If you are into choking, the bad news is that this is the least safe BDSM activity, it is responsible for the most numbers of death. The good news is that most of those deaths occur when people do it alone. Still, even if you do it as a couple, I strongly advise against it.
Choking, breath play or, more technically, erotic asphyxiation or asphyxiophilia, is used to refer to two very different types of actions. The first involves cutting the air supply to the lungs by choking or blocking the nose and the mouth. The second involves cutting blow flow to the brain, which is usually done by pressing on the carotid arteries. Spoiler alert: the second is much more dangerous than the first.
Of course, it is possible to interrupt the breathing of a bottom partner by other means. One popular one consists of sticking a cock deep into her mouth and then pinching the nose. This has the additional advantage of giving pleasure to the cock-owner and eliciting some interesting gagging reactions in the bottom. However, one thing I don’t understand is why in this type of situation the top is not concerned about having his cock bitten. Sure, any well-behaved submissive will never bite the cock that feeds her, but the body will do all kinds of weird stuff in a life-or-death situation. And breathing is our most basic drive.
OK, so we rule the cock as an instrument of asphyxiation, but there are still many other ways to stop a person from breathing, like putting a pillow or a bag over his nose and mouth. And, yes, this is safer than any of the other possibilities that I am examining. The body as a whole can store a good amount of oxygen. There are three main reservoirs: the air still present in your lungs, the hemoglobin in red blood cells and myoglobin in the muscles. Myoglobin is a protein similar to hemoglobin that is also able to bind oxygen. Cetaceans (whales and dolphins) have large amounts of myoglobin in their muscles that help them hold their breath for long periods of time. Free-divers learn to take advantage of these three reservoirs by different techniques to hold their breath underwater. I can comfortably free-dive for close to one minute, even while moving a lot. I once held my breath for 4 minutes, out of the water and relaxing. The world record in breath-holding is 22 minutes and 22 seconds, after hyperventilating in pure oxygen. But don’t get any ideas. As I said, this is done by trained people able to slow down their heartbeat and using sophisticated techniques to store as much oxygen in their bodies as possible. Importantly, the “air starving” drive that makes you want to breathe is not triggered by the lack of oxygen in your blood but by an excess of CO2. This can lead to dangerous situations (common in free-diving) in which you don’t feel like you need to breathe but are actually about to lose consciousness because there is not enough oxygen reaching your brain. So, if you want to engage in other types of breath play involving hyperventilating and then holding your breath (as I did as a teenager), you may want to learn a thing or two about the physiology involved.
Because of all this, even if asphyxiated to the point of loss of consciousness, most people will resume breathing and regain consciousness without any major consequences. However, this is only when said loss of consciousness doesn’t last more than a few seconds. Any longer than that and you risk having to perform CPR on a person who is unconscious and does not breathe on his own, as it happens with most drowning victims. After all, the centers that control breathing are themselves in the brain, so if the brain is not working they may stop functioning as well. And if the breath is stopped for several minutes there is a real possibility of brain damage.
What does all this have to do with choking? When you block the carotids to induce loss of consciousness and increase pleasure, you are starving neurons of oxygen and may be killing some of them. Keep in mind that you could have a substantial loss of neurons in your brain and not notice anything, because we are not conscious of most of what goes on in our brain. This happens to victims of concussion, who may suffer considerable brain damage without knowing it. The point is: you don’t know what is actually going on in your brain when you drive it close to unconsciousness, just because it is so much fun! Neurons could be dying while you party.
Let me explain why carotid occlusion is much more dangerous than other forms of asphyxiation. The key fact is that when you hold your breath, or when somebody blocks your breathing, there is a big reservoir of oxygen your body can use to stay alive. However, your brain does not have a similar store of oxygen. When you block the carotids, that’s it, your brain starts to run out of oxygen right away. That’s why people die much faster when their necks are cut than when they are strangled. There may be other complications of carotid occlusion, like cholesterol plaques being released from inside the carotids to cause strokes in the brain. But, even if you think you had a safe experience, there may be brain damage that you did not notice. As it happens with concussions (traumatic brain injury), injuries accumulate over time until all of a sudden the symptoms manifest themselves. And then is too damn late to do anything about it.
Choking, breath play or, more technically, erotic asphyxiation or asphyxiophilia, is used to refer to two very different types of actions. The first involves cutting the air supply to the lungs by choking or blocking the nose and the mouth. The second involves cutting blow flow to the brain, which is usually done by pressing on the carotid arteries. Spoiler alert: the second is much more dangerous than the first.
Choking
Straightforward choking, what we see in movies and TV, consists in pressing the neck to constrict the windpipe (trachea) to keep air from reaching the lungs. The trachea is a very delicate structure made of cartilage, a tissue similar to bone that also makes our joints. This makes the trachea semi-rigid, so applying pressure on it can deform it permanently. Around the trachea are also the vocal cords and the esophagus. Therefore, this form of choking can produce long-term damage affecting breathing, talking and swallowing. It should never be done, unless it is just fake choking not involving any real pressure on the neck and that does not block breathing.Of course, it is possible to interrupt the breathing of a bottom partner by other means. One popular one consists of sticking a cock deep into her mouth and then pinching the nose. This has the additional advantage of giving pleasure to the cock-owner and eliciting some interesting gagging reactions in the bottom. However, one thing I don’t understand is why in this type of situation the top is not concerned about having his cock bitten. Sure, any well-behaved submissive will never bite the cock that feeds her, but the body will do all kinds of weird stuff in a life-or-death situation. And breathing is our most basic drive.
OK, so we rule the cock as an instrument of asphyxiation, but there are still many other ways to stop a person from breathing, like putting a pillow or a bag over his nose and mouth. And, yes, this is safer than any of the other possibilities that I am examining. The body as a whole can store a good amount of oxygen. There are three main reservoirs: the air still present in your lungs, the hemoglobin in red blood cells and myoglobin in the muscles. Myoglobin is a protein similar to hemoglobin that is also able to bind oxygen. Cetaceans (whales and dolphins) have large amounts of myoglobin in their muscles that help them hold their breath for long periods of time. Free-divers learn to take advantage of these three reservoirs by different techniques to hold their breath underwater. I can comfortably free-dive for close to one minute, even while moving a lot. I once held my breath for 4 minutes, out of the water and relaxing. The world record in breath-holding is 22 minutes and 22 seconds, after hyperventilating in pure oxygen. But don’t get any ideas. As I said, this is done by trained people able to slow down their heartbeat and using sophisticated techniques to store as much oxygen in their bodies as possible. Importantly, the “air starving” drive that makes you want to breathe is not triggered by the lack of oxygen in your blood but by an excess of CO2. This can lead to dangerous situations (common in free-diving) in which you don’t feel like you need to breathe but are actually about to lose consciousness because there is not enough oxygen reaching your brain. So, if you want to engage in other types of breath play involving hyperventilating and then holding your breath (as I did as a teenager), you may want to learn a thing or two about the physiology involved.
Because of all this, even if asphyxiated to the point of loss of consciousness, most people will resume breathing and regain consciousness without any major consequences. However, this is only when said loss of consciousness doesn’t last more than a few seconds. Any longer than that and you risk having to perform CPR on a person who is unconscious and does not breathe on his own, as it happens with most drowning victims. After all, the centers that control breathing are themselves in the brain, so if the brain is not working they may stop functioning as well. And if the breath is stopped for several minutes there is a real possibility of brain damage.
Carotid occlusion
The carotid arteries form the main supply of blood to the brain. They run quite superficially on both sides of the neck. Cutting them, as we see in Games of Thrones and other gory TV series, will irreversibly lead to death in a matter of seconds. To stay conscious and alive the brain needs a continuous supply of oxygen and glucose from the blood. Neurons are the most finicky cells of the body: if they don’t get their oxygen they immediately throw a temper tantrum and die. Temper tantrum is quite an appropriate figure of speech because a neuron that is starving for oxygen will begin firing a lot of action potentials and releasing its neurotransmitters. The main excitatory neurotransmitter in the brain is the amino acid glutamate, which is also an abundant metabolite. When a neuron dies all of its glutamate is released into its surrounding medium, activating glutamate receptors in its nearby neurons. Too much activation of these glutamate receptors can kill those neurons, too, setting off a chain reaction that produces a wave of cell death spreading through the brain. This is what produces most of the brain damage during a stroke, which happens when a capillary inside the brain is blocked by a blood clot. So, why doesn’t this “wave of death” eventually kill the whole brain? Because there are cells in the brain (astrocytes, microglia and epithelial cells in the capillaries) that are in charge of preventing damage by absorbing glutamate and other neurotoxic substances. Still, considerable harm can be done before these cells manage to bring the situation under control. And, once neurons die, it is almost impossible to replace them.What does all this have to do with choking? When you block the carotids to induce loss of consciousness and increase pleasure, you are starving neurons of oxygen and may be killing some of them. Keep in mind that you could have a substantial loss of neurons in your brain and not notice anything, because we are not conscious of most of what goes on in our brain. This happens to victims of concussion, who may suffer considerable brain damage without knowing it. The point is: you don’t know what is actually going on in your brain when you drive it close to unconsciousness, just because it is so much fun! Neurons could be dying while you party.
Let me explain why carotid occlusion is much more dangerous than other forms of asphyxiation. The key fact is that when you hold your breath, or when somebody blocks your breathing, there is a big reservoir of oxygen your body can use to stay alive. However, your brain does not have a similar store of oxygen. When you block the carotids, that’s it, your brain starts to run out of oxygen right away. That’s why people die much faster when their necks are cut than when they are strangled. There may be other complications of carotid occlusion, like cholesterol plaques being released from inside the carotids to cause strokes in the brain. But, even if you think you had a safe experience, there may be brain damage that you did not notice. As it happens with concussions (traumatic brain injury), injuries accumulate over time until all of a sudden the symptoms manifest themselves. And then is too damn late to do anything about it.
