Punishment and Reward?

Theoretical scenario:  If I am smarting off or being impatient with my husband, and then he spanks me, but then I just go on fairly soon back to the same behavior, doesn't  that mean that whatever we're doing isn't working?  If this dd thing is working for the reasons we set it up to be, I would think I would be getting less spankings...... wouldn't I?  *Looks around*  Wouldn't you?  

Of course, this brings out the obvious: that many of us are spankos. But, are we specifically choosing dd (and sometimes calling it ttwd) so that there are almost always spankings?  How can spanking be both the punishment and the reward?  I think this has been part of my own internal struggle.  For those of us who have things other than spanking or in addition to it that we desire and/or that "pushes our yummy buttons," I still ask the same question.  How can action by the dominant partner be administered and then received by the submissive as both the punishment and the reward? 

I understand that some have their dynamic set up where there is such thing as a reward type spanking.  But, for me, it can never be a reward because that doesn't fit in my ideal headspace.  It would fit nicely in the D/s area just like it used for me before I stumbled upon an area of opinion on the internet and led me into thinking classic dd was the only way to have the spanking thing work as discipline.  Looking back over my blogging years, I was and still am wanting to explore my submissiveness, but I was sometimes embarrassed around others (virtually) by that label because I learned not every wife associates spanking with submission (although I don't see how that is even possible unless it's only "play.")  Obviously dd is a label, too, but it was the very one that many of us were trying to find our place in, so there was a community that seemed to accept mainly that. 

It's my own fault for feeling influenced by statements such as, "My partner would never hurt me (punish).  Spank me, yes."  Huh?  First of all, semantics.  Second, if the spanking doesn't hurt, then no wonder why we keep going back to it.  We aren't intimidated by it.  It isn't a deterrent.  Because it's a kink?  Apparently one that is more about the idea of spanking, being told to bend over, and a bit of the feels of the physical impact sometimes followed by sex, which is fine, but for some of us it is not the complete answer.  

Even if it truly hurts enough or is just slightly more than one prefers, overall it still seems like a rewarding situation.  Or could it simply be the cycle of being disciplined for reasons established ahead of time, accepting one's punishment, and then cashing in the rewards of the whole dynamic?  If spanking is NOT a kink for you, then that is or can be a whole different ball game with a new set of rules.  I think.  

In his book, Spank Her!, the late great Devlin O'Neil offers some insight:

"There might be a girl who needs very much to be spanked, but who would never ask for such a thing. She may, however, go to great lengths to find a man who can satisfy that need, and then do whatever it takes to let him know what she requires. These are often girls who give themselves to one man only, and then only when he proves he will come and get her, then do whatever is necessary to sort her out. This girl desperately needs boundaries, and at the same time she will fight desperately against having any such boundaries imposed. Only when this man has shown her, usually by spanking her bottom hard and making her listen to him when he tells her that she has no choice but to accept the boundaries he thinks best for her, will she accept that he is in charge and come to him fully. She accepts this change of attitude gratefully, if not always graciously, but is the sort of girl who easily forgets the lessons of the past, so that he must repeat them often. She does not forget these lessons because she is stupid, but because it is too easy for feelings of insecurity to cloud her judgment, for her to lose that sense of his presence if she is not actually in his arms or across his lap, and for her to want to push the boundaries again, just to see if he is still there to..."

Hmm.  I think there are many angles to look at this.  What's your angle?  Please share with me.