- Question submitted by Anonymous and answered by Whiskey Blue as part of Everyone Is Gay: Second Opinions.

Whiskey Says:

Hi! What a great question. Thanks for sending it. I’m going to start right from the beginning. Ready?

What is BDSM? The acronym means Bondage, Discipline, Sadism and Masochism. The dynamic consists of a powerplay between a dominant partner and a submissive partner. The practices are countless—from spanking to tying each other up to toys and tools that facilitate creating BDSM scenes between consenting partners.

But what is BDSM really about? Our impulse might be to reduce BDSM to a specific act or set of acts—or a random image of a person tied up in a dungeon—but at its core BDSM refers to a playful exchange of power between consenting partners who have set down boundaries and chosen a safe word to use if anyone begins to feel they’re out of their comfort zone. BDSM doesn’t refer to any specific act, practice, or fetish. It requires trust on both parts, and open communication beforehand so that all parties can come up with the scene (the setting, the practice, toys, anything!) and, most importantly, communicate what is okay and what isn’t okay.

Now, all of this being said, if you don’t want to be slapped you don’t want to be slapped. Maybe you will never want to be slapped. Maybe that’s a hard limit. Maybe one day you’ll be open to it and it can be a soft limit and maybe it will turn out you like it. Maybe you’ll never want to try. All of these possibilities are totally okay and totally legitimate.

As for potentially trying BDSM with your girlfriend, you could start by asking her if there are any specific practices she’s particularly interested in. Maybe she can tell you what she knows about these practices, and why they’re enticing to her. Then you can do any kind of research you want. I think talking about this a few times will greatly relieve anxieties you have about BDSM as a concept, and that talking about specific practices will help you focus on a specific idea or image rather than tackling the infinite world that can be called BDSM. I recommend having multiple conversations with your girlfriend. This way you can take your time. You can avoid feeling rushed or feeling like you’re expected to do anything you’re not ready or willing to do. You can also do some research on your own (here’s a great Salon article about safe sex kink practices for teenagers).

If you decide to explore BDSM with your girlfriend, start out with something that you both can agree on and something that doesn’t scare you. I don’t want to assign any specific value to any specific BDSM practice but… let’s just say you started with the possibility of spanking. Spanking is a popular practice that can be very gentle. Partners can work their way up in terms of intensity depending on needs and desires. The potential for injury or damage is very low if this is done conscientiously. Start off really gentle and go from there. Start off with just one. Start off just talking about it, even.

If spanking is not of interest to you or if it’s triggering, there are other ways to explore a light powerplay. You could go so far (or not far) as to lie down with your arms above your head— pretending you’re bound, pretending you can’t move them. This gives you the sensation of relinquishing control without being physically constrained. Alternately, of course, your partner can lie on her back with her arms above her head, depending on who will be dominant and who will be submissive. You can take turns, too.

You can also write a script! Who is going to be dominant? Who is going to be submissive? Where will the setting be? What will the act be? You can establish hard limits, too, which means that you can explain what you would consider going too far. This ensures that, from the very beginning, you get to establish what is absolutely off the table for this first encounter. Then you can choose a safe word together (Dan Savage’s safe word is popcorn) and use it when one of you wants to stop. Say the spanking is a bit harder than you’d like—popcorn!Say your partner is asking you to slap her in the face but you’re not ready—popcorn! Say you’re not into hanging out tonight—just kidding, I guess you don’t need a safe word for that. Anyway, start by talking it out, then talk it out again, and again. Then take it as slow or as fast as you like, and let me know how it goes.

***

Click through to read more about Whiskey and our other Second Opinions panelists!