Open Marriages

Consensus is generally that a marriage must be exceptionally strong to support an open marriage or swinging lifestyle without imploding. Introducing more sex partners to the mix won't fix a struggling marriage.

The closest one might come is a don't-ask-don't-tell policy.

Refusers are often in denial about the failure of the intimate relationship. Even when they aren't, they often see it as a point of control that they aren't about to relinquish. An open marriage would require them to acknowledge the situation, admit that it isn't going to change, and then be complicit in this arrangement. The odds are extremely low; rational logic does not apply.

Data indicates that the level of success in long term open marriages (as defined by eventual divorce) is the same as it is with closed marriages. I know from people WITHIN the polyamorous community (in various forms - swinging, poly committed, triads etc) that those who adopt it as a "lifestyle" as opposed to a thing they do (ie. they claim it as part of their identity) tend to talk it up as a kind of Utopian ideal, or as an "evolved" form of relating - like a kind of club or achievement. I do NOT see it that way (though I'm not turned off by it per se). I just see that as the mirror of people who casually dismiss it as perverse. As a dating person - at least in a metropolitan city - it's the total norm for singles to date multiple people casually for a period - with no assumption of monogamy. This isn't called polyamory when it happens like that, and yet it's more promiscuous than I ever was in an open relationship. So, I'll chalk it up to saying that it's hard to get good information, when people are captured by an idea - pro or against - or a sense of a norm that isn't necessarily true in a meaningful way.

What that leaves us with, if the rate of divorce is identical (and most people in open relationships who divorce seem to blame the divorce on the same things as people in "monogamous" relationships), is the idea that whether or not external parties are added to the mix, you are still dealing with the same problems in your primary relationship, and these are not really diminished.

I would liken it to having a baby to save the marriage, or going on a camping trip to the jungle, or sailing around the world. Because you both know that you are entering intense hazards, it generally causes both parties to lean in and focus attention on developing the emotional skills and tools needed to navigate and withstand or enjoy the experiences you will have. Talking to people who are in these situations is like talking to dog show enthusiasts or new parents - 100% of their attention is devoted to adapting to their new reality. That activity and shared attention offers a proxy for being onside - for being engaged in building something new - and that can feel invigorating for a while. But eventually it can run out of gas.

When I agreed to try an open marriage, it was under the main stipulation that my wife was using it to "discover" her sexuality again, independent of her role in satisfying me. The thought, she rationalized, was to break the cycle. If she felt more sexual in general, she could apply it with me. It worked for a while - sort of, with diminished returns in a kind of extended reset, with the goalposts of her encounters moving farther and farther away, and many rules not only broken - but broken because the rules were resented altogether, more than the freedom she had been offered was appreciated. When our own relationship when celibate again, and when she resented my own minor dalliances by comparison, and when she still pressed for other partners for her - it was very crystal clear to me that OUR MARRIAGE was over. The romantic investment she had in me was done, and could quantifiably and (to my satisfaction) irrefutably, be shown. (worth noting that she still clung to her "I'm just not as sexual as you" narrative).

At the core of it, I was still left with the question of what marriage brought to the table for the two of us?
I recall fantasizing impossibly about a situation happening differently, where SHE was the paramour and I was married to someone who was actually invested in me.
And that led me to ponder the feeling of her simply not being invested in me romantically.
Regardless of who was or wasn't doing what to whom - in that situation - marriage was not bringing anything to the table that an amicable ex-spouse couldn't.
Making that decision was like jumping from a burning building, or amputating and arm trapped under a rock - but it really was the only authentic thing to do. I couldn't fool myself anymore.

So it comes to that with you. Take your best case and your worst case out of open marriage. What does the marriage bring to the table?
Suppose you have the best, most passionate plentiful sex with your partner, or just good enough to make the starvation bearable. What then, between you and your wife?
Would you still marry her?

With kids, you have co-parenting, if all works out and you fix on how to do that well.
With the estate, you have co-owners in a shared asset that you both value.

Our couples' counselor suggested open marriage the second to last counseling session when I admitted out loud (again, but with a third party present) that once-a-month marital sex life was simply a deal breaker for me. It kind of baffled me that he suggested it - his ideas are a little complicated emotionally (IMHO) for my husband to grasp. I had read so much about it on here, that even in the past when I had asked for as much, I have come around to the thinking that it would be a hollow replacement for what I really want. And even though I am not necessarily emotionally invested in the marriage, save the children, I would guess his dalliances would infuriate me too. I recognize that I would not be emotionally mature enough to handle that.

The last counseling session, I admitted I don't care if this works out. We opted for husband to do individual counseling with our couple's' counselor first and we discontinued our couple's' counseling.

Sex since, has been devoid of emotion on my part. A place I never thought I was able to get to - but, here I am.

My guess is - open marriage will fix the physical issue for many. I simply cannot separate passion and love from the equation, so it would not work for me.

One category of my wife's complaints has to do with my personality and mannerisms. One classic example is internet debates. I can debate rationally and logically, but when someone jumps to bad logic and emotion I rip into them deeply. My wife hates this behavior and wishes that I would be calm and gentle to people all the time, without regard to the well documented fact that even Jesus was not calm and gentle to people all the time, because it doesn't work.

Last December she went off ape shit style on me, asking what I thought our pastor would think about my behavior. She has more respect for our pastor than she does me. I swear, if she ever drags me in for a counseling session with him, I'm going to float the idea that we swap partners until he accepts or kicks us out. I'm not a cuck. I want an even trade. But I think it might help my wife to get the bone from someone she respects. Even more importantly, last summer he preached a sermon on sex, and declared that Christian married sex was the best sex ever. I want him to experience the corpse fuck I deal with and hear his take on what Christian married sex is like for me. Their pairing is a win-win for me, and I get some strange, too. What an awesome experience. I just don't see any down side.

Given that most of your statements - based on my own experience within the community - are incorrect, and I gather, not based on your own experience with the matter, I am having a tough time accepting that your comments are made on any other basis than your personal social mores.

There are many types of open marriages. In my personal experience, and what I've seen, love, care and affection most certainly does enter the equation, as does lust.
I find it ironic that in a a group devoted to lamenting the lack of sexual expression within a loving relationship (or that hopes to create a sexual relationship where none exists), to see a post that poses "lust" in opposition to "love" as two different choices. This is the rationalization of my formerly celibate ex-wife.  

Having an open relationship does not mean that one is promiscuous - not any more than being bisexual means you are going to sleep with half the town. When I was married and open, I slept with two people in 2 years - my wife and my girlfriend. Since I've been single, post divorce, I've slept with quite a few more than that in the same time frame. THAT is "normal" though. My life in CNM was far less promiscuous than my life as a serial monogamist, and I find that that is pretty normal.

Before I dipped my toe in those waters, I researched heavily, and my research indicated that the open relationship crowd generally does NOT have a higher STD/HIV risk, unless you are parsing the data to include gay men. The subset of the non-monogamous crowd called swingers - has a stringent culture of safer sex.

Re: "going to swingers" : You don't "go to a swinger" the way you pay a pro. Generally speaking, it's not much different trying to get with a swinger (ESPECIALLY AS A SINGLE MAN) as it is with anyone else. You have to talk and get to know them. They need to think you are attractive. They have to like you - they will have many choices. The bullshit assumption that because a woman is hanging out in a swing club that you can just walk up and she's good to go with you - really doesn't fly well. I doubt any swingers are trying to kick down your door to get with you - am I wrong? To put it in perspective, I've been to general vanilla nightclub/danceclubs, and I've been to swing clubs that had dancing, and consistently - every single time - my partner was treated with more respect, care and agency at the swing club. At the dance club, I had to tell her she needed to handle the number of guys trying to get with her at least partly on her own, or I would end up being in multiple fistfights.  

The idea that what other people do is shallow or animalistic - as you portray it comes off to me as sanctimonious. There might be some people - even lots - that are having animalistic, rutting sex - but you know what? There's nothing wrong with that either. Frankly I could have used a bit of that in my marriage from time to time. There's nothing wrong with having, expressing, and satisfying an appetite. And sharing that experience with someone can be just as much an onramp to a more fulsome emotional investment as anything else.



Sanctimonious passive-aggressive piffle.
You sound exactly like my ex-wife playing the victim by posing her "higher love" against "sex" and acting hurt that I've chosen unwisely in her false dilemma. Your "hat" is not off - you are calling him an animal and you might as well call everyone on this board the same.

I can certainly understand your feelings.  However, when I hear sermons like this, I try to remember that the person is just speaking from his/her own personal experience.  I can tell you that when I finally told my pastor in the previous town where I lived that my W was a refuser, his jaw dropped and he said he would not be able to put up with 1 year of celibacy, and certainly not any more than that.

My guess is that your pastor would not be supportive of your wife's adulterous behavior either.  Do you mind saying what denomination your church is?