Removing the layers...

I am finding that as you progress through this type of relationship, whatever label you want to put on it D/s, submissive, DD, TTWD, you begin to peel away layers, walls, barriers.  Even being relatively new to this dynamic, I have felt the layers peeling away.

The removal of some of those layers has been very freeing.  Being honest about my needs and discovering that my husband does not feel repelled or think I am weird - that in itself was very liberating.  Letting down walls that have been up for years.  Letting my husband be close to me.  Realizing that I am desirable (still struggling with that one). 

Admitting that I have no ambition for a career outside of the home, contrary to what was instilled in me from childhood and still gets pushed on me by well meaning friends and family like: "But what will you do when the children get older?" "What if your husband leaves you?"  "What will your contribution to the world be?"  Right now I am totally satisfied with being a homemaker, wife and mother.  Hopefully someday I will be recognized as an author.  But in the meantime, I plan on being a homemaker, wife and mother and I refuse to feel ashamed of that anymore.

Writing all of these emotions down and opening up to all of you helps immensely.  Reading your thoughts, stories and experiences helps me more than I can say.  Someday I would like to be able to feel fully free to just be me - and make no apologies for it (Vanillamom :) 

But now, it is all so new and sometimes scary. 

With so many old layers gone and the skin underneath feeling still raw I am way too vulnerable to this.  I am becoming so open.  Lately I have been feeling like I have been tearing down a pretty big wall.  The "Fear of Rejection" wall.  This is a very thick, very strong, almost impervious wall.  But it has been shaking lately and with the shaking a lot of debris has fallen.  I find myself picking through the rubble and examining it.

1. The first boy who got to 2nd base with me, then told all his friends about my breasts in detail and they laughed.
2. The boy I gave my virginity to after dating for a year, who then dumped me for my best friend.
3. The boy who dated me for three years and then dropped me.
4. The boy I thought I loved who didn't love me back.
5. The career I invested myself in for ten years that ended in a lay off.
6. The business I poured myself into that wouldn't show a profit.

Are they failures, or rejections or just life lessons?  Whatever they are, they caused me to begin to guard my heart, guard my soul from taunting laughter, rejection, intimacy... things that caused me to doubt myself, my worth and my abilities.  It hurts to have these things resurface, and yet it is cleansing to release them - a kind of pleasure/pain - connections withing connections.

But it is scary to start peeling away these layers because it leaves me vulnerable and open.  At the same time, being so open makes for greater intimacy (and better sex) and a better marriage with my husband.

Except...

Last night and this morning husband has been in a mood.  I'm not sure what is bothering him (I have some ideas but again, he just isn't verbal) and he has been very edgy.  And not edgy in a good way.

He is falling back on his old ways of dealing with this.  So he is mumbling, nasty and short tempered (I don't think spanking him would help the way it helps me!) and I know that he is worried about something but he is not sharing.  I try to be available to him but he is not interested in that right now (which is a shame because I would be willing to have him "vent" this on me - and I do think it would help) and I do not want to force the issue - I already feel inadequate and rejected.  How can I not feel rejected when he shut me out, when he turns me down, when he locks it all inside and does not let me in?  

The dam burst this morning, and now I not only do not want to force the issue, I want to rebuild walls and say screw it.  He's pissed, I'm hurt and this is not going to be the only bump in our road.  I know that there will be plenty of times that we have rough roads.  But...

I can't help but feel his pulling away (even though I KNOW he is only doing it to cope with whatever it is he is dealing with) as a rejection of me.  I immediately go into a spiral of doubt.  Somehow, someway this must be because of me.  Because I am not:

Hot Enough
Thin Enough
Contributing Monetarily
Running the House Efficiently

On, and on and on.  I immediately want to shore up the "Wall of Rejection" because that is my fall back safety.  That is the wall that keeps me safe from rejection.  I've been relying on its' strength for years.

I know if he could hear me now he would say, "It's not always about you!".  I can't seem to help it though.  I blame myself for his moods.  I know this isn't right, I know it isn't fair and I know it isn't how he feels.  This is how I feel.  Then I take it further, I take it right into the heart of the whole DD dynamic.  I begin to doubt.  Maybe all of this was just a phase and we're going to go back to where things were before.  I HATED how things were before.  I felt like we were on a gerbil wheel, round and round, miserable with no end in sight. I don't want to go back to that - EVER!

What if he has only been trying this to please me and now he is bored with it/me?  What if he doesn't like it anymore? What if he wants to go back to the old us?

What if I need to put those walls back up?  What if I tore them down too quickly and now I need their protection?  

What if I stay this open?  What if...