Last night Noah gave me what I have been literally and figuratively asking for over the past few years. We went to a play party–specifically a bdsm play party. We went early. We played soon after arriving when not many people were there. We didn’t really want people hearing us. We felt very awkward about what we were planning.

From the point of view of an objective observer I’m not terribly interested in bdsm. I am interested in being abused. I asked Noah to hurt me in ways I really don’t enjoy and get out the frustrations he has been holding in. Noah is fairly ridiculously controlled most of the time. I do rude things and watch him catch them then consciously choose not to react. Noah puts up with me being downright nasty sometimes. I am constantly afraid of when the other shoe will drop. When is he going to get sick of me? When will he take revenge for how awful I am?

So I asked him to get it over with. It’s kind of funny how I want to condescendingly say he did his best. He berated me for twenty minutes while slapping me and kicking me and punching me. It probably would look very bad for someone listening to what he said. Noah’s words were straight out of a domestic violence situation. He stopped at twenty minutes because I was freaking out and he wasn’t ok with continuing to hit me when I was that upset.

I wish I understood what this need in me is. Why do I need him to treat me that way so much? Why am I unable to go through life with a husband who is just nice to me? If I had a husband who was just nice to me I would almost certainly cheat on him and cause huge problems. Noah is nice to me the vast majority of the time. Then sometimes he agrees to treat me how I think I should be treated so I can deal with him being nice to me the rest of the time.

I told him that there is no space for atonement in my life. I know I fuck up in ways big and small all the time. He just lets it go. He is ridiculously nice to me in comparison to everything and everyone I have ever known. So I always feel bad. I always feel like there is nothing I can do to repay him.

I wouldn’t say that I have squared any of our debts in taking the beating. I may be motivated to keep my ungrateful whining to myself for a while. I feel really bad about how ungrateful I am. Most of the time Noah rushes to assure me that I am doing a hard thing–it’s not that I am ungrateful. I am grateful for what Noah does for me. I feel like a fucking asshole because I have the audacity to say that what he does for me isn’t enough. I still have needs that go unmet.

I read that highly role defined marriages are happier than marriages where people help one another and do the same tasks. I get that. The expectations are killer.

My ass hurts.

I felt weird at the party. I knew I would have to spend a while defending my monogamy. Of course. I was told that showing up at the party and refusing to play with a guy who wants me to suck his dick was teasing–and that’s not very nice.

How dare I not want to give a blowjob to some guy, right?

I am quite glad to know what is eating at Noah. This is going to be hard to think about for a while.

The difference between bdsm and abuse is that I have a large hand in scripting what happens to me. I tell him what I am up for and what I am not. I ask for these things. I think I deserve them.