It is a sign of ownership. She is putting her mark on you, saying that this one is mine. Its fairly universally recognized, and generally people will leave it alone.
Alternatively, possessive types may use love bites as a mark of possession to show everyone else you are taken. In which case you should take that as a red flag. For others it's a show of affection. Simply a regular part of a passionate kissing session.
“Hickey” is a slang term for a bruise caused by sucking or kissing a person's skin during a passionate moment. A hickey can be a trophy from a pleasing make-out session, but it can also be point of shame: something that a girl feels she must hide from her parents and teachers.
Hickeys are a mark of passion. They are often done in the heat of the moment. Contrary to popular belief, hickeys should be shared as a token of physical affirmation and pleasure as opposed to showing ownership over a partner.
Hickeys can be used as symbols of one's unavailability to the public. But they are not always intended for this purpose. I would venture to say that most hickeys don't have a purpose other than pleasure. In the heat of the moment, you might just get caught up and accidentally suck too hard for too long.
"It's not the hickey itself that's making you aroused, it's the act of kissing that's causing the arousal," Dr. Jaber says. For some people, it can feel good to get kissed on the neck. The neck is full of nerve-endings, which can make a kiss there a lot more pleasurable.
It's fun, and a bit dangerous and so exciting. Additional reasons could be anything from getting carried away with passion, through playing a practical joke, all the way up to marking their “property”. A hicky is telling others, “this one is taken”.
There's never any reason to shame someone for having a hickey mark — like all forms of consensual sexual behavior, you don't have to justify someone making out with your neck — but the paradox of the hickey is that it takes something private and creates a public, lingering effect.
“Hickeys are like marking territory. They represent an intimate thing that happened and make me feel like a caveman,” he said. “The adrenaline and dopamine rush from that alone is enough to get me going.” It's easy to get carried away, but consent and communication are still important.
“If you were wanting to bite your partner, with zero context people might not understand that there's a loving relationship there, or that person is being very aggressive,” she said. “But in that loving relationship, context is provided, and we now understand that this is a signal of affection.”
The sexual aggression we feel towards our partners (and the subsequent desire to bite them), is another form of cute aggression. Biting in a sexual way “might demonstrate a sense of playfulness that might be rooted in expressing one's interest,” Moali says. Basically, passion makes us bite-y.
Nibble his neck: Much like the ears, the neck is a very sensitive area as well. Gently bite or lick his neck to give him the hint. It will leave him gasping for more and get you exactly what you want. Touch his chest and waist: Contrary to popular belief, men actually enjoy being touched.
Usually, neck areas are popular spots for giving a hickey, which is fine if your partner has long hair. You can also consider other spots like the crook of the elbow or the inner thigh. To give your partner a hickey, make an O with your lips and press them firmly on your partner's skin.
To form a hickey, try sucking on the skin for about 20 to 30 seconds. Once you're done, the bruise can take anywhere from five to 10 minutes to appear. Of course, some people bruise easier than others, so the effect will be different depending on the person.
Hickeys are like friendship bracelets - juvenile and a little bit childish. While they are great and maybe even significant when you're a kid/teenager, they tend to lose their appeal the older you get.
THEY ARE BRUISES: Right below the surface of our skin are capillaries, the tiny blood vessels. They break when we hit something hard and this is why it pains or leaves a bruise. Similarly, hickeys are caused by breaking of these capillaries. Not more serious than hitting a table or bed, they are bruises nonetheless.
However, hickeys (and other markings) can be controlling and abusive if there isn't consent. It's important to ask and talk about what each partner is comfortable with and to respect boundaries.
Check for a bruise on the neck or shoulder area.
Most hickeys happen on the exposed skin above the collarbone. Those areas are kind of hard to bruise by accident, so a hickey is usually the culprit. People with hickeys usually cover them up by wearing scarves or turtlenecks.