When I was growing up in the 1980s, corporal punishment was generally out of favour – but not in our house. If my sister and I acted up or broke the rules, we knew we’d have our bare bottoms warmed by Mom’s Jokari paddle. It didn’t happen often – we were good children, and I wasn’t spanked at all after age 10. Until the week after my 14th birthday, that is.
I’d had a bad week. I was hoping to receive a pair of the latest Hi-Tech basketball sneakers, but all the stores were sold out. A girl I liked hadn’t come to my party. I had failed an important algebra test, and my basketball coach hadn’t chosen me to start in the game. A really bad week!
I’d been moping around the house for several days, hoping everyone would feel sorry for me. On Saturday morning, I was sitting on the floor in the den watching TV. Dad was out golfing – he’d invited me to join him but I didn’t want to go. My sister was at a friend’s house. Mom came into the room about mid-morning and sat in the middle of the sofa. I can remember it as if it was yesterday.
“When are you going to cheer up?” she asked. When I didn’t answer, she continued: “I don’t like the way you’ve been behaving, and your dad doesn’t either. What are you going to do about it?” I just shrugged.
“I guess it’s up to me, then,” she said, standing up. “It’s obvious that you’re overdue for a spanking.” “Mom!” I protested. “I’m too big for that. You haven’t spanked me since I was 10.”
“And that’s how you’re acting now – just like a 10-year-old.”
I stared at the TV as she left the room. A few minutes later she came back carrying the Jokari paddle. “Let’s get this over with,” she said. “You’re kidding, aren’t you?” I asked. “Strip down, kiddo – you know the routine. You have about 10 seconds to get over my knee.”
I could tell she was serious. If I didn’t obey, I knew I’d be grounded for a week or more. I stood up, took off my sneakers, T-shirt and jeans, and headed for the sofa.
“Underpants too,” Mom said. “Not that! Please!” My face flushed, and chills ran up my spine. I was sure I was turning red. “The most effective spankings are bare bottom ones, Charlie. You know that. Besides, you don’t have anything I haven’t seen before.”
“I’m older now. It’s too embarrassing.” “That’s part of the punishment. You should have thought of that before you started acting like a spoiled child. Now either take them off, or I’ll do it for you.”
“No way!” I turned to face the wall, dropped my briefs and covered my front with my hands. I knelt beside her on the sofa, resigned to my fate.
At first, I wasn’t really worried. Mom’s spankings had never been too harsh, even with the paddle, and I thought I could handle it. I stretched out and squirmed into position across her lap, careful not to expose myself.
“That’s a good boy,” she said. She patted my rump and laughed. “This will be fun. I’ve always loved seeing your cute little bottom turned up like this. Too bad how sore it’s going to be before long, but you really need this.” “Mom!” I was mortified, hearing my own mother talk that way.
“Hush,” she said as the pats turned into spanks. She used both hands, slapping the middle and sides of my bum and concentrating on my ‘sit spot’. She smacked my upper thighs, too. After more than five minutes of all that, she reached under my belly and lifted.
That pulled my knees forward and raised my bum high and round. She wrapped her left arm tightly around my waist to keep me still and tight against her body. She had never done anything like that when I was 10, and suddenly I felt scared.
“Now, don’t move,” she ordered. “I want a good target.” I could hardly believe how much she was enjoying herself. I sure wasn’t.
The hand spanking had just been a warm-up to the main event, which I knew would be a thorough paddling. She soon had me wriggling and kicking my feet. The way she was holding me, there was no way I could escape the sharp whacks of that nasty little paddle. Soon my tightly-stretched seat and upper legs were on fire.
I was determined not to cry, and held out for a long time. But when the pain became too much to bear, my tears began to flow. I sobbed deep in my throat, giving in to the fierce, exquisite punishment that my bad behavior had required. I stopped squirming and tried to lie still, while every well-deserved smack from the paddle wiped away the bad feelings inside of me.
My whole body was trembling. Mom seemed to know when I’d had enough, and put down the paddle. She hand-spanked me again, which was almost soothing after the intensity of such severe punishment. I gasped for breath, overcome by the way a thorough spanking could release me from the guilt of making Mom and Dad so unhappy with me. My poor bottom ached and throbbed, but I felt happy.
Finally, she let me sit up and cuddled me in close to her side, still bare but with a sofa pillow modestly covering my lap. We sat that way for a long time, and I felt well loved – and completely forgiven for how I had acted.
My Dad and sister never knew what had occurred in their absence. If they noticed that I avoided sitting on hard chairs for a couple of days, or that Mom and I were a little more affectionate toward each other, well, they never said anything.
My good behaviour occasionally lapsed during the next half dozen years, giving Mom reasons to paddle me a number of times until I moved out on my own. I never objected and would always crawl across her lap willingly, despite the intensity of the spankings. I’m convinced that her loving discipline kept me on the straight and narrow path to adulthood, and I told her so. It was a very special time in my life.
Contributor: Charlie