Wednesday, August 27, 2014

When life hands you a lemon, make lemonade.

In the last week, life has changed drastically for us.  My fiancé and I stepped up and were given provisional custody of his two nephews, ages 7 and 3.  Last month, his brother started working a job that takes him away from home a majority of the time and his brother's new wife wasn't ready for the responisbility of raising two extremely rambunctious boys, so we picked them up last Tuesday and enrolled the older one in our local public school.  We have been trying to provide stability and get them into a normal routine.  It has definitely been exhausting as they can totally wear me out.  It is very difficult to split your time between two kids who both need your attention, especially when their age difference makes it near impossible to try to spend time all together. *sigh* 
Want to know the irony of the situation?  We had just decided we probably weren't going to have any children of our own and just enjoy life together.  Now, all of our time at home is consumed with raising the boys.  Last week was rough and stressful, but the weekend did show me that we can handle them together. 
Even with everything going all topsy-turvy on us, we did manage to have some very limited private time after the boys went to sleep.  Lucky for me, we acquired those canes from Cane-iac last month. With the need to be quiet and all, they really are the only implements we can try to use right now. 
Anyway, there are a TON of things I miss terribly and even some things I regret not doing yet now that we have kids, but I know that we are doing the right thing in taking them in.  I do hope that the parents will be able to pull themselves together and figure things out in time for next school year, but in the mean time, we will do our best and take one day at a time. 
Positive thoughts, comments, smoke signals, etc. are all welcome and greatly appreciated!

Monday, August 25, 2014

Life has changed, but first...

I picked up my long-anticipated copy of Wanting It All from Amazon's Kindle Store on Saturday!  I've been trying to find time to sit down and read, but as you will soon find out, the time for that little luxury has been severely depleted.  As of this morning, I have successfully completed chapter one and am excitedly looking forward to continuing the rest of the book as time allows. 
Congrats to Livia Grant!  You are now a published author!

Monday, August 18, 2014

"I Am Your Life"

We started watching the Dead Poet's Society last night because I've been wanting to see it again after hearing the news last week.  When Robin Williams appeared on screen, I was hit with this sense of loss that I really hadn't been able to feel yet by just hearing about his death.  I'm sad that he is gone, but I hope that he has found peace.

Mostly because of the movie, I've been thinking about poetry.  When I first started to learn about poetry, I absolutely hated it.  I had a logical mind and never could come to same conclusion as the teacher about what the poem meant or why it was written.  It wasn't until I was told by my parents that we would have to move (after seven years of being in the same place) that I found a true appreciation for that thing called poetry.  I was in my freshman year of high school when my parents told me my dad would have to change employers and we would be moving at the end of the school year.  To a 15 yr-old, that meant the world was ending.  I had friendships that took seven years to develop and I was getting through my first year of high school unscathed and now you want me to do WHAT?  Needless to say, I was sad, angry, terrified, lost, etc.  In the end, everything turned out fine, and in hindsight, that move turned out to be the best thing for me.  But, experiencing all those raw emotions caused me to experience poetry in a whole new light, and I even ended up writing few poems myself during that time - one of which I will share at the end of this post.

As I wrote, I realized that only the poet truly knows why he/she wrote the poem and what he/she intended for audiences to take away, but what the poem actually means to me when I read it really depends on me and what I'm going through at the time.  Does that make my interpretation wrong?  Not at all.  A poet uses poetry as a form of expression, like dance, art, or music.  They put themselves, their passion, into the words on the page.  A reader can then take what they want or need from the poem. Like with many forms of expression, poetry can spur emotion and make you feel sad, happy, empowered, connected, understood, or any number of other things.  No one can tell you what you should feel or how you should interpret it, and it is OK for your opinions to be different from someone else's.  If a poem makes you feel or makes you pause and think, then that poem is a good one for you. To me, that is what matters.

Without further ado, I would like to share a poem I had written back in 2003.  Please contact me first if you would like to quote or use the poem in any way.  Thanks!

I Am Your Life 

By: Jessica Tham
Written: 2003

I am                                                           
Fair as well as unfair,
The fire that burns bright within you,
And what you live in everyday of the year

I am
Your time good and bad,
With your family,
And with your friends,
With your boy friends and girl friends,
With your husbands and wives
I am your time here on this earth

I am
Your feelings
Of happiness and sadness,
Of nervousness and anxiousness,
And of love and hurt

I am your heart
That beats you to live,
Even when you may not want to
I make you live

I am there
When you are down and crying
Because you think,
"I am not worth it,"
When you are up and enjoying me
Because you think,

"I am worthwhile"

I am there
When you lose someone close,
When you gain a new friend,
And there when you move
From place to place in the world

I am there
When you grow,
From an infant,
To a toddler,
To a child,
To a teenager,
And finally to an adult
That is when
You start to understand
Why you live in me
And what you gain from me

But right now
Whether you like it or not
I am your life
So make the best of me
For the rest of me

One day, someday
You will understand
That I am what I am
And what you make of me

I am all of this,
But nothing without you.

I am your life.
I depend on you.

Thursday, August 14, 2014

Finding a Balance

When I was little (eight or younger), I've been told I was a very brave and outgoing little girl.  Then, we moved from upstate New York to the South.  That's when I became who I remember - shy and reserved, but still independent and strong-willed.  Not to say there is anything wrong with the south, but to a young girl it was definitely a culture shock.  Remembering back, I was always very good at holding my own with the boys.  They couldn't bully me and I could keep up with the best of them. With other girls, it was a different story.  I couldn't stand up for myself and was bullied most of my 6th grade year by girls who were friends before and after that year.

Fast forward a few years and I no longer had a problem with bullies and even developed a few friendships with other girls who were more like me - tomboys, wore jeans and t-shirts, and played video games.  I also joined the band and fell right into several leadership positions over the years.  I remained rather quiet and reserved, yet through being a leader and doing well in school, my confidence in myself started to grow and I became more outgoing again.

In college, I had to work harder to keep my grades where I wanted them and I used band as a break to keep me sane.  Eventually I did have to let go of band because of the ton of time it took up.  During summers, I interned at NASA and was beginning to think almost anything was possible.  That dream lasted until I came back for what should have been my graduating year.  I had just broken up with my then long-term boyfriend and returned to college to start the two most difficult classes I had ever been in.  At some point during the quarter, I truly believed I was going to fail both of them.  I couldn't drop/withdraw from either of them because I would fall under full-time hours, so I was stuck.  By some miracle, I managed to just pass one of the two classes, but miserably failed the second one.  I know some people think, "No big deal just try harder next time," and although that is exactly what I ended up doing, I was devastated.

So, why am I bringing any of this up?  Because I changed that day. Maybe I became more realistic.  I lost that childhood belief that you can do anything. My self-confidence took a major hit.  Suddenly the world got very small and I realized you can't do anything.  When it came time to take the class again, I literally had to drop everything to pass it.  The class average was in the 60's and I was hovering just above it.  This was the only thing left to graduate, so I threw all my time at it.  The final came around the week before graduation and I was probably never more prepared for an exam.  I handed it in and felt pretty confident.  I passed the final with an 88 B and passed the class with a C.  Great, right?  Nope, not to me.  I gave it my all but what I found out was, the professor made the final easier so that unless I (and the one other student who had to re-take it) really had absolutely zero grasp on the class, I could definitely pass it.  What does that tell me?  That I really don't know much beyond the basics and it's like the professor didn't even have much confidence in me.

With little to no self-confidence, I took a job in town where I knew it would be relatively safe in that they wouldn't expect the moon from me.  I gave up on doing anything more challenging and gravitated away from anything that made me directly responsible for anyone or anything else.  It's been 2 years and 9 months since I started working full time.  I have grown a lot, made mistakes, and am slowly gaining confidence in my work-related capabilities.

At home, my confidence is all over the place.  One minute I'm very sure of myself, the next I feel like I don't know anything.  My fiancé tells me it's like I'm walking on eggshells around him.  He says that it almost seems like I fear him and it's preventing me from communicating with him.  I've thought about it, and I think the problem is that I want to avoid confrontation.  I don't just say what's on my mind because I don't want to feel judged, rejected, or ignored which can all lead to hurt feelings and confrontation.  Has he done this?  It's not like it is ever on purpose and it is usually never the intent, but every time it happens, my self-worth takes a hit albeit a small one.  I probably just take things too personally.

Another issue we are trying to overcome has to do with my parents.  I am caught in the middle.  Most of the time I feel like I'm doing a decent job of it, but then sometimes things blow up.  There are too many people trying to control everything.  I'm getting better at pulling away and speaking my mind with my parents, but I honestly feel like a rebelling teenager.  They have always done a lot for me and until now have always let me stretch my wings.  They have high expectations and some days those expectations make me feel so trapped.  I think it is getting better...at least I hope it is, but it is slow going and stressful in the mean time.

Yet something else that bothers my fiancé is my tendency to blame myself for everything.  Guilt, blaming myself, goes hand-in-hand with all my insecurities.  It's my fault, I could have done something to change it, I'm sorry.  Who would want to spank someone who feels like this?  Someone who seems this fragile and already broken?  Stepping back, I can see his point.  Keep in mind he wasn't a spanko before I brought it up and still sees spanking as possibly hurting and maybe even degrading to the spankee.  So, when he spanks me (not for foreplay), it would be like kicking someone when they're already down.  I don't see it as that.

I see spanking as a way to release and refocus.  I feel I need a spanking the most when I'm already on the verge of breaking down.  The reason why doesn't necessarily matter at this point.  All I know at that moment is that I'm hurting emotionally in my head and in my heart and I'm fighting to maintain control. A spanking at this point would be the push I need to let go of control (being held in position), release the emotional pain (tears or not), and be completely focused on the here and now (reddening bare bottom).  After all, what choice would I have if my ass is being lit up?  This view is hard for him to see as helping my well-being.  He is not judgmental about it at all, but since he cannot see it the way I see it, he doesn't automatically think about spanking when I do or the way I do.  That leaves me feeling lost...and so I tend to mope which he absolutely doesn't like because he thinks I'm upset with him when really I'm just confused and unsure about everything.  He really doesn't know what I want/need from him.

Since April of this year, I've been writing to him in a private journal that he will read when I add new entries, but we've never sat down together and re-read from the beginning.  I think that might be part of the problem of not knowing what to do or try next.  In my mind, I've written it down so therefore we've talked about it and if you haven't done anything about it then you don't like to or don’t want to do it. However, in his mind, I read it once and then didn't think about it again...not that I don't care, I just didn't think about it after reading it.  So, we have accidentally encountered a temporary impasse.  There were some pretty active feedback entries on my part in that journal and I think if we took some time to look back we might find out how to move forward. We need to work together.  He has told me that where I am weak, he is strong and where he is weak, I am strong.  Sometimes I think we forget this and rather than help each other, we work against each other. We also need to find a balance of give and take with TTWD because neither of us want to change who we are and lose ourselves in the process.

Tuesday, August 12, 2014

Hot 'n' Bothered

There's just something that gets me all hot 'n' bothered (in a very good way) when my fiancé yanks me over his lap while we're naked in bed to dish out a quick spanking. 
Why, you might ask? It was for sexually arousing him while he was trying to fall asleep.  What?  I swear I didn't do anything! Read on and you will see it clearly wasn't my fault. ;-)
Last night, we were both tired and cuddled up in bed when I started to massage him.  He said he was sore from working the last few days, so I thought I'd be nice and work out some of the knots in his muscles. I could tell he was enjoying it from all his moaning and groaning.  That's about when my hands wandered down his body and I started to gently caress and stroke him.  It's not my fault he had a reaction. 
Without so much as a warning, he yanked me over his lap and proceeded to give me a very quick and pretty hard hand spanking.

Then, he rolled me off of him and roughly entered me from behind to firmly remind me of who was in control. It was my turn to moan and groan!
Needless to say, I personally think it all worked out in my favor.  (giggles)

Wednesday, August 6, 2014

Eight hours a day...

For whatever reason, I was randomly contemplating the possible purposes of corner time while I was at work yesterday.  Having not been put in the corner since I was around seven, it's not like I have a particular inclination for or against it, but I've been reading about it on a few blogs recently.  So, when my mind decided it needed a break, it wandered away from my pressure vessel drawing that I was working on to the merits of corner time (sigh, of all the things that could have popped into my mind...shakes head).  Now, I don't recall getting very far in my momentary lapse of daydreaming, because when I came to my senses and glanced up, I was immediately overcome with the following thought, "Why on earth would I want to do corner time at home when I stare at this eight hours a day?!"



As you can see, behind my computer monitor is a perfect 90° corner that gets plenty of use when I'm bored...

Monday, August 4, 2014

"...I'd better find you naked on the bed."

On Sunday night, I couldn't figure out whether I wanted to have sex, play, or just go to sleep.  My fiancé kept glancing over at me on the couch and asking what I wanted, but I was being perpetually indecisive.  After a while, he got up and said, "I'm going to go take a shower.  If you want to do anything, then when I get out I'd better find you naked on the bed.  Otherwise, I'll assume you don't want to do anything and we'll just go to bed."  As soon as he closed the bathroom door, I hopped off the couch and went to our bedroom.


I stripped out of my clothes and piled a couple of pillows on the middle of the bed.  Then, I went looking for something we bought recently that I've been wanting to tryout - a restraint that goes around your waist and holds your wrists at your sides using two elastic bands.  I also pulled out a blindfold.  I tied the restraint around my waist, climbed on the bed, and slipped the blindfold over my eyes.  As I slid my wrists into the bands of the restraint on either side of my waist and leaned over the pillows, I heard the water cut off in the bathroom.  He was getting out of the shower and I was ready and getting excited.


He came into the bedroom and said, "Oh really?"  I felt him sit on the bed and caress my bottom.  "What? No implement?"  I smiled and thought that I couldn't very well have done all the work, but didn't respond otherwise.  I could hear him looking around for an implement.  Smack!  Smack! He picked the plastic hairbrush. He followed up with a few flurries on each cheek.  Those definitely stung, so I started wiggling a little.  He moved around working all over my backside. 


He paused to retrieve some lube and my pink dildo. Slowly, he worked it into me until it was comfortable.  With the one end of the inserted dildo in one hand and the hairbrush in the other, he got to work pumping and thumping.  It felt amazing, the pain and the pleasure mixing.


He asked me if I wanted him to switch to a bigger one (dildo), but I just said not unless it's you.  He promptly tossed aside the brush and the dildo and helped me rearrange myself so that I was properly on my knees with my face resting on the bed. (Side note...it's amazing what you are no longer capable of doing by yourself when you lack the use of your arms.)  He positioned himself behind me and slid all the way in.  After a moment of adjustment, he started slaming homeruns. He felt amazing.  I started moving back to meet him.  With the way we were going, one would have thought we were trying to break the record for number of homeruns slammed in under five minutes!  He reached his peak, and then he helped me out of the restraint and told me to get my vibrator.  I turned it on and he slipped in a finger.  Between the gentle internal stroking and the external vibrations, I was thrown over the edge where I enjoyed riding out the waves of pleasure.