It's Been Awhile

I know that it has been awhile since Aurora or I have written anything here.  I just wanted to check in with all of our awesome followers and let you know that Aurora is doing alright.  This new health concern has been tough on her, but her spirits are getting better.  She is getting some fight in her and developing a much better attitude towards the fight we have ahead of us. 

Because of the nasty side effects of the proposed drugs used in treatment for this disease and the fact that her case is fairly mild, we are waiting a little bit before proceeding with the conventional treatment.  I have noticed that stress is a major trigger for worsening symptoms, so my goal right now is to have Aurora avoid as much stress as possible and we are also working on techniques to deal with stress efficiently when it does arise.  In addition to that, I am changing her diet drastically and we have found some more natural "remedies" to try.  I'm not a huge believer in natural or herbal remedies, but after taking some time to think about it, it became obvious that it is worth a try.  At worst, she will be healthier when she has to take those nasty drugs.  At best, she never has to take them. 

I know one thing that bothers her right now is that this disease has taken a real toll on sex.  She misses it.  I miss it.  However, I am in major "Daddy mode" right now.  I want to do everything I can to make her better.  And having been through health issues with her before, I know I'll get my satisfaction eventually.  When Aurora is sick, my satisfaction comes when she is all better and I can look back at our journey with pride knowing that we successfully battled through it.  That alone brings us so much closer together.  That is true satisfaction!

Again, thank you all for keeping Aurora in your thoughts!

One In A Million

I know I need to catch up on all the great comments but really wanted to say thank you so much for all the amazing support and swearing on my behalf!

One in a million. According to some sources, that’s the odds of getting this disease I have. Some places claim it may be as high as 1 in 200,000, but they all seem to agree it’s rare. And unlike diabetes or celiac or lupus, it has a long name that’s hard to spell and even harder to pronounce and that NOBODY seems to have ever heard of before. My only risk factor for getting it was a drop of diluted Jewish blood courtesy of my father’s side of the family tree. Which is sort of funny to me because I’m not considered Jewish because my mother isn’t, however I’m ‘Jewish enough’ to apparently get this disease. Go figure.

Nine in ten. More than fifty years ago, those were the odds I’d die from the actual disease. Today those are the odds, I’ll survive it. Some studies claim the mortality rate is as high as 30 to 40 percent (but I’m going to stay on the optimistic side here). The downside of these odds is that the traditional treatment usually requires a scary high dose of steroids over a long period of time to put the disease in remission and in the majority of personal stories I’ve read, although they reached remission, it came at a high cost.

Now the thing about odds are that they are just numbers. And unlike something like the lottery, nobody is ever equal. It sort of reminds me of my ‘writer querying days’ when we’d try to calculate our odds. But you really couldn’t because no manuscript was equal. Some were better written, some were the ‘right story’ at the ‘right time’, some clicked better with certain agents, etc. And it’s like that here…everyone is different. The disease is different, reactions to medications are different, etc. 

I’ve done a lot of reading over the past few days. Not those scary websites---no I dug deeper for the real stories. Kinda like looking for this diseases's version of blog land (although it's nowhere near the size of here). And it’s given me a lot of hope. Yeah, there was a lot of scary stuff, but it’s also helped me to see how lucky I am. For most people, by the time they are diagnosed they are usually so sick they’re in the hospital because they can’t eat or they’re fighting off serious infections. That’s because this disease is so rare, it often is misdiagnosed. They say the average number of doctors to get a diagnosis is around ten.

I had two. The first being my primary doctor who actually suspected the disease. Because of this, I am not that sick. No hospital. No serious infections. If this was cancer I’d be Stage 1 or maybe even Stage 0.  I am just not that sick. I am not a doctor, but this does make me hopeful that this means the amount of steroids and duration to get me into remission will be a lot less. And if not, there’s lots of new drugs and therapies that have worked on others without the mega-risk of the steroids. I’ve also found a doctor covered by my insurance who specializes in the disease. And if we don’t like her or can’t get the referral her, we live an hour away from one of the best research hospitals in the country and Daddy says that’s where we’re going next.

One in a million. I once called Daddy that back in the early days. It wasn’t as sweet as it may sound at the time. We had only known each other a few weeks but we’d been e-mailing about some deep subjects—religion, politics, sex. And there were questions like... ‘what would you do if you got a girl pregnant out of wedlock’ and ‘would you ever cheat’. I was coming out of a very bad relationship and Daddy’s answers always seemed ‘way too good to be true’. So a part of me at the time thought it was all a line. So I wrote to him, slightly disbelieving, if “he was who he said he was, then he was one in a million.”

But I’ve learned Daddy’s a man of few words and rarely says something he doesn’t mean or intend to do. Because he did get a girl pregnant--me.  And despite neither of us being old enough to drink, he did exactly what he said he would in those first few weeks I knew him. And during a decade-long sex drought when he probably should’ve cheated, he kept his word and never did.

Daddy told me not to worry about this disease. He’s going to make sure I have the best doctor and the right treatment, and he’s not going to let it get that bad. And that no matter what happens…whether the drugs take my sex drive or make me go crazy, he’s not going anywhere. I’m going to be okay. He’s going to be okay. We’re going to be okay.

And I believe him. Because he really is my ‘one in a million’.

Fudge You 2014

During some of the days before and after my surgery, Daddy and I often talked about how we couldn’t wait to ‘get back to normal’. When Daddy left for his trip we talked of how close we’d be ‘back to normal’ when he returned. One of Daddy’s tasks he assigned while he was gone was to list everything I was looking forward to about ‘getting back to normal’.

Today I learned we won’t be ‘going back to normal’. Not any time soon. Maybe not ever. Early this morning the doctor called with the news I really hoped I wouldn’t be getting.

Daddy was at work when the call came and he’s having another busy day and even though we’ve managed to talk and text, I really can’t wait until he’s home. So far, I’ve managed to stay busy. I had doctors to call, appointments to make, and new doctors to research. But now that’s all done and there’s still nearly three hours to go before Daddy gets home.

And I’m scared and frustrated and angry. Very angry. I mean I know it’s not cancer, but it’s fatal if I don’t treat it. And treatment involves taking high doses of oral steroids and immunosuppressants that have side effects that will most likely make me feel way sicker than I feel now. And since it’s so freakin’ rare, the doctor who diagnosed it doesn’t even know where to start to treat it so I’m off to find yet another specialist (and hope to God they take our insurance).

And this is all I really have to say today (well I have more but it would involve using words I’m not supposed to use and despite the fact I'm thinking them all right now, I do still love and respect Daddy so I think I’ll stop right here).

His

Daddy came home a day late and is super busy at work this week. I broke another rule and I'm waiting on two punishments now. I'm fighting a cold and PMS and a bit of a fibro flare-up. Mother Nature can't seem to let go of winter and just give into spring. The meds the doctor put me on last week have me feeling like a zombie. And tomorrow, I get the test results.

But none of it matters.

Daddy got out the crop and the cane for the first time in months. I don't remember it hurting so much (and he says 'he went easy'), but it just shows how far I've drifted. From him, from us.

But over the past few days as he's played and spanked and grabbed the back of my head the way he does when I say or do something out of line, I've found myself sailing back into His harbor. As I've sat at his feet again, I've remembered and tasted and wanted and needed this.

I need to be His.

So no matter what tomorrow brings. If Daddy's job tells him he has to go away again next week or next month or next year. If it snows or rains or is 70 degrees and sunny. Or if the doctor says that I have this disease or don't have this disease or they lost the test results. None of it matters.

All that really matters...all that will every really matter.

Is that I'm His.

Enough is Enough

So yesterday I got in some pretty big trouble.

I went to my regular doctor on Monday for something I considered rather little. It was a follow up appointment over a symptom I had put off until after my surgery. Something unrelated to the surgery.

My regular doctor wanted to send me to a specialist. Still not worried. Not until I found out they were considering it ‘urgent’ and asked if I could go in yesterday afternoon.

There was barely enough time to text Daddy and get out the door to make it in time. But we did. And yesterday I found myself in a doctor’s office, half-naked with my mom and two nurses and the doctor and desperately wishing Daddy could be there. The doctor told us what she thought it could be – a rare autoimmune disease. It could be the cause of why I had to have that surgery last month. But I won’t know for a week and she’ll be calling me with the results. She also told me not to go looking it up on the internet and wait for her instructions.

I called Daddy after the appointment and relayed all the news and he ORDERED me to stay off the internet.

So what did I do?

Well…with a doctor telling me not to go looking and Daddy over a thousand miles away and my morbid curiousity getting the best of me.

Well, I googled it. And I read lots of scary things about it being rare and serious and fatal. And that up until about fifty years ago, 99 percent of people that got it died within a few years. And yeah, it all freaked me out. The internet is a scary place.

Daddy was NOT happy. He was very angry and once he was done letting me know that, he hung up. And I locked myself away in our master bathroom bawling my eyes out when I realized that my biggest fears weren’t having this disease or dying from this disease.

My biggest fears are Daddy saying “Enough is enough.” That I had gone too far by deliberately disobeying him. Or that he can’t deal with yet another ‘medical problem’ of mine.

Daddy didn’t say either of these things and we did talk last night and although he says I’m gonna ‘get straightened out when he gets home’, he did forgive me for not doing as I was told. And I’m so thrilled that late tonight I’m finally going to be safe and secure in his arms again after this super long week.

But I still can’t stop this nagging fear today. I'm starting to think that maybe we've been so happy over the past two years...that maybe people don't deserve to be this happy. We’re barely through this last ‘health’ storm and in a week we could be starting another one. I mean, seriously, when is enough enough?

Answers to Questions from Pearl Necklace

One more sleep until Daddy comes home! Yay! I cannot wait. Here's my answers to some questions from Pearl over at Happily Surrendered and Submissive. Thank you for the great questions!

#1. What is one of your favorite posts on your blog here and why?

Well my favorite posts are all the ones that Daddy makes. I love getting to see a glimpse into his head. But if I have to pick one, I think my absolute favorite is the one he wrote here about our one night of attempting switching.

I have two reasons why I love this post the most. First, because it’s about a really fun night. Since our dating years, we’ve always had this fun, goofy, light-hearted, don’t-take-ourselves-too-seriously side to our relationship. One of my worries when we started down the D/s road was that we would lose that—that things would have to be more formal and joking and teasing with Daddy would be a no-no. But no, I still get to tease Daddy just as much and make him laugh (love that). Sure, Daddy has a line that if I get too close to will result in “the look” or a “warning”. And he does take the dynamic very seriously. But we’re still having lots of fun and laughing (maybe even more than before) and this night was a perfect example.

My second reason is because Daddy tells me over and over that I shouldn’t worry about what others think. I need to be honest and just be myself. In this post he wasn’t afraid to ‘practice what he preaches’ and do that himself. He didn’t care if it made him look weak or like a wuss. He led by example and for that I have so much more respect and trust for him.

#2. Your ideal night alone with Phillip...are you tied up or left loose? Combo perhaps =)

Oh gosh, right now I have to say partially tied up. Daddy has this rope he’ll bind my wrists with. I took a picture this week of it and texted it to him saying I couldn’t wait for it to be around my wrists again. And I really can’t wait!

#3. One bit of advice you would give to other loving submissive wives?

I am definitely not qualified to really give advice because I'm still new and every relationship is so different, but I’ll go with something I struggle with a lot, including as recently as this week.

  

It's Don’t hold back your feelings or needs from him because you don’t want to ‘burden’ him. Just tell him.

I do this a lot. I can be super emotional and needy sometimes and when Daddy’s had a long day, the thought of adding to that by telling him what's wrong with me can make me feel so guilty. I’ve already written about doing this before here. 

It nearly happened again on Tuesday. I woke up feeling super empty and depressed. I started thinking bad thoughts—that perhaps I missed Daddy more than he missed me. I was feeling emotionally lost. Somebody suggested I might have some subdrop (and yeah, although I didn’t think of that at first since it’s been a while since we’ve done anything intense—it did feel that way). He called me briefly during the day and he knew something was up. He always knows when something’s up. However being over a thousand miles away with not a lot of time, it was hard for him to get to the bottom of it. And the day just kept getting worse. Daddy had a long one that left him with a headache. I had a lot of ‘kid drama’ to deal with. So the idea of adding to all that by telling him I thought I may have subdrop suddenly had me feeling guilty.

But due to a push from another sub (thanks geekie kittie), late that night when I finally got some privacy, I told him. Within twenty minutes, I received an e-mail from him with a list of tasks he expected done before he comes home. And suddenly, I felt like his again and was back in that happy place. And I’ve been doing much better ever since.

I struggle with this constantly because I want to serve him. I want to be there for him. To make his life easier. Not give him more to do. But I think that by me making the decision on what he can handle or not handle, it’s not letting go and letting him lead. It’s not trusting him. And for us anyways, it does make his life easier if I just come out with it. He can solve it with a quick twenty minute e-mail instead of spending the rest of the week trying to drag it out of me.

Someday I’ll get this, I hope. But for now it’s my advice (so everyone can remind me of it next time I struggle).  

Rules, Rituals, and Some Kinky Stuff -- Answers to Questions from Mc kitten

So mc kitten asked about the rules/rituals that Daddy’s instigated that I don’t like and what ones I do like. I have 67 rules at the moment and a handful of rituals, and after re-reading them this morning there honestly are not that many I don’t like. Or maybe I’m just feeling that way because a lot of them have been suspended over the past few months…I don’t know. But anyways, here I go…

Rules/Rituals I Don’t Like:

• There’s a rule that I’m not allowed to use the word “hate” in front of him. There’s no reason for this rule (except that he likes it and thinks it’s funny) so I think that’s why it frustrates me and I hate strongly dislike it. That and I forget it a lot.

• I’m not allowed to swear outside the bedroom. I’ve never been one to frequently use swear words so it’s not a huge deal, but there are times in life that just call for a really strong word. I am, however, allowed to swear in the bedroom provided it’s in a sexual context. For example, saying “I want to fuck you,” is acceptable. Calling him a “motherfucker” apparently is not.

• That I’m not allowed to cut my hair without permission. Daddy likes long hair. I sort of prefer it on the easy-to-take-care-of-short-side. I guess I get to use to long hair now.

• The 5 minute call/text back rule. If Daddy calls or texts me, he expects a response within five minutes unless I have a good reason (such as driving, in church, at a movie, etc). I have a bad habit of both turning my phone off, losing my phone, and forgetting to charge it. I’ve gotten in big trouble over breaking this rule before.

• The no asking for orgasms rule. I’m allowed (and actually supposed) to tell him if I feel I physically need one. But asking or begging for one during sex (unless he tells me to) is forbidden and sometimes well when we’re in the heat of the moment and all…I forget and ask anyways.

• There’s also a “No Expectations” rules which can give me a headache if I think too much about it. It would take me a month’s worth of blog posts to explain the circles it sometimes sends me in, but I'll try to keep this short. Basically I’m supposed to trust Daddy to guide me, love me, and take care of my needs. However, I’m not supposed to place ‘expectations’ on him. For example, early on I told Daddy I needed more domination from him to feel submissive. Daddy felt my problem wasn't that he wasn't giving me enough domination, but rather I was focusing too much on what was missing rather than what was there. So he gave me an assignment where I spent the week listing every time I felt his domination. In the end when I saw how long that list was, I realized he was right and felt much better. So telling him I need more domination and asking is okay. Trusting him to fulfill my needs is okay. Expecting him to give me what I ask for all the time is not okay because as in this case, he fulfilled my needs without giving me what I asked for. It is a good rule for us -- it just makes my head hurt sometimes.

• As for the rituals – well there aren’t really any I don’t like. Sometimes getting up at 5 am for the morning ritual and to make him breakfast sucks (because I’m not really a morning person), but the rituals to me are all about focusing on why I do this and why I need this. So they are a huge help to me and I do love them.

Rules/Rituals I do Like:

• There’s a rule that my job as mother always comes first. My father made my mother choose between him and the kids in a terrible way, and I’ve told Daddy in the past that I would choose my children if forced to in a situation like that. I’m glad that Daddy made it clear that he won’t ever make me make such a choice.

• There’s a rule that I have to go to church every week. I like this rule not so much for the rule, but because what it stands for. Daddy is not a religious person. In fact, he hates strongly dislikes most churches and religions. However, I grew up to have a rather strong faith, and Daddy respects that. He made this rule on his own (I never asked for it) and to me it sort of says that he’s not out to change me, just keep me safe and bring out the best in me.

• As for my favorite rituals – well I really love them all. But I think my favorite is the only one we’ve really gotten to do over the past few months (and what I’m really missing this week). It’s our one and only DD/lg one, but Daddy puts me to bed and tucks me in every night. I really miss him.

Mc kitten also asked: I'd like to know what you favourite new thing has been that you both have tried since starting on this TTWD road and what is the thing at the list of what you'd like to try next!

Well my favorite is the orgasm tease & denial. As much as I sometimes hate strongly dislike it, nothing pushes me faster into that subspace place than when he plays or rather tortures me. Daddy’s is the cane. We have a flogger, a crop, a paddle, a belt, a wooden spoon, and his hand, but Daddy always prefers to spank with his ‘stick’ (which up until recently was a blind tilt). Just before I got all my health issues, he got a cane and really loved the welts it made.

As for what we’d like to try next…Daddy just wants to get back in the ‘swing of things’. So he really wouldn’t say what he wants to try next. I’d like to be fisted or have my nipples pierced, I think. Or maybe not.

Thanks for the questions mc kitten!