I experienced the most brutal Dom drop of my life this week and I'm concerned that I may have acted irresponsibly. The guilt is killing me. I like to think that care is always my primary focus, but this week I hurried play with a nube sub who I let gag several times in a short period. He was restrained and blindfolded. His gag reflex was unusually strong and each time it triggered I stopped to kiss him and engage him verbally with the scene's narrative so I could be sure that he was willfully compliant, but then I allowed him to gag again, and again. Probably five times in all, I was in his head no more than 30 seconds at a time and I was explaining to him what he could do to negate the reflex. I thought I was being fairly gentle with him but he asked me to stop which of course I did. This was the first time it dawned on me just how stressed he was and I feel bad for not picking up on it sooner. His immediate need was to have the blindfold removed. He said he wanted to leave. I assured him that he could but at the same time I was thinking I couldn't let him leave in that state. I stood him up to give him some sense of agency and hugged him at which point his posture measurably relaxed. I pretended to be having trouble untying him to give me time to try and talk him down, but it hardly qualified as aftercare. He wanted to leave so I had to let him. I know the gag reflex is very powerful and I feel dreadful that I let someone suffer any degree of psychological trauma. Genuinely I think he left thinking I was a psychopath who had been trying to kill him. I've been beating myself up ever since. I can only imagine when I was checking in with him between gags he was thinking to himself he could tough it out. We had had vanilla sex a few times before this and he had begged to be "dominated" and "used and abused"; he'd also asked to participate in some "extreme kink". These comments obviously informed me that he was clueless which was why I had chosen to do a very gentle scene, more to give him the sense of having been there than anything else. I should have clocked his stress level sooner but the entire act was only five minutes long. I tried to contact him the next day to check he was okay but he has blocked me across all channels. Am I beating myself up deservedly or should I give myself a break? My better angel is really pissed at me but the other shoulder says he was a pussy and I should move on guilt free. What do you think? Cheers T.