I did one “Kink of the Week” post during the summer, and since then, I haven’t participated.
This is just because I was having a hard enough time keeping up with my regular posting, let alone try to add in something with a *gasp* deadline!
For those of you who don’t know, Kink of the Week (or KOTW) is a feature on my friend Jade’s blog. Every week, she posts a particular “kink” as the theme. These things are sometimes activities, materials, practices, ideas et cetera that a person might fetishize or enjoy as part of their kink play. She then invites other bloggers to write up their opinion, interests, ideas or “take” on this topic. Everyone’s links are posted to the KOTW page, so readers can get a variety of opinions on one topic.
It’s a bit hard for me to write these posts sometimes because I see my kink play as being fairly limited because my fetishistic interests are pretty straight forward compared to some people. That said, I have dabbled in a lot of things and I do have thoughts on basically everything. That’s the beauty of having a brain, isn’t it? 😛 More importantly, I like the *idea* of KOTW. I like having a variety of minds come together and describe their thoughts and feelings. I like the fact that instead of it being a thread on a forum somewhere or a place where you can comment on her blog, Jade allows us each to showcase our own work. We write and format our posts in the style that’s natural and comfortable for us, and we do it in our own spaces on the internet. When we invite others to read our KOTW posts, it draws attention to each person’s blog or site and allows us to find people whose thoughts and words are powerful and important but who we would not normally encounter.
For these reasons, I’ve decided that I’m going to try to make myself write about the KOTW topic each and every week, though, even when the kink is something that I don’t fetishize or usually practice. I don’t know how much I’ll have to say about these topics, or how great my post will be, but we’ll try it.
Relatedly, this week’s topic is Bastinado.
Bastinado isn’t something that I’ve ever fantasized about. I think this is probably because even though it’s a traditional form of corporal punishment, it’s very removed from the domestic/institutional corporal punishment base of my fantasies. It feels darker, to me, but it doesn’t fit with the dark parts which draw me in. In general, the basis of my darker interests is always a change in theme or intensity, not a change in the style of play. Then there’s the fact that my feet are very sensitive and because I’m very clumsy, I’ve injured them a lot of times. There’s nothing particularly exciting about a sensation that I associate with accidentally hurting myself.
Still, I’ve experimented with getting hit on the feet on two different occasions. The first was during the very start of my relationship with Malignus. During the time that we first started sceneing together, we tried a lot of things that I had never done before, many of which we would never do again, just for the sake of experimentation and new experiences. One day, while we were hanging out in his living room (this was before we lived together), he grabbed my foot and applied a sharp smack to the bottom of it with a wooden spoon. I found the sensation of this to be something which I can only describe with one word: “invasive.” I don’t mean that it was invasive to my personal comfort zone that he did that or anything like that. I found the pain to be invading my body in a way that I’d never experienced. Because the hurting traveled up the body of my foot, the feeling seemed more akin to a foreign object entering me in a place where it wasn’t meant to than just feeling sore. I thrashed around, trying to shake the feeling out of my foot. This kind of sensation made me very uncomfortable and almost a little disturbed, like some shockwave of hurt was wiggling around in my body.
We never did that again.
Target?
Maybe you could give warmup strokes over socks, to make a foot-baring ritual and borrow from the spanking routine?
I’ve mentioned this idea before, but I always find it very humbling when I play around in a kink other than my own. I can get to feeling very tough indeed when it comes to taking spankings. I can have a very high tolerance (I say “can” because in a vulnerable situation my tolerance is laughably low). It almost fills me with awe at how much things hurt me that *aren’t* on my bottom or thighs, and my bastinado play experiments are a good example of that. Still, I think that when I want that feeling of being shocked by how painful something is, I think I’ll stick to something that I find thematically more interesting (like my hands). ♥
19 Responses to KOTW: Experiments with Bastinado
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Oh, Hai!
Alex
Los Angeles, California, United States
First and foremost, I’m a girl who loves being spanked. It’s at the very center of my being. I’m also a professional spanking model, which means I get to do what I love for my job. I’m twenty six years old, and currently located in Los Angeles when I’m not traveling around on my adventures. My vanilla interests include poetry, film history, academia, Pokemon, indie music, baby animals, baking and cooking, collecting vintage clothes and lots of cuddling.
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I like the idea of KOTW and links to different bloggers take on a particular subject.
I’ve never found much appeal in Bastinado, but it was fun hearing your thoughts and experiences.
Thanks for your comment!
I agree with you on the Bastinado not really being appealing, but it was fun to examine for the post. 🙂
You touched on so many things that resonate with me and make me want to think/write more on both the specific topic, and on kink and how we perceive it in general.
First – I totally agree with what you say about how the KOTW works, both in allowing bloggers/readers to find new perspectives & blogs, and also in how it allows bloggers to approach the topics in their own unique way _ I love that about it!
Secondly…what you say about how having your feet struck feels…I found myself nodding. I didn’t even realize that was what I was experiencing but yes! You described it so well. To me it feels shocking and yes, “invasive.” It’s also not a sensation that I either eroticize or feel that I can “grow” my tolerance to. I love the idea of having the socks pulled down, tho, like the panties ritual!
I agree that I don’t think I’d be able to grow my tolerance for this. I don’t know how I know that. I just do! 😛
Thanks for your kind words, and thanks for running this brilliant forum. <3
I never thought to compare my feet being struck (which I love) to my hands being struck – I’ve had one partner who liked to do the latter and I really hated it! Perhaps because it was approached as a punishment, and I perceived it as such, or perhaps because it was deliberately done across the flat of the palm? *hunts down blog post to see what I wrote at the time* Ah – it was strapping. And yes, it hurt! While the bastinado on my feet is very thumpy instead, and much preferable.
Hmm. More food for thought! KotW is great for that 🙂
xx Dee
I find hand-pain to be very, very sharp. It has a totally different psychology, of course, because to me it’s very traditional and therefore easier for me to get into, and because it’s happening RIGHT THERE IN FRONT OF YOUR FACE. I have a post about my first hand strapping experience here, if you’re curious: http://alexinspankingland.blogspot.com/2013/06/this-post-makes-my-hands-hurt.html
Thanks for your comment, Dee! Take care!
Bastinado is something I’ve only lightly dabbled in. I can enjoy it as part of a headfuck – an “anything is possible” action that uproots me and tells me that I have no idea what to expect. Light enough and the sensation is kind of tingly and erotic, too. It wasn’t until recently that it occurred to me you could slap and smack the soles of the feet with a hand, rather than having to use a cane or a whip or something!
I like having my feet rubbed afterwards (and having them stroked is intense too, but I’m highly ticklish so it can be really unpleasant), so like the socks idea (which I LOVE) that’s another point of crossover between bastinado and spanking.
The idea that you mentioned about ‘anything being possible’ is a feeling that I used to find very unsettling and disruptive to my headspace. Now that I’m in a calmer place in general, I might quite like that sort of thing.
I like the idea of having rubs afterwards, also. I’m glad you liked my socks concept!
<3 you!
If I’m getting an overall body flogging, I don’t mind a bit of light flogging on my feet. But otherwise, I have zero tolerance for having my feet struck.
A few years ago, during a caning (I was lying on a padded table), the top suddenly grabbed my ankles and started tapping the bottoms of my feet with the cane. The pain was so jarring, so totally unpleasant, that my primary reaction was pure anger. I wanted to kick backward and knock his teeth into his sinuses.
Guess that would have been scene-kill, huh?
This comment made me giggle a little. I love your honesty, Erica, and your total lack of tolerance for things that you don’t want. I find both very inspiring.
I hope you’re well, btw, and I want to see you soon! <3
I have always considered bastinado with severe punishment, I’m highly ticklish and most of the people I’ve played with are too, so for me… a “punishment” must be hard or severe. I still have horrible visions of “Midnight Express” – see that awesome film of the American tourist caught trying to smuggle class A drugs out of Turkey in the 1970’s and spending a long time in a horrendous jail… there was a feet/sole punishment that still makes me wince now… that has forever turned me off punishing anyone on their feet or dabbling, to be honest! It’s a defining scene, I promise if you’ve never seen this film, you will hide your eyes with your hands when it happens!!!
Anyway, nice to hear your thoughts on it… and do go watch “Midnight Express” – it’s still one of my all time top 10 must see films!
Midnight Express is a great film, but the truncheon to Billy’s feet scene is one of several reasons why it was a “acknowledge as a good film, but only watch once” film for me.
Hiya, John! Thanks for commenting. It’s fascinating how something in the media can permanently alter how we see a particular action like that, isn’t it? I haven’t watched said film (although I’ve read about it) so I probably should check it out at some point. It might make me go 0_0 though, considering I’m a bit squeemish about bad things happening to feet in the first place!
Sorry if this comes through multiple times – it’s being ornery letting me post.
I agree with you, both about the KOTW posts, and bastinado. Nice post!
Thank you, Sammi!
I like the idea of KOTW. It’s always interesting to read different opinions on a topic. I’ve never had any interest in being hit on my feet with anything. I don’t think it would be a type of pain I can handle. Like you wrote, my butt has a tolerance built up, but the rest of me really doesn’t.
It’s a neat idea, isn’t it? I like that it helps me to expand the horizons of what I’m writing about. 🙂
I agree that the pain from being hit on feet is very hard to handle. Eek.
<3
I experienced being hit on the bottom of the feet in one scene. Your description is so accurate. It’s unlike any pain I have felt before and I couldn’t even control my very negative reaction!
Thanks for commenting! I don’t think I’d ever be able to control negative reactions to this, either!