Submitting In The Dark

My life these days is spent in the dark.

I have a health issue. Thankfully it's not something that will take my life, but for the time being it's making it rather difficult to live it.

I'll be undergoing surgery next week. I've been through this surgery before. It kind of sucks and the recovery isn't much fun. Things will most likely get worse than they are now for a little while. But the odds are with me, and I have no doubt that in a few months I'll begin getting my life back. That I'll get out this darkness.

But for now it's hard. Thanks to technology and Daddy I'm able to do a little writing, but it's been a bit of a frustrating learning curve, and what I used to be able to write in hours now takes days. I miss blogland. I miss my tumblr. I miss surfing the web and reading books and watching t.v. I miss going out. I miss shopping. I miss driving and cooking and sewing. I miss doing fun and crazy things with my kids. Most of all I miss the way TTWD was.

TTWD used to mean me serving him. I made his breakfast, did his laundry, cooked dinner. We had rules and rituals and sex whenever he wanted it. Now he's making the meals and doing all the laundry. There isn't a lot of thought given to the rules and rituals. They just don't happen anymore. And the sex and spanking occurs more in my fantasies and dreams than in reality these days.

Daddy is still in charge. He told me on the way home from that first doctor's appointment when we knew what this meant that, "he was now indefinitely in Daddy-mode (which is his soft, not-masterly-rough, but more take-care-of-me mode) and that was that." He's gotten pretty strict about what I'm allowed to/not allowed to do. And he still gives orders even if it's just to tell me that no, he'll take care of that. So the TTWD is still very much there.

But it's different, and I'd be lying if I said it's been easy. Far from it. We've had a lot of rough moments these past few weeks. Daddy is exhausted and has little time to think. I on the other hand have too much. I start thinking of how much of a strain this is on Daddy, our kids, our lives. I think of how little time Daddy and I have to connect. How much I miss him. How much I need him. How I miss all the spanking and sex and doing things for him. I miss the feeling when I know I pleased him. Then I hate myself for feeling that way. I don't want to be clingy. I don't want to be a burden.

Daddy has said often I don't get to decide whether I'm a burden or not. He doesn't want me pulling away and closing myself off. But I've done just that several times over the past few weeks. I get scared to show my neediness, my fears, my sadness. I mean he's dealing with enough already. What if he can't take anymore? So, I quit trusting Daddy. I close myself off. I try to take back my power. I stop submitting.

It never lasts for long. Daddy has a keen sense of knowing when I'm pulling away and he rarely ever lets me go too far. But I know it's so much more work for him when I do this. There's lots of stress to both of us...emotions and tempers flare. It usually results in a loss of sleep and even worse--time we actually could be connecting. And right now, when I have so little to offer him, my letting go and not making him fight for my submission is something he does need. Something I can and should give him.

But the days are long and in some of the darkest moments, I find myself wishing I could go back to the girl I was. That one who was closed off and didn't like sex so much. Because she didn't have as much to lose. The vulnerability of opening up and submitting can be so scary. And now, without having those daily rituals and moments where I used to feel daddy's dominance, without those things I used to do everyday that I know pleased him, without the frequent physical connections through sex and spanking, it's even scarier.

Daddy hasn't given me a reason to doubt him. I'm not saying that he's infallible or hasn't ever let me down. He gets short-tempered, cranky, angry, and shuts me down sometimes when I try to open up (especially in the past few tiring weeks). But he's also very good about recognizing this and even apologizing once he calms down. And even in the hardest of times of our relationship he's always fought for it...fought for us. He's super patient and he's never given up on me (despite me giving him lots of reasons to). He's given me nineteen years of reasons to trust him.  

I am trying hard to focus on that. To remember I can trust him. This may just be a small blip of time in our relationship and soon we will be back to the familiar 'Phillip & Aurora' dance, but I think it's also part of our journey -- reminding us what our relationship is really about. I think for us all the rules, rituals, acts of service, sex, spanking...they're just the extras. Important? Yes. They reaffirm our roles, make us feel closer and connected. We need them. But I don't think they're what make our relationship work.

What makes us work and what we can't live without is the trust. It is at the heart of everything we are and everything we do. It's a daily (sometimes even hourly) thing, but I am fighting to stay open even without the reassurance of those 'connections'. I am trying to find the courage to let go even though I can't see him. Trusting he's there. Knowing he'll catch me. I am learning to submit in the dark.

P.S. Thank you for all the nice comments and messages. They've really meant a lot.