Creative Punishments and Guilt

Yesterday morning, I broke one of my rules in a fairly dramatic fashion.  Before I allowed myself to even think about it, the misdeed had already been done.  I say that the trangression was "dramatic" because it was such a blatantly foolish and irresponsible thing to do.  Domestic Discipline or no Domestic Discipline, I know better than to have done what I did.  It's really that simple.  Carelessness or forgetting is one type of mistake.  Total disregard for rules and safety is another and honestly, it's not generally my style.

Almost immediately, I knew that I would have a hard time waiting until the end of the day to confess to Tom.  Evening felt way too far away.  Furthermore, I didn't want to have to admit to what I had done while face to face with him.  I knew he would be disappointed and frustrated. I felt ashamed.  So, I sent him a sincere, apologetic, responsibility-accepting text to explain.

I have a tendency to over think.  I am curious about the human mind and how it works.  Every time I mess up, I torture myself with self-analysis.  Did I mess up because I unconsciously wanted to be punished?  Did I just have a genuine yet fleeting lapse in judgment?  Why would I mess up in this particular way at this particular time?  Ugh.  It's exhausting.  Yet, it's just how I tick.

Awhile after I sent my confession to Tom, he replied, "We'll talk about it tonight.  I love you and need you to be safe. -Daddy."  Yes, he signs his texts.  Always.  Just a cute little quirk of his.

I felt comforted by his text, but also continued to feel pretty darn guilty.  I don't know that I have ever felt this badly about a mistake I made within our DD arrangement.  Usually, I feel guilty for *not* feeling guilty enough. (Doesn't it sound like a real barrel of monkeys to live inside my head?)

Tom could tell that I was upset when I got home.  He, on the other hand, was calm and reassuring.  "It's okay," he said, his voice gentle.  "There will be consequences, but you will learn from it and we'll just move on.  The purpose of this is not to make you feel badly about yourself."  He asked me to trust him to help me learn from my mistake.  I love him for saying all of those things.

I was fully prepared to have to wait at least a day for Tom to tell me what my punishment would be. I assumed that it would be a spanking. Imagine my surprise, then, when he laid in bed next to me last night and said, "I've decided that you need to write an essay about *insert stupid thing I did here*.  It needs to be 1000 words."  Whuuut?  Despite my surprise, I simply nodded. Of course, I wanted to know his thought process and decision tree and all of that.  Instead though, I tried very hard to just accept the consequence he chose and to trust him like he asked me to.

Sooo, I will evidently be writing an essay.  I haven't written an essay in years.  I asked Tom this morning whether he expected citations and he chuckled at me.  "No," he said, as though the question was absurd.  I was serious, though!  Perhaps needless to say, a spanking would have been much preferred over this.  I suspect that is exactly why I am writing an essay instead. *pout*

I am trying to forgive myself.  I know that Tom has.  When I mess up, I tend to feel undeserving of a DD arrangement at all.  I know that's illogical, but... that's me.  I have needed lots of reassurance from Tom around this and fortunately, he has been there every time to provide what I needed.  For that, I am eternally grateful.

*sigh*

💖 PrincessImp