The Ultimate Guide to Kink (27 page)

Douching is necessary for three reasons. One: Most of the people who like ass play do not, oddly enough, like shit. Two: Even a partially full bowel can cause contractions that make penetration painful. Three: Feces with a gritty texture should not be ground against the delicate lining of your rectum and lower bowel. People who enjoy scat have their own sets of techniques, mores, and safety precautions that are beyond the scope of this article.

The top also ought to spend a similar amount of time in preparation. Do some yoga, meditate, journal, do what you need to do to put yourself in a good frame of mind, with lots of energy. Don’t show up with a cold or a rotten attitude. You will be using your body just as much as your partner uses theirs, so pay attention to your own well-being. Eat some protein before you play so you don’t get a big crash in your blood sugar. Groom your hands. Remove every sharp cuticle and trace of fingernail. Do this even if you are going to be wearing gloves! The lining of the rectum is not very thick; puncturing it can have dire consequences in terms of infection and bleeding. So if the tip of your glove breaks, for any reason, make sure that there is nothing abrasive on your fingertip that can cause harm. This also alters your hands and turns them into sexual symbols with the potency of genitals.

Once you and your partner are together, do whatever the two of you enjoy to get turned on. There’s no rule that says you have to throw yourself into a sling in the first five minutes. Tops who like to get off may choose to have the bottom make them come before play, to take some of the edge off their nerves. Some bottoms find that an orgasm helps them to relax. For others, coming just makes them lose interest in any more sex.

The topic of drugs and alcohol inevitably comes up during a discussion of preparing for the main act. If you’ve read any leather community history, you will know that drugs used to be a very big part of the gay men’s fisting scene. In fact, doing fisting without them was practically unheard of. MDA was a popular relaxant then, but people also drank alcohol, popped Quaaludes, did crystal meth, dropped acid, snorted coke, swallowed a variety of prescription sedatives and muscle relaxers, and came up with other unique and sometimes scary combinations. And, of course, the brown bottles of amyl nitrate (or after that became illegal, butyl nitrate) were ubiquitous.

I’ve been clean and sober for nearly 20 years, but I can’t lie to you: being intoxicated did help people relax, shed their inhibitions, and dilate their orifices. But the high level of drug use also led to addiction (which I define as repeatedly trying to get high when it stopped being fun a long time ago), overdoses, unwise selection of partners, imprecise communication, blunted pain, overuse of the back door, and a lot of depressed and sore mornings after spent with one ice bag on the forehead and another between the buttocks.

If you are a pervert and an addict in recovery, you have no choice but to learn how to enjoy your wicked ways without the use of mind-altering substances. This probably deserves its own chapter or even a book. But if you are not an addict, I see nothing wrong with one drink (and I do mean one). There are many people who would disagree with me. The politically correct injunction is not to drink or use any drugs when you play. This may be an ideal, but it’s not the way many people actually have sex. I think we are doing poor sex education if we don’t look at how erotic behavior actually takes place, and offer people interventions that are reasonable. If you don’t know your own body well enough to understand what kind of psychotropic substances you can ingest without harm, you are an arrogant novice or willfully ignorant, and nothing I can say will help you. Unfortunately, I still see a lot of us engaging in self-harm, perhaps because we feel guilty about our deviant sex lives, or we’ve got a lot of baggage from fucked-up families of origin, or perhaps our friends are giving us stupid advice and pressuring us to do as they do. I want all of us to have scads of fun and love in our lives with as little damage as possible. Be careful of your precious self. If you need to get injured, emotionally obliterated, or killed to fulfill a wrongheaded, romantic idea of your own doomed specialness, it’s not as if you won’t be able to find a bunch of villains who will oblige you. Dammit.

Assuming you are a sensible person who has managed to line up an opportunity to misbehave, you can maximize your chances of a good experience by paying some attention to the environment where you meet. Some of us like to get our freak on at group sex events. If you’ve got access to that luxury, well and good. Hopefully the space will be clean and unlikely to draw the wrath of the vice squad by doing stupid things like admitting minors. A good sound system and the above-mentioned music help a lot as well. If you are playing in private, setting the mood doesn’t have to mean constructing your own dungeon in a spare bedroom. Just clean up the room you are going to use, get rid of the dog bed and pictures of Grandma, and create a play surface. One solution is to cover the bed with a plastic sheet and then put something with a nicer texture on top of it. Some folks have invested in portable stands and slings. Other accessories include a couple of stacks of trick towels, some squeeze bottles of water, a large supply of lube, and any toys you might want to include in your Voyage to the Center of the Earth. Useful toys include vibrators, ass plugs and dildos, tit clamps, bondage restraints, genital whips, or cock rings. Don’t forget condoms (to keep the toys clean) and gloves.

One of the most important items on this list is the lubricant. The classic of the 1970s and 1980s was, of course, Crisco. You knew you were with a cheap date if he showed up with generic vegetable shortening. When the AIDS epidemic got under way, the use of water-based lubricant became important for other types of sex, because oil can weaken the latex in condoms. Some fisters will swear that water-based lube is not thick enough and doesn’t last long enough to make for a friction-free ride. I’ve seen recipes for mixing water-based lube with shortening, which allegedly gives you a product you can wash out of the sheets. (Don’t count on it.) With experimentation, you will come up with your own answer. But I’d like to point out that you can use the thicker, longer-lasting grease if you are not going to need safer-sex protection later on. If you aren’t going to be using condoms to contain sperms-and-germs, and if you are using nonlatex gloves, oil-based lube won’t be dangerous. Keep in mind that the grease is going to linger in your tail for a few days, so think about what your sex life is going to include after the current date.

Remember that lubricant can be a source of disease transmission. If you have a big container of it, put some in smaller containers that can be discarded after play is done. Some people use paper cups; squeeze bottles or pumps are also handy. Just make sure that any lube you’ve touched is never used with another partner. Even if you are both healthy, the bacteria and other microorganisms from the colon could make somebody else sick.

Keep the room nice and warm. Cold makes muscles tense up, and your asshole is a muscle. For most of us, decent music is also very erotic and helpful during tough bits of the play. It can lift the mood and strengthen the bond between players during nonverbal moments. Keep up with what’s current in the clubs and make your own tapes or buy good ones. Think of it as lubricant for your ears.

What is the best way to position your bodies? Slings became popular because they created a weightless sensation, and the top could move one back and forth, like the rocking of a cradle. But many people don’t like them. It can be hard to make a good pillow for a sling, and who can ignore a crick in the neck, no matter how loud their prostate is humming? Some bottoms do better if they can get up on their hands and knees. I think it’s good to keep the option of changing positions, since moving the whole body will also affect the target orifice.

JOURNEY TO BLISS

When you are facing the bottom, with the bottom on their back, you probably want to make the initial approach with your left hand: the rectum naturally bends the same way your wrist will bend. Apply some lube to the outer opening and massage it in. Use fingers or toys to gradually expand the opening. You actually want to get lubricant inside the rectum. That’s tricky until the asshole begins to gape a bit, and you can shove some in on your fingertips. You can hook one finger around the lip of the anal orifice, stretch it a bit, and use your other hand to tuck a gob of lube past the ring of muscle. If you are already inside and it feels like you need more lube, carefully remove your hand, fill up your palm, and go back in. Then squeeze your hand to release the lube.

Should you talk to the bottom or let them go off on their own mental trip? I prefer partners who stay connected to me while we play. I need to check in with them about what feels good and what does not, how fast or deep I should go—so I want that channel to stay open. I recommend not letting the two of you get too far apart. If you can maintain communication nonverbally, through body movement and eye contact, that’s fine—but it’s also not too common. It’s okay for the top to ask, “Are you groaning because you want more, or are you having trouble?” Reassure the bottom that it is okay to ask for a break, more lube, less lube, tit work, genital stimulation, etc. Also let them know that the play is not goal-oriented. If you don’t get your whole hand inside them, that’s okay. (And they won’t believe you unless that’s true, so curb your enthusiasm.)

Talking can be a way to take control of the bottom’s internal experience. By tweaking his or her emotions, you can also make their body give sway. Fisting can have dozens of different meanings in the context of the relationship between top and bottom. It is the top’s job to identify, name, and sell that meaning. “You’re doing this because you belong to me. It’s the ultimate way of giving me ownership over your body.” “I want to get you higher than you’ve ever been before. You know that nobody can make you feel the way that I can make you feel.” “You’re a dirty little piggy. You can never get enough. Now everybody is going to know what an utter whore you are. See how much you need this?” “I’m touching you because I love you. Every time I push into your body, I’m pushing my love into you. And when you respond and give me what I want, I know that you love me too, because that energy hits me right in the heart. Feel that? Feel how much I love you?”

Remember that there are two bodies present. You can take a break and get sucked off, sixty-nine, do some bondage and flagellation, put on a hood or blindfold, trade back rubs, masturbate, or do anything else you both enjoy. I do not recommend doing play piercing or any other play that breaks the skin during fisting. Sweat and lubricant will be flying everywhere, carrying little travelers, and you don’t want butt germs to enter the bloodstream.

As the butthole opens up, the top will feel some tension around the largest part of the hand. It takes experience to know when you should ignore it and go forward or wait for more dilation. The bottom’s opinion ought to prevail. Use your fingertips to stroke the tissue inside the opening. Keep your hand pointed, folded up as small as possible, with the thumb tucked into the palm. You may approach this point of tension, back off, then work up to it again several times before you slide inside. Use your breaks to drink some water and make out. (Please don’t tell me you are going to turn someone into your sock puppet but you won’t kiss them!) When someone is learning how to get fisted, they may play without being completely penetrated for quite a while before their body learns to trust that these strange sensations are okay, and relaxes. Remember your prime directive: The Asshole Must Feel No Pain!

If you are lucky enough to be admitted, let the shape of the bowel direct the curve of your hand and wrist. Fisting is safest when you don’t go any deeper than your wrist. Just sit where you are for a while, and let the bottom’s body settle down. They may shake all over, cry out, and even cry. It’s intense. You are in a very sensitive area, so you don’t have to do a lot to create a big reaction. When you do start to move, keep it small. Make little circles. Gently open your hand a fraction of an inch, then close it again. Wiggle your fingertips. See what the response is to each of these gestures. If a prostate is available, a little extra pressure in that area can be sexy. But few men enjoy having the prostate hammered, so don’t overdo it.

If there is enough wiggle room, get the fingertips of your other hand into heaven. This can help to introduce more lubricant. Also, some people enjoy a slow in-and-out in which you trade hands, one slipping past the other. Rotating your hand from side to side can also feel good. Eventually, you may be able to use the traditional in-and-out motion with one hand.

Having something that big inside your body usually changes the sexual response cycle. For example, guys may not get erections even if they feel very excited. Sometimes stimulating the penis or clitoris or vagina can help open the butthole up. But sometimes these sensations are too much, and don’t have the desired effect. This can change from session to session. Often, people wind up focusing on the rush they are getting from the anal play. If they have a genital orgasm, it may come at the very end of the play. Fisting can sometimes make people piss. Get your next trick towel out, mop up, and proceed apace. It’s a way of letting go, expanding emotional horizons, and releasing inhibitions. It can also feel grand. Don’t make people wrong for an experience they can’t prevent. Go with the flow. Literally.

From time to time, it is normal for the stimulated bowel to generate waves of contractions. Small ones can be ignored. Just hold still until it’s over. But if you feel your hand being pushed out, let the body do what it needs to do. The feeling of having the hand expelled can be as pleasurable as being filled up. The anus is stretched no matter what direction you are going in. Engage in another activity or take a break until the bottom feels ready to get plugged again.

The bottom’s physical challenge in a fisting scene is obvious. The top is also running a marathon, and perhaps those challenges need to be explained. The top will be putting out a lot of emotional energy through minute concentration and attention to detail. This is a lot of responsibility, and that affects an ethical person. It’s also a huge ego rush. The top will probably be in uncomfortable positions for extended periods of time. If your nose itches or you have sweat in your eyes, your hands may not be clean enough to safely address the problem. (Have a clean bandana with the towels.) Your hand or arms can fall asleep. Your back can hurt. You may feel sleepy or get bored. Let’s acknowledge that you are touching somebody else a lot, and for most of that time, no one is touching you, so you can experience alienation from your own body. The experienced fisting top learns how to minutely adjust position so blood can flow back into the feet or arms. With practice comes greater stamina.