Recreating traumatic experiences through kink can heal trauma and help reclaim personal power. Learn how from a kink researcher and a kink-allied therapist. 

“Trauma play” is a controversial kink practice. A kink researcher and a kink-specializing therapist both weigh in on whether kink harms or heals trauma. 

Pleasure and Pain: Healing Trauma Through Kink

“Rewriting the Script”: How Kink Can Heal Trauma 

Why do others avoid it at all costs? We’ve long debated nature versus nurture, but what about experiences that are the opposite of nurturing? What is the impact of trauma, specifically sexual trauma, on a person’s sexuality? 

Why are chains, cuffs, and Saint Andrew’s crosses the height of some folks’ cathartic pleasure? Is it because they’re mired in their trauma, or are these high-intensity sensual experiences the answer to healing trauma? 

To explore this topic, I spoke with two kink and trauma professionals to help us understand the link between these realms:

Developmental psychologist, researcher, lecturer, and founder of:

Specializes in sexual identity development, alternative sexual identities, and therapists who serve folks with alternative sexual identities.

Dedicated to bridging the conversation between traditional psychotherapy and kink knowledge.

 and has developed the first therapeutic model allowing for the re-experiencing of sexual trauma to create healing. 


Kink & Trauma: First, Let’s Define Some Terms

Since this discussion is rooted in science, let’s first review some definitions. 

“Kink” is an umbrella term for a wide range of erotic interests and behaviors, including BDSM (bondage, discipline/Domination, submission/sadism, and masochism) practices (

Kink is essentially any sexual experience “outside of the mainstream,” a designation that varies based on culture. 

“Trauma” also has a broad clinical definition, including exposure to actual or threatened death, serious injury, or sexual violence (

An enduring theme of my discussions was the variety of human experiences, preferences, and personalities. Considering this diversity, it’s important to reflect on the language we use and the way we label experiences.

Let’s go back to the Psych 101 classroom: Freud’s pleasure principle says that human beings are constantly trying to pursue pleasure and avoid pain. 

“Pleasure” doesn’t necessarily mean a positive feeling, and “pain” doesn’t necessarily mean a negative feeling. “Pain,” for example, is not an inherently negative experience: for some, it might be an intense sensation that helps them feel more present in their body, thus an enjoyable and/or desired experience. This complicates things, but it’s helpful to try to understand why people do what they do, including engaging in kink practices. 

Research suggests that kink sexuality develops like any other sexuality (

“We have evidence that the peak time someone first becomes aware of a kink interest is in childhood, around age 6-10. This lines up with the first clear memory of sexual interest in general,” says Dr. Sprott.

This timeline corresponds with hormonal development, including adrenaline and testosterone, right before puberty. Since these hormones are important for sexual development, it makes sense that people would feel “a strange excitement,” as one research participant noted, roughly around that time. However, some people don’t feel a kink interest until late adolescence or adulthood, and still others never experience an interest in kink. 

So what makes some people kink-curious, and not others? Three psychological theories dominate the landscape of kink development: social learning, psychodynamic, and humanistic.

Social learning theory says that someone might develop a kink because of experiences they have had (

They might make associations and connections for a particular sensory experience that later becomes a fetish, or make an association with a situation with expression of power differences. We learn to make connections with certain bodily experiences, and that starts to form our preferences. 

Psychodynamic and psychoanalytic theories suggest that kink sexuality addresses conflicting motivations, needs, and feelings (

Finding things that feel good and focusing on those things can help us handle feelings of anxiety and overwhelm and can contribute to our sexual development. Interactions with our parents can lay the foundation for connecting with others, influencing power dynamics in later relationships. 

 approach says that we have certain experiences, which might be driven by our maturing bodies or what's happening around us. We try to make sense of those experiences, and in that effort, we interpret things as being sexual, positive, etc. This creates an “erotic map” of what is exciting or arousing for us. 

These theories of human development apply to sexuality overall, therefore, they apply to kink as well. 

Andrew Pari notes that “We are born with so many variations in things like eyesight, skin tone, and sensory experience. We have different pain thresholds and are primed for a wide variety of sensory experiences and preferences, including pain and pleasure.” 

This genetic diversity is vital for our survival as a species, and diverse responses to stimuli can influence diverse sexualities. 

A study on sadomasochism (SM) and couple bonding found that couples who enjoyed consensual SM showed reductions in the stress hormone cortisol, and increases in relationship closeness (

. The key here is that the activities, while including “painful” sensations, were consensual and mutually enjoyed by the participants. People who engage in kink and find that they enjoy it, whether for the physical or emotional effects, may develop an ongoing interest in kink thereafter.

Like genetics, personalities are vastly diverse. Attraction to kink might be an inborn personality trait, similar to other forms of attraction. Certain traits like thrill-seeking and risk-aversion, or different coping styles, can drive a disposition for kink (

The fact that kink is present in every culture, and broadly defined as anything “taboo” or outside of “mainstream” sexuality, reflects the human desire to explore outside of accepted norms. Kink exploration may also be an exploration of the “edges” of oneself, and the rebellious excitement of exploring something novel and taboo. 

Get prickly with James & Six as they play with clothespins. 

According to Dr. Sprott’s research, trauma does not cause kinks. However, trauma might affect how a kink is expressed. 

From trauma, there might be a fascination with painful sensations. These could be physically painful sensations, like spanking, and emotionally painful sensations, like humiliation, as part of a power exchange. 

Research suggests that trauma can influence some people to want experiences of intense sensation, such as pain. For example, one study of people diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) seemed to be more fascinated by masochism than people who were not diagnosed with BPD (

Trauma can shape the direction our kink goes into, but it doesn’t inherently “make” us kinky. 

According to Dr. Sprott, there is a common belief that kink is a reaction to trauma, or that traumatized people are using kink to recreate their trauma and harm themselves. People with a history of trauma can also be kinky, but not because kink inherently comes out of trauma. 

Andrew seconds this, noting that kink and trauma don't need to be connected. Even if they are, folks benefit by examining them separately. 

“Instead of thinking, ‘This happened to me and now I’m enjoying sex in this way; what's wrong with me?’, we can process the awful thing that happened to you, so we can put it in the past like a bad memory,” Andrew says. 

Unraveling the shame and self-loathing that might be attached to one’s sexual interests is key to healing one’s relationship with their sexuality, unless shame is part of the kink. 

If someone has a sexual interest they believe emerged from trauma, it is up to them to decide if they want the sexual interest to go away, or if they enjoy the sexual interest and simply want to heal unwanted feelings of fear, shame, and self-loathing surrounding it. By focusing on developing the freedom to feel better about oneself, healing the trauma will likely result in losing interest in an unwanted kink. 

Trauma can complicate how someone navigates their kinks, especially with partner play. 

Kinky people with a history of trauma can struggle with self-disclosure of their trauma due to the misconception that trauma is the reason they are kinky. They might fear that others will judge them or think their trauma makes them a “risky” partner due to the possibility of being triggered. 

However, not disclosing trauma history can have consequences of its own: the person may become triggered and suddenly feel unsafe, overwhelmed, or experience dissociation. The assumption that, if someone has a trauma history, they must be “fragile” might scare some potential play partners away. 

While it is important to go slowly and pre-negotiate, folks with a trauma history can also have profound resiliency and strength from coping with their trauma. 

The philosophy of kink itself reveals its potential for healing trauma. While many acronyms have graced the fetish clubs and BDSM dungeons over the years, the current code of kink is the “four C’s” (

These considerations are inherently lacking in traumatic experiences and inherently present in ethically practiced kink. The four C’s should ideally be present in all interactions, sexual or non-sexual, but their requirement in a kink scene creates an ideal environment for the reclamation of autonomy and personal power. 

While researchers aren’t exactly sure, they have some ideas of how kink can heal trauma: mainly, that kink provides the very aspects that are missing in experiences of trauma. 

The reaction to trauma is often to disconnect from our bodies, and kink, whether solo or with a partner, puts us in touch with our bodies in a way that is the opposite of dissociation. For example, 

, if done safely, is one way people like to explore alone. Or like 

 for those looking to try something with a partner. Trauma, especially sexual assault, is often very isolating and makes victims feel invisible.

 Grab your ropes. Watch May Grey & Show Pony explore shibari.

“Engaging in kink to address past trauma is the opposite: you are seen, not just by your play partner negotiating with you, but often by other people. The expectation is that you will talk about it with friends or a therapist, or you’ll do it in a space with multiple people to witness, like a public or community dungeon or playspace,” says Dr. Sprott. 

All of that can be the exact opposite of the original trauma, and “rewrites the script” of a traumatic experience: “Trauma often involves a loss of control, a total lack of consent, and offers no way to recover afterwards. Playing with kink means you’re negotiating, establishing a safe word, and practicing aftercare. All of those things make the experience the exact opposite of what happened in the original trauma,” Dr. Sprott explains. 

While trauma and kink can look similar on the surface, kink feels very different on the inside because of the embodied experience and the presence of agency and control. 

“Curative Kink”: A New Model for Healing

Andrew coined the term “Curative Kink” based on his development of a therapeutic model to address sexual assault trauma. By recreating the behaviors that occurred during trauma and pairing them with prior and ongoing negotiations of control, choice, and consent, it is possible for participants to gradually separate those behaviors from their traumatic context (

Andrew witnessed multiple women reenacting their sexual trauma in unsafe ways, through seeking out strangers at clubs or bars who were likely to sexually assault them. Andrew recognized that there was “something these women were getting out of these experiences,” and developed a model of “exposure therapy” to understand these women's behaviors without shaming them. 

In his time working with female sexual assault victims, Andrew deduced that control-mastery theory could explain why some women continued engaging in harmful reenactment behaviors. The repetition compulsion of seeking out opportunistic strangers is harmful, but the underlying goal of recreating the trauma is self-knowledge, self-understanding, and self-mastery. 

To support his clients in feeling safe and gaining this self-knowledge, Andrew guides them in recreating a trauma scene in a controlled, pre-negotiated environment with a safe and known partner. This is followed by a therapeutic discussion, allowing the client to identify the trauma moments they’re specifically seeking to engage in and discuss what they’ve learned in a supportive, psychoeducational environment. 

Andrew describes this therapeutic model as “a new type of somatic re-experiencing, exposure therapy, and drama therapy: ‘Curative Kink.’” 

Curious About Kink for Healing and Don’t Know Where to Start?

Starting slow and being attuned to oneself and one’s partner are very important, according to Dr. Sprott. 

Talk about all the different ways in which a kink scene will work: what to do and not do, what might be “too much” or triggering, what to do if someone has a bad reaction, and how to debrief later and with whom (one’s play partner, a therapist, etc). 

Dissociation can impact communication, and mistakes and injuries can happen from ruptured lines of communication (

). Additionally, don’t initially try to recreate the entire situation all at once; focus on little elements to avoid feelings of overwhelm. 

Andrew recommends seeking out someone who “knows what they’re doing, because there are a lot of harmful actors.” There are several kink-friendly mental health professionals, but not many that are kink-competent, which can perpetuate difficulties for kinky clients (

Take your time interviewing therapists before deciding on one. Readers who would like to reach out to Andrew with any questions or to continue the conversation can reach him at andrew@saawareness.com. 

Join Laura & Lía on Lustery as they test out paddle play.

Choice, discernment, and control are the things we lack in trauma, and the very things we gain in kink. 

While kink can appear similar to experiences some may find traumatizing, such as pain, the power dynamics and intense sensations intrinsic to kink are underscored by consent and communication. Experiencing intense sensations and playing with power roles of one’s own choice, and on one’s own terms, can rewrite inner scripts to increase feelings of autonomy, self-efficacy, and empowerment, and decrease feelings of shame. 

Shame prevents us from self-knowledge, self-exploration, and navigating feelings about our thoughts and experiences so we can free ourselves. “Curiosity is the antithesis of fear and shame,” says Andrew, “so as long as we can remain curious, we can make progress.” 

If you're a survivor or someone with lived experience of sexual violence/abuse and are interested in learning more about kink and pleasure, 

 as an organisation offers workshops and offerings around these experiences and practices through their