ChrisWrestling's blog

I'm going to start off by saying, I'm not out to ruin anyone's good time, I'm not trying to police this community when it comes to chokes.  When I have responded it has been to make sure that people understood the real risks before engaging in the behavior.  The pushback I've gotten has been on both sides from some people feeling that being non-judgemental when explaining the risks is being permissive, with the other side brushing off what I was saying.  Choking people out is controversial but I'm not here to apologize for bringing the clinical realities into the discussion.

Today the discussion has taken an unexpected turn.  The context is that someone had asked in a forum about how deep you've put someone out and how many times in a single session they put someone out.  When someone asks a question like this they are not asking because they love statistics and are just curious what other people's experiences are, they are trying to find out where the boundaries of what is safe are.  One person who responded said 24 times in a single session.  I called him out for that and he has since messaged me in private to defend his answer as him "simply answering the question asked".   I'm sorry but when you share information like that you are an ambassador to that experience and you are being permissive for that kind of behavior.

The popularity of sexual choking is rising but statistics on deaths from it are non-existent because of several factors: 

1) Oftentimes the person doesn't die that night.  Choking someone out can cause an arrhythmia that may not become fatal right away.  

2) The damage to the arteries may not rupture them and it creates an area where platelets can get stuck which later break free causing a stroke.

3) Cranial pressure from the choke can cause an aneurysm which can later on.

4) Deaths by choking are often ruled as homicides rather than consensual choking for sexual gratification. 

Our community is particularly vulnerable to having a distorted view of the risks of choking.  Decades of gay wrestling porn have staged fake choke outs strung back to back, something I jerked off to as a teen, or deep chokes being held way too long, again fake.  Movies show people going out and staying out so when people choke out others in real life and the person doesn't stay out for long they think they didn't do it right then try again going progressively deeper.  Our chat rooms and interest groups often function to further normalize choking creating a false sense of security around it.  This builds the "it will never happen to me" mindset which is destined to end in tragedy.

So I am sorry if I am pissing people off on either side but at some point someone has to be the adult in the room to pull this community back to reality.  Do I have personal experience with this?  Yes.  I am friends with a former (very prominent) porn star who has been reduced to a slurring man child after he had his stroke at 40 years old following being choked out. Thankfully he survived but his story is not unique.  Following his stroke he had to relearn how to walk, he has to wear an eye patch because his brain can no longer process both eyes at once. He used to be rather intelligent but now he can barely function.  He lives in another friend's basement unable to get a job or provide for himself.  His mom had put him in a home for a year and once she had power of attorney she ran off with every cent he made.  This is not something I would wish on any of you.

Your choices are yours to make, risk aware consensual kink is about making sure you are informed, not about telling you what play you engage in, but please understand that when you are replying to someone asking questions about how far you can push choking, they aren't asking out of curiosity, they are asking so that they know what they can get away with and you should respond accordingly.