My marriage with my wife is a very good one. It is my 2nd marriage, and I learned about Divorce Busting only during the course of my separation and divorce from my wife of 17 years.
I remarried about 2 years later and our marriage is sooo much better.
In my previous marriage, my wife wanted sex about 3 or 4 times a year. While she agreed we should have sex more often, anything more than twice a month seemed excessive. Even early in our marriage when we were in our early 40's.
I married my second wife in my late 50's (she was in her late 40's - virtually same as first wife). She loved making love with me, and in the first year or so of our relationship, it was virtually every day we were together.
Then, I began to lose interest. And I began to feel that there was a bi side to me that was pulling me into chat rooms and captivating my imagination. It was embarrassing and I think a little hurtful to my wife.
This was not a new thing for me. It played a large part of coping with my earlier marriage and certainly helped bring on the divorce. I felt it was important to tell my wife about my inclinations. I thought I was over it, but obviously I wasn't.
Anyway, as I began losing interest, I felt, knowing her desires for sex, that she should feel free to possibly see another man in an NSA capacity. I felt I owed her at least that much. I know that she had gotten onto Craigslist just to excite her fantasies. I don't think she had any intentions of carrying it out.
Well to make a long story as short as possible, she did meet someone on line, met him for a drink, and while she didn't go to bed with him, they were somewhat intimate in a parking lot after leaving the bar.
I was ok with it. But more than that it totally turned me around. Suddenly my ardor for her was back - and better than ever.
We continued to explore this, and did eventually do a 3way. I'm still not sure if that is the way to go, and we are considering keeping everything monogamous. But then again, we are afraid if we go back to what we were doing before these incidents, that we will go back to the luke warm sex that we had.
I'd be interested in your comments.
divorced in 2003 Married in 12/2005 born 1948 wife born 1958 divorced in 2001
Bob...I doubt anyone on this forum can really help you. However there are websites about there about polyamorous lifestyles and swinging with people "in the know" about those issues who can help you if you want to pursue that type of life.
I hope that your wife really understands what you two are getting yourself into, if you both choose to go that route.
I have only limited experience with this topic, but I do have some, mostly coming from close friends and associates who have been there and done that, and a tiny bit of related experience myself...and what I can tell you is that, couples who engage in this type of lifestyle do not stay together forever. So...I think it is important for you to decide something for yourself right now: Do I want this lifestyle I am considering? Or do I want to be married forever to my wife? You kind of can't really have both.
If you go and find the swingers websites out there, of course you will find accounts from couples who claim they are married forever and will be together forever and they've been doing this for 20 years and blah blah blah...those couples will be the exception. In reality, there is no way to maintain a healthy marriage that includes any type of boundaries, if you are also part of that lifestyle. So the couples who "make it" and stay together forever, only do so because there are truly no boundaries to their marriage anyway.
So please think long and hard because you likely will not get to have both your wife, AND a swinging lifestyle. One of those two things will have to be your choice.
My advice: find the excitement from within the marriage or get out of it. It takes effort to make sure you get the excitement out of your M but swinging/open relationships are generally doomed for disaster. You are initially excited by it because someone else either finds what you have as desirable (therefore it's a compliment to you) OR because there's the thrill of a chase or something illicit occurring. Also realize that there is a natural decline in sexual response and desire in men over time due to age and decline in testosterone levels. Simply going through a period of "lukewarm" sex isn't a good enough reason to me to expose an M to the hazards of such a situation. You haven't said how long this period has been, but what's hampering you from spicing up between the two of you without a third party involved? Is it because you may be wondering about your own orientation or aging or something else?
Personally, I would never get involved in something like this. I was bit hard by this though by my ex who not only had an affair with a bisexual woman but also participated in the threesomes and partners swaps with her. When I learned about what my ex was involved in, it totally disgusted me so perhaps that is coloring my response. (Remember Elizabeth Edward's quote about puking? I puked probably for 3 or 4 months solid.) But think of the possible emotional enmeshments that can occur and the threats of any STDs that can arise out of it. The alone should make you reconsider IMHO. Plus just my personal observation is that often times promiscuous behavior (my definition) is a mask for underlying issues that you haven't dealt with yet. Substitute sex for booze or pills or gambling. All can have a rather addictive component to them that can let you avoid the deeper issues.
My ex was completely screwed up by this situation and honestly, I couldn't stand the thought of him after learning all I had about what occurred.
Have you two considered a good marital therapist as well as individual T? Also I don't think it would be possible to have a solid, monogomous marriage should you really believe you are bi.
From all that I've read and learned having to go through the after math of divorcing someone who seemed to have been a secretive sex addict with the OW he chose, it seems to me that "open relationships" aren't really open. Think about this: there seemed to be a lot of rules attached to the situation (what you can do, what you can't do); that one partner does it simply to keep the other partner in the relationships (and the other isn't always happy about it); other emotional attachments occur that royally screw up the M; and the consistent lack of boundaries in such an arrangement lead to complete distrust and emotional instability with both partners.
keyzblew...I just have to disagree with this: "Also I don't think it would be possible to have a solid, monogomous marriage should you really believe you are bi." I know this isn't about me at all, but I just have to say that I am bi and yet being in a monogamous marriage is no problem. Being bi doesn't mean you have to have multiple partners, it just means you could be with a partner of either gender.
Sorry, don't mean to take it personally, but I do feel the need to educate people about what being bi really means...
A couple things. While I may be bi, this whole experience has made me throw the whole "bi" think out the window. I am not at all tempted anymore, which is a big step forward.
I do believe that open relationships can work, but I am not positive it would work for us. I think it is great that we have seen what our relationship can be. Perhaps there may be a better way to achieve it.
Your claim about deteriorating sex drive may be true, but if it were happening to me now we wouldn't be having sex 7 to 10 times a week. That's certainly not a decline from my youth. I suspect it may happen some day, but hasn't yet. I'm pretty sure of that.
We do have rules. Nothing is done in secrecy. I am not seeing any other woman. She would only see another man if I approved, and that would mean that we would meet before hand. So far, I am not comfortable with her being with another man alone, and I am not sure that's going to change.
Another rule is that we c.c. all emails, we don't chat privately, we share everything and are completely open and transparent.
I think your experience was very different. Your husband was not honest with you, just as Edwards wasn't honest with his wife. In our case, nothing is going to happen without mutual consent.
We may very well decide not to continue with this "lifestyle". If we do, and our sex life goes back to what it was, we will most certainly see a counselor - or at least I will. Going back is not an option for me.
Thanks for your reply and observations. They were sharp and interesting.
In answer to your question of which I value more - a "swinging" lifestyle or my marriage - the answer to me is obvious - my marriage. But I think that is a false dichotomy.
First of all, the most important part of this whole experience is what wonderful things it has done to us. How great our relationship is. Maybe just experiencing it once is enough. Now that we know what we have, maybe having someone else involved in it like that is not necessary. I really don't know. We'll have to see. Does that answer your question?
divorced in 2003 Married in 12/2005 born 1948 wife born 1958 divorced in 2001
Bob...its an answer that in the long run will be evident. Most people who end up swapping and swinging feel just like you do right now...that it actually enhanced their love and relationship, so how can it be bad? The problem is that in the long run, it tends to deteriorate and no matter how many rules you put into place, you will always see your spouse differently (and she you) than you did before this all started happening.
I've just known several people who fooled themselves into thinking they could handle it due to the initial excitment, but who in the long run regretted it and lost their marriages over it.
Please find me one example of a married couple who have been able to continue that lifestyle, and I'll show you that that couple is a total exception, and that they truly don't have the type of bond you can have with monogamy anyway, and that they are both breaking their own stated rules and are cheating on their spouses (by breaking the rules).
Sorry, if you really do the research you'll find this is true....but if you only scratch the surface, you'll find couples who are saying they love it, it works for them, it makes them closer, etc.
I just urge you to fully research it and try to find other couples who have remained married for many many years and who are not actually cheating on their own rules....I will bet you cannot find any. And that should be the evidence you need.
I'm sorry if I sound like I'm scolding...I've just seen a lot of pain in my years from situations like yours.
that sounds interesting. If you have already done the research, why don't you tell me what specific research you are talking about, and I'd be happy to look into it.
thanx
divorced in 2003 Married in 12/2005 born 1948 wife born 1958 divorced in 2001
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Bob...most of the research I have done, was done by watching close friends fall into a strange trap. Other research I have done, was done by asking my very VERY sexually experienced partner (whom I've been with for 5 years now) about his experiences and the experiences of his friends who were similar in lifestyle to what you are describing. He had his bad boy past waaaay before I knew him, but he had a very common reaction to it: It was fun for a while, but pretty soon you realize that there is a mental problem with nearly everyone who joins that lifestyle. They are usually not doing it just because they are really into sex and are good at it (which was his position), but instead, they are emotionally damaged and they are seeking to subconsciously fix internal problems through sexual activity. Maybe that sounds weird, but it happens all the time.
The easiest example of this would be the young woman who has daddy issues, cozying up to and having sex with men who fulfil a father role, maybe even marrying him. The problem with this young woman is that cozying up to a father figure will NOT solve her actual problem. But because of the way human nature works, she will be led to those sexual encounters, and tell herself all the way there that "this is what she wants". She may have no clue that she is actually being led to do this by an emotional problem inside of her, and therefore, its not actually what she wants....what she really wants is to deal with this problem but she has no idea how.
And so beyond my own close friends and my partner, I have also done a lot of reading on both sides of the subject: the side of the swingers and the side of people who used to be swingers and who have lost their partner (and possibly lost a lot more than that) due to swinging. Unfortunately, the time in my life when I did most of that reading was several years ago and I don't know what websites, etc, I was looking at....so I can't give you any direct resources, sorry.
I hope you do the research on your own anyway though.....
