Suzi Godson

A reader wants to know If bondage play between two consenting partners is difficult for the average person to understand, solo bondage is baffling. The idea of someone wanting to dress in rubber, don a gas mask, tie a noose around his neck and strap himself to the bedpost simply doesn't make sense. It's not just the why, it's the how. Solo bondage involves meticulous preparation and the kind of skill set that is more James Bond than Joe Bloggs. The straitjacket self-bondage rope tie definitely didn't get taught at Scouts, and although the sticky plaster, squash ball, uninflated balloons, 6ft of pink ribbon and giant joke shop dummy sound like a Blue Peter script, they are not, believe me.

To the average punter, the only obvious advantage to doing this kind of thing in secret is that no one else can see how ridiculous you look. But for the solo bondage fan, the energy, the sourcing, the expense, the squirrelling away, and most of all, the clandestine and hazardous nature of the activities combine to create an incomparable adrenalin rush. There is the risk of getting caught, but there is also the risk of it all going horribly wrong.

It is potentially as dangerous as physical restraint in partnered sexual bondage with the grave exception that if things do not go according to plan, you cannot escape there is no one to rescue you.

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When the Conservative MP for Eastleigh, Stephen Milligan was discovered dead (and naked, bar some suspenders and a pair of women's stockings) by his secretary, he had an electric cord tied around his neck, a black bin liner over his head and a piece of orange in his mouth. I suspect that his fiancée at the time was, like your wife, devastated to discover that her partner had been hiding his sexual predilections from her.

Solo bondage is a very exclusive club with a membership of one. You operate alone. You satisfy your own needs without any need to compromise, any need to accommodate anyone else. Your enthusiasm for this secret, silent, and highly introspective form of stimulation probably developed years ago and I would imagine that you yourself found your interests challenging initially.

Consider then how much more complex your wife's situation is. In her eyes your involvement with bondage is a sexual commitment that does not involve her. It is a lie that you have been living under her nose and any attempt to persuade her that “it is a good idea” is unlikely to work in your favour.

At best, your wife will view your interests as a unique kind of sexual indulgence, at worst, an enormous betrayal. In choosing to keep this part of yourself private you denied her the right to know you in full. Now that she is enlightened, she has the right to decide what she wants, in her own time and on her own terms.

Suzi Godson is the author of The Sex Book (Cassell, £16.99) and The Body Bible (Penguin, £16.99)

Dr Thomas Stuttaford

Your apparent surprise that your wife was devastated to discover that her husband kept a secret stash of bondage equipment astonishes me. Unless you are into auto-asphyxiation, a dangerous practice if ever there was one, having bondage gear implies that its owner has someone with whom he or she can share it.

Your wife has to confront a series of questions. How long has her husband had this kit? What does he do with it, when was it last used and with whom? She must also be wondering whether throughout the time she has been with you, and you have been professing undying love and satisfaction with her sexual performance, you were pretending. Were you in reality feeling frustrated and misunderstood as you longed to unpack and play with your toys? Had she failed to notice the hints you gave while lovemaking that the missionary position night after night was not really what you were hoping for? She will now be wondering what her role is supposed to be, and whether any part of it will involve carefully staged bondage and SM.

Could she ever find bondage a turn-on? If bondage and sadomasochism are based on and are about domination versus submission, freedom versus slavery, power versus helplessness, as the late Anthony Storr the great Oxford psychiatrist taught, your wife is bound to wonder how she will fit into your fantasy.

Is she expected to be the dominatrix and you the subservient slave, or is that to be her duty? There is a strong body of opinion among psychiatrists that some element of role-playing involving a small element of domination and submission is so common that it can be considered normal. The difficulty is in deciding when an affectionate pat becomes a spank. Similarly when does playful, but forceful, even if pain-free, restraint during lovemaking constitute assault?

A former patient once told me she thought that about one in four of her lovers had wanted to play at tying up. But she said that often this was so token that it couldn't be described as bondage or, I suspect, have involved a hidden cache of sex toys. Storr also taught that many couples indulge in minor sadomasochistic rituals because that is the way one or other becomes stimulated. The golden rule is that both must agree, and both have the power of veto.

Any assumption that male sexuality is innately aggressive and women passive and masochistic is unwarranted. Often roles are swapped and although several studies support the belief that women have an inherent desire to be dominated, others dispute this. One study found that although a surprisingly large minority of men fantasised about dominating their partner, only a small minority fantasised about sexual acts involving pain or degradation. Other research has shown that an appreciable minority of women are turned on by spanking, even if as a token. A recent research paper suggested that this could be related to the nerve distribution of women secondary to their anatomical structure as much as to any deep psychological yearning.

Dr Thomas Stuttaford, the Times doctor, spent many years working in a genitourinary clinic

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