QUESTION: After sex, I find that I’m always really depressed and anxious. It’s like I go from this intense high and happiness to suddenly feeling like total sh*t. What is that about? Can it happen in all kinds of sexual situations?

The sub-drop in BDSM.

This refers to coming out of subspace - a place where we reach a sort of pinnacle of arousal and are floating in a sense of safety, happiness, and perfect bliss. The drop happens when the play is over and we're returned to real life.

Sub drops happen in a lot of ways, they can happen right after the play ends and sometimes they can come on the next day or a few days later. It's due to a lot of things: A drop in our bodies feel-good hormones, the entrenched cultural shame we have around sex (particularly sex that falls outside the vanilla heteronormative understanding of sex), and one's personal and subjective feelings about their own sexuality, their body image, and self-esteem. All of this can lead us to feeling sad and depressed after a particularly intense sub-space experience.

Outside of the kink community, people still experience the post-sex blues.

The post-sex drop can be called a lot of things: Post-sex blues, post-coital dysphoria and on and on. We hear a lot about the afterglow in sex, but rarely do we here about its shadow side. When we're in a heightened state of arousal, our brains and bodies are flooded with a cocktail of chemicals: Adrenaline, dopamine, oxytocin, norepinephrine, serotonin - all the good stuff that makes us feel alert and excited and turned on.

After orgasm, the peak of the sexual arousal cycle, many people feel relaxed, happy, and at peace - but this isn't the case for a lot of us. In fact, 50% of women have reported the opposite effect. Post-orgasm can feel like a crash. You're coming down from a big explosion of chemicals and the levels can drop quite quickly. So you go from feeling very happy to suddenly feeling despondent. This is normal and temporary.

Even if you enjoyed the experience and didn't engage in any domination/rough stuff, it’s normal to feel sad after sex.

It's completely normal. Sex and orgasm can bring out incredibly intense emotions - both positive and negative. You may laugh, cry, scream, sob - anything and everything is normal because it is such a profound mind/body connectedness for most people. And frankly, we aren't really used to connection like that in a society that praises emotional unavailability, no work/life balance, and extreme levels of productivity. We turn off the mind/body connection on a daily basis so being in the highly-vulnerable state of orgasm and nakedness can be very emotional, cathartic, sad, and scary, even.

The sadness is a combination of the psychological and hormonal things happening within your body and mind. You're dropping from the hormones, as well as coming back into your thoughts - which are connected to the reality you perceive: The messages you've received about sex, your particular attachment style, your comfort with intimacy, your self-esteem etc. Every PCD experience will be unique to the person having it based on their unique experience.

When to seek professional help.

If this is happening frequently or the depressive symptoms seem to last several days, weeks etc., always seek professional help from a qualified therapist of coach. Seek out someone who is BDSM-affirming and regularly works with people in the kink community. If you're not kinky, you'll still want to find a coach or therapist who is sex-positive and will be very affirming of your sexual choices.

The importance of aftercare (in all types of relationships).

It's very important to practice aftercare once you're finished with sex - whether extremely kinky or vanilla. We need time to orient ourselves to the world again. This will look different for people. Some people may want to cuddle, be caressed, or held. Others may need distance to be with themselves and connect to their minds and bodies. Others may want to simply talk through what happened. Maybe you'd like a combination of all these things or some of them.

Aftercare should be baked into your sexual experiences before you engage in sex. This goes for all sex, kinky or not. Have an open and honest conversation with your partner and let them know what you need to feel safe and grounded after sex, Invite them to do the same. It doesn't matter how casual or serious or kinky or vanilla a relationship it is, it is still a relationship - you are two (or more) human beings who deserve to be treated with care and respect.

XOXO GIGI

This article originally appeared as an interview with SHAPE Magazine.