Behind the Paddle
Welcome to "Behind the Paddle", the podcast that explores the fascinating world of sex across a wide spectrum of topics; from LGBTQ+ and feminine power, to kink, sex work and the adult industry. We aim to inform, inspire and entertain, featuring expert interviews, compelling stories, and thought provoking discussions.
Join Porcelain Victoria (a very experienced Pro-Dominatrix of 8yrs) on a funny and wonderfully truthful look at the world through the lens of a BDSM practitioner working in the sex industry.
She will also be answering listeners questions about real-life queries which will be discussed on the podcast. These can be sent in via email or through any
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Behind the Paddle
E72: Rope Bondage with Miss Fay Morgan Part 1
In this deeply textured episode of Behindthepaddle, Porcelain Victoria is joined by the enigmatic and skilled rope practitioner @MissFayMorgan whose eight years of experience in shibari and rope bondage span teaching, performance, and profound emotional connection. Together, they untangle the physical, psychological, and spiritual dimensions of rope play from the meditative tension of a single column tie to the breathless beauty of full suspensions.
Whether you're curious about trying rope for the first time or looking to deepen your existing practice, this episode offers invaluable insights into the technical, emotional, and spiritual dimensions of this intimate art form. Follow Miss Fay Morgan on FetLife or Twitter/X to learn more about her workshops and professional sessions in Edinburgh and Glasgow.
https://fetlife.com/MissFayMorgan/
https://x.com/Miss_Fay_Morgan/
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Thank you so much for listening 💖
So hello and welcome back to Behind the Paddle Podcast with me Poulsen, victoria. Today we have a very special guest. I feel like every episode we have like a special guest. The most recent episodes I have been joined by such wonderful people and today we have Miss Faye Morgan. And yeah, today's guest brings with her nearly a decade of experience in a practice that blends art, sensuality and trust in the most intricate of ways. She is a rope practitioner, teacher and student of shibari and kimbu and she's joining us to discuss the deep, personal and physical world of rope bondage. Her name is Miss Faye Morgan. She can be spotted at rope jams here in Edinburgh, giving workshops across the UK, rigging for erotic films or attending international rope festivals in Berlin. She brings the sensual intensity she has honed through shibari to her other kink practices and this year she begins offering pro dom sessions. She's here to share insights gathered over eight years of hands-on experience not just time but in teaching, learning and holding space with rope. So welcome to Behind the Banner Podcast. Thank you.
Speaker 2:I'm delighted to be here. I very much enjoy listening to your podcast and the wide variety of topics you covered, and I thought that rope was a significant omission and one that I'd very, very much enjoy filling that gap.
Speaker 1:I mean, from reading your resume, you seem to have quite a lot of experience, so let's start at the very beginning. Most people come to rope with a kind of curiosity. Maybe it's aesthetic, maybe it's erotic. But somewhere along the way it becomes something else, something deeper. So can you tell me about when that shift happened for you, when rope became more than just a technique or play, when it started to change something internally?
Speaker 2:So I was drawn to rope I think as many people are both by the appeal of having that kind of technical skill and particularly something that's quite niche and in demand and by the aesthetics of it. And I initially was more interested in rope bottoming. But I wanted to be able to learn how to assess someone's tying skills, to figure out if there was someone who was going to be primarily safe to tie with and someone who was going to be enjoyable to tie with, both in terms of their technical and their consent practices. So I went to a workshop with a friend. We switched. During the workshop. My intention was more just to learn how to assess rigors, and then I found myself really loving tying.
Speaker 2:At the end of that workshop there was a demonstration by two presenters, which was a over six foot male body person and an under five foot female body person, and the five foot one tied the over six foot one and just used the rope as an extension of their body and just completely sent the bottom to space. And you could see from their face that they were just gone and I was completely bewitched and I thought I want to learn how to make people feel like that. And so the first time that I got a little taste of that power for myself. I was tying someone I'd I'd just met and been talking to at um sort of dungeon open day and uh had said hey, could I practice my, my tk, my box tie on you? And I did, and I started to bring in some of the interactive and body handling techniques. I'd begun to pick up and there's this moment where his torso just started to lean and his eyes closed and he just started to melt into me and I could see just from those few wraps that he was gone and I was like, oh yes, this, this, I want more um.
Speaker 2:And so then that was how I initially got the bug, and then, when it became more than just a technique or play, I would say that happened when I went to channel my own energy into it. So, rather than mimicking what I'd seen others do, it reached a point where I had a level of comfort and confidence which was partly from technical competence, but more so from feeling empowered in myself and sure of what I had to offer. From feeling empowered in myself and sure of what I had to offer, and then I could bring start to bring myself to the scenes in a real way, and for me, actually, rope was my journey into topping. So when I learned to bring my own sexy, predatory feminine energy into rope, then it naturally flowed over into me being able to confidently bring that energy into DS. And so I always say that when I tie and when I dom, I'm not playing a character, but I'm putting a different lens on myself. So there's some aspects that are magnified and intensified, but they're all genuine parts of me.
Speaker 1:I mean, I find it beautiful that um correct me my lovely forgetful brain, but correct me if I'm wrong. The six-foot person was not the rigger.
Speaker 2:So they were both switching through the class. They were alternating tying, yes, so in this case the smaller person was tying the very tall person.
Speaker 1:I love that.
Speaker 2:I'll talk a bit later on about how much I love having people bigger than me be very surprised when I fling them around like a rag doll.
Speaker 1:I mean it's yeah, we can get to that. So it often becomes a practice of self-discovery, not just power dynamics. Over the eight years, has the meaning of rope shifted for you so like? Has it evolved into something new as your skills and partnerships have developed?
Speaker 2:absolutely, and I mean, it's gone through seasons.
Speaker 2:You know, I I that first rope class I took was 2017.
Speaker 2:I very much dove into learning rope in 2018, um, and then this little thing happened in 2020 that you may or may not have been aware of or affected by, but that very much put a freeze on anything I could do apart from solo time for two years, um, but taking that hiatus out of it, I would say that I had this initial absolute infatuation with rope and a desire to to do all the technical things and to perfect things.
Speaker 2:Uh, and I say that, over time and as I attended events and got to know more people, it shifted more to caring about the friendships, relationships I form and where rope can take me, both literally and metaphorically, and how to use it as a framework in which to be creative and perverted. So I still you know, don't get me wrong I still love nerding out and honing my technical ability, but I feel this sense of security that this is a long-term practice for still, you know, don't get me wrong I still love nerding out and honing my technical ability, but I feel this sense of security that this is a long-term practice for me. You know there's. I've got the whole rest of my life to learn things and there's so many different practices, different directions that you can take it in oh, absolutely.
Speaker 1:I feel like, no matter what the subject is, you always learn something new, no matter what, and it's rope is so beautiful. Sadly, I don't do it yet, which is why, like, I really wanted you on, because it's something which I'm a little bit educated in, but not enough to say that I'm a professional in rope or I can educate somebody on rope. So it's really wonderful to have you on, because I this is something which I don't know that much about at all, and when people in the west hear the word shibari, they often think of something decorative or erotic, maybe something they've seen in photos or on stage, because I see, especially on social media, there is so many beautiful. When somebody's wrapped in shibari, wrapped in rope, it's to me such a beautiful art piece and it's so pretty, it's so pretty, it's so pretty.
Speaker 1:But there's a real culture and historical lineage here that many people don't fully understand. So, for those who are new here, shibari as we know it today has roots in hojujutsu, so a Japanese martial art used to restrain prisoners with rope, japanese martial art used to restrain prisoners with rope. That history is full of symbolism the knots used, the position of the body, even the intention behind the tie. I'm sure we'll go more into this, more into the history of shibari, in a future episode, but over time this evolved into what we now call Kenbaku, kenbaku, kenbaku, an erotic art form that began appearing in Japanese erotic prints and later in underground S&M photography and performance scenes. In the mid-20th century, in Western circles the term shibari became more common, though in Japan that distinction between hojujutsu and kenbaku still holds cultural weight. So how do you hold that cultural context in your own practice, and what do you notice about how Western rote culture interprets, or sometimes misinterprets, it?
Speaker 2:So I think it's really interesting there how you were talking about, how you saw it as something very beautiful, sort of wrapping, decorating the body, body, um. But when you bring in the context of it being used to restrain prisoners, it's actually something that, for people who come from those cultural backgrounds, their initial association with it is going to be more akin to how we feel when we see handcuffs. You know, we wouldn't tend to see handcuffs and go oh, what a beautiful wrist adornment.
Speaker 2:Well, you know, there tends to be thinking oh, you know, they're having their freedom restricted, perhaps there's an element of shame, you know public they're being, you know publicly displayed as, uh, being a criminal, or you know being under the power of the other, the other person. So I always find that one interesting because it's not like as a white western person. It's not my automatic cultural context, but you know it is one um from which your form has developed um. So there is a genre of what's often called western rope um, which is, it's quite distinct from shibari, although there's some overlaps and sort of knots and stuff used. So Western rope tends to be more of a sort of the damsel in distress genre. So you know, you have someone with like a cloth in their mouth and they're tied up, and it tends to be with synthetic rope and with longer lengths Because it's synthetic rope. That means that you're focused more on knots rather than sort of wrapping the rope around itself because it can't friction. That means that you're focused more on knots rather than sort of wrapping the rope around itself because it can't friction. In the same way, and the focus tends to be on sort of struggling against the rope or being tied up so that things can be done to the victim, whereas I would say in Shibari there's more of a focus on rope itself as an instrument of torture, of eroticism and of connection.
Speaker 2:You spoke about sm? Uh photos and magazines, and I'd name check here nobuyushi iraki, who's one of the early photographers who took these really beautiful, intense photos, uh, in rope um. So I'd recommend checking out if you're interested. Um, in terms of what's misinterpreted, I think that while there are things which had cultural reasons being how they are, there's sometimes a risk of there being this uh exoticization of shibari um, and you know the fact that it's so beautiful and you know a bit more mainstream in some ways and other bits of kink in terms of its more presentable image, um, I think sometimes that can take away the pervy core of it. And, as I said, uh, nobu nobuyoshi irqi, like this picture's really dirty um. Are you gonna look up? Um?
Speaker 2:And then the other thing I think can sometimes happen with the exoticization, or sometimes sort of projecting a context on things that aren't necessarily there uh, sometimes things were done for practical reasons. So I think a good example here is um ropes a certain length, you know. So people say like six meters or seven meters is like the traditional correct length, and oh, you know you're not doing it traditionally if you're not doing it with that length. But that is based around being twice someone's arm span, so that you can bring your waist high with your rope doubled in shibari, and the idea is that you can bring the rope through in a pass. You can't see me on camera, but I'm extending my arms like, uh, the angel of the north, um, so the idea is you can bring the rope through like that in a single pass.
Speaker 2:And, uh, because people tend to have smaller stature in japan than in the West, on average Seven meters or six meters was kind of the right length for them, whereas, you know, if it's a white man in America, eight meters might be an easier length. You know, for me I tie with 7.5 meters, you know, as a tall-ish woman. So that's just an example of something that was done for a practical reason but has sort of whimpered outside its original context, acquired a layer of woo-woo which wasn't actually there initially. I'm just gonna look at these pervy pictures. I'll be right back. Look, here's one oh, very nice.
Speaker 1:Oh wow, I just just love just him. In general, it just looks so cool. There's something else that often gets misunderstood in RIP the idea of who's active and who's passive. We're conditioned to see the person tying as the doer and the person being tied as the subject, but the reality, especially in connection, especially in connected rope scenes, is so much more dynamic. Talk to me about the interplay between the person tying and the person being tied. What are the subtle? You're mummying me? I don't need google translate, no more. Um, the subtle communications happening in a well-attuned rope scene so, um, an image I like to think about here.
Speaker 2:Um is a quadrant in terms of how the bottom is responding, doesn't just apply to rope active to passive on one axis so are they suck potatoes or are they fighting um, and then resistant to cooperative on another. So you could have someone being um passively cooperative, actively cooperative, passively resistant or actively resistant or anywhere in between. Um, when you say a well-attuned rope scene, I mean you can definitely have a well-attuned rope scene where someone's being active or passively resistant. But if we were to use the example here, say, of me doing a um suspension transition sequence, uh, with my regular rope bottom, where we tie together regularly and have done for years, we know each other's cues and she knows the sequence of positions we move through.
Speaker 2:Um, there are moments where, for instance, I may lift her body, but I need her to lift her hips and tilt her weight back, and without that it wouldn't work. You know, perhaps there would be a way to sort of yeah, you can't really brute force someone into that position, you need the cooperation from the bottom. And in those moments it can be a bit like um, people doing aerial circus or yoga or something like that that they have an awareness of their body, um. But you know, when we tie together, there's attunement beyond just knowing the steps of a dance. You know, we know what each other's cues mean. She knows that when I cue things to her in a certain way, there's a response. I'm looking for um, and vice versa.
Speaker 1:I know her signs, yeah so I feel, like in previous episodes, which I've mentioned as well, it's just communication, communication in so many different ways, and communication really is key, especially when it comes to any element of BDSM. This idea that rope is a conversation is so important, and it's. It's not a verbal one. It's communicated through pressure, placement, eye contact and intention. Now I've heard people describe rope as a language that every tie say something, even if you don't have the words for it. So my question to you is what are you saying when you Thai somebody? What does rope allow you to express that spoken language doesn't.
Speaker 2:So I feel there's a couple of parts here. You know, sometimes you're saying something that you can't quite put into spoken language and sometimes you're expressing something that could be expressed in spoken language but rope saying it in a very direct way. It's sort of a funny irony how having this arguably elaborate practice that you participate in someone and how it can free you up to interact in a very direct and visceral way and the things I might be saying to the bottom like very much depend on the nature of our dynamic and the nature of the scene. I could be saying you're beautiful, I desire you. I could be saying you should be ashamed of yourself or I enjoy your suffering, but something I think I'm always saying is I see you and to take that one step further, what do you hope the person being tied hears in return?
Speaker 1:because I imagine in those moments of surrender or stillness, there's a emotional message that's being received.
Speaker 2:I want them to, yeah, to hear what I'm saying and then also to know that I'm listening to them and I want them to to feel the weight of my gaze and just know that, in the the bubble that our scene is creating in that moment, they're the only thing in the world to me.
Speaker 1:They have my entire focus what I'm hearing and I think many listeners will resonate with this is that rope isn't just about erotic control. If anybody has listened to the rest of my lovely podcast episodes, I think we're coming up to 70 next week I'm not too sure I know I'm so happy you're septuagenarian now in podcast years.
Speaker 1:Oh, I'm so happy this is, oh, hopefully another like 70 and more will come out of this, because there's so much to talk about. There really is, especially when it comes to bDSM and LGBTQ+ and what's going on around the world, right now my silly little phrase I like to say is if you can think it, you can kink it.
Speaker 1:Absolutely so. Yeah, bdsm is so much more in general, more than erotic control. It's also about care and witnessing someone, about helping them be seen and held exactly as they are, and that is the exact same for rope and anything which is inside of BDSM as well. Now I'd love to hear about how this practice has shaped you as a person tying, because for all the focus on the person in rope, there's a powerful internal experience for the top two. So let me ask you when you tie someone, what happens in you, how do you feel and what do you receive from that in exchange?
Speaker 2:So I think that's really accurate.
Speaker 2:What you were saying there about witnessing someone, and for me, in all my topping kind of the core of it is the power and the trust I feel from someone choosing to be vulnerable and to let me witness their vulnerability in that way. Vulnerable and to let me witness their vulnerability in that way um, in terms of rope more specifically, there's a lot of um associations over, you know, almost a decade of doing it, that being such important practice to me. I feel that once I'm sat down, you know, on the floor or the mat or wherever, I'm tying with someone and I, you know, have a talk with them, and then I get my rope out and the moment I start to feel it in my hands, I'm just, it's like the everyday cares melt away. You know you've got one focus, you've got one job, but sometimes it feels like a lot of jobs, especially if you're suspending and have more safety and technical aspects to handle. But you know you start stressing about when you're going to pay the gas bill you know, um, and neither is your bottom.
Speaker 2:you know, my uh, an early rope mentor of mine said that your main job as the rigger is to make sure that the bunny never has time to think about their shopping list, which I think is is excellent. That's so good, um. So for me there's the ritual and familiarity, there's the thrill of doing something that you know you're good at and that you love, and there's that intense connection and communion with someone. And then there's also this well, I get a direct high from the power that I feel, both from their trust in me and from the asymmetry of our positions, you know, with them tied up, potentially suspended, and me in the position of power. And then I also get this vicarious high. You know, from witnessing that, how high um the intensity of emotional experience and also like how far from subspace they can be, from the rope oh, I feel like just every role in bdsm.
Speaker 1:It's just so beautiful because you have that aspect of just being in space, whatever space that is like you don't think about, as you said, you don't think about the bills, you don't think about the things that have stressed you out. I mean it's one of the reasons why, like in my personal life, I like to be the submissive and stuff, where it's just like I don't want to think about anything I've. I've just had like a four hour shift at work. I want to be like all subby and like taking care of things and I don't want to feel like I have, um, I have to be in charge of, like another person and it's letting go of everything and forgetting all the worries and all the stress, and just being there in that moment is so beautiful. I mean I always say a lot where it's just like it's beautiful, everything's beautiful, it's all beautiful and, yeah, it's so bliss it really is.
Speaker 1:That grounded presence, that deep meditative attention, is something I think we're all craving more of in this hyper distracted world. And that's one of the beautiful paradoxes of rope it slows you down by necessity and you can't rush it because, trust me, the amount of clients which I've had who think I can do a rope session, or just anybody in general can do a rope session like 30 minutes, and I'm just like, no, like I feel like I need a lot more time, depending on um, how meant, how? Uh, what's the word?
Speaker 2:I think I'd say I don't really want to do any session that's 30 minutes, I mean, unless it's a, you know, an established uh, someone, someone I have an established dynamic with and you know it's sort of a BDSM quickie, as it were that fits into the context of a larger relationship and dynamic. You know, I think that whatever practice you're doing, you know, getting a sense of someone and being able to, yeah, witness them and have that immersive grind of meditative experience, isn't really something that can fit in 30 minutes, whether there's rope or not, yeah, absolutely, and especially when it is rope like, you need quite some time and also getting to know the person as well and learning about the dynamic and, yeah, learning about each other.
Speaker 1:And I feel like, um, going a little bit off script here, but I feel like some people do think that rope is so easily done and quick, when for me at least, it's not yeah, I think it's something that very much depends.
Speaker 2:I mean another, another thing that my, uh, my rope mentor told me is um, we learn to tie quick so we can tie slow. And you know, there was a time where you know I was um as a regular sort of drill with my rope bottom when we had our weekly practice sessions before we went on to learning or working whatever excited thing. I would do a takate kote, which is the box tie, the classic hands behind the back position, which is often abbreviated to tk. I'd do a time tk, uh, and you know try and consistently get it. You know, under 90 seconds to have one on, that was good and that would be, I'm sorry, 90 seconds, I must be, I said that wrong.
Speaker 2:Three minutes, not 90 seconds, but three minutes to get one on, that you know, was suspendable, that was safe, that had the you know all the tensions correct and so on, and it is quite an engineered and technical tie. But I'm not rushing to get a tk on in three minutes every time, you know, but because I have drilled it so much, because I know I have a muscle memory and I have the instinctive ability, then I can slow right down and I can absolutely focus on the people, on the person and on the interaction, and my hands know what to do with the rope that's such a skill it really is.
Speaker 1:I'm just like yes, yes. Applaud because, like with me, if I don't do it um often, then I will just completely forget that's the thing, though.
Speaker 2:You know it is muscle memory. Um, you know the next question.
Speaker 1:I'll have some relevant things to say about muscle memory, for sure so this is a relationship, energy, emotional collaboration and all the non-verbal ways people can say I trust you. Now we're going to dive into the how of rope. We'll cover the fundamental ties nerve safety and the role of the bottom in a scene and what it takes to teach rope responsibility. So much of rope starts with what's known as a single column tie. It's the first knot most people learn and it's deceptively simple, even for sort of my brain, even for sort of my brain. So, Miss Faye Morgan, can you walk us through what a single column tie is, why it matters and what people often get wrong when they're learning it?
Speaker 2:So a single column tie is a category rather than a particular tie.
Speaker 2:There's often a misconception that shibari is all knots, but often you only tie one knot and that is your single column tie, which is your cuff.
Speaker 2:So a column just means you're tying around one cylindrical object. So you know that could be a wrist, it could be a leg, it could be both wrists held together, it could be a waist and the single column tie. There's also the double column tie which you classically see, you know, if you're binding someone's wrists in front of them, for instance, um. So the single column tie can be done with a single or a double wrap of rope and then there is a, a knot of some description on top, and so this forms a couple of purposes. You know, in the case of your cuff, you know that's the initial bit of a restriction, but it gives you your, you know your starting point, your anchor, as I mentioned before when I was talking about the contrast with Western style bondage. In shibari we tie with natural fibers, with pample, with jute, because they have more friction and so you can wrap the rope around itself and the tension of the rope and the friction from it pressing against itself, from a body, pressing it harder against itself, holds it in place. So single column tie is important because if you're learning one knot, that's when you're learning, but the trick is it's not just one knot. There's many different ways to do it. There's people will talk to you about somerville bow lines and granny knots and reef knots, and there are many passionate camps of people who advocate for using one in one context or oh no, this one works in every context.
Speaker 2:I think as a beginner, I know I fell into this trap where I thought, gosh well, I've got to learn at least six different types of single column tie and memorize them all and then know which context to use them. Problem was it meant that I could tie six of them, okay, and it's much better to be able to tie one of them really well. We were talking earlier about muscle memory and you know I used to sit and watch a show on Netflix and just practice on my ankle, just tying my cuff again and again cuff single column tie, tying it one handed and then tying it with my eyes closed, and then, you know, tying it with my left hand, and so on and so on and in different orientations. And I actually find if I stop and think about it, I sort of lose how to do it. You know, sometimes I'll try to tie a cuff. I'm thinking too hard, it doesn't work, and I have to sort of stop, shake my hands and then do it while focusing on something else, and my hands know what to do. So, in terms of what people get wrong when they're learning it, so there's that thing about it's better to just choose one and learn how to do it really well.
Speaker 2:There's also the tightness. So, depending on the type of tie you want, you might want it to be more snug or more loose, and by that I'm talking about where it wraps around the column, for instance the wrist. You always want the knot to be tight, which, with the natural fibers, you do by compacting them down. Otherwise they can loosen up once there's tension on other parts of the rope. Uh, you also want to make sure that the ropes which are touching the skin aren't twisted or lying across each other, because that can increase pressure and be an additional risk factor for nerve damage so I have um an off script question where, if you're you, if you're not using hemp or dupe um, and if you're using um, say, cotton, would that still be classed as shibari?
Speaker 1:if not, what would it be classed as?
Speaker 2:yeah, I mean I'd say, I'd say, yeah, I, I mean I'd define. Yeah, I mean I'd say we could still be shibari. You know, I know people who tie with hemp hex, which is sort of synthetic hemp and do shibari style ties. I'd, you know, I'd say, like you normally think of people doing ballet in tutu and ballet shoes, but some ballet dancers do it barefoot and some do it in different costumes and it's still ballet, but it's not what you might traditionally associate. Or it might be a bit harder to do some technical sorts of ballet if you're not wearing ballet shoes. It might be harder to do some sorts of shibari if you're using nylon rope nice, nice.
Speaker 1:I like that comparison. That's very, very good. And then from there people usually progress to double column ties, basic chest harnesses and eventually more complex structures. But before we go further into technique, let's talk about the body, because rope isn't just a set of shapes, it's a form of stress and pressure being applied to flesh, nerves, joints and bones. Can you talk us through some of the most important anatomical considerations in rope play, and where are the danger zones? And what do people often overlook when they play with rope?
Speaker 2:So this is the kind of thing it's hard to give a comprehensive answer to in an audio format, so I would encourage people, wherever possible, to seek out in-person tuition. There's a lot of online resources, both free and paid. A subscription-based resource which I find very valuable and which I use a lot in my learning is Shibari Study, which has a vast library of videos and all aspects of Shibari, and they also have some free videos and there's a um bottoming fundamentals I think it's called a bottoming essentials or something like that um series by um fuoco. I always say their name wrong, but it's f? U o, c, o, um. Yeah, so I would recommend shibari study and I would recommend ideally getting some in-person education, but if not, you know, learning what you can online.
Speaker 2:But in general, broad terms, danger zones well, the neck, obviously, it's very dangerous. That's an edge play zone. It is generally dangerous to tie too close to joints, particularly over bony parts of joints. Generally dangerous to tie too close to joints, particularly over bony parts of joints, um. And generally fleshier and more muscly parts of the body are lower risk um, but there are some parts where nerves are closer to the skin, so you have your brachial plexus and the underarm area, um, and then there's parts of the um inner side of upper arm which, when your arms twisted round into a box tie, become parts of the outside of the upper arm, which can also be a risk factor for nerve damage and digits, fingers and toes.
Speaker 2:I love doing finger and toe rope, but they are small joints and they're vulnerable, so you need to be really careful with them in terms of danger aspects that people often overlook. Um, as you said, you know you're putting tension like into a body. Um, I think what's sometimes missed is how, if you already put rope on the body and then you attach rope and you tie something else, you're changing the tension and perhaps the direction of pressure of that original structure. If someone is struggling or changing body position, that will also affect it and also issues can be caused by something other than the rope. So if someone is lying on the floor, perhaps it's pressing their joints in a bad way. If you're tying them to a pole, perhaps the pole is digging into their shoulder blade. You know it might not be the rope.
Speaker 1:Mm-hmm. Okay. So what does nerve damage look like and what are early warning signs?
Speaker 2:Mm-hmm. So nerve damage if I haven't mentioned it yet, I will talk about it or I will touch on risk appetite, which is Jabari, is inherently risky. It is more so when you're doing suspension. But even four ties can be risky and nerve damage is a risk.
Speaker 2:I have sustained nerve damage as a bottom. I was lucky in that it was minor sensory nerve damage to my left big toe and you know it wasn't the fault of the rigor, it was sort of an interaction of factors and you know we both learned things from the situation. I considered it a fairly cheap way to learn an important lesson. But you know my toes a little bit numb sometimes, that's fine, it's not life altering. So nerve damage, people normally say to look out. So in your sensory nerves, look out for burning or tingling pain. You know that zapping feeling, when you hit your elbow you hit your funny bone, yeah, yeah. So that kind of feeling, um and numbness, it's more indicative.
Speaker 2:Numbness can either be circulation or nerve. It's more indicative of it being the nerve. If you have, for instance, um, one part of your hand numb and the rest fine. So if you're like, actually, my ring finger, my little finger, have gone numb, but I can the rest. That would be a sign of it probably being nerve impingement.
Speaker 2:But there can be numbness due to circulation loss, which in itself isn't a concern.
Speaker 2:As you know, if you ever fall asleep on your arm and wake up with it completely dead, you can like safely lose circulation to a body part for quite a long time, as long as it's not your brain or your heart. Hence watch it on the neck rope. You can safely lose it for quite a long time. You know, even if the limb's a bit blue, like it's going to be painful when it comes back. You're going to have killer pins and needles, but that in itself isn't. The potentially more dangerous thing is that if your whole arm's gone numb due to losing blood circulation, you could then miss nerve impingement because you've already lost the sensation and then you couldn't tell if there was that zapping, potential nerve damage feeling. Motor nerves can also be injured and there are various sort of check-ins and drills that some riggers like to use, um for finger movement. You know, getting people to squeeze your hand, to extend their hand. That's something again I would encourage people to seek out some resources on oh, wow, that's so interesting.
Speaker 1:And um another thing which um I'd like to point on is like can we all have rope scissors please?
Speaker 2:I've got mine in my bag. Right now. Let me leave the house with Adam like rope scissors.
Speaker 1:Um I can, I can, not um. Even though I don't really do rope, I still have some rope scissors upstairs in my own little play space.
Speaker 2:I would also say practice using them, because it's harder than you think to cut through rope, especially when it's under tension, and you also need to. We'll talk a bit later on about what to do if things go sideways in a tie, but you need to think about where it makes sense to cut, because if you have someone hanging up and you just cut the rope that's holding them and they fall on their head that's no good.
Speaker 1:No, no see things like rope in bdsm. It's got so many layers to it and you have to be so careful. So let's flip the lens to the bottoms experience for a moment, because even though rope often centers, the person tying, the person being tied up is having just as much of a physiological, emotional and sensory experience from your experience, both as a top and someone who's worked closely with bottoms. What should people know about being in rope and what does a good rope bottom communicate, notice or even learn for themselves?
Speaker 2:I'm really glad that you included this question. I'm very much an advocate of um valuing the the skills and contributions of bottoms. I think if anyone thinks that rope bottoming isn't a skill, then they've not noticed a night and day difference between tying with a skilled work rope bottom and tying with non-skilled rope bottom. Um, when I say skilled, I don't mean they can do incredible yoga positions. What I mean is body awareness and an ability to communicate sensations and to both strike a balance between losing themselves from the time, maintaining enough of safety awareness for everybody days. But you know, I I do have quite a bit of experience of bottoming in rope as well.
Speaker 2:Um, and so what should people know about being rope? As we've said before, it can be dangerous. Um, it's not boring if the top's any good. So if you're thinking about your laundry list, then that's, um, probably a top problem, not a bottom problem. Um, I'd say it's about the journey, not the destination, and it's about how it feels, not how it looks. So, in terms of what a good bottom communicates, notices and learns, they learn about what works for them. So, to go back to the box, tie the TK.
Speaker 2:There's a lot of variation in individual anatomy of like the way the nerves run. It can depend on how muscular you are or you, you know, if you have more fat on your arms or if they're more bony. Um, and so learning I like my rap, for instance. I like my raps to be quite close together and relatively high um is the sort of thing that it is helpful to communicate to a rigger if that's something that you learn about yourself. Um, and a big thing for me in my root bottoming journey was about, um, learning the difference between potentially dangerous pain and pain. That was unpleasant but not dangerous. Um, so I, yeah, so learning to sort of recognize when to speak up about something and also to get over my fear that I'd speak up about something being problem and all the rope would suddenly come off, because the vast majority of the time, something can be fixed very easily and it doesn't mean scene's over, we're completely done, so don't suffer in sight well, you know, suffer in silence.
Speaker 2:That's what's been negotiated, but if there's a potential nerve issue, you speak up. Um. The other thing that is really helpful and that I really appreciate in my um in the person I tie with most often um is that she comes up with her own ideas, which is great. You know, I'm victoria, I'm sure you can appreciate how tiring it gets, uh, coming up with all the ideas all the time and so having someone come along and hey, I really like that thing we did last week, how about we take this slant on it, or we practice this. Something that's more of an advanced bottoming skill, particularly with suspension bottoms, is. People will say something like I've got five more minutes with my arm loaded like this, and so then, as a reggae, you know, ok, okay, I don't need to get them down immediately, but I need to step it a bit up and take that in mind. Um, but those are things you learn along the way, they're not prerequisites.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, I very much appreciate it when I have somebody and they're just like yeah, let's do this, especially if we've done scenes previously. I'm like oh, thank god, because, like, I don't have to like think as much and like yeah, it's so much easier to bounce ideas if someone comes along and says, how about this?
Speaker 2:and you go oh, yes, and then this and what about this?
Speaker 1:yeah, exactly, and and then it also builds the connection between you both, and it's so nice yeah because, like, a bdsm dynamic is not something you as a top impose, it's something that's co-created yeah, exactly, you're building it together.
Speaker 1:That is what bdsm is, where like there's not just one person doing one thing, like you're both in it together, no matter what, um, no matter what scene you're doing, because you've got communication, you've got to be there for each other, no matter what. And I don't really personally like it when there is a dom and a dom or a top and they just think that everything like relies on the submissive and it's just like. No, like you're both in it together, you both have that relationship. I agree.
Speaker 2:You know, if I have someone approach me for a session saying I want exactly this, you wearing exactly this, saying exactly that, doing exactly that, and I'm sort of thinking, where is the room for me to express myself and find my own joy and enjoyment in this? You know, you'll have a much better experience if I have a bit of freedom to enjoy myself. Um, but equally, when someone says you can do whatever you want to me, literally anything, firstly it tells me, but they've not really had a proper think about what their boundaries and limits are, um, and secondly it means I don't have a starting point. So I agree with you.
Speaker 1:But there's a happy medium and a sort of interaction of building something together absolutely, because I was discussing it um before off camera, talking about, like when subs say you can do anything, I'm like okay, give me your wallet, let me stab you with a needle. Oh, it's not everything, then that's fine. We can now construct what we're going to do and talk about things, because it's not everything then shave your eyebrows I will give you a buzz cut, we will shave you everywhere.
Speaker 1:We will call up your mother and like talk to her and like there needs to be talk and communication. So let's move on to the teaching side of your practice. You've taught locally across eng England and at workshops and rope festivals in places like Berlin. What's your approach to teaching rope and what are the things you emphasize early on with students, and how do you create a space where learning doesn't feel intimidating or elitist?
Speaker 2:I think one of the things I emphasize is, as I said, for its journey, not the destination. Everyone learns at different speeds. You know, some people are very quick at picking up motor skills. For me, I struggle to learn physical movements by mimicking them, but if I have enough time to work them out by myself, then they're in there, which is you know why I sit and sort of tie up my own leg while I'm watching something and figure something out. And everyone has their own challenges. So you know, if you're in a workshop and you're looking at the pair next to you and you're going oh my God, the rugger picked that up so quickly you don't know what else they might struggle with further in their practice. Or maybe they'll just, you know, end up speed running things and not stopping to smell the flowers. And you know the fact that you need to take a more intentional approach due to needing more time to learn things might mean you can have more enjoyment along the way. So everyone's on their own journey.
Speaker 2:It's not a competition, I think, absolutely emphasising bottoming skills and not as an afterthought. I've been to so many workshops where, both with bottoming skills and with adaptations different bodies they do the whole workshop and then in five minutes, at the end, they go oh yeah, and this is what bottom needs to do and this is what you do. If someone can't put themselves into a pretzel and that is not meaningful engagement with those topics. Um, but we'll go into more detail later about adaptations, different bodies. Um, I also think part, a big part of it as a teacher is to be encouraging, you know, and you don't need to nitpick everything.
Speaker 2:Safety is important and I would tell someone very quickly if they're doing something unsafe. But besides that, I'll calibrate the amount of feedback as well as the way I give feedback based on the student. You know, if they're loving getting into the technical weeds, then I can, oh, try that. And if they're just like starting to gain a bit of confidence, starting to vibe, I'm not going to rush in and go, oh no, that wraps wrong, that's too loose, because that kills their joy in it. And ultimately we're there to find joy.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, absolutely, and I love that you can be sitting in front of the tv and you just start tying. I feel like that just shows the love for um rope. It's so beautiful. So there's something really interesting in the culture of rope scenes, especially around riggers and bunnies. I love the, I love the role bunnies it just sounds so cute. It's like whoever gave the names of just riggers and bunnies.
Speaker 2:There's a bit of controversy because, like well, in in europe, I think just due to translations, the word model is more frequently used and I remember being really confused by that at first because I was like I thought model meant someone who had. Due to translations, the word model is more frequently used and I remember being really confused by that at first because I was like I thought model meant someone who had photographs taken and I was like, oh I like I get tied sometimes. I'm not a photographic model and perhaps model implies a more passive role, but then bunny is quite infantilizing and then, but some people like bottom, some people like bunny, all depends yeah, interesting, that's so interesting.
Speaker 1:Um, that binary can be useful but also limiting and sometimes even gendered in unhelpful ways. How do you approach or even challenge that dynamic in your own practice and teaching?
Speaker 2:so, as I mentioned earlier, you know I am a switch in rope. You know I do like to be tied as well as to tie, um, and I have taught classes where I was the bottom, ones where we switched throughout or halfway through and ones where I was the top, and in all of those I think being really clear that rope does not inherently have DS in it. So you know I I'll bottom in rope because it gives me joy, it makes me feel free. I find the physical pain and sensation very thrilling. But I'm very clear when I'm tying with someone, this doesn't mean that you're the boss of me. You know I'm not submitting to you in this scenario. We're equal partners in this. Submission can be a part of rope, but it's not inherently there. So I try to express that when I'm teaching. I also self-tie and self-suspend on occasion and I'm happy to talk with students about modifications to ties for use for self-suspension.
Speaker 1:All right about modifications to ties uh, for to be used for self-suspension, all right. So one thing I know listeners will appreciate is your attention to accessibility. Often rope spaces, whether in person or online, can feel exclusionary, whether because of the body type, flexibility, neurodivergency or assumptions around who gets to be tied and who gets to tie. How do you work to make rope more accessible and what advice do you have for people who might be afraid they don't have the right kind of body for rope they don't have?
Speaker 2:the right kind of body for rope. So, as I mentioned before, I think centering accessibility in the teaching is important. Many classes I've been in my regular rope bottom is a woman who is taller than me and hench as fuck, so weighs more than me, and the assumption often is that personal tying is going to be smaller than you, and often the techniques that are taught you know, for instance, the way you lift someone into a particular suspension or the way you reach around them is worked on, that based on that assumption, and that doesn't work in our case. So you know, we've come up with our own workarounds, but it sure would be lovely if that assumption weren't there in the classes. Um, and so there's accessibility angle here, both from the bottom and from the top. So you know, a more obvious example with bottoms would be you know my joints don't bend like that or I'm I'm not comfortable, uh, kneeling on the floor. Know that doesn't work for my joints. And so coming up with adaptations, for example, with your TK, instead of tying it with the arms parallel, you can tie it with the arms lower down, or you can do ties chest ties, leaving the arms out, tie the arms at the front of the body, I think the accessibility angle for rigors as well. Accessibility angle for rigors as well, you know, both in terms of how much you know, how strong you are, but also in terms of your degree of freedom of movement. I had a severe leg injury and I had to adapt my tying style for a time because I wasn't very stable on one of my legs and so I adapted to more of a sort of a floor-based moving around on my knees style for that. So that's something that I try to bring in In terms of the right kind of body for rope.
Speaker 2:I would say again to remember that it's about how it feels, not about how it looks, and also that we don't tend to see each other very well. You know, if someone see ourselves ourselves very well, if someone's tying you, they're, you know, you're just the hottest shit in the world to them at that moment. You know um and I in terms of resources. Another plug here for for woco, who has a really good writing on fet life, um, where she talks about kind of the inadvertent bias where she was teaching a class and struggled with something and a student came up and was like wow, I didn't know you ever struggled with stuff and she was saying well, you know, we teach the stuff that I'm really good at enduring, because I can endure that for repeated classes.
Speaker 2:We're not going to teach something that makes me absolutely miserable and doesn't work for my body. You know, I know for myself, when I'm bottoming in rope I really hate having pressure on my collarbones, on my ribs. It makes me miserable. I can't last very long but I will happily dangle off um a futomomo like a thigh tie or a single waist rope like that's okay for me. People might see that and think I'm a, I'm a badass, but they don't see how I cry when something presses on my ribs oh, that's understandable.
Speaker 1:To be fair, I mean, I feel like that would hurt. It does hurt, yeah. So the this idea of being like rope worthy bodies I I find toxic and quite persistent. So a follow-up question is why do you think rope draws so many neurodiverse people, and how does your own neurodivergence help and hinder you in this context?
Speaker 2:So I think it helps me because Shibari is both structured and free. So me having some structure means that I can let my weird creative juices really flow. I love being able to hyper focus, whether that's nerding out about technical stuff or hyper focusing in the scene. You know, the overwhelming world is just reducing down to the feel of a rope, my focus on the other person, their expression, breathing, movement, and my awareness, their body and theirs. It can feel like a type of meditation in terms of, um, hindrance, I think, for me, sustaining the motivation, uh, to keep.
Speaker 2:You know you get good at stuff by doing it repeatedly over time, and when you have ADHD you get bored of doing things repeatedly over time. And I know with rope it's good once I'm doing it. But I can feel resentful about the fact of you know it's Tuesday afternoon and I am going to do some rope practice with my regular rope bottom now, because that's what I do on a Tuesday. I love it once I'm doing it. But I think there it really helps having a rope partner with some accountability to lovingly bully me into it.
Speaker 1:You've seen a lot of rope communities, from local jams to big festivals. What changes have you noticed over the years in terms of inclusivity and awareness, and where do you think we still need to grow?
Speaker 2:um. So something positive I've noticed is more women rigors or non-male rigors, and greater queer representation, albeit often of somewhat limited sort. I think there's been some progress in terms of um, the centering of bottoms and rigors of color, um, but there needs to be a lot more um. Things that I think we don't really see very much of are women tying men, men tying men. You know they sort of, in general, mix shibari spaces. You don't see a lot of that. You know you might see in a femdom focused event, uh, you know, women tying men, or at a gay male event, men tying men, but it's not very common to see in general at shibari events and I'd love to see more of it oh interesting and online oh yeah, I, I think I definitely agree there where, um, everybody needs to tie each other.
Speaker 1:Just that in general.
Speaker 2:So let's tie some big burly men is fun. Trust me, I mean that.
Speaker 1:That sounds very nice, that's very nice, a good image in my head. So let's briefly um return back to technique. Suspension is often seen as like the holy grail of rope. I know when I see somebody suspended I'm just like in awe. It's so awe, yeah, literally. It's beautiful, cinematic and deeply intense. But it's also dangerous when done without serious training. So here's a practical moment for our listeners what do you want people to really understand before they even ever consider attempting suspension?
Speaker 2:I'd say first up it hurts. I had a conversation with a rigger before who was really surprised to hear that suspension hurts.
Speaker 2:It's all your body weight is on some strands of rope you know, even if it's not a torture position, it hurts and it's an act of physical endurance. It's very intense for bottom and that's the reason why the rigger needs to be able to do things smoothly, calmly and quickly, because if someone needs to come down in two minutes, you should get them down in two minutes. Practice, practice, practice Very important to be able to lift people safely and smoothly. I spend a lot of time practicing with a backpack filled with rocks and bottles of water. When I learned to do, I learned my sort of basic pulley and sort of practiced on my own limbs and practice with, you know, tying people's limbs to bed frames and stuff like that. And, yeah, practice with my, my trusty backpack a lot. And then I practiced with an experienced suspension bottom an experience and a an experienced suspender as a spotter. The first time I did it for real and I was so nervous. But and I said to my mentor do you think I'm ready for this? And they said no one's ever ready for suspension, but the fact that you're asking, concerned about it, is a good sign in itself. And then the other thing I would say is always remember to protect the melon.
Speaker 2:The head is vulnerable. You don't want it hitting the ground. If in doubt, be careful. I've been at events where, even where there were very high level rigors, there was an event rule that there were to be no single point inverted suspensions, which means someone is hanging upside down by one line. There had to be a safety line, for example attaching to the chest, so if the thing holding up their hips were to break or the lock were to fail, their head would be protected from a hard impact from a grind. It's risk appetite. But yeah, really be aware of a head, not just a floor. It can hit furniture. Um, you might hit it with carabiner.
Speaker 1:Try and avoid that I know, when I don't really get suspended that often or at all really, but when I first got suspended by a previous partner, um, over there, literally on that I was just like why does this hurt? Like what the fuck? Like how, how do the bunnies or the models like, how do they do this?
Speaker 2:like it's so, it's so beautiful and I'm just like I'm in pain, oh, and once again the ballet analogy of you know, people who are experienced and skilled and like find their bliss and those sensations make it look, or can make it look, serene and peaceful, but it hurts and it's very strenuous.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I was just like wow, they do this for hours, models, bunnies, the fact that they can hold themselves for that amount of time, especially depending on how long it takes to fulfill what rope they're doing, and, man, it's dedication to the craft. It really is on both sides.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, that was something else I wanted to say actually on suspension, which is when I first started suspending although I could do it safely, I was sweating bullets the whole time and very focused on my locks and I found that I couldn't have. I could do a safe and technically sufficient suspension, but I couldn't do a scene. You know, I couldn't engage in play once the suspension lines were up. You know, if someone wanted to do that with me, it would need to be a partial suspension or a floor tie, and I've since, you know, had enough practice and skill building and experience, um, that I can do that with suspension. But yeah, I'd say yes, it can be more physically intense, but it can sometimes, because the rigor isn't just playing with you but also playing with gravity. There's another person in the scene, there's a third person in this marriage, and so, yeah, it doesn't mean it's necessarily better or more intense from, like, an emotional or essential standpoint standpoint?
Speaker 1:yeah, because I know there's. There are a lot of people in the kink community and even I feel, like in vanilla, where they see suspension and they're like, yes, I want to do that, but some, some of them just they don't either do the training or they just don't understand it, I feel, and that's where it can just be really dangerous, where there needs to be training, there needs to be understanding and there needs to be education to be able to do rope and suspend somebody Absolutely. And I really appreciate and admire that you've taken so long and so many precautions and so much training to master the art of rope.
Speaker 2:Oh, I've definitely not mastered. I don't think one can ever master, but that's a good point okay, what was close to mastering? Like, okay, getting close walking the long, slow and stony road towards it, walking the rope Ay.
Speaker 1:It is really, really beautiful to see somebody who has achieved so much in rope, and it's really eye-opening as well, and I love that you're here for the podcast episode to help teach other people and, hopefully, guide them in the right way and to be very helpful about it as well, as well as expressing your own story and talking about rope as you do, and it clearly is very near and dear to your heart. I think we are gonna come to a close with this episode and so we're gonna just talk about um.
Speaker 1:A final question which I'm gonna ask, because we've been talking for like over an hour now and I know that I'm gonna um edit this and I think it's still probably gonna come to an hour or close to that rope eats time it does, and talking about rope does too I mean when you've got two people who are very enthusiastic over kink, and especially when there is something which maybe the other person doesn't know that much about, and then the other person really um goes off on their love for something, and it's great to have somebody you can just bounce off of as well.
Speaker 2:Absolutely.
Speaker 1:It just helps the conversation and clearly, with us going over an hour, this is something that we both enjoy.
Speaker 2:So I think you have one last question for me for this hour.
Speaker 1:I do so. Rope isn't just about skill, it's about awareness. The best riggers aren't always the ones with the fanciest knots. They're the ones who notice, who sense when something is off or when a breath changes or when a bottom's energy starts to shift. So let me ask you what's your personal checklist when you tie someone? How do you know, beyond just the rope, if a scene is going well?
Speaker 2:so we'll talk in a bit more detail in the next episode about negotiation skills and monitoring um a scene. But in terms of, uh, me for me to feel that a tie has gone well, it's a combination of the negotiation, how things go in the scene and in terms of my feelings, I feel totally in the moment during the scene and I feel on cloud nine after it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean, I feel like for me as well, cloud nine is oh, it's bliss so good and especially if a session ends in cloud nine. Um, it's great, it really is.
Speaker 2:So I'm gonna ask you to because this is the end of one um, plug anything and everything, oh, absolutely so, um, as Victoria mentioned at the beginning of the podcast, I do offer sessions as a pro dom and I work in Edinburgh and in Glasgow, and if you want to follow me and uh, you know, perhaps uh check out some of my pictures and consider sessioning with me, or just uh hear more of what I have to say, then you can find me on fetlife at miss faye morgan. Uh, so that's miss faye f-a-y morgan, m-o-r-g-a-n, or one word. And then on twitter, slash x, I am miss underscore faye, underscore morgan, and uh, if you don't really do socials and you just want to email me and inquire about a session, it's miss faye morgan. Spelled the same way at gmailcom dead, easy, wonderful. Thank you so much for having me. This has been a joy and I'm excited to get to talk further with you about rape in the next episode.
Speaker 1:I know right, I know this episode has went on longer than I thought to be fair, but I mean, we both gel. I feel so like it makes sense, and we do have quite a lot more questions. So stay tuned for part two, which will most likely be out the week after this airs. Um, so, yeah, this has been behind the paddle podcast with me, paulson victoria and my lovely guest, miss faye morgan. And yeah, please give us a like on spotify apple wherever else you're listening, and if you have any questions or any topics you would like to listen to, and if you do want to be a guest on this podcast, then please email in or you shall be able to find us on x and instagram. So, yeah, bye.
