I am Meronym. I've been involved in my local BDSM community since early 2009, and teaching kink classes since 2010. I am not a legal, medical, or psychiatric professional, so please don't take my information as anything more than advice from someone who has been around one particular kink community for a while. If you need professional advice, the NCSF provides assistance finding kink-aware professionals at www.ncsfreedom.org. This is a class I teach with my husband, Akhenaten. We ask for three demo bottoms for this presentation - someone who is a top, a masochistic bottom for vacuum cupping, and a bottom for fire-cupping. Let's start by talking about 'nice' cupping - because, much like massage, cupping can be a very pleasurable experience. The physics of the matter are pretty simple. Through one of several methods, suction is created, pulling up the skin and a bit of flesh. This works the flesh somewhat like massage, relieving pressure and tension. Suction can be created using flame in a closed cup, or with a mechanical device that pumps out the air. Typically several cups are used at a time to pull in several places.
The cups are placed on bare skin. I prefer to use a little bit of massage oil on the body first. This means a bit of massage as warm-up, which also lets me get to know the body I'll be working on. I can look for damaged skin and watch for reactions that indicate pain in certain spots. Cups should be placed over muscle, especially sore muscle. They can simply be placed and left, or slowly dragged across the skin to work on muscle tension. If done slowly, this can be very pleasurable. If done quickly, it can be painful. Many people describe the sensation of cupping as deep tissue massage, but in reverse, since the cup pulls up on the muscles instead of pushing down. After a few minutes, cups can be removed and reset in a different spot, as many times as you wish. Sometimes, acupuncture needles or pressure-point sleeves are used inside the cup. For 'wet' cupping, a cut will be made on the skin before placing the cup so that blood will be drawn out by the pressure.
Cups can come in many different materials, shapes, and sizes. Traditionally, cups were made of bamboo, animal horn, or bone. Later came glass, metal, pottery, and stone cups. And now we also have silicone cups. The cup opening is generally round, and it is important that it has a rim for it to create a good seal, but the cup itself can be long and skinny, a cylinder, or a bell or ball shape. And they can be found in very tiny sizes meant to be placed near the eye or on a clit up to very large sizes that may cover most of a shoulder or all of a breast.
The cupping I'm most comfortable with is mechanical vacuum cupping, usually just calling 'cupping'. The cupping set I use is a trigger-device set
available on Amazon for under $20, and it comes with pressure point sleeves. I like the mechanical cupping set because the pump allows for a great deal of control over the amount of pressure, I can adjust the pressure after the cup has been placed, the cups fit my hand well for moving around, and the cups can be washed on the top rack of the dishwasher. Other ways to achieve the suction needed are squeeze-bulb or twist-up cups, or silicone ones that you squeeze together before placing.
The other kind of cupping is heat vacuum cupping, usually referred to as 'fire cupping'. The air inside the glass cup is heated up before it is placed on the skin, and as it quickly cools and the air contracts, a suction is created. There are several ways to get the desired heating of the air inside the cup, but the most common is a flame on a handle of some sort inserted into the cup and moved around to heat the air and the glass, then the cup is set and allowed to cool. This method is harder to control, but is much flashier and fun to watch or participate in, and brings temperature sensations into the scene. Of course, because this is fireplay, it holds all the risks of other fireplay and is considered edgeplay.
Of course, all ancient cupping was fireplay. And it is a long-standing form of medical therapy that is supposed to go back as early as 3000 B.C. There is evidence of cupping as a medical practice in ancient Egypt, China, Finland, and Greece, but it is usually associated with Chinese culture.
There has been a lot of media attention in the past few years on cupping as a therapeutic practice, especially during and after the 2016 Olympics. It's become a celebrity fad as well. Like massage, cupping can be used to treat many conditions, most especially anything that benefits from increased bloodflow.
However, part of that increased bloodflow results in 'octopus tracks', or hickey-like marks on the skin. The marks are usually not painful, just a little tender - more like a hickey than a bruise. But they are very visible, especially for the first few days. So when planning some cupping, it is wise to think ahead to see if marks are going to be unwanted any time in the next several weeks. And as is recommended with massage, it is important to hydrate before and after. The cupping works muscles more deeply than usual, and releases toxins that need to be flushed.
During a cup scene negotiation, it is important to ask if there are any injuries, skin breaks, bloodflow or skin conditions that could be exacerbated by the cupping. Cups should be placed on fleshy areas like the back or thighs. Avoid areas with thin skin that could be torn or skin that is already damaged through injury, especially on joints. Match the size of the cup to the location - the cup must form a good seal, or you won't get good suction. If you're going to be moving the cups around, you'll want a thin layer of oil on the skin to provide some lubrication. Massage oil works well.
Cups can be placed anywhere you can get a seal, so smaller cups can be used on nipples and clits, and larger cups can be used on breasts. Moving the cups is where you can take this therapeutic practice and turn it into a sadomasochistic event. When there are many cups on a bottom, the skin is pulled taught. By moving the cups around without breaking the seal, you pull the skin with them and cause some pain. Cups can be dragged slowly or quickly, and as the cups start moving you can pull them easily or jerk them quickly. Going over the same spot repeatedly (a trick known as 'racecars' for the racetrack oval that is easy to create) becomes more and more painful. Tension can be increased by pumping more air out of the cups if they are to remain in one place. Too much tension will prevent moving them. After the cups have been used for a while, the skin will also be sensitive. Tapping, twisting, and pulling on the cups, or scratching or pulling on the skin, will have lots of effect.
Like any sadomasochistic experience, there can be some very loud responses from the bottom, and the potential for dropping into a strong headspace. I find that my cupping scenes often draw an audience, since it's a less common kind of play. I've had bottoms curse and yell, or sob and cry. I use plastic cups, but if your cups are of a breakable type, you may want to restrain your bottom to reduce the risk of cups falling. And of course, the marks after the scene are quite vivid and make good photos. Cleanup is fairly simple - just wipe the cups out. I usually wipe them with disinfectant wipes after a scene, and run them through the dishwasher when I get home.
Here are some typical marking patterns you may see with cupping. Where cups are left in place for a time, you'll get a circle. Where they are moved around a lot, you'll get a rash-effect, and the skin will turn leathery and dark. Immediately after the cupping, you may also see indentations from the cups themselves, like those on the man in the center. These marks will typically last anywhere from three days to maybe three weeks. They may be a little tender to the touch at first, then itch a little as they start to fade. Keeping the skin hydrated with oil or lotion will help.
For a flashier cupping scene, fire cupping is the more traditional cupping method. It is harder to control until the top has gained some experience, so more practice is needed to claim proficiency. As with any kind of fireplay, you have increased risk. But in additional to the usual risks for fire, there is also now the added risk of using glass cups. If one falls, you may have broken glass to manage in addition to fire. I recommend any fireplay scene include a spotter/assistant, but especially fire cupping.
There are several ways to get the fire into the cup and then the cup onto the bottom. The most common way I see is to use some sort of lit wand to swab the fire around the glass cup just above the bottom, pull the wand away, and set the cup down. I've also seen alcohol sprayed into the cup, lit with a wand, and the cup set down. Or I've seen something placed on the bottom's back, set on fire, and then covered with a cup, trapping the fire setup inside the cup. Of course, great care must be taken not to burn the bottom, especially with the last scenario. This is a higher-risk scene than mechanical vacuum cupping.
Not as commonly used in the kink world - but certainly not unheard of - is cupping where the goal is to draw blood out, known as 'wet cupping' or 'blood cupping'. It's another version of cupping as alternative medicine. A cup is placed for a few minutes, then removed. A cut is made where the cup has been, and the cup reapplied. Blood will come out. It congeals very quickly. Obviously, this kind of play is messier and involves more cleanup, as well as more risks that go along with other kinds of bloodplay.
Once you have cups, you're ready to experiment with cupping on yourself and others, whether pleasant or painful. I've listed suggested supplies here. You'll need additional supplies for Wet Cupping or for Fire Cupping. But it's not very expensive or difficult to try out. Enjoy!
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Thank you for reading through this presentation. If you have comments, suggestions, questions, or corrections, please leave a comment, or you can email me at meronym@myself.com or send me a fetmessage on FetLife. You may link this presentation anywhere it may be useful for educational purposes (no media).
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