Enforced Addiction and the Pathway to Discipline

Been a bit busy, what with my birthday being over the weekend and all! Happy birthday to me!!! Hurray!!! Hope I have not posted this bit before, but here is a tiny snippet from the new book. It is taken out of context and needs work... but here is your chance to play editor and point out the typos and stuff that just don't make sense. Perhaps none of it does - but I'm a little depressed at the moment and apt to look on the dark side. The pic is just something that someone anonymously contributed - I wish I new where it came from as the full-sized, full quality version would be interesting.

Enforced Addiction and the Pathway to Discipline

The raven-haired teenager shook her head solemnly, tears welling in her lovely deep-violet eyes. She was sitting hunched on the side of her bed, the barred side having been folded down out of the way, gazing down at her open palm where only moments earlier had rested two innocuous-looking little green and gold plastic capsules. To her right the foam-filled pillow still retained some semblance of the outline of her head, the subtle gently-creased indentation gradually subsiding and fading from the flounced pink latex covering. To her left the water still sloshed to and fro in the half-drained plastic tumbler squatting accusingly on the narrow wheeled bed table, a Formica-topped hospital-style affair which spanned the bed and which could be slid across as necessary.
Her hands still shook a little, but already the tremors were subsiding. The overwhelming feeling of panic that mere moments before had been uncontrollably welling up in her breast and threatening to swallow her whole, was easing also. Of course it was far too soon to be due to any pharmacological effect of the medication - but what did she know of that, any more than she understood that the underlying cause of her condition was itself, at least in origin, as much the result of psychology and the power of suggestion as was the immediacy of the respite. She felt as if a gently-comforting warmth was spreading throughout her body - whether real or imaginary she couldn't tell - and with it, a kind of a feeling of surrender, of having given in, that was in itself comforting to some degree. But there was remorse too, anger, even a little self-pity:
She had been doing so well -why had she given in? How long had it been, a week? Might it have been longer? It was difficult to tell for sure. Aunt Julia tended to encourage her to remain in her room for much of her time in any case, but had been even more insistent of late, arguing that it would make it easier for her to handle if she really did insist on giving up on taking her sedatives. And she had slept such a lot; in hindsight it was difficult to discern where one day had ended and the next had begun.
But why had she come over drowsy as often as she had since giving up her medication? Jitteriness, creeping flesh, that horrid, 'wired' feeling she had on occasion experienced and that her aunt described as her having ‘ants-in-the pants’; all this and more she would have expected. In its stead there had come a sort of marshmallow-brained lethargy coupled with a bone-aching weariness and a pleasant meadow-sweet urge to sleep that there had seemed no sense in fighting. Why, she had no idea, but in a way she had been glad to give in to slumber - there was little or nothing to occupy her in her room and on the few occasions when she had ventured downstairs... Well, her aunt didn't really agree with her watching television and turned it off when ever she was in the room and she had never come across a radio in the house. There was a bookcase, in her aunt's private study, but it had been made abundantly clear to her on the very first morning after her arrival that the word ‘private’ meant exactly that - besides, the door was invariably kept securely locked when Aunt Julia was not in occupation in any case.
She hadn't really thought about it before, but she had never as much as seen a newspaper left lying around. But now that she came to think about it; it did seem rather odd that no newspapers magazines or other publications were ever delivered, at least to her knowledge. She would have thought that a woman who worked from home to the extent that Aunt Julia appeared to would have taken out subscriptions to several periodicals, simply for convenience sake. She decided that Aunt Julia must be someone who pick’s up her post promptly - it certainly fitted with her aunt's impatient nature and obsession with efficiency and neatly explained why she had never seen as much as a circular or a piece of junk mail lying on the mat by the door, let alone a letter. Come to think of it, she had not as much as heard the post arrive, nor glimpsed the postman. She had not heard the crunch of his boots on the gravel outside, not ever, not even when she been in her old bedroom, the room she had been given when she had first arrived - a simple pretty little country-cottage bedroom that did not look like part of a sanatorium and which had dainty windows that opened out into the summer sunshine rather than being double or triple glazed to the point of near-perfect soundproofing and perpetually hidden behind heavy ‘blackout’ drapes.
She used to write copious letters, then, when she had first arrived. She would write daily to old school friends, the boy she had been fond of - and had once had a burgeoning relationship with - and the family solicitor, the latter in an attempt to make some inroads into starting an action against her guardian. Aunt Julia would post them for her whenever she went into town. She would listen intently each day for the post to arrive, sometimes even going as far as to hover around in the short passageway behind the front door, pacing impatiently up and down while all the time listening intently for sound of the post-office van pulling in. She would quite quickly be ushered back to her room by her aunt, despite her protests that would sometimes embarrassingly verge on stamping her foot in frustration. As it turned out, it was all to no avail in any case; no replies ever arrived- not even from the solicitor's office - and gradually her enthusiasm had waned and the habit had faded.
Sleep, then, whiled away the time and protected her from the worst of the symptoms. Not that there had actually been any symptoms, now she came to think about it, at least not that she had been aware of. Yet, that made it worse somehow: She had gone a least a week, by her reckoning, without the slightest twinge of panic, not so much as a bead of sweat forming on the forehead or a trembling of the fingers. Then, on this one morning, the one morning that she had awoken with that all-too-familiar pounding in the ears, the palpitations, the unfathomable anxiety and nauseating dizziness, Aunt Julia had for some reason taken it on herself to place out her medication in the little dish alongside the tumbler of water that she always brought up first thing in the morning. She assumed it had been by mistake; perhaps Aunt Julia had been in a hurry and it had been result of unthinking habit - these things happened. But why, oh why on this particular morning? Why did Aunt Julia have to leave temptation within such an easy reach on the one morning her resolve happened to be at its weakest?
She felt a tear begin to meander its trickling way down her cheek and lent further forward, cradling her head in her hands. The polythene mattress cover crumpled and rustled like dry leaves scrunching underfoot in a forest as her weight shifted. The childish winceyette pyjama bottoms that she was wearing sighed a lightly squeaking sort of sigh, betraying the presence of a waterproof vinyl inner-lining that extended from the elasticated waistband as far as mid-thigh and that, moistened and lubricated by girlish perspiration - the garment fitting quite snugly in any case - had encouraged the back seam to slip deep between her buttock cheeks.
Despite being alone, she blushed. An embarrassed, girlish little giggle escaped her lips, startling her and bringing her back from the reverie she had slipped into; it reminded her of just how fuzzy her thinking was already becoming. The thought struck her that surely the dosage had been increased. It was this otherworldly, fuzzy-headedness that she disliked most about taking her sedatives - that and the worries she had over possible addiction - but it had never felt as disorientating is this before. She shrugged off the notion, reasoning that the last thing that Aunt Julia would allow would be her doctor increasing the strength of her medication, given that she had been so keen on helping her get off the things. But then again; if Aunt Julia was so keen on helping her give up relying on the sedatives, why had she left them out for her to take? Why had she been more careful? And why had... and why had...? She could no longer quite recall the question she was trying to form and so the thought drifted out of focus. Without quite realising it, her jaw had slackened and her mind once again clouded over.
The click of the lock, the metallic rattle of the round brass handle and the squeaking of the bedroom door’s hinges startled her. Rubber soles padded dully on the spongy clinical linoleum, the unhurried rhythm accompanied by the whispering rustle of polyester and the harsher rustling of starched cambric. Smart black court shoes and tan nylons moved into view. Lifting her a head from her hands, she caught sight first of the royal blue hem of the woman's dress, Aunt Julia's dress, smartly aligned with the tops of her shapely nylon-shadowed calves and flapping open with the momentum of the approach. Her gaze wandering higher, her eyes were met by the glassy-glint of light reflected from the first of the deep-blue glossy buttons fastening the skirt front. Then, higher still, came the next button, surrounded by the shadowy-sheen of uniform-blue polyester, then even higher and the crisp white hem of cambric came into focus, delineating the lower edge of the woman's apron, the spotless starched snow-White fabric curving around to meet the dress's side seams before sweeping inwards and upwards to disappear at the waist under a deep-set navy-blue belt of Nylon Petersham ribbon.
Lavinia's gaze paused at the sterling silver belt clasp. The buckle, a highly elaborate butterfly-wing affair decorated with pierced rococo scrolling, strangely fascinated her - some deeply-buried part of her could not help but marvel at her aunt's trimly-belted waistline in comparison to the relative broad maturity of her hips. An unguarded thought arose unbidden and blushing more deeply she looked up, her gaze taking in the re-emergence of cambric fabric as the yoke of the woman's bib-apron flared out above her nipped waist, mirroring in miniature the flare of the skirt and covering the fitted blue bodice of her uniform dress to just above the swell of her bustline above which showed two more of those deep-blue glassy buttons before a final white button that closed the stiff blue-piped collar about her slender throat. Her eyes momentarily met her aunt's. Then, unaccountably unable to hold her gaze, shyly she averted her eyes catching sight first of the bright burnished-silver nurse's fob watch pined to the apron yoke and then coming to rest on the matching silver nurse's scissor-chain. The latter, looping down and arching around from a clip on the side of the woman's belt before disappearing into a hip pocket set in her skirt held the keys to this room, the cupboards and the draws and more besides, dangling at its end as if an arcane symbol of authority.
Still perched on the edge of the mattress, the teenage girl slowly straightened up, yawning lazily, latex, PVC and winceyette all shuffling, scrunching and creaking together as she did so. Seeing her aunt in nurse's uniform was nothing out of the ordinary, in fact it was more and more becoming the norm for Aunt Julia to make an appearance in her old hospital nursing sister's dress, Whether for purely practical purposes or whether simply because it seemed appropriate to her aunt, given the woman's self-appointed role as ‘carer’, Lavinia had no idea. The one thing she did know was that for some unaccountable reason the mere sight of her aunt in her nurse's uniform seemed to sap her will – she found it virtually impossible to stand up to the woman when she was so dressed. She experienced a similar effect whenever she would visit her psychoanalyst's office. The doctor's receptionist was a horrid, tyrannical rottweiler of a woman and yet one glance at her in her sky-blue nurse’s uniform and Lavinia would be left with no choice other than to kowtow down to her, a situation she found humiliating in the extreme.
A hand intruded into Lavinia's field of vision from her left; a white elasticated arm cuff brushed her cheek. Arm puffs were as much a feature typical of a nurse's uniform circa the mid 1960s as was the bibbed apron, but it was so typical of Aunt Julia to favour such a detail, despite it dating from well before her time in psychiatric nursing. Her aunt was leaning over her, gently rolling the bed-table away down toward the bars at the foot of the bed while simultaneously turning so as to seat her self in its stead. Lavinia felt the mattress dip down to her left as the woman shuffled her mature frame into place, the soft complaining creek of stretching polythene bedcovers now joined by the murmurous crumpling and swishing of polyester, cambric and nylon brushing one upon another and whispering together like summer breeze rippling through bulrushes.
The sudden deformation drew the girl closer in to her aunt's side, just as an arm slipped comfortingly around her shoulders. The woman's voice murmured reassuringly, her lips so close as to be almost brushing the girl’s ear. Lavinia seemed to feel as much as hear the words, her aunt's hot breath caressing her ear and raising goose-bumps on the nape of her neck:
“Now, doesn't that feel better, honey?
“Why? Why did you leave them lying there... th,,,tho... those capsules? Why did you have to leave them lying there like... th,th, tha,thaa...”
“That? Like that, is that what you mean? Remember what I have told you to do if you think you are going to stammer – stop, rehearse it in your mind...and if you still think you are going to stutter, try wording what you want to say in a different way. Try to avoid words you know you might have difficulty with. Now, come along. Let's hear you try again.”
“Th...tha,,,that...Like tha...tha”
“Alright, alright. I can see you are upset, lets just leave it for now and just focus on what is troubling you,”
“ But I, I, I thought you were on my side”
“What ever do you mean? Of course I am – what a funny thing to say.”
“Then why did you...”
“Leave out your medication for you? Well, it was for your own good, believe me. I can see when things are starting to go awry...and believe you me, things were starting to go awry indeed. You might not have been aware of it, but you were rapidly heading for a breakdown. I looked in this morning and you were shaking like a leaf – I just did what I thought was best through you. Of course I 'phoned your doctor first, but that was her advice – to leave out your capsules and leave the decision up to you. I'm just glad you saw sense and decided to return to your medication. I could see you were really beginning to suffer - it was heart-rending to see you that way, it really was. You were becoming too deluded to see it for yourself, that's all.”
“But aunty, I was so, so...close”. There had entered into the girl's protestations a piteous keening, whimpering quality that Julia Soames found somehow appealing, in a vulnerable girlish sort of way.
“It wasn't doing you any good, though, was it? Just look at you, how pale, how drawn you look”. She indicated the girl's reflection in the dressing table mirror opposite. “Yes, you're calm enough now, but just a few minutes ago you were quite literally climbing the walls with anxiety. When the time comes your doctor and I will wean you off your sedatives, but under proper medical supervision. You can't just decide to stop taking them by yourself, just like that – its asking for trouble. But I guess you've learnt that lesson for yourself now, you silly, silly little girl.”
Inside, Julia Soames was smiling to herself: Close? The mere notion had nearly made her laugh out loud when the girl had said it. The truth was that the silly little over-privileged trollop had been no closer to abandoning her sedatives than to abandoning breathing. In fact, though the girl did not yet recognize it, she would soon discover that she had now become more dependent on her daily medication than ever before. The suppositories had seen to that. The first of the daily triad she had given her young trusting charge had always included a modicum of a sedative substance. It had been simplicity itself to shift over to one including in its constituents an internally absorbable form of the girl's usual medication, having very bit the sedative activity of the oral form, not to mention sharing its unfortunate habit-forming qualities. Poor deluded Lavinia; in actuality she had never been off her medication. Indeed over the previous fortnight - for that was how long it had, in actuality, been – she had been gradually and steadily increasing the dosage given her patient. Then she had simply cut her patient off, dead, from her supply of instant brain-numb euphoria - the previous morning in fact – and awaited the consequences. The rest was already history.
Yet her conscience was clear – at least in as far as the delight that she had shown when her charge had first announced her intention to wean herself off her medication had been genuine enough. It had all gone perfectly. As far as persuading the girl to submit to psychiatric care, one of the more difficult aspects was in convincing her of the need to have her under a certain degree of sedation. The idea had always worried the girl from the first time it had been broached.
The girl had always been loath to take her medication and certainly couldn't be trusted to take it, unsupervised and off her own back. On more than one occasion, in the early days, Julia had found the capsules secreted away underneath the girl's pillow. Of course on each occasion she had discovered the deceit immediately - she had been a psychiatric nurse after all - and had stood over the girl while she was then obliged to take them – albeit after a stern talking to and not withstanding a little backchat. But even with the threat hanging over her of being sent home and of her aunt washing her hands of her, young Lavinia had continued bellyaching. The point was; although it was true that he girl would eventually take her medication, it was only ever under protest. Yet, if she was to progress Lavinia to the next stage – though the term regress might be a more accurate description, given her intention - then it was important that the girl could be trusted to take her medication voluntarily, quite automatically and without even being told to do so.
The ironic truth was that only with sweet Lavinia’s own co-operation, by her continuing to struggle, continuing to stand her ground, could she have been properly tamed. It was important that she should have made the brave and strenuous attempt to go without her medication that she had - and seen herself fail… and fail completely, hopelessly and dismally. Without having at least tested her tethers, how could she know the infallible strength of her bonds? But having done so - and found her cause hopeless - with a little encouragement and reassurance the girl could now be expected to settle back in her chains.
Had she not attempted to break the habit they had so carefully formed in her, Lavinia might never have truly accepted her addiction. As it was, this change in mindset, this, sense of hopeless, despairing acceptance, that Julia Soames knew her charge was presently experiencing, would ensure that in time and with a suitable form of encouragement hers would become a very humbling addiction indeed. For now there would be no more fighting back, at least not on that front. In time, as they went forward, new fronts would open up and new obstacles would have to be negotiated but each would be tackled in their turn.
An old adage states: “never fight a war on two fronts”. It was something that Julia Soames knew to be very true. What had been achieved to date had been achieved one step at a time, and that was the way they would continue to progress. But with the battle won on one front the way was now clear to take their struggle of wills in a new direction, to open up a new front. She now had the perfect lever in her hands with which to weaken her charge's defences and had already in mind the way in which she would first apply it.
It was a battle in its own right just to contain her own imagination: How sweet her Lavinia would look in a fresh, pink cotton frock, nearly covered in its entirety by a big, spotlessly-white or pink-checked pinafore with bows of pink ribbon at the shoulders. How ravishingly pretty she would be in a pale-blue sailor suit with a white collar and silk tie or a blue and white candy striped dress with a white peter pan collar and a long back zip - better still, fastening up the back with awkward to reach buttons – the sort of thing a young girl might once have worn to school, a blue plastic belt pulled tight around the waist and fastened with a white plastic buckle at the front. Nothing of her vision seemed particularly suitable for a strapping teenager, but what did that matter within the confines of the home. What was wrong with a simple tunic-dress with a column of buttons to fasten it up the back? Then, why not a grey gym tunic, an old fashioned thing with a square cut satin-lined yoke? She remembered coming across just such a thing – and much more besides - when she had first taken possession of the house; hanging in a wardrobe in a long-disused attic room. A school uniform... Why not a school uniform? Indeed, had not Dr Ecclestone herself – the girl’s therapist - hinted at such an idea?
Dr Anne Ecclestone: now there was a woman who knew what she was talking about. The redoubtable psychotherapist had been lamenting the demise of the traditional British school uniform at the time, saying how it would have been the obvious solution in such a case as Lavinia’s, to whom, in time, even making such a basic decision as to what to wear each day could be expected to present a problem. That the developing situation under discussion was largely of the good doctor’s own creation was beside the point. The psychologist had simply asked, in passing, whether Lavinia still had her old school uniform but the inference had been clear. Julia Soames had been forced to answer that sadly in the negative. What had passed for a uniform at the girl’s school, as she understood it, had consisted of little more than a set of guide-lines as regards colour and certain style restrictions merely aimed at outlawing some of the more outrageous fads of the time. Beyond that, a liberal credo of ‘freedom of self expression’ had reigned – expensive, pampered and privileged was how she would have put it.
That was it, then, the decision was made: a school uniform it would be. And as for that much vaunted ‘freedom of self expression’ – well, the girl had already lost a lot of that, a little discipline would soon deal with the rest. She was not going to rush it, of course, but there would be rules to go with the uniform, and restrictions, strict restrictions. Yes she was going to be strict, very strict. And a strict regime would need some equally stringent means of enforcement – and what could be more apt than the traditional school cane, the heavy leather Scottish tawse, punitive writing of lines, corner-standing with hands on head and all the rest? But all in good time… All in good time…

Badges of Shame and Other Summer Madness – With or Without Bars, Though?

Yesterday was a bit of a lost day at this end, I'm afraid - but that has been too often the case recently. First of all there were personal problems at home, necessitating going out quite early on and not having the space to boot up the machine even for a glance at my emails - it would all have caused too many more problems! Then I had to scoot up to Enfield to help my mother with something... Then finally I sat down at the Enfield Costa-packet coffee house - from where I can ordinarily get a good fast WiFi connnection - only to find that I couldn't log on. Next I went to the nearest pub, The George in Enfield Town, which, I happen know, has a free WiFi setup - but it was full of football supporters waiting for the England v someone-or-other match. So I cycled back down to Woodgreen, to the Wetherspoons there, as I know that branch is not showing the matches. It quickly became apparent that their WiFi was down and I couldn't get a signal from the local library WiFi box while sitting at a table outside either, as I usually can (probably because there was a huge mobile unit lorry (truck) thing parked directly outside it, blocking the signal path. Next I wandered down to the Turnpike Lane wetherspoons branch where they were showing the match but where I also knew I could sit outside away from the row. So I got a beer, as you do; I got a seat - great - I even found I was getting a good WiFi signal - even better! But before I could even begin to log on, let alone get anything done, a guy who knows me and who sometimes chats to me sat down and...well, chatted to me. ...And chatted and chatted and chatted... Beers were bought and downed, the sun fell low in the sky...well, I'm sure you get the picture. Then it was morning and I found myself back home, with not a single word or idea or thought to show for it.

It's a difficult thing to deal with and I am trying not too beat myself up about it. If I am working and get a lot done - as is often the case on a bender - then I can justify it in some way in my mind. But if all I am doing is sitting getting drunk? It's just that everything and everybody seemed to be conspiring against me. As it is there are constant rows over the time I spend writing, both with the other half and my mother, both of whom keep coming up with things that need doing, the argument being that I am not working so I must have plenty of time. Writing a book is not seen as 'work'. I should have lied and said I'd found a modestly-paid 9 till 5 job some place and then gone out every morning as if off to work. Sounds crazy but I have heard of folks doing exactly that!

Right, enough of my babbling sorrows! I have managed to do a fair bit of writing over the last week or so, despite these and similar tribulations and think a complete first draft of the new book should be about completed in three weeks. Meanwhile my arty collaborator in the 'States continues to throw up new ideas and to explore new directions and of course I have a contribution or two to make (I hope). Actually I am looking forward to starting work on designing the new cover soon - one of my favorite bits of all this - and in preparation I have today be putting together some ideas for how the badge might look on the regulation hospital-issue patient uniforms in the institutional discipline scenes depicted. Actually most of the illustration work has thus far focused on the institutional discipline aspect but ideas have simultaneously been emerging as regards the domestic discipline scenarios - and there are plenty of those - so some effort will, I expect, soon be expended in that direction. Meanwhile here are two variations of the uniform badge I have come up with, this version being intended for patient 30, quite obviously, who those of you who have read the first two volumes will recognize instantly as a young lady who is never far from the controlling, grasping hands of her guardian - even if safely behind the locked doors of a secure institution. By the way; the textual appearance is deliberate and supposed to make it look as if painstakingly embroidered on fabric.

A Tiny Bit of What I Have Been Writing

The choice was stark, but even having the notion of a choice was a form of subtle psychological torture. She could sit quietly and dwelling more and more inwards, turning it on herself and sending herself quite mad in the process or let herself be gently led by the hand deeper and deeper into mental illness by her sweetly smiling guardian angle rustling and bustling around her in her blue-checked uniform dress. For what else could this be but some form of mental illness? Head swimming in swirling sedative fog, hands thrust down the front of her hospital issue asylum pyjamas masturbating furiously, fingers plucking and twitching under stickily-humid plastic mental-home incontinence knickers and worrying at a sutured rubber thimble cap device who’s sole purpose was to rob her of the one thing she desired more than anything else in the world at that moment – sexual release.
“Stop that, now – it’s time to get you back into bed and I’m going to have to draw back the curtain”.
The command bit deep into Lavinia’s psyche; shame and humiliation shared equal billing with hot-cheeked heavy-breathed, tear-wrenching frustration. She felt her hands being physically tugged from their private fumbling and being placed forcefully in her lap, the musky pungency of her unrelinquished arousal rising accusingly from fingertips left tacky with bodily lubrication. She was only half aware of the head and shoulders pressing thorough the opening in the plastic curtains surrounding the bed and the chair in which she was presently seated, wriggling uncomfortably in her sweat-soaked pyjamas.
“I’m so sorry, Sister – I just didn’t know what to do to stop her”.
“A quite disgusting display! I want her put back in full restraint immediately and she is to be confined to bed at all times for the foreseeable future. Meanwhile, you are to make out a full report of this behaviour for the doctor under the heading of ‘evidence of pathological sexual obsession and obsessive-compulsive behaviour’.

.....

Now, I bet you're wondering what the pony-girl illustration is all about - hmmm? Not really my thing as such - and nothing to do with anything in the new book - it's just that I recently came across a couple of great pony-girl sites which I have now added to the 'Useful Resources' list that can be found in the right hand sidebar (listed under pony girls, amazingly enough!).

Institutional Enema Punishment and a Bit of New - Institutionalised Volume 1 goes Live on Amazon's Kindle

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Institutional and Domestic Discipline: An Illustrative Collaboration 2 - Evolution of an Image

Those of you who have been following this blog over the last few weeks will now that I'm now involved in a collaboration with a digital artist or illustrator the aim being to provide an illustrated version of the new volume (see Institutional and Domestic Discipline: An Illustrative Collaboration, Wednesday, 28 April 2010 - just click to view). I was just thinking the other day that some of you may be interested as to how things were progressing on the illustration front so I thought I would put together an example of the evolution of such an illustration. Of course you will understand that this particular piece of art work is presently very much a work in progress but it should be sufficient for you to get the idea without giving too much away as regards the storyline. In the context of the latter, one thing I can tell you - so as to set the scene without providing too much of a spoiler (I hope) is that one of our three hapless heroines, having now come under the personal care of an institution’s somewhat domineering section psychiatrist - a rather overbearing woman with questionable ethics and even more questionable aims - finds herself incarcerated in a claustrophobic, secure and isolated little cell-like anteroom leading directly off from the good doctor’s consultation room, dressed 24/7 in institutional green striped pyjamas, denied any human contact other than with the doctor herself and subject to stringent discipline and corporal punishment for the slightest fault.

Generally speaking I have been restricting myself to writing the text and generating ideas (although of course ideas flow both ways thus nurturing yet more branches and avenues to explore). In the development of this particular image, my collaborator has sent me the three-dimensional artwork shown in the first couple of examples but then I've taken the liberty of attempting to change the background colour to better fit the narrative - which to be honest I cocked up to some extent, obliging me to digitally repair the kneeling nurses hairdo (badly) - and added in the girl’s room’s barred security door and her nemesis, Matron, approaching outside in the doctor's consultation room, purely as an experiment to see how it might add atmosphere. In the first image the girl is of course naked and unblemished, free from any evidence of prior correction. In the second and third images she has on her institutional shapeless and baggy pyjama jacket and a healthy red blush is apparent colouring her behind.

The nurse came from an old scanned catalogue illustration and is supposed to represent the stern hospital matron placed in charge of the hapless young subject. Although in this version she is carrying a cane, in the storyline it is a folded leather belt that is put to use; but I didn't have a suitable strap / belt picture to hand and has always being full of enthusiasm and having little patience I was in a hurry to try the idea out. The final version, if it indeed it is decided to go ahead and include the bars and Matron approaching from outside, will have her carrying the leather belt or strap. The idea is that the nurses outside the girl's cell in the doctors consultation room (obviously) and as she is more distant she does not have to have such a high degree of 3D-ism. In the storyline the bars of course painted white but are not too sure how well this will appear in the final image and is something I have yet to experiment with.

.....

The image of the nurse is actually a horizontally-mirrored version of the original photograph for reasons of perspective and so I first of all shifted the nurses’ fob watch in the original to her right hand side so that it would actually appear on her left in the final shot, as it should. I was especially keen to allow her belt buckle, trim around the collar and fob watch to be seen as I think these details all add to the sense of authority I intended her image to engender. In the final version, if used as a concept a freshly constructed nurse image will be used

The bars themselves came from the original version of those that I used on the book covers of INSTITUTIONALISED volume 1 and INSTITUTIONALISED volume 2 and I used an image shearing facility on a Linux-based image processing application called ‘The Gimp’ called to simply pull them into shape to fit the perspective of the 3-D image as judged by eye (there is also a 'perspective' tool available on ‘The Gimp’ but that doesn't seem to work so well - at least not in my hands, LOL).

I have since fed back the results of my manipulation to my collaborator who has now sent me a version re-coloured to suit the narrative but minus the mess that I made of it. This latter modification is of course based on the original art work, so next one or the other of us will add in the extra detail as in my experimental changes, such as the external view and matron outside (always assuming of course that we decide to continue down that route). Any opinions / comments will as always be gratefully received. With external nurse / bars or without? Which should it be - that sort of thing. One thing that I should point out - and that I have pointed out before - is that the institutional aspect is balanced by the domestic discipline aspect in the final work and even a little ecclesiastical discipline: It turns out that one of my characters may - or may not (depending on who you believe - and even the subject herself is uncertain as to how much is memory how much is delusion) have suffered expiation (both sexual and otherwise )and physical chastisement under the guise of ecclesiastical care in a church-run home for wayward young women. This of course came to light during the events unfolding in INSTITUTIONALISED volume 2 but in the new volume we learn more of her trials and tribulations and perhaps discover the truth.

News, Views and Prison-Bar Blues

Do you remember the exciting news I said I was going to share with you? Well, last week I signed an agreement with an online electronic publisher which should result in INSTITUTIONALISED volume 1 becoming available in the various ebook formats, including Kindle, iphone, ipad and the rest! In addition it is likely to become more widely distributed and therefore more visible to search engines and thus to potential readers. Regular readers of this blog will be all too familiar with my bemoaning my poor choice of title which has led to the book's existence being well nigh impervious to disclosure by way of the usual array of spanking / discipline / uniform fetish / clinical-institutional bondage and restraint - type keywords. It's far too soon to say any more, but I'll keep you posted. If all goes well, both INSTITUTIONALISED volume 2 and the new volume, when I finally get the thing finished, may well follow suite - of course depending on their suitability as judged by the publisher. As for the new volume: it's been gradually evolving from a quick, short piece - designed both to utilise previously written material that wasn't finished in time for inclusion in the first two volumes and to fill in the gaps in the story arc so as to pave the way for volume 3 – to masterwork of near epic proportions. As for the latest on volume 2: Thanks to a little help from Lulu (at last) it has now been assigned one of my block of ten ISBNs and so later today I shall be submitting it for inclusion in Google's Book Search scheme, including all the modifications I have made to it with the aim of so called ‘search engine optimisation. One proviso is that I’ll am apparently going to have to modify the back cover to include the ISBN. If I am going to do that I may take the opportunity to change the background colour to match that of the front cover and spine . I'll see how much work it is going to entail offset against what is a minor cosmetic advantage at best – it all depends on whether I still have the background available as a separate layer.

Now for some other news: I have just added a link to a guy called Doug Adams’ home page in the ‘Useful Resources’ list (see right hand side bar or click on ‘Doug Adams’ home page’, above highlighted in blue – I hope ). Look in the left hand side bar in his index page for a list of content, including articles on all sorts of fetish-related subjects, many of which have relevance - either directly or indirectly – to my present project or at least are potentially inspirational. Scroll to the bottom and you will also find a free image gallery, which again I have found inspirational.

I have also added two new blogs I came across just now while searching for more inspiration for the new volume to the blog list (situated in the right hand side bar, if you're new here). Schoolgirl Spanking Stories does exactly what it says on the tin – click on blog name to visit or check side bar.

The second, Pandora Blake's blog, is written by, and deals with, the star of many short films revolving around our favourite genre – which is my excuse to present a little promo film (moving content no less!) from those master's of the Institutional / prison punishment scene – Bars and Stripes! (See window immediately above, click on arrow to play) I have mentioned their work previously - well before my recent signing to their affiliate program – as they are one of only a few purveyors of such material that regularly feature my all time favourite scenario: The smartly uniformed nurse, ward sister or matron – all tight-belted blue polyester, cambric or cotton and starched white apron - wielding a cane or strap across the defenceless chubby backside of some young female incorrigible miscreant against the backdrop of a secure institution. Enough already – it's getting all too exciting…Bye for now – I have to go close the curtains!

Institutional and Domestic Discipline: An Illustrative Collaboration

Hands up who would like to see an illustrated version of the new volume when it appears. Over the last couple weeks or so I have been developing a collaborative project with a guy from across the pond who works with 3-D rendering - and who is on a similar wavelength, to boot - with an eye to doing just that. Actually you have met him and his work before in the blog entry dated the 17th April 2010 entitled Another Day, Another Barred Window (click to view) under the name of ‘Snoozz’. It's still early days in the creative process yet, but it's an exciting concept I'm sure you will agree - even so I thought it would be interesting to garner opinion; so let me know what you think! It is ‘Snoozz’ we have to thank for today's pictorial offering (above left). Although representing just one scene, in what is a fairly complex storyline, I feel that it really embodies that all-important sense of oppression and the feeling that here is a buried, private and secluded little world outside the reach of conventional society and beyond the control of meddling ethics committees, busybody social workers and the rest. Quite wonderful! To see more of this guy's work click here.

While on the subject of illustration: the pic on the bottom right is something I pinched from a site I am affiliated to (see bottom of page) and that I think illustrates beautifully a scene I've been working on for the new volume which harks back to an earlier period when one of our characters, prior to being brought to the clinic, had first gone to live with her aunt - a strict, overbearing ex psychiatric nurse who begins to dominate her from day one.

Actually, now that I come to think about it; an opinion poll is something I have yet to do. I've never really been that excited about the idea, simply because there have been so many others carried out in the past on the various other websites, blogs and forums etc that populate the spanking world. Nevertheless it would be interesting to know, for example, which implements my readership prefer to imagine used, what types of scenario are favoured or which fetishes people think might work within the story arc of the series or would like to see included in some manner. At the end of the day this blog has never been entirely about spanking nor is it purely about BDSM in the conventional sense. With that in mind, perhaps a poll or questionnaire could work, if it were presented in a new non-stereotypical way and the questions were structured in such a way as to reflect both the spirit of the books and gain inspiration while stimulating the imagination of the participants.

Towards the end of last week I managed to acquire a chest infection - well to make matters worse while away this past weekend it developed into some sort of full-blown chest complaint, making it difficult to breathe. I have asthma and to be honest it is quite common for a simple cold to develop into a breathing problem - sometimes a sneeze will set off on asthma attack; which is fine if I have an inhaler to hand, which quickly sorts it out. On other occasions - and this looks to be one of them - a secondary infection sets in a whole thing becomes problematic until I can get my hands on some antibiotics. Those of you who regularly followed my ramblings will already know that I rely to a great extent on voice recognition software to dictate my work into the computer as I am as dyslexic as hell, easily distracted and incredibly slow at typing (not in any particular order of importance). Well, in addition to making me nauseous, I'm sure you can imagine how fits of uncontrollable coughing not to mention a blocked nose and wheezing can play havoc with voice dictation software - all sorts of gobbledygook results unless I quickly turn off microphone. To make matters worse the wheezing and blocked nose, together, seem to have affected the character of my voice so that more than ever this perverse little software package seems to be deliberately working against me - and I've often thought that it deliberately misunderstands me in any case… this computer hates me, I am sure of it! Bye for now!

How Might She Punish Herself: A Random Thought for the Day

A random thought brought about by working on the new book and through an email correspondence: The idea of the victim having to train their tormentor is potentially interesting in the extreme. In a way this could be a secondary matter - for example; if through some weakness of will our young heroine might allow her tormentor some sort of insight into her subconscious that might then in turn be used against her to extract yet more information. Then again, consider this: How about a trainee nurse been placed in charge of our suffering young woman, who in turn has been instructed by her nemesis - the young woman psychiatrist under who’s strict disciplinary ‘care’ she bristles – that she must lead the nurse, step-by-step, through some humiliating procedure being carried out on her person. The trainee nurse will then be tested and any failure in her knowledge paid for by several strokes of the cane – but not laid across the nurse’s backside, but rather across our hapless patient’s bottom.

Then again, perhaps the caning might even be carried out by the trainee nurse herself - the patient having to explain exactly how she should be caned, the number of strokes the doctor would expect to see awarded under those particular circumstances - that sort of thing – and all under threat of yet more punishment to come should the trainee nurse then not carry out the caning to the doctor's satisfaction.

Actually this point is quite interesting in itself as it might well be used as a lever by the doctor to overcome any reluctance on the trainee nurse's part to inflict a sufficiently severe caning. After all is said and done; should the trainee feel any sympathy for the patient - and alter in any way the procedure dictated for the punishment - then ironically all she will have succeeded in doing is to earn the subject of her sympathy an even more severe, repeated punishment. What do you folks think? Hmmm?

Filmic Inspiration, a Blog and a YouTube Link

Hi folks! I'm glad to be able to report that work on the new volume (that I am still yet to come up with a title for - any ideas folks?) is coming on in leaps and bounds. Some great, new and decidedly fresh ideas have popped into my head of late - all suitably cruel, as I'm sure you can imagine, but in a subtle way that I think somehow becomes even more twisted for being so. The only problem I have at the moment

is that, having successfully repaired my home computer, as am sure you know, I've yet to persuade it to co-operate with my printer / scanner. I'm not sure what the problem is but I am away from home at the moment anyway and I won't be back at my desk

until Monday or Tuesday of next week so the fix will have to wait until

that time - and then hopefully I can get on with scanning more of my magazine and book collection for your delectation and delight. I am also absolutely dying to get on with some artwork for the front cover of the new volume - it's one of my favourite bits when doing this stuff, although I'm not that great at it. One thing I have decided upon is that the imagery should incorporate some sort of parochial theme as between the pages we are afforded an insight into a church-run charity home for wayward young women. I will say no more than that for the time being, other than to say that we do also get another glimpse or two into a certain behavioural research unit, specifically that part set up a run in the style of an old-time secure reform school or boarding school but mostly the story deals with young Lavinia's life with her increasing tyrannical aunt and that woman's idiosyncratic views on domestic discipline. Basically it deals with the events leading up to her being persuaded to volunteer as a research subject in a project that she is told will involve her staying for a 'short while' in the experimental psychology unit of a private hospital. As you will know if you have read INSTITUTIONALISED volume 1 and volume 2, it is all pretty much as described to her, give or take, other than that the researcher's view of what constitutes a 'short while' differs some what to her expectations. And it is not a place one just walks away from. We also see something more of the background of one of the other characters who emerged during the events of volume 2, young Meridith Hewson.

Talking of reform schools; am I the only person in the whole world who had never heard of the B&W 1929 film ' Diary of a Lost Girl' by G.W.Pabst and starring Louise Brooks (See above left?. In it an "unprepossessing young woman is seduced by an unscrupulous and mercenary character". She is then sent to a reform school for girls, that seems less "an institute of higher learning than a conduit for fulfilling the headmistress’s sadistic sexual fantasies" and that is headed by staff who expect and exact "unrealistic standards of obedience from the cowering, terrified pupil" one in particular apparently seems to derive "an orgiastic pleasure from the rigors of [the] discipline inflicted". Sounds bloody gorgeous!!

By the way; is punishment PT / enforced PE and physical drill discipline is your thing? It is? Great! then click on the film poster top left to see a clip from the above movie posted on YouTube. You can also find a link to the same film clip in the useful resources list in the right-hand sidebar. The pictures scattered around this posting came from various sources on the web and all from the film other than the last one which comes from an entirely different source (actually the French film, Alphavillel). This I included simply because I think it would make a good basis for a suitable reformatory uniform, certainly a good starting point to work around anyway, particularly for the inmates of the type of old-fashioned style church-run regime that I envisage in the new volume. In the behavioural research establishment of course the regime is more closely based around an old-fashioned private girls school, though the discipline imposed is no less rigorous, despite the inmates theoretically being 'volunteers' and there were talking all high, tight starched collars, cotton interlock knickers and tightly braided pigtails.

Oh! I almost forgot: I have just added a blog to the blog list in the sidebar called 'School Girl Discipline'. Click to visit or see the link in the sidebar. See you next time.

A Kind Comment Received and a Bit about the Next Book

As a comment to my last posting ‘Orage’ wrote: “Garth,
I've finished reading ‘Institutionalised part 2’ and words fail me to express admiration! The book is absolutely riveting. Your minute description of the girl's garments when she's in the car was enough to make me sweaty all over.
You're so knowledgeable you could write an outstanding study for a university doctorate. But God forbid! Much better to leave us on tenterhooks waiting for part 3.”

I was about to reply with a comment of my own when I realised what a chance it presents to outline something of the book I'm presently working on - the in-betweeny volume, as I call it as a working title. So I thought I would paste up my reply as if a full-blown blog entry, pretty much in the style that I had begun writing it - so here goes:

Ah! Well, you see I already have a university doctorate, albeit something to do with cows losing their marbles. Thanks for the kind comments, it all helps keep me going. Anyone having gotten to the end of volume 2 would have got some flavour of the direction volume 3 will be headed when I get round to writing it (some small part of it is already completed to some degree - and perhaps as much as three-quarters of it exists already in my mind’s eye). First of all though I want to finish the book I'm working on as it is perhaps as much as two thirds completed on paper. It sort of fits in between volumes 2 and 3 - as I've said before – and covers the period in Lavinia's life when, while in conflict with her Guardian, she is taken under the wing of the woman she comes to call Aunt.

We follow step-by-step Lavinia's path as she is introduced, first to that woman's psychotherapist friend and then gradually to a life of increasingly restrictive discipline and the acceptance of corporal punishment by way of the strap and the cane. We see her persuaded to sign up, as a volunteer clinical research subject, to a project being run under the auspices of a private psychiatric hospital in that institution’s very secluded and very secure experimental psychology unit - itself embedded deep within the hospital's secure wing – where she is to join a small group of girls living in an environment that has been set up approximating to a private boarding school from a bygone age. It all sounds very cosy - all ‘jolly hockey sticks’ and midnight feasts, straight out of The Girl's Own Annual circa 1955 - and so she is completely unprepared for the strict discipline, mind-numbing tedium, demeaning treatment, corporal and psychological punishment and near constant humiliation that she encounters there. Little wonder then that she should seek to leave as soon as possible; but as we have seen in volume to leaving that particular research project is not such an easy option.

We also get a further glimpse into the previous life of one Meredith Hewson and gain insight into the works of a church-run charitable institution only vaguely alluded to in volume 2. Set up in the nineteenth century to care for ‘young women likely to drift into moral peril’ - its remit: to house, employ, keep secure and keep safe such ‘waifs’ from their own harm - vouchsafed beyond the scope of prying eyes and with a nefarious, if nebulous, connection to the aforementioned psychiatric hospital, its work continues today in much the same vein as it did then. Behind its austere portals, the runaways, the lost hopefuls, toil in penance to the Lord and are educated in equal measure - albeit within the limited scope deemed suitable for such girls by 19th-century values; parochial and scholastic discipline intermingle with hypocrisy and ambiguous motive.

Later some of the loose ends are tied up and gaps filled in when we learn something of what happened after young Lavinia made her bid for freedom after her psychological assessment as seen in volume 2. Finally we are given some insight into the mindset of a certain Ms Julia Soames as she prepares to receive back Susan Stringer from the research clinic for the summer months, before deciding - upon consultation with her psychotherapist acquaintance - that it might be advantageous for all concerned if young Susan was to pass the summer living under the care of a professional governess and her nursery-nurse assistant in the secluded country home of a certain titled woman in North Norfolk. And at this point we will of turned full circle and be set up for volume 3 with the necessity for flashbacks etc now negated.

Throughout, though, I'm cognisant of the need to try to avoid repetition as much as possible, in the manner that the work of another author was criticised in a comment appended to an earlier posting on this site. And therein lies the trial of course.

More on Admission Procedures and Institutionalised Punishment

Once again I find myself a little strapped for time. I have to rush out to get on with one or two shores related to preparations for Christmas but I shall be taking my net book computer with me so hopefully I will be doing a little writing later on somewhere, perhaps in a pub with any luck! There has been some interesting correspondence going on via the comments sections attached to my last few posts over the last couple of days, including the contribution of some very interesting and useful links, all of which I shall report on next time. An anonymous contributor has apparently been greatly taken with the subject of admission procedures, as portrayed in the reader's letter that I scanned in from an old copy of Janus I found my collection. As I said before, this was a subject broached any times over the years in the Janus reader’s letters pages, played a pivotal role in developing and forming my interests as they are today and in retrospective view provided a rich vein which I have unashamedly mined quite extensively in developing some of the ideas I have incorporated (and continue to develop) in my INSTITUTIONALISED story arc. Anyway, over the weekend, while rummaging through my old suitcase-cum-treasure chest in a spare moment, I came across a fascinating firsthand account of life in a 1930s institution that I remember reading way back in the 1980s and that my mind has often flashback to in developing my storylines. I have truncated it somewhat, as it is rather long and also moves away from my particular areas of interest, to include those sections that were personally most influential at the time and that endured in the back of my mind to be refined, redeveloped and incorporated into the little (and not so little) tableaux I would conjure in fantasy. See you soon - meanwhile why not have a trawl through the comments sections and join in; all ideas and contributions are most gratefully welcomed.

And the birched Schoolgirl? Nothing to do with the letter's contents whatsoever, it's just that the birch seems to me an appropriate form of institutional corporal punishment for that era. I can't envisage it in the home environment, even in the hands of a stern governess, but within the confines of a suitably secure punitive institution...that's another matter entirely. It is not a form of correction I would imagine would be found wielded by the medical staff, the nurses and matron, populating the secure experimental psychology unit that we visit in INSTITUTIONALISED volumes 1 and 2, but behind the walls of a charitable church-run shelter for girls deemed in moral danger... Well, who knows?

A Rainy Enfield Day - The Day After

I am very much 'out-and-about' today. Right now as I write this section sitting under an awning outside the Enfield Town Costa Coffee house (1:45 PM) the batteries on my 'NetBook' are getting low - a pain in itself - and now I have just been shat on by a big fat London pigeon. And now it looks as if his mates are all set to join in also - there are five in a row on a ledge about nine or ten feet above my head, with heads to the wall and with their bums over-hanging my table and quivering threateningly. The proprietors have hung up a rather unconvincing plastic model of a hawk to keep them at bay, but these things ain't that stupid. Besides, these are London pigeons; they probably have no idea what a hawk is and they have learned to ignore big flying things - they're buzzed by jets and helicopters all day long. .. The Ba*$@@ds!!!

Well that was yesterday - making this the first entry I have created split over two days. I had a little 'real' work to do - gratis, this, even though my pockets are fast draining - and then intended to finish off this at home. But the gods of flagellation and discipline were not on my side: the home computer initially crashed horribly on boot-up and from that point on - although I could access and search Google ok - I could not get my Google email to load properly, nor could I sign into Blogger to update my blog. Actually, it seemed to come down to not being able to use anything that involved a user-name and password. This morning the fault still persisted and was still present when I finally gave up and came here, to my friendly local coffee bar, about one hour ago. The weird thing is that the problem does not seem to be with the computer itself; I have a wireless router and connecting via that using the machine I am presently boring you from produced the selfsame symptoms!!! Yet all is ok working through the coffee bar's router. I checked my router's firewall but can't see any settings amiss - nor can I understand why anything should have changed anyway. Any ideas, people?

Not withstanding the above hassle, and not wanting the day to be a complete washout, I spent a few hours scanning stuff for future use. And hit minor pay-dirt: I had intended to upload a piece I came across - and scanned - over the weekend, on admission procedures (a letter published in an old copy of Janus) but then I came across this and my mind got to working. Someone emailed me recently asking if I had illustrations for my books. Well I haven't - I can't draw for toffee and I sure can't afford to employ an illustrator. But if I was to choose an illustration to suit a certain scene in INSTITUTIONALISED volume 2 - think late teenage girl, in a cassock and under secure ecclesiastical care - it would be this. Actually, if truth be told, it was the fading memory of this artwork - and the story that went with it - that inspired that particular scenario (I have previously published a section of it here somewhere - check out the blog archive). Anyway, I then came across another, unconnected, piece but one related to the background to that part of the story arc to which I just alluded and 'hey presto! I was writing - so let's see where that leads us.

A New Cover - Your Help Needed

Many, many thanks for the many congratulatory and supportive messages I have received, both as comments and as emails, on the first anniversary of my blog! I was initially quite unsure as to how my approach - and the subject matter of my blog - would be received. Indeed, with the publication of my first book and after my initial postings here, I was bracing myself for a deluge of judgemental condemnations - or at the very least, bemused misunderstanding. It is so gratifying to have met so many like-minded - or at least, tolerant - people willing to explore beyond the accepted bounds of 'conventional' spanking, S/M and D/S literature.

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But work goes on and now I have a favour to ask of you: As you probably know by now, I have been hanging back from more widely publishing INSTITUTIONALISED Vol 2 because I am not particularly happy with the cover as it stands. I have come to the conclusion that I would like to have something of a uniform look running through the entire series if at all possible - a sort of 'brand identity', if you will. As volume 1 has already been published through conventional channels its cover can not be altered; thus for better or for worse if I want to go down that particular route then the other covers - in this case, volume 2 - will have to be based around it. This is where you come in: below are three versions of the proposed new volume 2 cover design I have knocked-up today. The question is... which one (if any) do you like or prefer? Or should I stay with the present cover (as at the top of this post)? Or do you have any ideas of you own - some preference perhaps? What would make you want to look inside?

Let's call them version A,B or C respectively: Well, what do you think? Or are they all equally crap - which, incidentally, is how I'm feeling today. I'm pretty much confined to home: sore throat, aching limbs, high temperature - all in all a bit 'flu-like. Blimey! Grunt, grunt, grunt! My next posting will incorporate some of the stuff I have recently scanned in from my long-lost collection, now retrieved from the loft.

INSTITUTIONALISED Volume 2 Now on LULU (at last!)... I'm Knackered!

I've still got the 'sniffles' but I have managed to get INSTITUTIONALISED Volume 2 up on LULU (Click cover to link). In the end I had to take out a chunk which I couldn't really do justice to in the time I had available but that will still work as a flashback in volume 3 wherein I will have more space to include all of the unfinished sections of writing (some parts dating back over two years) that I would otherwise have had to leave out. As it was, volume 2 was getting unwieldy (over 300 pages at one point) and I have loads of fresh ideas that I would like to pursue and to do so requires a change of scene - as much as I like the whole institutional - reform school - asylum thing.

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For the time being volume 2 will only be on LULU for download - there are bound to be some typos that have gotten through (I am dyslexic, don't forget) and the cover is up for a redesign (I no longer like the present effort and consider it a temporary stopgap). The thing is; it is difficult and expensive to make revisions after an ISBN has been assigned so for the time being I'm holding back from making it available through Amazon, Waterstones et al until such a time as I'm absolutely satisfied with it (volume 1 had 11 revisions in the end). In fact I found a typo just a few moments ago but it is only a misplaced hyphen so although I have corrected my copy I have not bothered to upload the correction to LULU - it's daybreak here in Londinium and I haven't been to bed yet. I have also yet to post up a proper book description on LULU (I've just recycled the one from volume 1 for the time being) and I haven't had time yet to create a proper preview (because I'm going to bed). It is actually really quite hard to find on LULU via a straight forward search at the moment - but then, I have only just this minute (quite literally) uploaded the thing and it probably takes LULU's search-engine a while to get going. Obviously it will not appear in a google search at all at present - a situation that will remain until I am totally happy and have registered the ISBN (but it is hugely cheaper to electronically download these things anyway rather than buy a physical copy through a bookshop, because of their enormous markup).

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One other thing - I have used an illuminated letter at the start of each chapter (in the hope of creating something of a Gothic feel - just a little bit of fun and frivolity) but it pushes up the file size so if anyone has any difficulty downloading please let me know and I'll upload the plain version. I am also think of quite quickly (for me that is) putting out a shortish followup / adendum to fill in the gaps and tie up loose ends before working on volume 3 per se - that would allow me to change scene entirely to a more domestic setting without having to worry over flashback scenes (at least in terms of flashbacks to the institution). What do you think? I actually really feel quite nervous at the moment to be honest with you, despite the positive response I got from volume 1 - volume 2 is a different beast in some ways and I'm a little worried that it all got a bit too ambitious (so please be gentle with me - I don't feel well).

Night - night...ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ

An Apology and A Very Short Snippet

I must apologise to all those waiting for the publication of volume 2 and those wondering what has happened to the blog of late. Both answers come down to the same thing; the evils of drink. You may recall I was going to a real ale festival when last we spoke, trouble was that I ended up attending all three days of it. Then the next day after it ended I met up with an old school mate for more of the same - then yet again on the following day. Then came Mother's day, requiring a pub lunch, and by the morning after that I was feeling so shaky that I had to have one or two 'medicinals'. Of course, predictably enough that just led into a couple more days of the same. Basically yesterday was my first totally 'dry' day and I'm still somewhat shaky. Nevertheless, I am on the mend and writing for volume 2 again (actually I got quite a lot written in pen during my pub visits that I have yet to get into the computer and should near enough complete the thing when I do). Other than remodeling the cover (I don't like the school girl / gymslip thing it presently incorporates and now find it a bit silly) it should be ready by next weekend.

I thought for today you might like to see a very short volume 2 snippet I have just written to link together two pieces of the story line - not much happens, but you should get a feel for that particular thread. By the way; I wonder what has become of Judith and her aunt (the pic above reminded me) it has been a long time since we have heard anything from that direction?

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A Return to the schoolroom

There had been changes-a-plenty in her absence, far reaching changes, going far beyond the outward appearance of the girls – though the new uniform was a drastic enough departure in itself. For one thing, in addition to the new school mistress, a new dormitory mistress had been installed, the previous woman having been transferred to another experiment. Not that Lavinia was to know anything about that, it had nothing to do with her - she was just another test-subject.

This new woman had brought with her an entire legacy and an approach almost entirely built on the quite unreasonable bitterness she still felt having been dismissed some time previously from a fairly high-flying post in control of the secure wing of a psychiatric hospital. That this had only been following a whole series of allegations of serious staff misconduct involving the long-term psychological and physical abuse of patients and that she had been lucky to escape legal redress, a lengthy investigation having implicated her in “fostering or allowing to develop” what had become a “deeply entrenched institutional culture of inappropriate treatment” did nothing to ameliorate the resentment she now carried with her.

Someone, then, had ‘blown the whistle’; someone had betrayed her trust. There would be no whistleblowers here; no investigative committee to poke, pry and probe. Indeed her unique style of management was something not only condoned but encouraged. Someone had to pay for the humiliation that still stung her - and what better salve could there be than the humiliation of others.

These girls she could equate quite happily with the mental patients she once had charge of. How they were treated once in the schoolroom per se each day, what they did in there, the school uniforms they wore; none of this was her doing and none of this was of interest to her. Once back in the dormitory however they became her girls once more: she was a psychiatric nursing expert and they were in her care.

As far she was concerned, once in her hands they were mental patients and the regime was to reflect this. They were to be treated like mental patients and expected to behave like mental patients. They were to be allowed to do nothing for themselves, neither dress nor undress or even feed themselves. The three meals they received in the dormitory each day- breakfast, dinner and supper - were to be spoon fed to them by the nurses; each girl being obliged to sit up stiffly in her bed, dressed in her hospital-issue latex nightdress and plastic knickers and with her hands on her head, fingers tightly interlocked, throughout her meal and while waiting - with two nurses and six girls there would always some element of waiting, but it all added to the sense of control and discipline.

It went without saying they would have to be dressed appropriately. It was to be straight out of those school uniforms - that she would never have approved of have if it had been up to her, it smacked far too much of normality -and into those night dresses and knickers she deemed more appropriate for good, well controlled mental patients, with their locking zippers, tamperproof waistbands and the wonderful adaptability of the flexible system of restraints they incorporated.

Not that she had neglected other, more conventional, means of restraint - six thick strong canvas and leather-strapped straitjackets, the traditional mainstay of the mental hospital, were to be always close at hand should any of her patients show even the slightest hint of rebellion. As would be a heavy yet supple length of bamboo and a selection of thick leather punishment straps of various lengths: once caned in a straitjacket, the tight crotch strap conveniently and invitingly parting the full, heavy fleshy globes of her buttocks, a patient was never quite the same person again.