Anger vented, pet protected

One of my favorite lines from my story You awake ahead of the alarm (printed in M. Christian's anthology Best  S/M Erotica Vol. 3) is this:

She has no gradations of grief at disappointing you. Any failure feels like the end of the world to her.

This is horribly, unfortunately true. I am terrified of failure because I'm terrified of rejection. That by not being good enough I won't be wanted. That one way or another, I will be shut out. As I beg the sadist whenever we have one of our episodes: "Please don't send me away."

I trace this back to my parents. Which is a whole other story that I won't go into. But I realized last night that I developed a very strong fight or flight instinct. And the flight part manifests itself in two ways: as a physical urge to leave, quit, get out, give up... and as a flight to inner safety, behind a strong wall that locks away any feelings.

This, in some ways, was the scariest part of this little episode. I shut down inside. I stopped having any feelings for him - or rather, I walled them off so I thought they had gone. I thought - all right then, I'm not what he wants me to be, I can't be, I never was. I won't walk away from him, but if he sends me away I'll be relieved. Because I can't stand disappointing him.

But - with him - it never ends up that way. Even the separation early in our first year... I had never meant for it to be over then. I merely misunderstood, and was angry, and then he... well, obviously we made it through that.

Tuesdays are his usual day with me. He was curt this morning. Short, economical e-mails relative to his plans. The first was but 3 words. And then he told me to take the cane, the paddle, the wooden spoon, and the chain outside and lock them up in my car.

You see?

He does protect me!

Besides, he has ways to hurt me far more powerful than implements of pain.

He has words.

He has silence.

We had a lot of time.

And we worked our way through.

He even gave me the gift of what could almost be termed an apology.

He also left a very serious bite mark on my left butt cheek.

(Again, he looked after me, advising me to cleanse it. I wiped it down with rubbing alcohol. It stung, so I knew I was doing the right thing. Then I coated it with antiseptic ointment and covered it with a bandage. Human bites do carry a danger of infection, and a visit to the doctor for treatment of a big butt bite would be highly embarrassing...)

The last couple of months have been hard on both of us. He's been under a lot of stress from many sources. One thing ends, another immediately erupts, and then something else lands on top of it all. Thinking about it dispassionately, I'm not surprised we had a blow up on Sunday.

As for me... well, we've had 2 months of rain. Two months of rain with sun promised in just another few days and then it would be pushed back and pushed back and pushed back...

Finally.

Today.

It arrived.

Autumn.

Sunny and cool and dry.

For at least a week.

I am sorely tempted to shout "Praise be to God" even though - if I believe in God at all, which isn't quite certain - I don't believe in that sort of God. But in this case... well it feels like credit ought to be apportioned somewhere.

The point is that 2 months of rain when you have SAD and are still supposed to be recharging your personal solar battery is NOT A GOOD THING. I've been struggling. Concentration has been shaky at best, moods not all that firm, and my ability to think minimal. 

Plus the issue is a persistent one. This won't be the last time we'll bump up against it. If only we could keep from reacting on such a deep emotional level! 

Still, we made it through. And at the end, as we talked about ordinary things, he enthroned in the Eames chair and me, still naked, sitting on the floor at his feet with my head resting on his right knee, I felt the gentleness of his hand stroking my hair and the love flowing back through me and knew that I couldn't make him so angry if I didn't also make him feel so good.