Debrief

What is a debrief?

Debrief (Dutch: nagesprek) is the conversation in which, one to a few days after a BDSM session, you look back together: what worked, what did not, and what may go differently next time. A debrief deliberately does not happen right afterward, but once the high has faded and judgment is clear again. A debrief is there for everyone who took part, including the leading role.

What a debrief looks like in practice

A debrief usually takes twenty minutes and covers what was good, what fell short, and what changes next time.

A common example. A session on Saturday night, nothing on Sunday, a phone call on Tuesday. She starts with the part she liked most, he says where he doubted whether he should keep going. And then comes the point the conversation really exists for: there was one moment when she was briefly gone, and nobody had noticed. On the night itself she had not said so. She did not yet know it then.

That is the pattern. The most useful information from a session does not surface during that session.

The encyclopedic description of aftercare names this conversation in so many words: aftercare can also include a review or debriefing of the session, to look back on the experience and to talk through worries or successes.

Where the word comes from and how a debrief works

Debrief comes from the military. The encyclopedia describes debriefing as a structured process after an exercise or event that goes back over the actions taken, and distinguishes, alongside the military form, debriefing in education, crisis intervention, research and organizations. The best-known crisis variant, Critical Incident Stress Debriefing, was developed by Jeffrey Mitchell.

The working ingredient is the same everywhere: you take an event apart while the participants still have it fresh, but no longer live inside it. That second part does the work. Right after a scene, arousal colors the judgment. Two days later the scales are balanced again.

For BDSM that yields a fixed order with four kinds of information: negotiation beforehand, a check-in during, aftercare right after, a debrief a few days later.

Why a debrief helps

A debrief does not deliver comfort but usable information, and it lands differently for each role.

• For whoever had the receiving role the gain is that something can still be said that could not be said in the moment itself.
• For whoever was in charge the debrief is often the only place where their own doubt exists. During a session that doubt is useless. Afterward it is the most important question there is.
• For a couple a vocabulary grows: after three or four debriefs you talk about limits in terms that are yours and do not come from a checklist.

A debrief undoes nothing. A session in which a limit was crossed does not belong in an evaluation at home but is a consent violation, and that calls for something other than a round of what-did-you-think.

How people do a debrief

The most common form is a phone call, two to four days after the session, scheduled before everyone went home.

What happens beyond that varies. Some keep to a fixed round: first both the best moment, then the worst, then one concrete agreement for next time. Others write it down separately and swap it, which helps when one talks more easily than the other.

The difference between careful and sloppy is in the scheduling. A debrief you plan in advance happens. A debrief called “we will call sometime” does not.

Misconceptions about the debrief

“A debrief is the same as aftercare.” Aftercare is the care on the night itself: a blanket, water, close together. The debrief is the conversation afterward, once the body is done and the mind gets its turn.

“If it went well, there is nothing to discuss.” The successful sessions are exactly the ones that yield the most usable information, because then you can point precisely to what made it work.

“A debrief is a form of processing trauma.” No, and that is more than a matter of words. For the Cochrane review, Rose, Bisson, Churchill and Wessely looked at fifteen studies on single-session psychological debriefing after a traumatic event. Their conclusion: there is no evidence that single-session individual psychological debriefing prevents PTSD, and compulsory debriefing of victims should stop. A debrief after a session evaluates something you chose yourself. That is a different act than talking through something that happened to you.

What I see of it myself

I am Victor, a gigolo, with twenty-five years of experience in BDSM and a background as a psychotherapist. The after-talk is the part of my work that looks least exciting and that I get the most out of.

What people say right after a session and what they say three days later rarely match. Not because anyone is lying. On the night itself there is simply no distance.

And one thing I have unlearned. I used to ask open questions. “How was it?” gets you “good.” Since then I ask about one moment: which moment came back to you this week? The answer is always in there, and usually it is not the moment I expected.

What you can do yourself

• Schedule the debrief before you part. Name a day and a time, even if you do not yet know whether there is anything to discuss.
• Wait at least one night, preferably two. A conversation on the night itself measures the high, not the session.
• Ask about one moment instead of the whole. “Which moment came back this week?” yields more than “how did you like it?”.
• Let whoever was in charge get their turn too. A debrief where only the receiving role is questioned misses half.
• Get outside help if a limit was crossed, because then the debrief is the wrong tool.
• End with one concrete agreement. Not three intentions, but one thing that demonstrably goes differently next time.

More reading on the debrief

On this site, the article on the role of feedback in BDSM goes into what this after-talk looks like from the inside, and why aftercare is crucial after BDSM describes the part that happens on the night itself.

Off this site, the Cochrane review by Rose and colleagues is free to read, precisely because it shows how well-meant talking-through can backfire the moment you use it as a treatment.

Sources

• Psychological debriefing for preventing post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Rose, Bisson, Churchill & Wessely, Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews 2002(2), CD000560. Fifteen studies; the conclusion that there is no evidence single-session individual psychological debriefing prevents PTSD and that compulsory debriefing of victims should stop.
• Aftercare (BDSM). Wikipedia. Supplies the finding that aftercare can also include a review or debriefing of the session, and the description of retelling the scene.
• Debriefing. Wikipedia. Supplies the description as a structured process after an event that goes back over the actions taken, the five kinds of debriefing, and Jeffrey Mitchell as the developer of Critical Incident Stress Debriefing.

Related terms

• Aftercare. The care on the night itself, of which the debrief is the late closing piece.
• Check-in. The gauging during the session; the debrief is its counterpart afterward.
• Consent. The agreement you adjust in a debrief for next time.
• Consent violation. What is at play when the debrief exposes a crossed limit.
• Contract. Where the outcome of a debrief often lands for steady couples.
• Negotiation. The conversation beforehand, which after a debrief starts again.