Ones of the core fundamentals of BDSM is safety. It is your responsibility to educate yourself, understand the risks and be able to discuss them with your play partner(s) so you can give informed consent. Engaging in BDSM impact play is high risk, without adequate knowledge, skills and safety precautions it can be very dangerous. Learning how to warm up, the safe impact zones and understanding that mistakes and accidents can and will happen will help you understand the risks and the importance of safety when engaging in any forms of BDSM Impact Play.
What is a warm up and why should you do it?
Warm-up spanks, when done lightly and intensified slowly, will do a magical job of teasing the bottom. Slowly putting them in a relaxed mental and physical state, with mild pain and pleasure, as they start to drift off and embrace the actions. Teasing them as they want more and more, slowly giving them what they want, you can watch them as they get more into the scene, where some will drift off into subspace, and then the real fun can begin!
Warm-up spanks are most commonly done with the hand as it’s the easiest to control the force. Your hand will also give you a general feeling of what they feel and the warmth of the skin as the blood starts to flow. Slowly implementing a light toy, such as a crop, will allow the Top to swap away from their hand and ease into more implements. Proper warm-up before an impact scene is imperative. It allows both parties to enjoy the scene more, the bottom will be able to take more, and both to have a more enjoyable time. Watch their body language throughout, it will usually tell a pretty good tale of how they’re doing mentally. If they’re jumping at every light spank, they may need to be calmed down a bit in other ways before carrying on, such as cuddling, stroking the skin, talking to them. Once they’re relaxed and starting to poke out their pert bottom for more, then that’s a sign they are enjoying it and an open invitation to carry on! The main thing is to go slow, it’s not a race.
Warm-up spanks, whips, or impact in any form is very important for a variety of reasons. Focusing on spanking, warm-up spanks are a series of lighter spanks (with your hand or light impact item) intended to “awaken” the area. This will wake up the skin, trigger blood flow to the area, and help protect the muscles from trauma. They also give the bottom a taste of what’s to come. They’re a great way to “feel” each other out, allowing both the Top and bottom to understand how the other will act when the play becomes more intense. Different areas will produce different reactions on different people, as well as potentially showing “trigger” areas that might have been overlooked during negotiations.
Areas of the body suitable for impact play and areas to avoid
Safe
- bottom
- backs of thighs
- fronts of thighs
- forearms
Low Risk
- inner thighs
- calves
- backs of shoulders
- upper arms
High Risk
- shins
- feet
- knees
- hands
- head
- stomach
- chest
- lower back
- spine
- back of neck
Avoid
- Achilles tendons (back of feet)
- backs of knees
- elbows
- armpits
- wrists
- ears
- front of neck
You can find pictures of impact play body charts all over the internet, some are okay, some not so much. Below is the link to my prefered BDSM Impact Play Safe Zones chart.
Accidents Happen – how do you deal with it?
There is a reason why you must have informed consent from your play partner prior to engaging in any forms of impact play. That’s because there is always a risk of something going wrong, mistakes and accidents happen. The more knowledge, education, skills and experience someone has reduces the likelihood of mistakes but no amount of knowledge, education, skill and experience can eliminate accidents happening. Accidents will happen it’s how we prepare, react and deal with them is what matters most.
As a Top, Dom(me), D-type
Accidents happen to all of us; Top, bottom, Dom(me), sub. As a Top, accidents can happen in a variety of ways, broken toys, missed the impact spot, got carried away, etc. The main thing to remember is to communicate with the bottom when this happens. How you communicate largely depends on negotiations beforehand and how well you know the bottom. It could be to stop the scene completely to check in and see how they are doing and if they even noticed the accident. Remember that they may be in subspace and have endorphins and adrenaline flowing, so be careful how you pull them out of it. It could be something like wrapping your hand around their shoulders and admitting that you made a mistake, then asking if they noticed, are okay, and if they would like to carry on. The main thing is to just tell them and make sure they are comfortable before carrying on. If these mistakes happen, make a mental note of them and use them for future negotiations. Having some feedback afterwards can really help in establishing and reinforcing a relationship where both parties openly communicate.
As a bottom, sub, slave, s-type
Stop the scene. It’s much better to stop the scene right here then continue as if nothing ever happened. Continuing as if nothing ever happened destroys trust in the relationship. When your Top knows that you will speak up if something happens that’s outside your comfort zone, such as a mistake or accident, and that you will stop the scene, should be a huge relief to them. Accidents happen; subs make them, Tops make them, we all make them. The play can always continue after both parties have examined the situation and agreed to continue. How you stop the scene will depend on what was negotiated; there may be a safeword, such as yellow or red, or any other way you have discussed and agreed to stop the scene. It is of the utmost importance to communicate what has happened at this point in time as this will ensure that the scene, or play, continues in a safe manner. Whatever you do, don’t continue as if nothing ever happened.
Contributors: This article was researched and written by Mistress Michelle and published by Umlindi.
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