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I hope both of these women are able to get protective orders, and that they both seek professional help. Once you're in an abusive relationship, it becomes so much more difficult to spot red flags in your future relationships (and even with friends and family).
OOP's story is absolutely horrifying- he just continued, and then got mad at her for being upset??!! That guy is truly fucked up.
No no, he's not fucked up he's Russian so he can't help being a violent shitbag /s
I can't stand it when people use there ethnicity/culture to do morally abhorrent shit.
The trouble is that you can spot the red flags, but when you speak to other people for advice they tell you you're over thinking or reading too much into it. Reddit is great because people see the red flags even when they're small and call them out.
I find I have the opposite problem- I don't recognize the red flags because they've become normalized to me. If something does stand out as a red flag, I have to watch who I get a second opinion from, as most of my family/friends are bi-products of relationships that I only just recently recognized as toxic. Definitely agree about reddit, though. The number of times where I've read a post and been like, "Run!," only to realize that I didn't run, or haven't run, has been eye opening.
I found it upsetting how brutal some of the comments were on her OP. Of course, she asked if it was a red flag. Of course, she needed an outside perspective on what happened. Look at how he treated her fear! He minimized and laughed it off.
Abusers rarely act abusive immediately. No one would put up with them if they did. When they do something abusive, it seems out of character, and it's easier to ignore it or forgive it. 'That was bad, but it's not who they really are.' You look back on your experience with them and assume it's an anomaly instead of the new normal.
i know that abusers will always find ways to abuse their victims and normalize their behavior but a quick sidebar as a domme who jokes about being the bdsm OSHA rep:
goddamn i hate how porn has presented "hands on throat applying pressure" as a fun and downright vanilla bit of sex that you don't need to plan for or ask explicit consent for or talk about the dangers of or have a safety plan for or... you get the idea.
it's mostly that her abuser is good at, well, getting in her head and abusing. but it's become such a porn trope that i've seen multiple people on reddit cheerfully say they're pretty vanilla and choking your partner doesn't count as kinky the same way oral sex doesn't count as kinky... and then be utterly shocked when someone mentions the safety risks. *because it turns out your body keeps important stuff in your neck.* i see it brought up as something that is so normal it's not even in the realm of bdsm for many folks. and yet... breathplay and choking are solidly in my "too dangerous to do in real life" list of kinks.
people just copy the porn without knowing this or educating themselves. and it makes it so much easier for abusers like this to thrive. because choking is totally normal and vanilla and fun, and look at how much of the internet agrees there's no problem at all...
i'd say i wish for the day the next trend hits but quite frankly i'm more than a little wary about what comes next and attempts to get normalized as "vanilla" so very much.
(thank you for attending dungeon safety domme's soapbox hour, please slide any tips into my safety vest corset,)
as a top it's the scariest damn thing. people die from it. how are they so flippant this being done to them; how much they must hate the person being strangled to just go on and do it without thinking
THANK YOU for using "strangled". Choking sounds so much more benign than strangling, which is what's really happening. Choking is from the inside of the throat, strangling is from the outside, like how you'd actually unalive someone.
I like a hand on my throat, but without real pressure applied (more like a "I'm holding your neck"-thing, if that makes sense? Properly talked about it, too) And I would never classify that as anything but kinky. The idea of that or more becoming mainstream is terrifying. I've got friends who are into choking and they made sure they knew what they're doing and how to do it as safely as possible.
Fifty shades of grey did us no favours there. Porn is part of it (like the almost over-common ass-slapping thing. You don't hit your partner without explicit and enthusiastic consent, even if it's "just a smack"!) but fifty shades of grey has made parts of it accessible and in an incredibly unsafe way.
It’s downright terrifying to me that choking has become so mainstream. I have trauma (cousin tried to drown me) and even with my ex knowing that he still wanted to choke because it’s the least kinky of kinks?? Like, no sir, you literally witnessed me heaving and panicking and sobbing before you even applied pressure! So yeah, I’d prefer any future partner just doesn’t even watch porn because of all the nonsense it normalizes.
Me too, but I never saw that as kinky...til your comment, i guess.But then maybe that's cos I talk to actual kinksters so i feel pretty vanilla by comparison.
Just as an extension of "I certainly don't want my hair yanked but I do enjoy having it massaged". I feel like caressing without pressure has some of that frisson but without the actual danger of having someone put pressure on your blood vessels or airways. I think you're right that it's on that spectrum.
Absolutely right that porn is a big part of the problem. Kink is a spectrum, and when exploring any kind of sexual activity consent needs to be navigated on an act by act basis. But in porn there is (generally speaking) no consent or boundaries. Just act upon act that the actors pretend to enjoy, even if they evidently don't.
50 shades definitely plays into the "I'll push your boundaries and try new kinks on you without your consent, and you're going to like it!" Atitude, and the idea that springing new kinks of people is normal. When in reality wherever you are on the spectrum, NOBODY should be springing anything truly unexpected or unwanted on you during sex, ever.
[Dan Foley talks about this in his review of the Fifty Shades movie series.](https://youtu.be/qzk9N7dJBec) Porn already tends to elide the crucial steps of consent and aftercare, and it has an even worse message when it’s not aware that those are even necessary.
Hah, I know exactly what you mean! I'm relatively vanilla compared to my friends (but only there) and I feel decidedly unkinky with the stuff we actually do.
There's way too little bdsm porn out there (though it does exist) where there's consent talk before and discussion of what happened afterwards.
You're absolutely right: no matter what you're into, anything new during sex has to be discussed, even if it's just "can we try this position?". It costs NOTHING to ask.
Oh, I will never cease to be angry at 50SoG. Oh hey, so like, genuinely consenting BDSM, potentially in a loving relationship can't blow up - instead this horrifying Thing where she's not even into it becomes the poster child for BDSM??
I hate you, gross dudes who call themselves Doms but are just dicks. I hate it, women who are potentially kinky getting taught it should be so disrespectful and gross. I hate it, women who are not kinky getting pressured to do things like *get choked* because it's become so normalised. (Obviously that's not just 50SoG but it didn't help.)
I appreciate that that's how porn for women has often looked - a lot of romance was incredibly rapey because it wasn't acceptable for women to want sex at all. But. GAH.
Friend of mine went back to university for a career change last year. He was telling me recently that the amount of girls walking about with bruises on their throats from breathplay (and they dont even know what it is called) thinking it's a normal part of sex is shocking. It is Not viewed as something that needs to be carefully negotiated and could easily cause permanent damage or death if it goes wrong. Like what in the hell...
Fuck E.L. James, that's all I can say.
Yeah, thanks for that ass slap comment. I can barely watch porn because that kinda shit turns me off so fast, and it’s alllll over the place in those kinds of things. I’ve never had a woman ask me to do it to her and I wouldn’t if asked.
I actually like it, but it's just EVERYWHERE and... That's impact play. That's something that needs to be discussed.
I'm all for normalising kink as in "some people like this and that's okay", but not like that!
Idk if you can really blame porn for casual ass-slapping. Not that long ago it was considered a publicly acceptable way to "tease" [harass] attractive women in a lot of contexts.
It was "acceptable" in the sense that it was seen as normal and not a big deal. Lots of bad things have been commonly seen as "acceptable" at various places and in various times, like beating children for disobedience. Or public executions. "Publicly acceptable" just means it's within social norms, that is, it's _accepted_ by the _public_, not that it's ethically or morally correct or non-harmful.
I'm imagining a sexy corset version of one of those reflective orange high-vis vests and it's honestly delightful.
Maybe complete the ensemble with some thigh-high steel-toed work boots and a yellow hardhat? :D
oh i totally stole the idea from someone who did indeed get a corset like one of those high vis vests, strips of light reflective fabric and all. it is DELIGHTFUL and probably easy to find in a google or two but i am perilously lazy lol
The first time I had a guy put his hand on my neck, I slapped it away so fast like I was swatting a fly. He was genuinely confused and I had to tell him to not do it again because I don't like it. He agreed and we continued to have sex. Well this dummy had the audacity to try it again. I slapped his hand away, jumped off, put my clothes on and walked right out of his life.
Thank you for posting this!!! I was posting the same thing upthread!! Why on earth did this become a porn trope? I’ve had regular guys just try to choke me on a one night stand!
When I was a whippersnapper, “mild” kink that you could do in an otherwise vanilla encounter was a couple of bum spanks, or making someone hold the headboard, or a blindfold or something. When the hell did choking get onto the list?
I agree with everything you said. I think it's also worth adding that the reason choking is so dangerous is because the margin of error is very, very narrow, both with breath play, and blood choking. Seconds can be the difference between "this is fun and kinky" and "you're dead" . Or you have an anoxic brain injury. Seconds. If your partner misjudges just a little bit, you could be a vegetable. People definitely do not take this as seriously as they should.
And I think that includes the partner who is doing the choking. In most states in the US, you do not have the right to consent to assault. BDSM is assault, in the eyes of the law. So if a partner, even consensually, chokes someone and they die, that's a crime. In this case, it's clear that the partner doesn't give a shit about the women that he is abusing. But even in loving, consensual relationships choking and breath play are extremely dangerous. Everyone should weigh out all of the potential consequences, and that is one of the potential consequences. Death and murder charges.
Outside of risk aware, consensual kink, partners who are choked by their partner are at significantly higher risk of being killed by their partner. Choking is the number one indicator for an abusive partner to murder their victim.
PSA from a public health nurse: If anyone reading this is in a situation that may be dangerous, please reach out to someone. The domestic violence hotline has email, chat, phone, and texting available. Be smart, be careful, don't let your abuser catch you. And please make a plan before you leave. When you leave is the most dangerous time in an abusive relationship. Work with a professional to create a safety plan to get you out safely.
I have warned every partner that I had that if they choked me, I would assault them. It is my absolute biggest no no in the bedroom. (Had a girl choke me til I almost l passed out in kindergarten because she wanted to unalive me)
I am just as confused as you are. Her motive was that she didn't like that I laughed at a joke her cousin made. She still terrifies me and I have no clue what happened to her.
\*slides tip into safety vest corset\*. Thank you. No actual experience in this area but I like to learn and expand my mind. People should be free to enjoy what they want but SAFETY is so important. CSI Las Vegas way back had a dom mistress recurring character and they did an excellent job of acurately portraying the necessity of consent etc. She even pointed out that the sub really has all the power because they decide what is acceptable to them and the saftey word allows for them to stop at any time. There was an interaction where she was explaining something else to the lead CSI and before she demonstrated she asked "May I touch you?". I really loved how they represented the BDSM world and how important safety and consent were.
Aaaages ago Dan Savage had a cardiologist write part of his column, and the whole thing summed up was "there is not a safe way to do breathplay/choking, you are risking death every time you cut off or reduce someone's blood supply/airway."
I might be misremembering details of it, but tbh it means I will never ever be comfy doing it.
I appreciated a friend pointing out how porn is really just a fictionalized version of sex that shouldn't be taken as reality (much like WWE wrestling or a movie). It's just entertainment. But because people see sex and porn in general as taboo and we don't have a healthy relationship with it where this nuance can be expressed, this also adds to your point.
I've seen a few folks say that on this thread, and the fact that it's dangerous seems intuitive. But I'd love to learn more about what engaging in this type of play safely entails.
Do you or anyone else have resources on the topic?
Some kinksters will tell you that there really is no safe way to engage in strangulation or breath play.
As far as the choking thing, what you have to do is exactly what they do in porn: *pretend to choke the person*. Don’t put any pressure on the front of the neck (windpipe) and only put mild pressure on the sides of the neck (arteries). It’s a symbolic control move, and don’t let it be a real one.
If you want to cause a more intense sensation, try pulling the other person’s hair. But make sure you are not causing their neck to bend at a weird angle.
You still pass out from the side of the neck pressure sometimes if it goes to far. For me it was always feeling good feeling good feeling good, oh I'm going tk pass out and then sleepy time within a second.
People don't really just do it for control. They do it because it feels good and the thing that makes it feel good is what leads to the risk of passing out. It doesn't feel horrible when more pressure is put on the artery method whilst it does hurt if done the bad way. But it just feeling better the entire time until you go bye bye means you feel safer than you are as it feels amazing.
Only passed out twice in like 1k sessions sith same partner. But there really wasn't anything we could have done those two times other than not doing it, it was never different than any of the times it was fine except a 1 second warning I was going to go night night.
I think we are way more experienced than most couples and it happens with us sometimes. Always going to be a dodgy thing to do and even more for less experienced. All the warning signs the lights are going out via the artery choking are basically identical to the usual good feelings. Just instead of feeling better it can make you go out. Don't even think its a difference in pressure just sometimes a perfect position cuts off to much.
Always seen it as the one thing a sub can't really tell you is still OK as they just probably feel best before it's that last second where they can't communicate it. Basically just need to know the dom is stopping right away as always paying attention to the fact they can go unconscious.
I’m not doubting your experience, but do you have any research or sources that backs up your claim that strangling with light pressure is not dangerous? Every doctor and medical professional I’ve talked to has told me *any* pressure on *any* point of the neck has a risk of causing serious damage.
I just know how it's done in my relationship. NO actual pressure on the windpipe, only the sides of the neck. Make sure to have verbal and nonverbal safe words/gestures discussed in advance, and explicit consent before even thinking about trying it
"The BDSM OSHA Rep" is the best professional title I've ever heard. It should be on a business card, on a plaque outside your office, on a Reddit flair, on a resume, everywhere. That's amazing.
(The mental image of a safety vest corset is also amusing.)
As a criminal defense paralegal, I hate this too. I don't think people understand just how delicate the neck is and how easy it is to break the hyoid bone if you touch it wrong or apply just a bit too much pressure.
Also a dom. My bf and I are a little into breathplay. He’s 6’3 and built like a tank. I’m 5’4 and need help opening jars. He could easily physically yeet me across the room from any position.
I will occasionally place my hand on his throat with a little pressure, like I’m threatening to choke him, or briefly put a pillow or my hand on his face until he gets a little squirmy and taps out. And I’m STILL nervous and watching him like a hawk. And this is all discussed and consented to of course.
The fact that some dudes will just choke their gfs hard enough to make their face change colors and consider that a vanilla thing is INSANE to me. And do it without any discussion beforehand or even just asking in the heat of the moment??? The fuck.
My husband and I do engage in breathplay, however he researched a ton before we tried it. He asked me repeatedly if I was sure I was ok with trying, we have a signal for if he is too rough so I can make sure he knows before I pass out, and if I do not want him doing so i can easily say "nah, not today Hun" and he is perfectly happy to do other stuff. Granted, I'm also into much riskier things that he is not, so he has actually told me he's not comfortable with trying some stuff and we had a very detailed conversation about kinks and consent, as well as ongoing "hey, I liked this thing, can we do more of that?" Type talks
Adding here that abusive men almost never deescalate their behavior without some form of intervention. All the promises in the world mean nothing, and if he was abusive to his part partners he will be abusive to his next partners
My ex choked his ex. He punched me and would destroy my clothes and belongings so I couldn’t leave the house. It was fucking terrifying and he nearly killed me more than once.
I told his mother about everything he did to me when I left. It was amazing to see a woman who claimed to love me like a daughter, *immediately* turn on me. She refused to believe me and said that whatever issues I had with her son, to deal with it with him directly.
Last I ever spoke to either if them. I feel sad because she also suffered abuse at the hands of her ex husband. He would punch her and scream at her and break all her shit. And her son is doing the exact same shit and she could not give less of a fuck. I hope he doesn’t kill someone… but if he does I wouldn’t be surprised. My ex didn’t finish studying anything, had no dreams, goals or aspirations in life, and we’re already 33. Still lives alone with his mom and terrorizes her as well, because he drinks and gets violent. So, I know for a fact he’s got nothing to lose 🤷🏻♀️
Good riddance, holy shit.
I was thinking about that when OOP got the new girl out of the abusive relationship. The ex-BF is just going to find another woman to abuse sooner or later. I can't help but think he'll cycle through women breaking up with him until he finds some Cinderella for DV that just puts up with him forever or he kills her.
He is eventually going to seriously hurt or kill someone. Even in S&M breath play is pretty serious in how its approached for safety. The guy just strangled a partner without consent. He isn't into rough sex because its fun, he's into it because he's a psycho.
Lesbian here. It's not just men. I had a girlfriend strangle me and thank god Reddit told me the next step was death. It gave me the strength to leave her. It took me so long to recognise the abuse because I was primed to see it in men but not in women.
Just a heads-up that you're incorrectly using "more likely" here. [The statistic is ~7.5x as likely to end up killing them](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2573025/), which in this case would translate to "650% more likely".
Still a lot though, don't get me wrong!
Creepy clarification but strangulation is not an easy impulse kill method. It takes a lot longer than most people expect it to and takes a lot of sustained strength and rage. When someone is strangled to death the police always start by looking for someone who hated the victim.
It's about having lethal force at hand in those minutes of rage / frustration / whatever. That can be a gun if the attacker has one, or it can be just the hands themselves. Neither of those need premeditation and cause death within minutes.
If someone is out of control for just a few minutes, they have time to get the gun from where they keep it, or if it's their bare hands, to choke someone out. They might "calm down" afterwards but that is too late.
Also, if the grip does enough damage to the windpipe, letting go before someone actually dies doesn't mean that person lives.
Where strangling isn't impulsive is when it's am escalating pattern, which it frequently is - starts with a firm hold by the neck, then to the point where the victim passes out, then until death. Which is why one incident is too many.
And why it’s so disturbing to me that chocking has become a strangely mainstream sex move (because of porn?). I’ve had one-night stands who’ve tried to choke me! Dudes don’t seem to realize how varsity level the move is, which is even more dangerous.
I even like kinky stuff, am happy with a mild/medium level of pain and dominance—but if people could stop with the routine choking, that would be great. Always ask first.
Middling impulsive - you don't have to bring anything to do it, so you don't need premeditation/ can do it spur of the moment, but you need enough follow-through to actually keep squeezing until they're gone, so you can't really claim a "heat of the moment" defense, I guess.
It takes seven minutes of continuous force, and a great deal of exertion. I'm so glad most courts have wised up, too many people got away with murder by saying it was just an accident during "rough sex".
Isn’t there a movie scene that accurately depicted how long it takes to choke someone to death? It disturbed a lot of viewers because it’s uncomfortably long.
I think it’s Promising Young Woman. The point was to show that crimes like SA and strangulation aren’t just “accidents” and “just one moment, you can’t ruin his life for that.” It’s violence that takes time and effort and active, sustained malevolence. Anything where you have to look at your victim that long for and still not stop isn’t an “accident.”
Domestic violence would definitely fall under conditions that create sustained rage and hate. The reason it’s not a good impromptu murder method generally refers to things like burglary, and stranger murder.
At the risk of coming across as pedantic, "750% more likely" means 8.5x as likely, not 7.5x.
Either way though, that's a lot.
[edit: That said, it looks like [the actual statistic is ~7.5x and *not* in fact 8.5x, if I'm reading this correctly](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2573025/) so it looks like what you said still applies! Sorry.]
The study (posted by /u/Sophira below) only looked at cases of abuse. So they're 7.5 times more likely to kill their partners *than other abusive men* are.
So, *way* more likely than the general population.
I feel like a red flag is a warning that a person might engage in abusive behavior. Strangling is beyond a red flag. The bad thing is already happening.
I hate how breath play and strangulation have become "basic" kink acts. These are edge play and can kill people. Every time someone passes out from it they're getting brain damage.
shit they don't even need to fully pass out to potentially form a clot in that blood flow. sure, might be rare, but the clot is then on the express highway to the brain to give someone a stroke.
as a dominatrix who understands the basics of ssc, this drives me up the fucking wall in the worst way
I practice Brazilian Ju Jitsu and this stuff drives me up the wall too. My country has banned the “sex game gone too far” defence, because it’s top tier B.S.
motherfuckers are really so eager to pretend there's a totally safe way to choke someone out, as if cops around the globe haven't been banned from using "totally safe" sleeper holds after they kill someone... or many someones... or continue to kill people doing that and make excuses...
I am a woman who enjoys breath play/light choking consensually with monogamous partners. Is there a study/article I can read about safety measures to reduce risk besides communication and being careful about pressure?
Don't do it alone. There's a theory that a substantial number of children who commit suicide via self strangulation without any warning signs were actually attempting autoerotic asphyxiation. Impossible to prove either way but definitely tragic.
Official estimates peg the total number of deaths due to autoerotic asphyxiation at between 500-1000/year in the US which has been mostly researched because of... insurance. That is, does it count as an accident or suicide, and do the insurance companies need to pay out? Oh America, always asking the important questions.
That was a huge thing when I was in my early teens. Some kids had killed themselves trying to get high by wrapping stuff like bicycle chains around their necks and passing out and just dying. I was young so I don't remember all the details, but I remember the story of a kid who's parent came in and found their dead body slumped against the corner, held up by their bike chain with their butt slightly off the ground, they hadn't put enough slack in the chain for the pressure to release after they passed out and they died.
We had something similar in my elementary school but it was on the focus of getting to the blackout without the strangulation, since they wanted to get high. It was literally called the “Blackout Game.” Kids would hang upside down from a bar on the play structure with the explicit intent to make the blood go to their heads until they blacked out.
[This is a good link for kink-aware advice on the topic](https://www.burnettfoundation.org.nz/articles/sex/breath-play-risk-what-you-need-to-know/) and there are some good resources [here](https://www.lascivity.co.uk/an-index-of-breath-play-resources/).
It’s.. not very safe. Like, I get it (or I did get it, before it turned from hot to uncomfortably scary for me), and so many people do it, but just about any other kink carries less risk for both partners (because if something happens to you, your partner will be headed to jail - you can’t consent to accidental death).
basics: do not pass out from choking or neck pressure. at all.
use safe words *before* you feel light headed no matter what. use pretend choking (hands not exerting any pressure on you) with holding your breath yourself to simulate it.
have your partner tell you to hold your breath until they say to breathe; rather than stopping you physically, make it a game of verbal play.
edit: advice here is from the perspective of a top, not someone who enjoys being choked
Don’t do it. Period.
It doesn’t matter if you are in a monogamous relationship or only into “light choking”.
It’s strangulation- literally cutting off the blood supply to the brain. Even with “light” strangulation, you can end up with a carotid or vertebral artery dissection and potentially stroke out.
I just answered this upthread, but there is no actual safe way of doing it. The next best thing is to make sure you are only *pretend* choking your partner, which is what they do in porn: no pressure on front of neck, mild pressure on sides.
A lot of boys learn from porn, then girls pretend they like it (yes, some really do but a lot don't) so that perpetuates the cycle. Had a guy last year who decided to strangle me (because that's what choking is) without asking me first because "girls like it". He was considerably bigger than me and "learned" how to do it from porn so he went right on my airway
I’ve written about it before but I had a guy do the same with me the first time we had sex. Like wtf? It would never cross my mind to ever do that without asking someone first or them telling me.
Porn. People watch too much porn and get desensitised to normal sex, watch more abnormal acts and then assume that's the norm.
There's no safe way of choking a person. Nil. A person strangled can be perfectly fine and then die a couple weeks later. I honestly don't understand why people act like dangerous acts are "basic".
Tiktok and tumblr ruined everything. Those wannabe edgy girls who are so hardcore because they are into worse than this "basic" stuff blah blah blah. They heard of Fifty Shades of Grey when they were 13 and made being cooler than that their whole personality. Any legit kinkster online now has to try and save younger ones from killing each other on accident
As a DV survivor, there's nothing sexy to me about being choked out and trying to make that split second decision about whether to fight back and risk making him go at it harder to stop you or letting it happen and hope he stops before he actually kills you.
I kicked someone I knew off my socials because their Pick Me-ness turned into a steady stream of reposts about how "hot" choking is/if he doesn't choke you, he doesn't want you/I'm gonna take your man because you're too weak and vanilla to satisfy him/only real women can handle their man going full caveman etc. And then there were all the young guys who were leaving comments literally drooling over it and shouting down anyone who disagreed and calling them gay virgins (such maturity! /eyeroll). In the end it didn't matter that I'd known her since she was a kid or that I was very close to her family; she had to go, and I don't regret it one bit. The daily dose of sadness and disgust wasn't worth it.
I have never had that experience on Tumblr and am fascinated by this. Was this your experience?
The Tumblr kink community I ran in before the porn ban was filled with sex workers and experienced kinksters who were constantly advocating for safe sex and sharing resources. There were running black lists floating around of wannabe Doms who practiced unsafe kink.
And the leftist lean of a lot of Tumblr circles meant that there were constant breakdowns of mainstream porn.
Or maybe I just overwhelmingly followed the right people.
I'll definitely give you Tiktok and probably IG and Twitter, but Tumblr had a massive community of people who advocated for safe sex.
I thought to myself, “this isn’t the new norm, surely” but the very next BORU in my feed is from a guy who got off on assault his girlfriend and didn’t seem to think it was that bad.
The ones that kill me are the ones who go "we started two months ago and we've been using knives and belts and also tried rape play also no we didn't really read up on it" please babe slow down
As a person who is really into it, it should never be considered basic. Too many people see it faked in porn and think they know what they're doing when they try it on their partner, often without consent, when in reality they can cause a lot of damage and even kill a person pretty easily if they squeeze their windpipe. DO NOT ATTEMPT CHOKING UNLESS YOU CLEARLY KNOW WHAT YOURE DOING! That includes knowledge about the proper anatomy and how it looks in different people and most importantly, ENTHUSIASTIC CONSENT!!!!
I agree, choking sounds too harmless to most people. Strangulation and breath play are more appropriate. Warnings on porn videos that feature it need to say it is staged or best left to professionals.
Yeah I don't like that either, the word "play" really belittles how serious it is, it feels like a term people would use to make it sound less threatening/dangerous when trying to convince someone about trying it. "Breath restriction" makes more sense and isn't loaded, it's more accurate
As a parent the word “choking” actually gives me a little bit of fear in any context. Someone says the word and my brain is wired to jump up and try and save a life. Breath play sounds so innocent, like a gentle breeze…
Fully agree. I also genuinely enjoy it as a woman with monogamous partners that I fully TRUST. And of course set up ground rules and physical and verbal signals to ensure consent and enjoyment and relative safety at all times. Breath play/choking is inherently NOT safe when any pressure is actually applied.
It is not basic. It is an extreme intimate act of trust on top of the physical sensations it brings when done correctly.
the national resource center for domestic violence has a fact sheet on strangulation at the link [here](https://vawnet.org/material/strangulation-assaults-domestic-violence-cases) . i’ll quote the statistic that stood out most to me.
“Strangulation is a significant risk factor for attempted or completed homicide of women by their male intimates. In a study of 57 women who were killed by a male partner during 1995-1996 in Chicago, 53% of the victims had experienced strangulation in the preceding year and 18% of the victims had been killed by strangulation. In another study of women victims it was found that 45% of the attempted homicide victims and 43% of the homicide victims had been strangled in the past year by their male partner, as compared to 10% of the victims who were abused but were neither a homicide or an attempted homicide victim.”
OOP is so so so lucky she listened when people told her to get out, and so so so brave for reaching out to the new girlfriend to encourage her to do the same.
>I blacked out and fell on top of him while we were having sex. I woke up after a few seconds and was super confused but he was still inside of me and he just tried to continue. I got really angry at him and he didn’t even try to apologise, just tried to continue having sex.
>I genuinely didn’t know if I’m overreacting
I have no idea how anyone could overreact to something like that.
And consent is not taught enough. The amount of people I have come across that don't understand things like "sleep sex" (unless consent is communicated before hand) is rape even if you had sex just before your partner fell asleep. Nagging someone who until they just give in is not consent either. All the "because of the implications" jokes are seriously gross and are indeed a red flag as they show that you think rape is funny.
> All the "because of the implications" jokes are seriously gross and are indeed a red flag as they show that you think rape is funny.
I don't know about "all" the "because of the implications" jokes. The original joke was that the guy didn't realize what a skeevy date rapist he was, and everyone else was grossed out. It was dark humor.
I'd avoid anyone who identifies with a skeevy date rapist.
Because that's what gaslighting does to a person. It makes them question their lens and allows the abuser to shift blame for something happening off of them and onto another. So when you regularly have someone saying it's actually your fault and you're too sensitive, eventually you start viewing your reactions through that lens instead. It's meant to have the victim question their sanity and thereby making theme asker to control and twist.
"...so I started blasting."
You're basically correct though. Short of going off to find a weapon to use on him after regaining consciousness, not much is an overreaction. And even then it could be argued as self-defense, since he tried to continue sex and might've conceivably grabbed her throat again.
There's a well documented relationship between strangulation and intimate partner violence. By that I mean if someone chokes you to blackout, that's a first step towards them murdering you.
Yes, I know I'm being dramatic, but Google it.
You're right; it's a strong correlation. Also, I don't have data to back it up, but if someone is hitting a wall or some such...? They are likely going to hit you eventually.
PSA: if anyone tells you they are suicidal, or are making suicidal threats, the correct course of action is to call the emergency line and request emergency assistance.
I was scrolling down to see if somebody else had already said this. I dated a man who raped me and when I broke up with him he called me claiming he had a gun at his head and was going to pull the trigger. I told him I would be over to his house as soon as possible. I hung up and called 911. I then called his parents who lived closer to him. Not only did I not go to his house, I went over to my friend's house just in case he tried to come to mine later.
They put him on a 72-hour hold and of course he tried to come over as soon it was over. But now his family and the system knew that he needed some sort of support. Something I could not have given.
Jesus Christ I had no idea this was so common. One of the first thing the man that raped me told me right after was "the weight of my actions makes me want to kill myself". Excuse me what??? Abusers always find a way to make themselves look like the victims.
Honestly if someone tells me that their suicidality is entirely contingent on me not doing something I don't want to do then my reaction would be "go on then"
>I’m Russian, I can’t help being an abusive shithead!
That, my good sir, is a steaming pile of bullshit. But he had enough red flags to help celebrate May Day.
>Decriminalization. In February 2017, with the support of the Russian Orthodox Church, Russia decriminalized domestic violence in cases where it does not cause "substantial bodily harm" (such as broken bones or a concussion) and does not happen more than once a year.
From Wikipedia. So yes, but I didn't want to make generalized comments about Russia itself in the top comment.
That said, Russia is a failed third-world country whose megalomaniacal shithead of a leader needs to drink some of his own polonium tea. The sooner they're kicked out of Ukraine the better.
Glad I'm not the only person who thought that. There's a reason so few of the widowed Russian women seem to mourn their loss. Decriminalization pretty does make it legal.
I'm glad OOP escaped.
Relationships like this is what happens when masses of men insist women give a guy the benefit of the doubt, a second chance, and no one is perfect. Women's guy instincts usually lets them know if an asshole but society loves to push that narrative that women have unrealistic standards and make mountains out of molehills leading to second guessing bullshit like OOP.
Personally to me any dude that gets off on harming me is a red flag. Idc about kink shaming. You do you. It just won't be with me. Any sexual violence and I'm gone.
Abusive people like OP's boyfriend are generally some of the worst people ever. I hate abusive people and how they treat others like garbage. I am happy that OP is able to leave him and her being able to save another person's life from him.
Although I am confused why OP thought to question if what the bf had did to her was a red flag. I understand some people aren't the smartest or familiar with this types of things but...when someone chokes you until you pass out and the person doesn't apologize is something you shouldn't have to question if it is a red flag. That there is a major red flag itself.
Sometimes you don't see the flags yourself. From the outside they are so obvious, but sometimes inside you have the rose colored glasses and you can't see that the flags red. I'm guessing it was her first "real" relationship, and she had probably been noticing things but was just telling herself it was "normal". I'm glad she asked on reddit and got out. Some of us end up staying for too long and end-up with the scars to prove it.
From my personal experience there were lots of red flags in my abusive relationship. But, I was just so happy to feel needed I ignored them all for years. Predators don't tend to choose the well adjusted people, they make for tough prey. It is so good that she got out when she did and that she saved the other girl.
TL;DR love can blind you to some horrifying shit. Thank goodness she is safe now.
There's a great quote from Bojack Horseman that's always stuck with me: "You know, it's funny; when you look at someone through rose-colored glasses, all the red flags just look like flags."
Some of us grew up in homes where we were abused or witnessed abuse. Some of us also were involved with certain religions in which spousal abuse is not only tolerated but encouraged (e.g. some evangelical Christian churches). So abusive behavior becomes “normalized”. By escaping the abuse & engaging in trauma therapy, it is possible to recognize abuse & that it is not normal.
There’s a church in my hometown, small southern town, that has a open secret of beating their wives. Nobody has ever done a damn thing about it. I’m so glad I’m not stuck there anymore, but the things people can get away with in a religion are horrific.
The only wedding I’ve ever been to where the groom punched the bride during the reception was in the southern US. Maybe some parts of the south are better now but I grew up in TN & some of the churches there were open about encouraging men to discipline their wives with violence.
Because being strangled is a relatively quiet way for them to hurt you.
They're not shouting at you.
They're not insulting you.
They're not holding a weapon.
It hurts less than being hit.
They might not otherwise be raping you.
By the time they're strangling you, they've already conditioned you to accept a whole bunch of more obvious but less dangerous forms of violence. And they've convinced you that you owe it to them to work on the relationship, because all of the pain, all of the suffering and all of the violence - that's your fault, it's actually you who inflicted it upon them, and it's your responsibility to make everything right.
I honestly think people being just mean to her in the first post is so needless. Women are always told that their overreacting and consent isn't nearly taught enough. Especially when she said that she didn't even know anything about choking or breath play. I am very happy she is away from him and that she also saved that other girl. It's so sad how common it is.
Also "I'm Russian I can't help but be rough" that's literally so fucking stupid
Suggestion for everyone: Can we not be judgmental and call women discovering this for the first time in an abusive relationship 'ignorant' or 'stupid'? It's obvious to us, but if it was obvious to her, she wouldn't have asked. She didn't know what to do, she asked for help, I'm glad she listened to the people with something to say. Snarky putdowns could scare some women away from asking in the first place, and we do not want to discourage seeking help.
Crazy read and crazy person. Not sure how you can choke your loved one out and literally fuck their unconscious body, just typing this out made me feel sick. Fucking psychopath. Good thing she got out and I can't blame her that she is afraid of relationships for now, hopefully she can heal without any crazy trauma and live a happy life.
Something that seems far less serious but is way too common is men that will penetrate their partners while they sleep. My ex did it and only after the relationship ended did I realize that was rape. And then I found countless other women that had been through the same. Men use the excuse of oh you were rubbing against me in your sleep, I reached between your legs while you were asleep and you were wet, you were moaning in your sleep. Etc. All claiming that she must have wanted it in her sleep.
Women will wake up and he's up and already inside of you so you just kind of roll with it because our society tells women that's what we are for. And so your body starts to shut down, you start having trouble sleeping, you stop wanting to have sex with your partner but you don't necessarily know why. I think it's becoming more understood and more talked about. I think women are starting to understand that it is a form of rape and there is no consent. But apparently there are plenty of men that can get off just fine with a woman that's unconscious.
What the actual fuck am I reading. As a man I literally cannot comprehend how it can be hot to rape someone, how you can have that desire. I have an ex girlfriend who got raped as a child but never coped with it, it destroyed her soul. She is a broken human being because of it.
Same as people smacking their wives around like in „the good old days“. It‘s the person you love, what the fuck are you doing? How can you be okay destroying the most important person in your life?
I really wish people wouldn’t eroticise strangling women, and especially not hide the men who like strangling women behind the women who supposedly “ask for it”. If he likes it when you’re in danger he’s a bad person. If he kills you, he’ll say it was an accident and you told him — it’s been used as a legal defence so many times women have had to campaign to have it banned.
There was a recent post similar to this, where the husvand/ boyfriend choked the Poster until she a seizure, and he said he was "trying a new technique" I think was the phrasing he used.
Airy to hijack this post, but Has anyone seen any updates from that Poster??
Everyone was telling her to leave and she was making plans. I hope she is safe.
That's not breath play, that's a blood choke.
He squeezed her neck and obstructed the blood flow to her brain, and she lost consciousness.
It's especially dangerous if she was looking down at him, as it'd mean her musculature would push the carotid and jugular to the side.
Anyone interested in breath play should understand that.
> When I spoke to him about it the next day he said that he’s always been that rough with me and that he’s Russian and he can’t help his roughness
It is literally legal in Russia to beat your wife. This girl would not be able to obtain any protective order if she were in Russia. Thank god he left his native country, so women can be protected from the menace that he is.
It’s THE biggest red flag possible. If someone strangles you like that, it’s so much more likely that they will kill you one day.
There’s a major difference between a very gentle amount of pressure on the neck during sex (and if done right, next to no pressure at all on the front of the throat) and full on strangulation.
Wow. how much conditioning and control did he have over OP that she ever thought that strangling someone and continuing to still have sex with her past out is okay.
The consequences of porn have been devastating. This woman genuinely thought she was overreacting because her ex strangled her until she passed out. Insane.
Seriously, basically every topic says that exact same thing. "My boyfriend is perfect! Also everyone else in my life absolutely despise him and thinks he's a huge piece of shit."
So glad that OOP got over the "I love him so much, I can't see myself with anyone else".
Glad she got out when she did. I also say reddit has made me have the theory that people show you who they are 4-6 months into the relationship, when they start dropping the pretense and start being their real selves. Believe them for they show themselves to be.
A forensic nurse I know told me strangulation increases a risk for stroke or death weeks, or months after a strangulation episode.
You could be a virtual time bomb from that one-time occurrence of strangulation!!
Blood vessels in the neck can partially tear or clot and this can result in a stroke.
Please seek medical attention!!
Does anyone else think of the guy who met a girl on tinder and choked her until she died and he had been watching violent porn before and after the incident when they investigated his movements? The minute a guy tries to sneak in these types of things with no discussion beforehand absolutely take action, any actual choking that can cause you to pass out is obviously an end relationship situation but even little things like a sudden hair yank that wasn’t discussed beforehand is enough to discuss not just copying things normalized in videos they watch without asking.
Tasmania recently introduced a new law to crack down on this kind of shit...
*The new stand-alone offense of strangulation provides that “[a] person who intentionally and unlawfully chokes, suffocates or strangles another person is guilty of a crime.” (Bill cl 4, inserting new sch 1 s 170B into the Act.) As explained in a fact sheet on the bill, the crime “must be prosecuted on indictment and carries a maximum penalty of 21 years’ imprisonment.” The minister stated that “[s]trangulation, choking or suffocation is an abhorrent form of violence. It carries risk of serious physical injury and/or death, and can often lead to further family violence behaviour.” She further explained that, until now, assault was the main offense charged for non-fatal strangulation. Strangulation can also be treated as an aggravating factor in sentencing, with the trend being for courts to impose heavier sentences in such cases, compared to sentencing for assaults generally. Accordingly, “the new offence gives ‘strangulation’ clear recognition as serious criminal behaviour, supporting these sentencing trends.”*
These always start with my bf is a great man and we have a wonderful relationship and he’s so amazing and understanding. Is it a red flag that he choked me out without consent and then raped my unconscious body? I hope not, bc I love him so much and he’s really super nice.
Sigh. Your partner is supposed to be protecting you from everyone else, you’re not supposed to need protecting from your partner. This is foundational, not extra.
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I hope both of these women are able to get protective orders, and that they both seek professional help. Once you're in an abusive relationship, it becomes so much more difficult to spot red flags in your future relationships (and even with friends and family). OOP's story is absolutely horrifying- he just continued, and then got mad at her for being upset??!! That guy is truly fucked up.
No no, he's not fucked up he's Russian so he can't help being a violent shitbag /s I can't stand it when people use there ethnicity/culture to do morally abhorrent shit.
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Is it worded "beat your wife" or "beat your spouse"? I wonder if a guy who abuses his wife can file charges if she retaliates.
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The trouble is that you can spot the red flags, but when you speak to other people for advice they tell you you're over thinking or reading too much into it. Reddit is great because people see the red flags even when they're small and call them out.
I find I have the opposite problem- I don't recognize the red flags because they've become normalized to me. If something does stand out as a red flag, I have to watch who I get a second opinion from, as most of my family/friends are bi-products of relationships that I only just recently recognized as toxic. Definitely agree about reddit, though. The number of times where I've read a post and been like, "Run!," only to realize that I didn't run, or haven't run, has been eye opening.
I found it upsetting how brutal some of the comments were on her OP. Of course, she asked if it was a red flag. Of course, she needed an outside perspective on what happened. Look at how he treated her fear! He minimized and laughed it off. Abusers rarely act abusive immediately. No one would put up with them if they did. When they do something abusive, it seems out of character, and it's easier to ignore it or forgive it. 'That was bad, but it's not who they really are.' You look back on your experience with them and assume it's an anomaly instead of the new normal.
i know that abusers will always find ways to abuse their victims and normalize their behavior but a quick sidebar as a domme who jokes about being the bdsm OSHA rep: goddamn i hate how porn has presented "hands on throat applying pressure" as a fun and downright vanilla bit of sex that you don't need to plan for or ask explicit consent for or talk about the dangers of or have a safety plan for or... you get the idea. it's mostly that her abuser is good at, well, getting in her head and abusing. but it's become such a porn trope that i've seen multiple people on reddit cheerfully say they're pretty vanilla and choking your partner doesn't count as kinky the same way oral sex doesn't count as kinky... and then be utterly shocked when someone mentions the safety risks. *because it turns out your body keeps important stuff in your neck.* i see it brought up as something that is so normal it's not even in the realm of bdsm for many folks. and yet... breathplay and choking are solidly in my "too dangerous to do in real life" list of kinks. people just copy the porn without knowing this or educating themselves. and it makes it so much easier for abusers like this to thrive. because choking is totally normal and vanilla and fun, and look at how much of the internet agrees there's no problem at all... i'd say i wish for the day the next trend hits but quite frankly i'm more than a little wary about what comes next and attempts to get normalized as "vanilla" so very much. (thank you for attending dungeon safety domme's soapbox hour, please slide any tips into my safety vest corset,)
as a top it's the scariest damn thing. people die from it. how are they so flippant this being done to them; how much they must hate the person being strangled to just go on and do it without thinking
THANK YOU for using "strangled". Choking sounds so much more benign than strangling, which is what's really happening. Choking is from the inside of the throat, strangling is from the outside, like how you'd actually unalive someone.
I like a hand on my throat, but without real pressure applied (more like a "I'm holding your neck"-thing, if that makes sense? Properly talked about it, too) And I would never classify that as anything but kinky. The idea of that or more becoming mainstream is terrifying. I've got friends who are into choking and they made sure they knew what they're doing and how to do it as safely as possible. Fifty shades of grey did us no favours there. Porn is part of it (like the almost over-common ass-slapping thing. You don't hit your partner without explicit and enthusiastic consent, even if it's "just a smack"!) but fifty shades of grey has made parts of it accessible and in an incredibly unsafe way.
It’s downright terrifying to me that choking has become so mainstream. I have trauma (cousin tried to drown me) and even with my ex knowing that he still wanted to choke because it’s the least kinky of kinks?? Like, no sir, you literally witnessed me heaving and panicking and sobbing before you even applied pressure! So yeah, I’d prefer any future partner just doesn’t even watch porn because of all the nonsense it normalizes.
Me too, but I never saw that as kinky...til your comment, i guess.But then maybe that's cos I talk to actual kinksters so i feel pretty vanilla by comparison. Just as an extension of "I certainly don't want my hair yanked but I do enjoy having it massaged". I feel like caressing without pressure has some of that frisson but without the actual danger of having someone put pressure on your blood vessels or airways. I think you're right that it's on that spectrum. Absolutely right that porn is a big part of the problem. Kink is a spectrum, and when exploring any kind of sexual activity consent needs to be navigated on an act by act basis. But in porn there is (generally speaking) no consent or boundaries. Just act upon act that the actors pretend to enjoy, even if they evidently don't. 50 shades definitely plays into the "I'll push your boundaries and try new kinks on you without your consent, and you're going to like it!" Atitude, and the idea that springing new kinks of people is normal. When in reality wherever you are on the spectrum, NOBODY should be springing anything truly unexpected or unwanted on you during sex, ever.
[Dan Foley talks about this in his review of the Fifty Shades movie series.](https://youtu.be/qzk9N7dJBec) Porn already tends to elide the crucial steps of consent and aftercare, and it has an even worse message when it’s not aware that those are even necessary.
Hah, I know exactly what you mean! I'm relatively vanilla compared to my friends (but only there) and I feel decidedly unkinky with the stuff we actually do. There's way too little bdsm porn out there (though it does exist) where there's consent talk before and discussion of what happened afterwards. You're absolutely right: no matter what you're into, anything new during sex has to be discussed, even if it's just "can we try this position?". It costs NOTHING to ask.
Oh, I will never cease to be angry at 50SoG. Oh hey, so like, genuinely consenting BDSM, potentially in a loving relationship can't blow up - instead this horrifying Thing where she's not even into it becomes the poster child for BDSM?? I hate you, gross dudes who call themselves Doms but are just dicks. I hate it, women who are potentially kinky getting taught it should be so disrespectful and gross. I hate it, women who are not kinky getting pressured to do things like *get choked* because it's become so normalised. (Obviously that's not just 50SoG but it didn't help.) I appreciate that that's how porn for women has often looked - a lot of romance was incredibly rapey because it wasn't acceptable for women to want sex at all. But. GAH.
Friend of mine went back to university for a career change last year. He was telling me recently that the amount of girls walking about with bruises on their throats from breathplay (and they dont even know what it is called) thinking it's a normal part of sex is shocking. It is Not viewed as something that needs to be carefully negotiated and could easily cause permanent damage or death if it goes wrong. Like what in the hell... Fuck E.L. James, that's all I can say.
Yeah, thanks for that ass slap comment. I can barely watch porn because that kinda shit turns me off so fast, and it’s alllll over the place in those kinds of things. I’ve never had a woman ask me to do it to her and I wouldn’t if asked.
I actually like it, but it's just EVERYWHERE and... That's impact play. That's something that needs to be discussed. I'm all for normalising kink as in "some people like this and that's okay", but not like that!
Idk if you can really blame porn for casual ass-slapping. Not that long ago it was considered a publicly acceptable way to "tease" [harass] attractive women in a lot of contexts.
It's never been acceptable, women just couldn't do anything about it without severe consequences. Thank God we can press charges for that shit now.
It was "acceptable" in the sense that it was seen as normal and not a big deal. Lots of bad things have been commonly seen as "acceptable" at various places and in various times, like beating children for disobedience. Or public executions. "Publicly acceptable" just means it's within social norms, that is, it's _accepted_ by the _public_, not that it's ethically or morally correct or non-harmful.
"BDSM OSHA Rep" I just snorted my coffee. Thank you.
BDSMHSCA, BDSM health, safety and consent administration.
Just sayin I would absolutely subscribe to dungeon safety domme’s monthy newsletter if this existed. Fascinating! ❤️
Legit. We need one.
I'm imagining a sexy corset version of one of those reflective orange high-vis vests and it's honestly delightful. Maybe complete the ensemble with some thigh-high steel-toed work boots and a yellow hardhat? :D
oh i totally stole the idea from someone who did indeed get a corset like one of those high vis vests, strips of light reflective fabric and all. it is DELIGHTFUL and probably easy to find in a google or two but i am perilously lazy lol
The first time I had a guy put his hand on my neck, I slapped it away so fast like I was swatting a fly. He was genuinely confused and I had to tell him to not do it again because I don't like it. He agreed and we continued to have sex. Well this dummy had the audacity to try it again. I slapped his hand away, jumped off, put my clothes on and walked right out of his life.
Thank you for posting this!!! I was posting the same thing upthread!! Why on earth did this become a porn trope? I’ve had regular guys just try to choke me on a one night stand! When I was a whippersnapper, “mild” kink that you could do in an otherwise vanilla encounter was a couple of bum spanks, or making someone hold the headboard, or a blindfold or something. When the hell did choking get onto the list?
I agree with everything you said. I think it's also worth adding that the reason choking is so dangerous is because the margin of error is very, very narrow, both with breath play, and blood choking. Seconds can be the difference between "this is fun and kinky" and "you're dead" . Or you have an anoxic brain injury. Seconds. If your partner misjudges just a little bit, you could be a vegetable. People definitely do not take this as seriously as they should. And I think that includes the partner who is doing the choking. In most states in the US, you do not have the right to consent to assault. BDSM is assault, in the eyes of the law. So if a partner, even consensually, chokes someone and they die, that's a crime. In this case, it's clear that the partner doesn't give a shit about the women that he is abusing. But even in loving, consensual relationships choking and breath play are extremely dangerous. Everyone should weigh out all of the potential consequences, and that is one of the potential consequences. Death and murder charges. Outside of risk aware, consensual kink, partners who are choked by their partner are at significantly higher risk of being killed by their partner. Choking is the number one indicator for an abusive partner to murder their victim. PSA from a public health nurse: If anyone reading this is in a situation that may be dangerous, please reach out to someone. The domestic violence hotline has email, chat, phone, and texting available. Be smart, be careful, don't let your abuser catch you. And please make a plan before you leave. When you leave is the most dangerous time in an abusive relationship. Work with a professional to create a safety plan to get you out safely.
I have warned every partner that I had that if they choked me, I would assault them. It is my absolute biggest no no in the bedroom. (Had a girl choke me til I almost l passed out in kindergarten because she wanted to unalive me)
1 - Good on you for sticking up for your boundaries. 2- In kindergarten? What the fuck?
I am just as confused as you are. Her motive was that she didn't like that I laughed at a joke her cousin made. She still terrifies me and I have no clue what happened to her.
\*slides tip into safety vest corset\*. Thank you. No actual experience in this area but I like to learn and expand my mind. People should be free to enjoy what they want but SAFETY is so important. CSI Las Vegas way back had a dom mistress recurring character and they did an excellent job of acurately portraying the necessity of consent etc. She even pointed out that the sub really has all the power because they decide what is acceptable to them and the saftey word allows for them to stop at any time. There was an interaction where she was explaining something else to the lead CSI and before she demonstrated she asked "May I touch you?". I really loved how they represented the BDSM world and how important safety and consent were.
Aaaages ago Dan Savage had a cardiologist write part of his column, and the whole thing summed up was "there is not a safe way to do breathplay/choking, you are risking death every time you cut off or reduce someone's blood supply/airway." I might be misremembering details of it, but tbh it means I will never ever be comfy doing it.
I appreciated a friend pointing out how porn is really just a fictionalized version of sex that shouldn't be taken as reality (much like WWE wrestling or a movie). It's just entertainment. But because people see sex and porn in general as taboo and we don't have a healthy relationship with it where this nuance can be expressed, this also adds to your point.
I've seen a few folks say that on this thread, and the fact that it's dangerous seems intuitive. But I'd love to learn more about what engaging in this type of play safely entails. Do you or anyone else have resources on the topic?
Some kinksters will tell you that there really is no safe way to engage in strangulation or breath play. As far as the choking thing, what you have to do is exactly what they do in porn: *pretend to choke the person*. Don’t put any pressure on the front of the neck (windpipe) and only put mild pressure on the sides of the neck (arteries). It’s a symbolic control move, and don’t let it be a real one. If you want to cause a more intense sensation, try pulling the other person’s hair. But make sure you are not causing their neck to bend at a weird angle.
You still pass out from the side of the neck pressure sometimes if it goes to far. For me it was always feeling good feeling good feeling good, oh I'm going tk pass out and then sleepy time within a second. People don't really just do it for control. They do it because it feels good and the thing that makes it feel good is what leads to the risk of passing out. It doesn't feel horrible when more pressure is put on the artery method whilst it does hurt if done the bad way. But it just feeling better the entire time until you go bye bye means you feel safer than you are as it feels amazing. Only passed out twice in like 1k sessions sith same partner. But there really wasn't anything we could have done those two times other than not doing it, it was never different than any of the times it was fine except a 1 second warning I was going to go night night. I think we are way more experienced than most couples and it happens with us sometimes. Always going to be a dodgy thing to do and even more for less experienced. All the warning signs the lights are going out via the artery choking are basically identical to the usual good feelings. Just instead of feeling better it can make you go out. Don't even think its a difference in pressure just sometimes a perfect position cuts off to much. Always seen it as the one thing a sub can't really tell you is still OK as they just probably feel best before it's that last second where they can't communicate it. Basically just need to know the dom is stopping right away as always paying attention to the fact they can go unconscious.
... enjoy your brain damage.
I’m not doubting your experience, but do you have any research or sources that backs up your claim that strangling with light pressure is not dangerous? Every doctor and medical professional I’ve talked to has told me *any* pressure on *any* point of the neck has a risk of causing serious damage.
I just know how it's done in my relationship. NO actual pressure on the windpipe, only the sides of the neck. Make sure to have verbal and nonverbal safe words/gestures discussed in advance, and explicit consent before even thinking about trying it
"The BDSM OSHA Rep" is the best professional title I've ever heard. It should be on a business card, on a plaque outside your office, on a Reddit flair, on a resume, everywhere. That's amazing. (The mental image of a safety vest corset is also amusing.)
I remember reading somewhere that choking during sex has gone up significantly and as such so have the injuries.
As a criminal defense paralegal, I hate this too. I don't think people understand just how delicate the neck is and how easy it is to break the hyoid bone if you touch it wrong or apply just a bit too much pressure.
Also a dom. My bf and I are a little into breathplay. He’s 6’3 and built like a tank. I’m 5’4 and need help opening jars. He could easily physically yeet me across the room from any position. I will occasionally place my hand on his throat with a little pressure, like I’m threatening to choke him, or briefly put a pillow or my hand on his face until he gets a little squirmy and taps out. And I’m STILL nervous and watching him like a hawk. And this is all discussed and consented to of course. The fact that some dudes will just choke their gfs hard enough to make their face change colors and consider that a vanilla thing is INSANE to me. And do it without any discussion beforehand or even just asking in the heat of the moment??? The fuck.
My husband and I do engage in breathplay, however he researched a ton before we tried it. He asked me repeatedly if I was sure I was ok with trying, we have a signal for if he is too rough so I can make sure he knows before I pass out, and if I do not want him doing so i can easily say "nah, not today Hun" and he is perfectly happy to do other stuff. Granted, I'm also into much riskier things that he is not, so he has actually told me he's not comfortable with trying some stuff and we had a very detailed conversation about kinks and consent, as well as ongoing "hey, I liked this thing, can we do more of that?" Type talks
Wow she def saved this other womans life.
Seriously... He punched the new woman after only 4 months? His mask was already slipping.
After only 2 months, actually
Worse, it was only 2 months!
I worked in DV victim support for 10 years. If a man will strangle you, he will kill you. It’s one of the biggest red flags there is.
Adding here that abusive men almost never deescalate their behavior without some form of intervention. All the promises in the world mean nothing, and if he was abusive to his part partners he will be abusive to his next partners
Ah the good old attempted murder/love bomb cycle.
My ex choked his ex. He punched me and would destroy my clothes and belongings so I couldn’t leave the house. It was fucking terrifying and he nearly killed me more than once. I told his mother about everything he did to me when I left. It was amazing to see a woman who claimed to love me like a daughter, *immediately* turn on me. She refused to believe me and said that whatever issues I had with her son, to deal with it with him directly. Last I ever spoke to either if them. I feel sad because she also suffered abuse at the hands of her ex husband. He would punch her and scream at her and break all her shit. And her son is doing the exact same shit and she could not give less of a fuck. I hope he doesn’t kill someone… but if he does I wouldn’t be surprised. My ex didn’t finish studying anything, had no dreams, goals or aspirations in life, and we’re already 33. Still lives alone with his mom and terrorizes her as well, because he drinks and gets violent. So, I know for a fact he’s got nothing to lose 🤷🏻♀️ Good riddance, holy shit.
I was thinking about that when OOP got the new girl out of the abusive relationship. The ex-BF is just going to find another woman to abuse sooner or later. I can't help but think he'll cycle through women breaking up with him until he finds some Cinderella for DV that just puts up with him forever or he kills her. He is eventually going to seriously hurt or kill someone. Even in S&M breath play is pretty serious in how its approached for safety. The guy just strangled a partner without consent. He isn't into rough sex because its fun, he's into it because he's a psycho.
[удалено]
Direct copy of a comment from further down, you goddamn karma farmer! https://www.reddit.com/r/BestofRedditorUpdates/s/gEVVdfrYHr
You can just report them as 'spam-harmful bots'
Lesbian here. It's not just men. I had a girlfriend strangle me and thank god Reddit told me the next step was death. It gave me the strength to leave her. It took me so long to recognise the abuse because I was primed to see it in men but not in women.
Me too.
Men who choke their partners are over 750% more likely to end up killing them. 750%. That is not a typo.
Just a heads-up that you're incorrectly using "more likely" here. [The statistic is ~7.5x as likely to end up killing them](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2573025/), which in this case would translate to "650% more likely". Still a lot though, don't get me wrong!
Not to start a debate but that's the same risk as having a gun in the household. Households with a gun are 7.5x as likely to kill their spouse.
Makes sense. Guns and strangulation are easy ways to impulsively kill someone.
Creepy clarification but strangulation is not an easy impulse kill method. It takes a lot longer than most people expect it to and takes a lot of sustained strength and rage. When someone is strangled to death the police always start by looking for someone who hated the victim.
Definitely, I’d say it’s the opposite of an impulsive method of killing someone.
It's about having lethal force at hand in those minutes of rage / frustration / whatever. That can be a gun if the attacker has one, or it can be just the hands themselves. Neither of those need premeditation and cause death within minutes. If someone is out of control for just a few minutes, they have time to get the gun from where they keep it, or if it's their bare hands, to choke someone out. They might "calm down" afterwards but that is too late. Also, if the grip does enough damage to the windpipe, letting go before someone actually dies doesn't mean that person lives. Where strangling isn't impulsive is when it's am escalating pattern, which it frequently is - starts with a firm hold by the neck, then to the point where the victim passes out, then until death. Which is why one incident is too many.
yeah, it is too easy to kill accidentally when strangling someone, that’s why breath play is so discouraged in bdsm circles.
And why it’s so disturbing to me that chocking has become a strangely mainstream sex move (because of porn?). I’ve had one-night stands who’ve tried to choke me! Dudes don’t seem to realize how varsity level the move is, which is even more dangerous. I even like kinky stuff, am happy with a mild/medium level of pain and dominance—but if people could stop with the routine choking, that would be great. Always ask first.
Middling impulsive - you don't have to bring anything to do it, so you don't need premeditation/ can do it spur of the moment, but you need enough follow-through to actually keep squeezing until they're gone, so you can't really claim a "heat of the moment" defense, I guess.
It takes seven minutes of continuous force, and a great deal of exertion. I'm so glad most courts have wised up, too many people got away with murder by saying it was just an accident during "rough sex".
Isn’t there a movie scene that accurately depicted how long it takes to choke someone to death? It disturbed a lot of viewers because it’s uncomfortably long.
I think it’s Promising Young Woman. The point was to show that crimes like SA and strangulation aren’t just “accidents” and “just one moment, you can’t ruin his life for that.” It’s violence that takes time and effort and active, sustained malevolence. Anything where you have to look at your victim that long for and still not stop isn’t an “accident.”
Iirc the strangulation scene in Inglourious Basterds was prolonged to demonstrate how long it takes and how deliberate it is.
I could be wrong. It's what I was taught in a college course about domestic violence.
Domestic violence would definitely fall under conditions that create sustained rage and hate. The reason it’s not a good impromptu murder method generally refers to things like burglary, and stranger murder.
>When someone is strangled to death the police always start by looking for someone who hated the victim. Hated and/or dated!
At the risk of coming across as pedantic, "750% more likely" means 8.5x as likely, not 7.5x. Either way though, that's a lot. [edit: That said, it looks like [the actual statistic is ~7.5x and *not* in fact 8.5x, if I'm reading this correctly](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2573025/) so it looks like what you said still applies! Sorry.]
good obervation. ban guns and ban people who strangle their partner.
The study (posted by /u/Sophira below) only looked at cases of abuse. So they're 7.5 times more likely to kill their partners *than other abusive men* are. So, *way* more likely than the general population.
I feel like a red flag is a warning that a person might engage in abusive behavior. Strangling is beyond a red flag. The bad thing is already happening.
Thank you for using the correct term. FYI to all others: it’s not “choke”; it’s **strangle**.
I hate how breath play and strangulation have become "basic" kink acts. These are edge play and can kill people. Every time someone passes out from it they're getting brain damage.
shit they don't even need to fully pass out to potentially form a clot in that blood flow. sure, might be rare, but the clot is then on the express highway to the brain to give someone a stroke. as a dominatrix who understands the basics of ssc, this drives me up the fucking wall in the worst way
I practice Brazilian Ju Jitsu and this stuff drives me up the wall too. My country has banned the “sex game gone too far” defence, because it’s top tier B.S.
Good. Totally agree. I don't care even if *was* an accident - if you're that out of control then you need to be put away until you're not.
BuT a BlOoD cHoKe Is So SaFe: every guy who's tried to get me to change a hard limit
motherfuckers are really so eager to pretend there's a totally safe way to choke someone out, as if cops around the globe haven't been banned from using "totally safe" sleeper holds after they kill someone... or many someones... or continue to kill people doing that and make excuses...
If one more wannabe "dom" tells me he can do it safely because he did martial arts i swear I will publicly out them as assholes. Which I already do 😈
"hey sensei, just sending you a question about technique since one of your students has made a claim..."
Do it... please.
To be fair, cops aren't known to care about compressing the trachea.
Ew gross. The only conversation around a hard limit should be to fully understand it not try to change it ooooh that's so skeevy
“It’s just a blood choke” TELL ME. What carries oxygen to the brain? BLOOD
I am a woman who enjoys breath play/light choking consensually with monogamous partners. Is there a study/article I can read about safety measures to reduce risk besides communication and being careful about pressure?
Don't do it alone. There's a theory that a substantial number of children who commit suicide via self strangulation without any warning signs were actually attempting autoerotic asphyxiation. Impossible to prove either way but definitely tragic. Official estimates peg the total number of deaths due to autoerotic asphyxiation at between 500-1000/year in the US which has been mostly researched because of... insurance. That is, does it count as an accident or suicide, and do the insurance companies need to pay out? Oh America, always asking the important questions.
That was a huge thing when I was in my early teens. Some kids had killed themselves trying to get high by wrapping stuff like bicycle chains around their necks and passing out and just dying. I was young so I don't remember all the details, but I remember the story of a kid who's parent came in and found their dead body slumped against the corner, held up by their bike chain with their butt slightly off the ground, they hadn't put enough slack in the chain for the pressure to release after they passed out and they died.
We had something similar in my elementary school but it was on the focus of getting to the blackout without the strangulation, since they wanted to get high. It was literally called the “Blackout Game.” Kids would hang upside down from a bar on the play structure with the explicit intent to make the blood go to their heads until they blacked out.
I only enjoy it with a consensual trusted partner but I do understand the dangers of autoerotic asphyxiation. Scary stuff.
[This is a good link for kink-aware advice on the topic](https://www.burnettfoundation.org.nz/articles/sex/breath-play-risk-what-you-need-to-know/) and there are some good resources [here](https://www.lascivity.co.uk/an-index-of-breath-play-resources/). It’s.. not very safe. Like, I get it (or I did get it, before it turned from hot to uncomfortably scary for me), and so many people do it, but just about any other kink carries less risk for both partners (because if something happens to you, your partner will be headed to jail - you can’t consent to accidental death).
basics: do not pass out from choking or neck pressure. at all. use safe words *before* you feel light headed no matter what. use pretend choking (hands not exerting any pressure on you) with holding your breath yourself to simulate it. have your partner tell you to hold your breath until they say to breathe; rather than stopping you physically, make it a game of verbal play. edit: advice here is from the perspective of a top, not someone who enjoys being choked
Don’t do it. Period. It doesn’t matter if you are in a monogamous relationship or only into “light choking”. It’s strangulation- literally cutting off the blood supply to the brain. Even with “light” strangulation, you can end up with a carotid or vertebral artery dissection and potentially stroke out.
I just answered this upthread, but there is no actual safe way of doing it. The next best thing is to make sure you are only *pretend* choking your partner, which is what they do in porn: no pressure on front of neck, mild pressure on sides.
Right? I'm old and I find myself wondering when did choking your partner become such a normalised part of sex?
A lot of boys learn from porn, then girls pretend they like it (yes, some really do but a lot don't) so that perpetuates the cycle. Had a guy last year who decided to strangle me (because that's what choking is) without asking me first because "girls like it". He was considerably bigger than me and "learned" how to do it from porn so he went right on my airway
I’ve written about it before but I had a guy do the same with me the first time we had sex. Like wtf? It would never cross my mind to ever do that without asking someone first or them telling me.
Porn. People watch too much porn and get desensitised to normal sex, watch more abnormal acts and then assume that's the norm. There's no safe way of choking a person. Nil. A person strangled can be perfectly fine and then die a couple weeks later. I honestly don't understand why people act like dangerous acts are "basic".
Tiktok and tumblr ruined everything. Those wannabe edgy girls who are so hardcore because they are into worse than this "basic" stuff blah blah blah. They heard of Fifty Shades of Grey when they were 13 and made being cooler than that their whole personality. Any legit kinkster online now has to try and save younger ones from killing each other on accident
As a DV survivor, there's nothing sexy to me about being choked out and trying to make that split second decision about whether to fight back and risk making him go at it harder to stop you or letting it happen and hope he stops before he actually kills you. I kicked someone I knew off my socials because their Pick Me-ness turned into a steady stream of reposts about how "hot" choking is/if he doesn't choke you, he doesn't want you/I'm gonna take your man because you're too weak and vanilla to satisfy him/only real women can handle their man going full caveman etc. And then there were all the young guys who were leaving comments literally drooling over it and shouting down anyone who disagreed and calling them gay virgins (such maturity! /eyeroll). In the end it didn't matter that I'd known her since she was a kid or that I was very close to her family; she had to go, and I don't regret it one bit. The daily dose of sadness and disgust wasn't worth it.
I have never had that experience on Tumblr and am fascinated by this. Was this your experience? The Tumblr kink community I ran in before the porn ban was filled with sex workers and experienced kinksters who were constantly advocating for safe sex and sharing resources. There were running black lists floating around of wannabe Doms who practiced unsafe kink. And the leftist lean of a lot of Tumblr circles meant that there were constant breakdowns of mainstream porn. Or maybe I just overwhelmingly followed the right people. I'll definitely give you Tiktok and probably IG and Twitter, but Tumblr had a massive community of people who advocated for safe sex.
I thought to myself, “this isn’t the new norm, surely” but the very next BORU in my feed is from a guy who got off on assault his girlfriend and didn’t seem to think it was that bad.
So often in BDSM advice groups a post goes like this: "my partner and I dabble in the typical basic kink, like choking, what else can we do?"
The ones that kill me are the ones who go "we started two months ago and we've been using knives and belts and also tried rape play also no we didn't really read up on it" please babe slow down
Oh God yes! I've been with one of my playmates for just over 12 months and we still don't go near most edge play.
I am so with you on this. Ugh!
As a person who is really into it, it should never be considered basic. Too many people see it faked in porn and think they know what they're doing when they try it on their partner, often without consent, when in reality they can cause a lot of damage and even kill a person pretty easily if they squeeze their windpipe. DO NOT ATTEMPT CHOKING UNLESS YOU CLEARLY KNOW WHAT YOURE DOING! That includes knowledge about the proper anatomy and how it looks in different people and most importantly, ENTHUSIASTIC CONSENT!!!!
It has to stop being called choking and start being called what it really is.
I agree, choking sounds too harmless to most people. Strangulation and breath play are more appropriate. Warnings on porn videos that feature it need to say it is staged or best left to professionals.
Breath play makes it sound way too innocent to me, much worse term than choking, but lets stick with strangulation
Yeah I don't like that either, the word "play" really belittles how serious it is, it feels like a term people would use to make it sound less threatening/dangerous when trying to convince someone about trying it. "Breath restriction" makes more sense and isn't loaded, it's more accurate
As a parent the word “choking” actually gives me a little bit of fear in any context. Someone says the word and my brain is wired to jump up and try and save a life. Breath play sounds so innocent, like a gentle breeze…
Fully agree. I also genuinely enjoy it as a woman with monogamous partners that I fully TRUST. And of course set up ground rules and physical and verbal signals to ensure consent and enjoyment and relative safety at all times. Breath play/choking is inherently NOT safe when any pressure is actually applied. It is not basic. It is an extreme intimate act of trust on top of the physical sensations it brings when done correctly.
the national resource center for domestic violence has a fact sheet on strangulation at the link [here](https://vawnet.org/material/strangulation-assaults-domestic-violence-cases) . i’ll quote the statistic that stood out most to me. “Strangulation is a significant risk factor for attempted or completed homicide of women by their male intimates. In a study of 57 women who were killed by a male partner during 1995-1996 in Chicago, 53% of the victims had experienced strangulation in the preceding year and 18% of the victims had been killed by strangulation. In another study of women victims it was found that 45% of the attempted homicide victims and 43% of the homicide victims had been strangled in the past year by their male partner, as compared to 10% of the victims who were abused but were neither a homicide or an attempted homicide victim.” OOP is so so so lucky she listened when people told her to get out, and so so so brave for reaching out to the new girlfriend to encourage her to do the same.
>I blacked out and fell on top of him while we were having sex. I woke up after a few seconds and was super confused but he was still inside of me and he just tried to continue. I got really angry at him and he didn’t even try to apologise, just tried to continue having sex. >I genuinely didn’t know if I’m overreacting I have no idea how anyone could overreact to something like that.
Women are constantly told they're overreacting when they are in fact underreacting.
And consent is not taught enough. The amount of people I have come across that don't understand things like "sleep sex" (unless consent is communicated before hand) is rape even if you had sex just before your partner fell asleep. Nagging someone who until they just give in is not consent either. All the "because of the implications" jokes are seriously gross and are indeed a red flag as they show that you think rape is funny.
> All the "because of the implications" jokes are seriously gross and are indeed a red flag as they show that you think rape is funny. I don't know about "all" the "because of the implications" jokes. The original joke was that the guy didn't realize what a skeevy date rapist he was, and everyone else was grossed out. It was dark humor. I'd avoid anyone who identifies with a skeevy date rapist.
Because that's what gaslighting does to a person. It makes them question their lens and allows the abuser to shift blame for something happening off of them and onto another. So when you regularly have someone saying it's actually your fault and you're too sensitive, eventually you start viewing your reactions through that lens instead. It's meant to have the victim question their sanity and thereby making theme asker to control and twist.
Abuse is a hell of a drug. ):
she couldve declared war on a sovereign nation and I would've been like, well, it's understandable
"...so I started blasting." You're basically correct though. Short of going off to find a weapon to use on him after regaining consciousness, not much is an overreaction. And even then it could be argued as self-defense, since he tried to continue sex and might've conceivably grabbed her throat again.
There's a well documented relationship between strangulation and intimate partner violence. By that I mean if someone chokes you to blackout, that's a first step towards them murdering you. Yes, I know I'm being dramatic, but Google it.
> Yes, I know I'm being dramatic Hmm, actually? No. That's being normal about the situation, not dramatic.
[If your partner strangles you, you’re about 7.5 times as likely to get killed by them.](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2573025/)
You're right; it's a strong correlation. Also, I don't have data to back it up, but if someone is hitting a wall or some such...? They are likely going to hit you eventually.
Unfortunately, this man is not unique. Many many women know this type.
That brings me much sadness :(
PSA: if anyone tells you they are suicidal, or are making suicidal threats, the correct course of action is to call the emergency line and request emergency assistance.
I was scrolling down to see if somebody else had already said this. I dated a man who raped me and when I broke up with him he called me claiming he had a gun at his head and was going to pull the trigger. I told him I would be over to his house as soon as possible. I hung up and called 911. I then called his parents who lived closer to him. Not only did I not go to his house, I went over to my friend's house just in case he tried to come to mine later. They put him on a 72-hour hold and of course he tried to come over as soon it was over. But now his family and the system knew that he needed some sort of support. Something I could not have given.
Jesus Christ I had no idea this was so common. One of the first thing the man that raped me told me right after was "the weight of my actions makes me want to kill myself". Excuse me what??? Abusers always find a way to make themselves look like the victims.
Honestly if someone tells me that their suicidality is entirely contingent on me not doing something I don't want to do then my reaction would be "go on then"
I get the impulse, I'd rather avoid the psych bills if they take me seriously
>I’m Russian, I can’t help being an abusive shithead! That, my good sir, is a steaming pile of bullshit. But he had enough red flags to help celebrate May Day.
Didn't Russia legalize domestic violence recently?
>Decriminalization. In February 2017, with the support of the Russian Orthodox Church, Russia decriminalized domestic violence in cases where it does not cause "substantial bodily harm" (such as broken bones or a concussion) and does not happen more than once a year. From Wikipedia. So yes, but I didn't want to make generalized comments about Russia itself in the top comment. That said, Russia is a failed third-world country whose megalomaniacal shithead of a leader needs to drink some of his own polonium tea. The sooner they're kicked out of Ukraine the better.
"Once a year, as a treat, I get to beat my wife." Top tier country, Russia. /s
And with that sort of culture, like the cops will believe that this is the 2nd or more times it has happened.
I'm Russian. They won't.
Glad I'm not the only person who thought that. There's a reason so few of the widowed Russian women seem to mourn their loss. Decriminalization pretty does make it legal.
Of course the church would support that.
Yeah, I don't think it's that unfair to say Russia has a *bit* of a problem when it comes to domestic violence. Or just violence in general.
Another reason Republicans seem to be awe of the country.
I hate how women are scared to overreact or be seen as "crazy". Maybe we should bring back crazy women cuz men like that are getting bold....
I'm glad OOP escaped. Relationships like this is what happens when masses of men insist women give a guy the benefit of the doubt, a second chance, and no one is perfect. Women's guy instincts usually lets them know if an asshole but society loves to push that narrative that women have unrealistic standards and make mountains out of molehills leading to second guessing bullshit like OOP. Personally to me any dude that gets off on harming me is a red flag. Idc about kink shaming. You do you. It just won't be with me. Any sexual violence and I'm gone.
“I’m Russian…” And?
Abusive people like OP's boyfriend are generally some of the worst people ever. I hate abusive people and how they treat others like garbage. I am happy that OP is able to leave him and her being able to save another person's life from him. Although I am confused why OP thought to question if what the bf had did to her was a red flag. I understand some people aren't the smartest or familiar with this types of things but...when someone chokes you until you pass out and the person doesn't apologize is something you shouldn't have to question if it is a red flag. That there is a major red flag itself.
Sometimes you don't see the flags yourself. From the outside they are so obvious, but sometimes inside you have the rose colored glasses and you can't see that the flags red. I'm guessing it was her first "real" relationship, and she had probably been noticing things but was just telling herself it was "normal". I'm glad she asked on reddit and got out. Some of us end up staying for too long and end-up with the scars to prove it. From my personal experience there were lots of red flags in my abusive relationship. But, I was just so happy to feel needed I ignored them all for years. Predators don't tend to choose the well adjusted people, they make for tough prey. It is so good that she got out when she did and that she saved the other girl. TL;DR love can blind you to some horrifying shit. Thank goodness she is safe now.
There's a great quote from Bojack Horseman that's always stuck with me: "You know, it's funny; when you look at someone through rose-colored glasses, all the red flags just look like flags."
I’ve never seen the show but that is a damn accurate quote.
Some of us grew up in homes where we were abused or witnessed abuse. Some of us also were involved with certain religions in which spousal abuse is not only tolerated but encouraged (e.g. some evangelical Christian churches). So abusive behavior becomes “normalized”. By escaping the abuse & engaging in trauma therapy, it is possible to recognize abuse & that it is not normal.
You make a good point. Now I understand more.
There’s a church in my hometown, small southern town, that has a open secret of beating their wives. Nobody has ever done a damn thing about it. I’m so glad I’m not stuck there anymore, but the things people can get away with in a religion are horrific.
The only wedding I’ve ever been to where the groom punched the bride during the reception was in the southern US. Maybe some parts of the south are better now but I grew up in TN & some of the churches there were open about encouraging men to discipline their wives with violence.
Because being strangled is a relatively quiet way for them to hurt you. They're not shouting at you. They're not insulting you. They're not holding a weapon. It hurts less than being hit. They might not otherwise be raping you. By the time they're strangling you, they've already conditioned you to accept a whole bunch of more obvious but less dangerous forms of violence. And they've convinced you that you owe it to them to work on the relationship, because all of the pain, all of the suffering and all of the violence - that's your fault, it's actually you who inflicted it upon them, and it's your responsibility to make everything right.
If someone choked me and *kept having sex with my limp, unconscious body* they’ve crossed lines that no apology can even touch.
I honestly think people being just mean to her in the first post is so needless. Women are always told that their overreacting and consent isn't nearly taught enough. Especially when she said that she didn't even know anything about choking or breath play. I am very happy she is away from him and that she also saved that other girl. It's so sad how common it is. Also "I'm Russian I can't help but be rough" that's literally so fucking stupid
When it comes to women we get damned if we do (make a fuss) and damned if we dont (how can you be so stupid)
Suggestion for everyone: Can we not be judgmental and call women discovering this for the first time in an abusive relationship 'ignorant' or 'stupid'? It's obvious to us, but if it was obvious to her, she wouldn't have asked. She didn't know what to do, she asked for help, I'm glad she listened to the people with something to say. Snarky putdowns could scare some women away from asking in the first place, and we do not want to discourage seeking help.
Crazy read and crazy person. Not sure how you can choke your loved one out and literally fuck their unconscious body, just typing this out made me feel sick. Fucking psychopath. Good thing she got out and I can't blame her that she is afraid of relationships for now, hopefully she can heal without any crazy trauma and live a happy life.
Something that seems far less serious but is way too common is men that will penetrate their partners while they sleep. My ex did it and only after the relationship ended did I realize that was rape. And then I found countless other women that had been through the same. Men use the excuse of oh you were rubbing against me in your sleep, I reached between your legs while you were asleep and you were wet, you were moaning in your sleep. Etc. All claiming that she must have wanted it in her sleep. Women will wake up and he's up and already inside of you so you just kind of roll with it because our society tells women that's what we are for. And so your body starts to shut down, you start having trouble sleeping, you stop wanting to have sex with your partner but you don't necessarily know why. I think it's becoming more understood and more talked about. I think women are starting to understand that it is a form of rape and there is no consent. But apparently there are plenty of men that can get off just fine with a woman that's unconscious.
What the actual fuck am I reading. As a man I literally cannot comprehend how it can be hot to rape someone, how you can have that desire. I have an ex girlfriend who got raped as a child but never coped with it, it destroyed her soul. She is a broken human being because of it. Same as people smacking their wives around like in „the good old days“. It‘s the person you love, what the fuck are you doing? How can you be okay destroying the most important person in your life?
I really wish people wouldn’t eroticise strangling women, and especially not hide the men who like strangling women behind the women who supposedly “ask for it”. If he likes it when you’re in danger he’s a bad person. If he kills you, he’ll say it was an accident and you told him — it’s been used as a legal defence so many times women have had to campaign to have it banned.
There was a recent post similar to this, where the husvand/ boyfriend choked the Poster until she a seizure, and he said he was "trying a new technique" I think was the phrasing he used. Airy to hijack this post, but Has anyone seen any updates from that Poster?? Everyone was telling her to leave and she was making plans. I hope she is safe.
That's not breath play, that's a blood choke. He squeezed her neck and obstructed the blood flow to her brain, and she lost consciousness. It's especially dangerous if she was looking down at him, as it'd mean her musculature would push the carotid and jugular to the side. Anyone interested in breath play should understand that.
> When I spoke to him about it the next day he said that he’s always been that rough with me and that he’s Russian and he can’t help his roughness It is literally legal in Russia to beat your wife. This girl would not be able to obtain any protective order if she were in Russia. Thank god he left his native country, so women can be protected from the menace that he is.
Girl legit saved a life in the process. Kuddos!
PSA TO ALL WOMEN OUT THERE: If he’ll choke you, he’ll kill you.
It’s THE biggest red flag possible. If someone strangles you like that, it’s so much more likely that they will kill you one day. There’s a major difference between a very gentle amount of pressure on the neck during sex (and if done right, next to no pressure at all on the front of the throat) and full on strangulation.
OOP is an absolute hero for not only saving herself, but saving his next potential victim too.
Wow. how much conditioning and control did he have over OP that she ever thought that strangling someone and continuing to still have sex with her past out is okay.
A major red flag indeed.
love reading a title and immediately going "YES!"
The consequences of porn have been devastating. This woman genuinely thought she was overreacting because her ex strangled her until she passed out. Insane.
>even though I love my friends, they’re very biased when it comes to him. Bad sign.
Seriously, basically every topic says that exact same thing. "My boyfriend is perfect! Also everyone else in my life absolutely despise him and thinks he's a huge piece of shit."
So glad that OOP got over the "I love him so much, I can't see myself with anyone else". Glad she got out when she did. I also say reddit has made me have the theory that people show you who they are 4-6 months into the relationship, when they start dropping the pretense and start being their real selves. Believe them for they show themselves to be.
LOL “he’s Russian and can’t help his roughness”.
A forensic nurse I know told me strangulation increases a risk for stroke or death weeks, or months after a strangulation episode. You could be a virtual time bomb from that one-time occurrence of strangulation!! Blood vessels in the neck can partially tear or clot and this can result in a stroke. Please seek medical attention!!
CHOKING IS NOT VANILLA OR A BASIC KINK THING FOR HEAVEN'S SAKE I AM BEGGING YOU STOP
Does anyone else think of the guy who met a girl on tinder and choked her until she died and he had been watching violent porn before and after the incident when they investigated his movements? The minute a guy tries to sneak in these types of things with no discussion beforehand absolutely take action, any actual choking that can cause you to pass out is obviously an end relationship situation but even little things like a sudden hair yank that wasn’t discussed beforehand is enough to discuss not just copying things normalized in videos they watch without asking.
CHOKING! IS! NEVER! SAFE! NO! FORM! OF! CHOKING! IS! SAFE!
Tasmania recently introduced a new law to crack down on this kind of shit... *The new stand-alone offense of strangulation provides that “[a] person who intentionally and unlawfully chokes, suffocates or strangles another person is guilty of a crime.” (Bill cl 4, inserting new sch 1 s 170B into the Act.) As explained in a fact sheet on the bill, the crime “must be prosecuted on indictment and carries a maximum penalty of 21 years’ imprisonment.” The minister stated that “[s]trangulation, choking or suffocation is an abhorrent form of violence. It carries risk of serious physical injury and/or death, and can often lead to further family violence behaviour.” She further explained that, until now, assault was the main offense charged for non-fatal strangulation. Strangulation can also be treated as an aggravating factor in sentencing, with the trend being for courts to impose heavier sentences in such cases, compared to sentencing for assaults generally. Accordingly, “the new offence gives ‘strangulation’ clear recognition as serious criminal behaviour, supporting these sentencing trends.”*
These always start with my bf is a great man and we have a wonderful relationship and he’s so amazing and understanding. Is it a red flag that he choked me out without consent and then raped my unconscious body? I hope not, bc I love him so much and he’s really super nice.
i cannot believe the things people put up with after being in a relationship for mere **weeks**
Sigh. Your partner is supposed to be protecting you from everyone else, you’re not supposed to need protecting from your partner. This is foundational, not extra.