally had to move THAT myself too. Sure I *can* do it, but like car repairs I prefer not to. And I expect him to handle those things without being asked.

After a long discussion about why he thought I was mad at him I realized I was partially to blame.

A few days before the washer spewed my Knight screwed up. He abused his computer download privileges and took advantage of my lenient opinions regarding porn and nudity. He was allowed to download whatever he wanted as long as he tells me about it and watches it in my presence. But, he downloaded something and didn’t tell me, and what’s worse was that he was careless and left the file in the trash folder and the trash folder open..... on the only desktop computer in the house. I was LIVID. This is the computer our kids use on a regular basis. There should NEVER be any nude pics, erotic stories or porn on that computer. If he’s going to write erotica, edit nude pics or download porn he’s supposed to use my computer because we can lock that stuff away from the kids on my system. I stumbled across the file and deleted it before the kids got to the computer but that really is not the point.

In the next few days afterward I laid down some new rules.  No erotica, porn, or nude pic editing at all if I am not around and aware of what he is doing. He downloads nothing *at all*, not even movies for the kids or ebooks for me, without my permission ever again.

I laid down the new rules, yanked his computer time for a few days, and gave him some extra chores around the house. I considered the matter closed.

My Knight, however, did not. He apparently didn’t see that as consequences and thought I was still mad at him. When he thinks I’m unhappy with him he retreats into his own little world and tries to avoid me as much as possible. And I think on some level he tries to irritate me to the point of yelling at him to punish himself for upsetting me in the first place. It’s a rotten spiral and one of the reasons we started FLR to begin with.

So.. he’s been in “she’s mad at me, I upset her, she doesn’t want me near her” mode all this time and I did not realize it.

I’m trying to figure out how to keep that from happening again.

When I gave him the new rules and the consequences for his mistake I told him the matter was closed. I said that I think that will be enough to keep him from doing it again and that when the last chore was completed the issue was forgiven. It seems to me that maybe it wasn’t strict enough to clear his conscience or resolve the matter in his own mind and so he figured that since he had not forgiven himself for upsetting me that I really had not forgiven him, either.

I may need to reevaluate my punishment system.

A Trying Morning.

My Knight must be having an off day. I swear he has messed up everything he's tried to do this morning. He started to make my coffee and got side tracked and forgot about it - I had to finish it myself. He forgot to feed the cat, and most importantly, he did not accomplish his morning tasks. 

I own and run a small business in addition to being an independent contractor. One of these business I took over from an acquaintance about 8 months ago because my Knight wanted to run it. It's in his field of expertise and really, he's a perfect fit for the job. Cool! We had planned for my Knight to quit his 9-5 job and run this business right out of the chute. Except the person handing it over failed to mention that she had been trying to get out for the last 2 years. The business only had 1 client. We found this out the day the files were handed over to us (she had been telling us what the business made *before* she started scaling back). Okay.. we know what it's capable of bringing in and since she gave us the business- no money involved, I really wasn't too concerned. Just meant we need to change our plans a bit. That's why my Knight is working this stupid overnight shift. It gives him time during every day to work on this business a bit. I take care of planning and administrative tasks on Monday and Friday, and my Knight is responsible for running the business Tues- Thurs.  Each Monday evening I write out a list of things my Knight needs to do Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday in order to achieve our production goals.

Except that today he could not stay on task and seemed to have forgotten all the training discussions we've had over the past 8 months for this task. Even though he has never performed the task I assigned him for today, he KNOWS how. We've talked about it at length. I've shared everything I've learned with him so he has the knowledge. He has my notes, and my list of what not to do - these are the same notes I have been using to do the job for the past 8 months. He just didn't put it to use. So now, this task has to be re-done tonight. Which annoys me because Wednesday is the only night we can go out alone. I have to give up my night out because he screwed up. Yes, I can go out without him, but I don't want to. No. I am not happy.

His punishment? Tonight, after the kids go to bed, he has to redo the task under my direction. After that is done he is going to heat my massage oil, and give me a full massage for at least two hours.. or until I fall asleep. I won't reciprocate, and I won't  play with his cock. His activities will be restricted to a simple massage. No sex, no oral, no nothing. In the morning, he will get up 5 minutes before me and put coffee on.

Tonight is our last night together before he goes back to work. Later this week it will occur to him that he missed the time we usually spend together on Wednesday.