I am finally getting around to writing this for Bethany. It has been more than a month since she first asked me to write something for her new website. A few weeks later her request became stronger and finally, last week, she asked to talk to Jeremy, my husband, to see if he would "help" her out by "encouraging" me in his own special way to stop my procrastinating and write.

It was this last form of persuasion that did the trick. Let me now share with you some of my thoughts and experiences on our favorite subject. I've written for other publications, stories, fantasies, et cetera, but I know that Bethany wanted this piece to deal with real couples and real women dealing with how this effects their lives. One of the questions that I am often asked is how I finally opened up and told my husband this deep dark secret.

Spanking has held a front seat in my thoughts and fantasies for as long a I can remember. I can recall conversations, movies, and childhood fantasies of stern father figures and guardians as far back as the age of three. I was spanked only once as a child and that was after I had realized my interest in it. That knowledge made that spanking far worse than I could have imagined. A squirt gun, a newly-tiled ceiling, and an angry and upset father brought spanking from my thoughts to my bottom one night when I was seven.

Throughout my teen and college years, I longed to find that dominant man who could keep me in line with a firm hand yet be a gentle and sensitive friend. I never found that combination. I gave up, finished college and began my career. Moving to a new area I pushed spanking to the back of my mind and fell in love with a wonderful man.

We shared every thought and dream but I could never bring myself to say the "S" word for fear of his judgment and misunderstanding. For ten years, Jeremy never knew about my interest in spanking, though at times I tried to push him to see if I could provoke him enough to even give me a swat now and then. No such luck! So I lived with my private fantasies and lots of historical romance novels for my "spanking fix."

On several occasions I shared excerpts from a romance novel with the idea that we would discuss and laugh at the romance/sex scenes. I knew that many romance scenes began with a spanking that would lead to a torrid bedroom scene. (Remember, this was ten years ago when spanking scenes were allowed in novels.)

Jeremy began to sense my hidden interest and one night, as he read VARIATIONS he found an ad for a spanking newsletter. He jokingly pointed it out to me. My reaction was to blush and stammer, then later to rip the ad out of his magazine. I secretly wrote and anxiously checked the mail. I did not want Jeremy to see anything from this newsletter. A letter and catalog finally arrived and it was like Christmas for me. I ordered stories and back issues of the newsletter. I began corresponding with the editor. I was thrilled to know that there were others out there with this same interest. I wasn't alone... and I wasn't crazy.

Yet, I still kept it a secret until I was so obsessed with my new-found knowledge I had to tell Jeremy. Finally, I took a few of the stories and articles that seemed to best match my spanking interest and gave them to Jeremy to read. We spent several evenings talking about spanking. At first, found myself weighing my words, still afraid of his judgment. Yet Jeremy listened, asked terrific questions, and accepted me for who I was. I asked Jeremy if he ever thought he could spank me. He seemed to understand immediately that some women liked to be spanked as foreplay, and I had to explain quickly that that was not my interest... that for me it was going to have to be more real, less than a game. A real spanking. At that point, he was not sure. His reasoning was that he had been raised to "never strike a lady." I told him I agreed with that, but that spanking was different. In my mind, a spanking was to teach a lesson, a lesson that would not be easily forgotten, and if that lesson was needed by an adult who was acting like a child, so be it. I wanted a spanking for a reason, for discipline, not as foreplay, and Jeremy was not sure he could do it.

This sort of "hung" between us for a while, but a few weeks later, he changed his mind. I was standing at the kitchen sink watching our children through the window. I heard Jeremy come upstairs from the basement. He stood behind me for a brief moment, then spoke. "Well, you'll finally get your wish tonight." At first, it did not even register what he meant. Then, as I figured out he must be talking about a spanking, he made one more, terse statement. "You left the basement door unlocked again, Marie." My heart sank! We had been away and anyone could have gotten into the house. I had done this once before and I knew how angry it had made him then. It really was careless on my part!

He walked away, leaving me dumbfounded. At first, I thought: this is NOT how I want a spanking to be, not how I had played it over and over again in my mind. At that moment, my heart began to race. Yet, this WAS how it was to be. I'd finally given up control, I had done something really wrong, I deserved to be punished, I was going to be punished, and I was scared! Would he really do it? Would it really hurt? What would he use? Would I cry?

I thought about it for the rest of the day, but by the evening, I was so involved with supper, children's baths, and getting them to bed, that the spanking was momentarily forgotten. Finally, though, sitting down after the last child was in bed, I was shocked to hear his next words as he looked up from the magazine he was reading. "Should we do it now or later, young lady?" I stammered and stuttered and muttered that we should do it now.

Taking me by the hand, he led me downstairs to the family room where a straight-backed chair had been placed in the center of the room. A ping pong paddle rested on the seat. He picked up the paddle, sat down, and with a tug pulled me across his lap.

Nothing was said. Jeremy had not developed his lecture techniques. My hands rested on the floor in front of me, my toes just reached the floor in back. I was surprised at the overwhelming feeling of embarrassment I felt. That grew in leaps and bounds as I felt my shorts being yanked down to my knees. Then the spanking began and all thoughts left my mind. It was time to feel. I felt the hardwood of that ping pong paddle light a fire from the center of my bottom to the top of my thighs. It wasn't a long spanking, but it was my first, and it left quite an impression.

I didn't cry, but I had a new and different form of respect for my husband. When it was over and he set me on my feet, he stood and gathered me in his arms. I laughed as I pulled away from his tight embrace. It was obvious that he had enjoyed giving me the spanking. Later that night, after an exceptionally wonderful romp in bed, we talked about the spanking. Jeremy had to admit that the feelings of power and control were exciting to him. It has been five years since that first spanking and they keep getting better all the time.