Shibari How To: Lesson 4/Psychological Considerations of Rope Bondage

From http://www.bdsm-chicago.com/cram:

Psychological Health
Now I am not a psychologist either, and everyone is different, this is what I have learned from my experiences, so please talk to a mental health specialist if you need advice! Now this should fall under a medical section. But I wanted to give psychological health its own section because it is an extremely important, if not the most important thing, about bondage.

General
First off, bondage is all about control (or there lack of), and trust, which are 2 very mentally based concepts. When people are in bondage, they think, feel and (re)act differently they they would normally. For most this can be a very minor effect, for some it can be very extreme. Now psychological reactions are the hardest to figure out before hand, because unlike an injury it is not something you can physically see (well at least usually), and a lot of times a person being tied up for the first time may not know how they are going to psychologically react until it happens.

Clinical Studies
Now I have tried to find studies done on why people like/do bondage, but as far as I can tell, there has never been a clinical study done on bondage topics besides what percentage of the American population does it in their life. I asked some friends about that, and they all replied the same, which was no institution will support this topic because it too taboo.

Comfort / Sleepiness
The type of bondage you are doing, and how the victim takes to the tie, will greatly effect how the victim feels and reacts. If a tie is very comfortable, and they are enjoying it, and immobile, it very common for the victim to get sleepy. I like to describe it as putting a sheet over a cage causing the bird to think its time to sleep, so it does. Human do the same thing, if you bind them and they know they cannot move or get out, and are relaxed, the brain shuts down and will put them in a minor coma like state, so they feel sleepy and want to sleep. Doing a Japanese hog tie, its very common for a victim to be able to stay in it for 1-4 hours on the first try, and I will hog tie them and let them go to sleep, and they will wake up when they are ready to get out, and tell me that, and I will let them out.

Fear / panic attacks
Now depending on the actions taken during a bondage scene, it is possible for a victim to have a panic attack. Now bondage is all about trust, so if the victim loses sight on this issue, or something happens that they did not expect, either action wise, or mental based, its possible for them to have a panic attack. The best thing to do in this situation, is talk to them and calm them down, and start removing them from the bondage calmly.

Psychology of Rope Bondage

Now there are three questions I have come up with when dealing with psychology involved with doing bondage…

3 Questions to ask about doing bondage…
The first, What does bottom/top receive from it?
Secondly, Why do they need/want that? and
Third, Where does it take them?

Generally there are many different reasons for everyone to enjoy bondage, there is no right or wrong as long as all parties are happy and getting what they need from it and also what they want from it! But there are several reasons why people do enjoy bondage, from both points of view. Some of them include what is listed below, but I am sure there are more then what I could come up with…

Control:
Probably the most important key of bondage. For most giving up/receiving, or losing/taking control is the main reason for loving / needing bondage! All the rest generally have something to do with this in some degree or form, but do not have to be the only reason.

Meditation: being bound for some can put the bottoming into sub space, or into a meditative state.

Stress Release: Giving up control can relieve a lot of normal daily stress.

Restraint: For use with other play.

Artistic: It just plain looks kool. ==B)