Who Knew? Women Are Trying These FLR Blog Post Ideas on Their (Mostly) Willing Guys

I never imagined, when I began this blog back in 2007, that my imaginings and scribblings would actually influence marriages and romantic relationships. I kinda hoped that might be the case, mainly by leading more husbands and boyfriends into the path of perpetual courtship and wife worship. I have been especially delighted, for instance, to learn, via several emails and comments, that there are wives who have their husbands read aloud to them at night from my books.

But the notion that girlfriends and wives would take “male management” ideas shared here and implement them verbatim in their own budding FLR relationships… well, as the title above says, Who Knew? With Elise Sutton, perhaps, but moi? It seemed farfetched and fantastical. But exactly that has been occurring.

For instance, my favorite guest blogger Beckie Sue took the blog post of Au876 on Financial Control, Part 1 (and yes, there is a Part 2) and applied several ideas from it more or less as written to her own marriage. As a result, her husband was instructed to surrender his debit card, had his his paycheck direct-deposited to his wife’s private checking account (just like me), and was restricted to $10 pocket money, with instructions to inform her promptly if he spent any part of it, so she could “replenish it.” “He had questions and doubts,” Beckie Sue writes, “but I told him the decision is final and permanent.” Moreover, she forwarded the Au876 posting (about husbands surrendering complete financial control to their wives) to “a couple of my friends to read and consider implementing some of the ideas.”

Whew! And as you are about to read, from the anonymous and adventurous young man whose postings I featured in “Starting Early on an FLR,” my blog on female-led shopping inspired his girlfriend to design mall outings for him in which he was basically the beast of burden for her and a girlfriend and… well, I’ll let him tell it.

But let me say first that no, I do not feel like a traitor to my gender for inspiring these women (and perhaps many others) to exert such increasing and sometimes capricious control over their husbands and boyfriends. I suspect these dudes are actually reveling in their new female-led constraints, despite discomfort, reduced status, etc. Please let me know, guys, if I’m wrong in this.

Now, to Anonymous and his experience in "Girlfriend Led Shopping"*:

Anonymous

My girlfriend and I had gone shopping a couple times early in our relationship. This was before it even started developing into what it is now. Those trips were the typical co-ed shopping trip; she would spend forever looking at stuff while I would wander off and either sit and wait somewhere or find a more interesting store to shop in (think video games).

It ended up being equally miserable for each of us, so we both sort of came up with an unwritten rule that shopping would be something that we'd each do on our own. Neither of us had reason to reconsider this unwritten rule.

That is until we worked our way back to your set of blog entries. She decided a trip to the mall (or “mauling” as I normally referred to it) would be a good way to evaluate my progress. She called her best friend and made arrangements for the following Saturday.

Prior to our departure on Saturday, she went over the rules. From the time we get there until we leave, I don't get to sit down. I carry all the bags and I'm not allowed to set them down. When they want me to, I also carry their purses. I am not allowed to fidget or appear to be bored. I have to stay three paces behind, yet still keep up with them.

Even though there was reasonably close parking, I dropped them off curbside in front of one of the big department stores, parked the car, and then caught up with them inside. They were sampling some of the perfumes. Without a word, they hand me their purses and go back to exploring the merchandise. I began my day as an obedient valet.

The first hour or so was actually easy and I would have to admit kind of fun. It's weird how it feels to be a good servant; it kind of gives a sense of pride. I diligently followed them around carrying their bags for them, carrying their purses when they wanted me to (which was actually most of the time), doing the holding all of the garments they wanted to try on, retrieving other sizes, and returning stuff they weren't interested in.

There was one incident where she gave me a dress to put back on the rack. The saleslady that was helping them tried to grab it saying that she could take care of it. My girlfriend chimed in and told her not to worry about it because I love doing stuff like that. The saleslady gave me a quizzical look. I just smiled and said, “I live for this” as I put the dress back on the hanger and headed to the rack to put it back up. My girlfriend's friend watched the exchange and got a good kick out of it. I didn't hear the comment the saleslady made after I walked away, but I bet it would have been interesting.

After they picked out the stuff they wanted, they'd retrieve their purses, and my girlfriend would give me the debit card and tell me where they were headed for next, leaving me to take the stuff to the register and pay for it.

For the most part, this wasn't a problem. However, one store we visited sold accessory type stuff and was fairly busy. One of my standing rules is that if I am in line and a woman gets in line behind me, I have to let her go in front of me. I was the only guy in the store. I ended up letting about 10 women go in front of me. The only exception to the rule is I don't have to let them go in front of me if they are displaying insignia from a sorority different from my girlfriend's. Luckily, I spotted Greek lettering on one lady's necklace that allowed me to secure my position in line.

Needless to say, my girlfriend was not pleased that it took me so long to catch back up with them. She accepted my excuse when I explained why I was delayed, but said that I would still have to make up for being late.

After what was probably about two hours, they decided it was time for lunch. We headed to the food-court. Before getting there, she reminded me that the rules about carrying the bags and not being able to sit down still apply in the dining area. Then she queried about how much cash I had left over from my allowance. We got to the food-court and they picked out what they wanted. My girlfriend relayed the order to me, added what I was to get for myself, and sent me off. She likes having me eat minimal sized meals when we're with her friends.

She noticeably didn't give me the debit card, so I bought the food with the remains of my weekly allowance, which was barely enough to cover the cost. This was obviously intentional since she had made sure how much money I had to begin with.

Carrying the food along with all the bags was a tricky juggling act, but I managed to complete it without spilling anything. Fortunately, the ladies picked a tall table so it wouldn't look too awkward for me to be standing there while eating.

While walking through the mall, there were other couples attempting to shop together. All of them were where my girlfriend and I were at the start. The guys were moping around looking disinterested, attempting to spot where the nearest seat was, and wishing they could take a detour to one of the electronic stores or something of more interest. My girlfriend would spot such couples and make sure to parade me right in front of them. She would also ask something as we passed such as, “are you able to keep up with us?” I would diligently respond with a smile, “Yes, dear.” She loves showing off and making other women jealous. I will admit it makes me feel good to help her do so.

As time went by, the number of bags grew and grew. While the weight of each bag wasn't a whole lot, the compound effect of multiple bags began to get taxing. While her girlfriend was in the fitting room, I requested to consolidate some of the bags together so that I wouldn't have to juggle so many of them. She merely responded by pressing her finger down on my upper lip, her way of telling me she didn't want me talking.

All that constant walking and standing was starting to really make my legs tired. I had to more and more make a conscious effort to remain well behaved. Even though it's where they would spend the most time just trying stuff on, I came to really like it when they went to the shoe stores. Helping her try on different shoes allowed me to kneel down and rest the bags on the ground.

I could also sense that they were starting to get tired as well (as if women could actually get tired of shopping). They would start doing a tag team at some of the fitting rooms, where one would sit and relax while the other was trying stuff on. Of course, that was not an option for me as I was either running garments back and forth or playing my role as a coat rack near the entrance to the fitting room.

Other women shopping or trying stuff on would seem to always make some comment, either directly to my girlfriend or her friend or open to everyone. The most common one was 'I need to get one of those.” Each time they'd say something, I could see my girlfriend beam a smile, reminding me again what this was all about. She would just tell them that the best thing about it was that I actually enjoyed shopping with her. I think she enjoyed the attention and comments as much as anything else.

The drive back to the house was a relief. It was the first opportunity to sit down that I had since driving to the mall in the morning. When we got back to the house she said that since it took me so long at that accessory store that I owed each of them a half hour of leg and foot massage. This probably would have been expected even if I didn’t have that blemish on my performance. I would give one of the ladies a massage while the other would be trying on all the different outfits and stuff they had bought, then they’d tag team swap. It probably ended up being about two hours.

After they were done, her girlfriend wrote her a check for her portion of the purchases and left. My girlfriend gave me her review of the day. She said I was much better behaved than way back when we first attempted shopping together. However, she added that she thought I was having to consciously work at enjoying it and that our goal should be that we get to the point where I don’t have to work at behaving and that it’s more natural. She summed it up saying, “On the whole, I had a good time. All of us had fun. I got a bunch of new stuff for my wardrobe, and I even made some money at it.” She folded up the check her friend gave her and stuck it in her purse. I do not expect she put it back in my account.

This all happened about six weeks ago and she’s decided that it’s time to make a return trip to the mall. She’s called another one of her friends (she says she has more fun when shopping with friends) and we’re about to head out.

Sorry about this being so long. I sometimes tend to ramble on. I also apologize for taking so long to post, but things have been busy for me and she doesn’t always consent to my internet time.

Do any of my readers wish Anonymous had written shorter? I bet not. As for me, I can’t wait to read his next installment. And, as for his precocious girlfriend, she is welcome to borrow anything she likes to expand her delightful dominion over him.

* You can read his original comments below the post “Wife-Led Shopping: The Ultimate Test, Part 2”.

Female Superiority - Conversion Experience, Part 2

As I wrote in Part 1 of this two-part post, my conversion to belief in the idea and reality of female superiority has been gradual. Perhaps the “aha” moment — when years of accumulated evidence reached a tipping point — occurred as I read that first email from Beckie Sue, describing her own reluctant journey of discovery, from FS skeptic to convert.

By the time I had reached her concluding thoughts—that “female superiority is only natural and is showing up more every day [and] someday it will be accepted by everyone”— I realized that not only had she hooked me, but reeled me in. Oh, I was still thrashing around in terminal protest, but I was definitely netted.

It felt like all the parts of her argument, which so closely paralleled my own experience (with my wife and all our married friends and family), had fitted and clicked together, permanently. Like one of those three-dimensional puzzles I can’t disassemble. All at once the matter-of-factness of female superiority was just there—everywhere I looked—and, in Beckie Sue’s phrase, “only natural.”

It was certainly natural in my marriage. I’m wedded to an Oracle. She makes wise and prudent decisions on the fly, weighing all relevant factors including how the outcome will affect each person in the equation. I have no clue how she does it; she didn’t graduate from Hogwarts, but she’s a full-fledged wizard nonetheless. I’ve learned, over the two-decade course of our marriage, and considerable dating time before that, to take every problem to her and then do exactly what she says. Like an applicant, or supplicant, to the Oracle of Delphi, say.

Since I have learned that many other husbands, especially of the wife-worshipping persuasion, do likewise, and for the same reason. In our house and theirs, Mother Knows Best.

So I was well primed to accept and promote the proposition of female superiority. Except for the inescapable corollary, i.e., masculine inferiority, or, more specifically, my own inferiority vis-à-vis my wife. Female superiority can be taken with a spoonful of sugar; male inferiority has to be swallowed straight and it can stick in one’s craw. Was I “man” enough to truly accept that lowered status, and live it? Frankly, Beckie Sue wondered the same thing. “I don't think you have accepted female superiority as a fact yet,” she wrote me, “though you want to.”

But how could I justify holding out on my secondary status in the marriage? It was writ plain for all to see—for our kids, family and friends, waiters and waitresses, car salesmen, the tax guy, hotel clerks. Everyone knew where the marital power resided, who made the decision, who handled the money, who exercised the superior judgment. In fact, the areas in which I was subordinate to my wife just kept—and keep—expanding, day by month by year.

My paycheck was direct deposited to my wife’s private account, just as in Beckie Sue’s marriage. (And for good reasons, which perhaps I can detail another time.) Again as in Beckie Sue’s marriage, all “our” decisions were wife-made and final. I was automatically out of the loop on almost everything of consequence, from permission for sleepovers to vacation plans. Arguments had become a thing of the past because I deferred to the Oracle on all matters great and small, and had grown comfortable doing it (and increasingly uncomfortable when circumstances required me to decide important matters without benefit of her wisdom and common sense).

And my wife was, and is, at ease with the female-first order and hierarchy. She knew her decisions were superior, that her judgment to mine was as a mother’s to a child’s. Even in supposedly masculine areas of expertise, like fixing mechanical things or organizing home-improvement projects, I have learned humbly to take the problem to the Oracle. She will study the matter until she finds a practical solution.

Anyway, I was excited after reading Beckie’s Sue’s email, and immediately sent a copy to my wife, wanting to share it, wanting her reaction. She emailed me back, “That was quite a letter from that woman.” Only later did I realize that a likely reason that Beckie’s Sue’s ideas had resonated with my wife was that my wife had already—quietly and calmly—reached the same convictions. Namely, that women are superior.

And I wondered: How many women are similarly convinced of female superiority and, out of social courtesy or reverse chivalry, go through the motions of according males a status they we not merit? I suspect it might be a very large percentage.

“I have asked my wife if she thought she was superior and she didn't answer,” wrote one commenter to the Subservient Husband blog. “I asked if she thought I was wrong in saying she was superior, and she was unable to disagree with me on that point.” Exactly.

But philosophical acceptance of female superiority is one thing. Living day by day in a home and family structure that is ruled by that superior creature is another. That’s the New World Order I have been coming to terms with. And, perhaps surprisingly, the more I have accepted it deep down in my being, the happier I have become. Not only is female superiority “natural,” like Beckie Sue says, but it just feels right. It’s more in sync with the actual power balance in our marriage. I am a satellite, circling her, magnetized by her. She has the gravitas. She is the center of my universe.

Again to quote Beckie Sue: ”Most husbands today understand, even if subconsciously, that they are inferior to their wives.” Absolutely true in my case. I realized that I had always felt like an impostor playing the role of man of the house, lord of the manor, and all that. Once I dropped that leading-man pretense and accepted my supporting role, I felt liberated and, to use a modern pop psych word, “authentic.”

Now, finally, I have become comfortable with my true and subordinate status. I am free to enjoy serving her, my superior, the love of my life, a Goddesss incarnate who I am privileged to live with, to adore and worship and obey.

As a bonus, I am enjoying the company of a large online support group of happily “inferior” guys who have also had their eyes opened.

In his admirable blog, Subservient Husband explores his own sense of “submissive” liberation and his growing sense of pride in serving a superior creature:

“I have come to appreciate her leadership… I am thankful she gives me the benefit of her direction. I do understand my wife is more intelligent too. It is a big thing to admit since it goes to the core of self-preservation kinds of things, but I feel I have worked though that now…
“I think the term [inferior] is being shunned due to the societal image it conjures up. In my view, it is healthy to acknowledge and accept that my wife is better at things than me and my willingness to submit to her authority is in my best interest.”

For Subservient Husband, acceptance and understanding of his inferiority offers an additional benefit. As a service-oriented submissive, he finds the idealization of his wife and the consequent imbalance of power a wonderful motivator, energizing him in his daily chores of housecleaning, child care, wifely pampering, and so forth.

Typical of the lively debate encouraged by Subservient Husband, his post was followed by a long and intense exchange of comments pro and con. I especially enjoyed two strongly supportive reactions from wives:

“[My husband] knows he is inferior to me and he loves being inferior to me.”

“Accepting being inferior (or accepting your husband as inferior) is hard after being taught otherwise all your life. Thank you for not backing down. This is actually hard for me to understand and write here. But male inferiority is to be accepted and embraced by both wife and husband. Once both accept their respective role, a relationship will be much smoother.”

Or, as Subservient Husband himself puts it: “Some may think that living as the inferior in a relationship would be cause for discontent. For me it is a realization I acknowledge and find I thrive on the recognition of."

As Beckie Sue has said, “If men only could understand that female superiority would be the ideal for them.” So, thank you, Beckie Sue, for opening my eyes to this blindingly beautiful fact of life, one which I will never forget.

On this same topic, I came across the following quote from a now defunct FLR message board. I’m guessing it was written by the opposite (and superior) sex:

“Why does female superiority make males happy? They are happy because they have found their place in this world. They have found a reason to exist, a reason which they can intuitively link to the natural order of things. To learn that they are inferior does not make males unhappy, on the contrary; they state it with pride. Males who have understood female superiority know that at their place they can be useful, and this makes them happy. They also realize how lucky they are to share this planet with such wonderful beings as women. To serve a superior female is not degrading; on the contrary, it is an honor for males to serve their superiors, It is assuming their rightful place and duty in the order of the universe.”

Note: I am, of course, aware that the topic of female superiority is debatable, and tends to excite strong reactions, pro and con. But, as this is a personal “conversion” post, I’ve steered clear of all that, or tried to, as well as use of the more inflammatory term, “female supremacy.” Perhaps another time.

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