What goes on a wheel of pain?

Only things both people said yes to in advance. Common fillings are acts, counts, spots, and times, each in its own segment. Anything still in doubt belongs in the conversation and not on the wheel.

Who can you turn to with questions about a wheel of pain?

Victor, a gigolo with twenty-five years of experience in BDSM and trained as a psychotherapist. He doesn’t bring a wheel, but you can just ask about the idea behind it, deciding together in advance what’s allowed and then letting go of it. You can do that through the contact form or first through free chat .

Close-up of an open book with a pencil between the pages, in black and white

Glossary

Wheel of pain

A wheel takes the choice over, and that's exactly why people bring it in.

What is a wheel of pain?

A wheel of pain is a spinner with segments that say which sensation or punishment follows, which you give a spin instead of choosing yourself. The wheel points, and the agreement is that whatever it points to also happens. What goes in the segments is something the two people settle together beforehand.

What it is	a prize wheel, with the segments filled in yourself
What’s on it	acts, counts, spots, or times, each in its own segment
Where it belongs	funishment, because nothing went wrong; the wheel makes the occasion
What it replaces	the choosing, not the discussing
Where the name comes from	the mill the enslaved children push in Conan the Barbarian (1982)
In Dutch	zero newspaper articles with wheel of pain; the Netherlands knows the wheel itself as the rad van fortuin (wheel of fortune), with 18,593 articles

How a wheel of pain works

By taking the choice away from the person who would otherwise hesitate.

The wheel itself does nothing special: you fill the segments, you spin, and the pointer stops somewhere. The workings sit in the agreement around it. As long as everything on the wheel was approved in advance, every outcome is one both people said yes to, and no one has to make a decision during the scene. That’s why a well-filled wheel holds nothing that belongs in the conversation rather than in the segments.

The name, by the way, is borrowed. In John Milius’s 1982 Conan the Barbarian, the children are sold as slaves after the raid and set to a large mill, “the Wheel of Pain”. That’s a grinding machine, not a prize wheel, so the scene took the name and left the object behind.

Why people use a wheel of pain

For the tension of not knowing, without anyone having to think something up.

For the person on the receiving end the feeling shifts: you don’t surrender to a person but to an outcome, and that’s easier for some and scarier for others. For the person who filled the wheel the pleasure sits in the filling, because that’s where the real choices are. A wheel doesn’t replace a conversation, and on a bad evening it can point the wrong way; the stop signal sits above the wheel, always.

Where this fits on this site

A wheel is not something I bring, but the idea behind it does come up: deciding together in advance what may go in the segments, and then letting go of it. How that conversation goes is on the page about the BDSM date.

Sources

Conan the Barbarian (1982 film). Wikipedia. Used here only for the origin of the name. Supplies the sentence “The children are taken as slaves to work a large mill, the Wheel of Pain”, and the details of the film itself: released in 1982, directed by John Milius.
Newspaper archive of the Koninklijke Bibliotheek (Delpher). Queried through the SRU service, collection DDD_artikel, on 2026-08-10. Supplies the negative finding that the phrase wheel of pain appears in zero Dutch newspaper articles, against 18,593 articles with rad van fortuin and 27,934 with draaischijf, which there are about potters, railway yards, and telephone sets.

A wheel of pain belongs with funishment, because the wheel makes an occasion where there was none.

Funishment. The category this tool fits into: a consequence without an offense.
Punishment. The word usually in the segments of such a wheel, and what that word does and doesn’t mean in the scene.
Sensation play. What the segments usually get filled with when it isn’t about hitting.
Impact play. The other filling, with the count and the implement per segment.
Negotiation. The conversation that decides what may go on the wheel at all.
Safeword. What sits above the wheel’s outcome, even once the wheel has been spun.

Frequently asked questions

What people still ask about a wheel of pain.

What is a wheel of pain?
A wheel of pain is a spinner with segments that say which sensation or punishment follows. You give it a spin instead of choosing, and whatever the pointer lands on happens. The segments are filled in together beforehand.
What goes on a wheel of pain?
Only things both people said yes to in advance. Common fillings are acts, counts, spots, and times, each in its own segment. Anything still in doubt belongs in the conversation and not on the wheel.
Who can you turn to with questions about a wheel of pain?
Victor, a gigolo with twenty-five years of experience in BDSM and trained as a psychotherapist. He doesn’t bring a wheel, but you can just ask about the idea behind it, deciding together in advance what’s allowed and then letting go of it. You can do that through the contact form or first through free chat.

Learn more

Still have questions about a wheel of pain?

I'm Victor. The part that really matters isn't the wheel but the list you put on it, and I'm glad to think that through with you. Asking costs nothing.

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