The Heretic's Opus

Adult Consensual Erotic and/or Disciplinary Spanking Within the Context of a bDDsm Lifestyle
Copyright [May 22, 2005] by [Raheretic]


I am the Alpha Dominant member of a heterosexual female, male, female, polyamorous, “V”, triad, intentional family. We describe our sensual/erotic orientation as bDDsm connoting the practice of Domestic Discipline within the over arching context of a BDSM relationship. We believe the practice of domestic discipline is a specialized practice of BDSM, and that there are many other BDSM practices as well. While we play and love in many ways, the practice of adult consensual erotic and/or disciplinary spanking is for us a primary expression of erotic excitement, intimate connection, and fun. We also use it to stimulate change in our relationships and or behaviors when that is necessary. Within our family we have all consented that we each are subject to potential discipline as determined appropriate from the other two family members.


How Did An Educated Middle Class Caring Professional Come to Enjoy and Need to Give and Receive Painful Spankings With the Women He Loves/Cares About?


My earliest erotic memories are of masturbating to fantasies of spanking girls/women. I don’t know why. I’ve never known why. I didn’t ask to have this orientation. It’s always been a reality in my life. It’s been the source of great self-hatred. I’ve gone to therapists to be cured of it. They had no cures. I’ve lived through a lifeless, horrid marriage in which I could not express this. I’ve felt that I must be the only person who felt like this, and that I must be a monster for my evil “proclivity.” I spent years pouring over Readers’ Forum sections of magazines like “Playboy,” “Penthouse,” and “Variations” for the occasional letter from a spanking enthusiast, or even better, the rare article about this sexual variation. I thrilled to learn there were others for whom this reality existed, and to see there were, in fact, mental health professionals who felt it was a legitimate sexual variation. Eventually, with the advent of the VCR, I went to adult bookstores and found videotapes depicting spanking motifs. Wow, there must be enough of us to bother to invest significant capital to produce large numbers of videos like this! I was becoming less alone. Along the way, I had some spanking affairs: secret liaisons with women who came to care for me, and who were willing to share this, my main expression of erotic connection, fun, and excitement. Coincidentally, the ending of my first marriage coincided with my first cyber awareness. I had an AOL account. I typed “spanking” into the search engine. My god, there were thousands of entries, essays, stories, pictures, and folks offering to help others understand. I was a recently separated man, going through divorce, and as is so often the case, in a post marital “sport fucking” phase. I developed a profile on adult connection Internet services. I developed a toy bag of spanking implements. I had a lot of success. Over two years I likely spanked two or three dozen different women some once, others as part of on-going dating relationships. Eventually, I learned there was a BDSM group in my community. I met some of the group’s leaders for lunch. I had never talked with more than one person at a time about my erotic orientation to spanking. I was amazed there was a community of us! I attended a Board meeting of the organization. I sat at a long table with a dozen and a half people all of whom shared spanking/BDSM as an orientation. They didn’t have two heads. They didn’t have “pervert” inscribed on their forehead in scarlet letters. They looked like normal people—all ages—all walks of life—all colors.

They had a party in a rented lodge at a state park. I attended with a date. There were spankings and other forms of BDSM activity occurring all over. I’d never seen a man bottom. I watched amazed as a woman tied her nude husband, a tall strapping fellow, to a pillar, and flogged him severely for an hour. I had terrifically mixed feelings about that. I was still feeling that men were somehow “innately” Tops, and had no understanding of how or why a man would submit to that. I was told that this man and woman were both “switches” and that at a previous party it was she who was bound and flogged, and he who had held the whip hand. I was as a kid in a candy store.

During the party I encountered one of the women with whom I’d lunched. She had seen me play, and offered to come to my apartment with her submissive and play. As we did so, she told me that I was practicing BDSM with “far more enthusiasm than skill.” She offered to give me technical training in the how-to’s of BDSM practice. She was viewed by many, within the BDSM community, as a “guru.” She had been in practice for 35 years at that point. I was pleased to have this opportunity so generously made available to me.

Training expanded my horizons. I had paddles and some crude straps. She had a huge and varied collection of professional quality implements. I learned to use a flogger, dressage whip, quirts, and straps of various materials. I learned the different types of sensations these implements could create, as well as, of course, my beloved paddles. I learned by topping her after she would demonstrate techniques on me. This was a mind-blowing experience. I was bottoming. I would never have to imagine what it felt like to be a bottom again. I now knew. I knew how to create pleasure, to create building endorphin release that could make even intense pain stimuli pleasant, or to create extreme pain. I was taught where to hit. If my control was weak and I struck an unsafe area, I was immediately disciplined for it. I never imagined myself bottoming. I wasn’t harmed by it. Not only was it educational, I learned it could be pleasant. I became a switch. I became a BDSM practitioner, not simply a beater of bottoms with paddles.

A few years later, I married a wonderful woman, my submissive, sly (teresa), who is my wife today, and while she lost her masochistic orientation due to a serious and horribly painful illness years later, she remains my committed service submissive. She has become an excellent Top, an orientation she once found as impossible as I found the likelihood I would ever relate as a bottom. We also live with sly’s sister-heart, and my slave and great love Sue (Rahereticsswan), who wears my initials ritually carved into the back of her shoulder as her symbol of my ownership of her. She is a pure masochist and high-end player. We have fun “freaking out” newbies in dungeons at BDSM conferences with the intensity of our play.

I no longer hate myself. My erotic orientation is a gift. I am skilled at relating to those for whom I care in ways that can please those who share my gift. I can create erotic pleasure for them or sadomasochistic intensity. I can help women make changes in their life that they desperately want to accomplish, but have been unable to muster the motivation to achieve. I can bottom, and go into subspace with the best of bottoms. I can help new persons to this life understand their orientation is just that, an orientation, not a curse, and not a reason to hate themselves. I can help them grow in their BDSM practice. I can keep them safe as they explore.

It has been a journey, but it is one that fills my life with joy and love, not self-denigration and longing as once was my lot. My life long question was: “how can I, a compassionate, caring, loving, man, enjoy inflicting painful spankings on people whom I loved?” I now know that those “painful” stimuli are intense sensations conveying erotic and loving connection.

I will go on to discuss some of the technical aspects of bDDsm spanking practice I’ve learned.

Erotic Spanking

Sensual/erotic spanking involves the intentional building of sensations starting with relatively mild “thuddy” not very painful implements which can be applied in successively more intense styles and materials, allowing a bottom to “ladder” up in the secretion of endorphins. The goal is to create such gradual escalation of sensation that one adjusts at each level to not only tolerate the spanking they are receiving, but come to enjoy it. Eventually this will result in reaching a state of endorphin intoxication known as “sub space.” Once there, even intensely stinging and painful stimuli, become bearable and a source of pleasure. Throughout this process intervals of sensually pleasurable stimulation such as massage, or stroking with a knifepoint, or with soft fur, or the tip of an implement, can further enhance the pleasure of this kind of experience. The Top in this kind of experience needs to become sensitive to the non-verbal nuances of his partner. Most people become barely verbal to non-verbal once sub-space is achieved.

The types of implements which could be employed in this sort of spanking are so varied and numerous it would be difficult, in one essay, to explain all the techniques that one might employ in this regard. It is likely one would learn this sort of technique through observation and or actual technical training.

Disciplinary Spanking

I believe the truest and most effective disciplinary spanking is the old fashioned switching. I am referring here to spanking with a whippy tree or bush branch, a “switch,” not to the power exchange in which practitioners change roles from Top to bottom. Performed as described here, a switching can be an effective form of discipline and/or very intensive sadomasochistic play, and can be safe and loving.


The selection of a switch is important both physically and psychologically. A good switch will likely be about 3/8 inch thick on the handle end and will be very green in the interest of it's being as whippy as possible, most likely about two and a half feet to three feet in length and relatively straight and as free of "buds" as possible. I like having submissive partners, whether in play or serious discipline select their own switches. I send them out on a switch hunting expedition with a mandate that they must return with a certain number of switches that will then be used on their bare bottom. I actually have a special pair of pruning nippers that are used only for the cutting of switches. When those are brought out and handed to the submissive, she is aware that her bottom is in very large trouble. I tell submissives that if they return with any switches that are inappropriate or insufficient that those switches will be immediately used on them until they are worn out and that they will then be required to go back out and select two to replace them. By way of preparation, switches should have all twigs, etc., broken or cut off them. These rods having been produced by nature, and not a factory, will not be perfectly uniform and straight. Buds on switches can add a great deal to the severity of the sensation they inflict. Switches are severe anyway without the enhancement of buds. I usually trim larger buds from a switch, preferring to have the pain inflicted by the switch tip and not bumps further up the switch.
Once selected I usually have the submissive scrub the switches with antibacterial soap to assure their cleanliness (I have rarely broken skin with a switch--but an errant switch stroke is capable of doing that--and thus I want them as clean as possible just in case). Then they are placed in a bathtub of warm water to soak. This not only assures cleanliness, it enhances the switch's pliancy and thus the sting it will inflict. I find the bottom’s apprehension about her impending switching is enhanced by her handling and preparing the switch. I often will have her whisk it in the air a few times to listen to its sound, and of course to imagine what it will feel like when it whisks across her bottom.I usually will prescribe a time when the switching will occur. For example, there might be a switch hunting expedition at dawn for a switching which will occur at 2:00 that day. The submissive will be required to check the switches soaking in the bathtub frequently and to keep the water in the tub warm, so that the switches retain maximum pliancy and thus ability to sting.
It is not uncommon for bottoms, thus prepared, to be in tears as their switching time approaches. A switching should begin with a preparatory spanking with a hand or relatively softer leather implement. The spanking should begin with very light loving pats and progress through mild and then moderate spanking. The preparatory spanking is complete when the submissive partner’s bottom is bright pink or mildly red and stingy. This not only sensitizes the bottom to maximize the sensation the switching will inflict, but dilates the blood vessels in the buttocks and reduces bruising.
At times, I have then called off a switching at that point, deciding that the bottom, beside herself with anticipation, and expecting to be severely whipped, has suffered enough psychologically. After placing her in position and making noisy switch strokes in the air or against a couch, etc., I will then tell the bottom that if anything like this happens again that the switching will actually be administered but doubly, and prescribe a bed time spanking as a reminder. There are other instances, when I follow through to carry out a switching.Administering a safe sound switching requires some skill. As with all spanking techniques, where to hit, how to hit, and how often to hit are the major considerations. I underwent professional Dominant training. In training the bottom partner wore thong underwear. The areas that are legitimate to hit are left exposed by thong underwear. Areas that are covered by thong underwear are strictly off limits and can be dangerous tostrike in any form of spanking. Switches are not uniform in length, curvature, etc. So caution must be taken to be able to gauge distance and position of the Dominant partner so that he can be assured of where his strokes will fall. I often in the midst of a switching will play on a nearby pillow for a few strokes to get the feel of that switch before actually whipping it on the bottom. Bottoms usually seem to appreciate my being so deliberate inmeasuring the strokes they are about to receive. The greatest danger in switching, besides errant strokes that could strike in areas like lower back or the spine, where serious nerve damage could be inflicted, is "wrapping." During a switching you never want the middle part of the switch to land in the center of the buttocks allowing the tip to “wrap” around the hip, thigh, upper leg, etc. That greatly intensifies the speed of the switch tip and can cause severe and lasting bruising, and can even break the skin--not to mention inflicting even more excruciating pain than appropriately applied switch strokes will already inflict.Switch strokes are not administered with force but with wrist flicking moderate speed. I usually have each stroke culminate from the switch's having traveled two to three feet in its path to the bottom.
Frequency is important. Really rapid spankings with any form of implement bruise much more. I was trained in “four second rule.” This rule prescribes that in any spanking strokes should never be administered more frequently than one each 4 seconds unless bruising/marking is a goal. With switching I would expand that to at the very minimum every 6 seconds and frequently space blows far more broadly than that. A switch stroke sensation builds over time. The initial contact with the bottom hurts startlingly (the usual comment is, “it took my breath away”). The sensation builds and worsens for severalseconds after the initial blow. Intervals between strokes allow the bottom partner to fully absorb the sensation of each distinct stroke and to minimize the physical damage to the bottom that is inflicted.I always use restraint of some sort with a switching. It is virtually impossible for a bottom, no matter how experienced, to hold still for a switching. It is important for the bottoms safety that strokes be controlled and the movement of the target can result in unintended damage to a loved one receiving caring discipline, or sadomasochistic play. I use a professionally designed kneeling restraint bench, although ottomans and soft canvasstraps used in camping work very well to support someone, and keep them immobilized during a switching. A switch is not an implement for over the knee position spanking, in my opinion.I often will follow a switching with an aftermath spanking similar to the warm up spanking administered prior to the switching. Usually I will tell the bottom, upon the completion of her switching, that she may rest and recuperate remaining in restraint as long as she desires, and that she will be taken over my knee for an aftermath spanking when she decides it is time. She may then rest there until she is ready to politely ask me to remove her restraints and take her over my knee and complete her spanking. Aftermath spankings are not particularly severe in and of themselves, but in theaftermath of a switching, bottoms often perceive them to be serious blisterings.After all the switching experience is complete I apply ice to the buttocks. A simple, and very effective, approach is to keep couple of plastic bags of frozen peas in the freezer. I then place one bag over each buttock until the bags are thawed, and then apply aloe lotion to the buttocks. Emotional aftercare is of course as important as caring for the skin. Holding, caressing, reassuring, forgiving, etc., should be something you both willwant by the end of a switching. While this sort of spanking is often intended to motivate a behavior change, it typically also results in strong emotional connection between the two partners as well.Prospective bottoms often ask if they "could handle" the pain of a switching. I'm sure can you see from this discussion, switching is severe corporal punishment. I "can't handle" the pain of a switching, and I have only met two true masochists who can (they actually enjoyed it). I guess the question is, if what we are discussing is true discipline, should that discipline be something you "can handle," or is being forced to submit to something you find intolerable, a more effective deterrent or chastisement. I have worked with bottoms who wanted disciplinary support to help them control behaviors which they were failing to control (e. g., smoking, overeating, excessive drinking, compulsive spending, etc.) After one, or in some cases, two sound switchings, it becomes clear that anytime they violate their behavioral program, just such another switching will be inflicted without fail, or hesitation, they then changed behaviors that all previous attempts to control had failed to change.

In Conclusion

The role of spanking in my life has evolved from a primordial curse to the main expression of love, intimacy, and connection in my life. I love spending time with others with whom my family and I can be who we are without pretense and stigma. I love traveling with others on their journey to self-awareness in this lifestyle.

RAHeretic

“Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life you’ve imagined.”
……………..Henry David Thoreau ________________________________________________________________________