Close swinging relationships

[Ripley & Ender]

We've just started looking into swinging, so we're still really new to this, but it seems like a lot of swingers warn each other against swinging with close friends or being very close to the people you swing with. Is this true? Is this something to worry about?
A lot of the attraction in swinging *for us* is the thought of finding a couple as close & tight as we are, and becoming very close to them too. We really enjoy our relationship, and we enjoy sharing it with other people, and the idea of sharing that with an equally close couple who shares their relationship with us too is very appealing.
But reading some on these forums seems to indicate that there may be some pitfalls with this idea?
Other than the normal risks of any close relationship, what should we be looking out for?

[SluttyWife]

Some of our very BEST friends are swingers, my dears!
That's the whole idea of "friends with benefits" IMHO.
Perhaps you might not want to look out for anything in particular nor
set any particular agenda on forthcoming friendships?
A good idea indeed to keep both "vanilla" friends and swinging friends
and see where things may lead that way you keep your risks to a minimum.

My input anyway.



Slutty Wife ;-*

[Carol_Danny]

Many of our closest friends were found though the Lifestyle. We even had friends who weren't Swingers, but became involved through us, and still remain friends. Over the years, we have rarely had a problem with friendship and Swinging.

[BiloxiCouple]

We have a personal rule that we don't swing with people we work with even if they are swingers. We think it could cause some headaches there.

We do have swingers who have become our friends over the years and that is okay for us.

[luvinit]

We have been playing with close friends for almost a year now. Its what we were looking for, we are not interested in one night stands. It is truly friends with benefits. We went on family vacation together this summer with our kids, we go boating, shopping and just hang out. The best part is the "girlfriend" relationship didnt know I was bi either did she we have had a lot of fun discovering we are, and our husbands love it. The biggest thing is COMMUNICATION. We are very upfront about what is happening, or not happening and respect each others boundaries, even if they change between play times!

[EmpyreanPleasur]

The "concern" that some people have about swinging with people you are close to or that you become close to is usually because of the delopment of a polyamorous relationship. Many people don't care for that sort of relationship and it's not right for them. Other's either come across it unexpectedly through a developing friendship or intentionally look for it.

It's something you may need to discuss and be aware of as you develop friendships with people you swing with and decide if it's right for you.

Aside from that a large number of people swing with close friends and never develop a poly relationship. It all depends on the type of people involved.

[JustAskJulie]

Most of the warnings you will find are in regards to swinging with vanilla friends, especially if both of you are new. The reason for this is that (especially with both couples being new) there is a lot of potential for misunderstanding, or of one of the couples trying it then deciding it doesn't work for them and no longer feeling comfortable with you as friends (because of the sex). It's along the same lines as in the dating world, many times you wouldn't jeapardize a good platonic friendship by having sex with them because it could change the relationship in such a way that results in the loss of a friendship.

[Ripley & Ender]

Thank you all so much for responding to the newbies. (insert smiley dude). Yeah, we've got to figure out the emoticons thing yet.
I think that we actually are a bit interested in polyamory relationships. I don't think either of us are out looking for that, but it is so fun having a close loving relationship with Ripley that sharing that with a couple of similar closeness and values sounds nice. I guess its one of those things that comes along better if you don't go beating the bushes for it. -Ender

[Jamie&Kieth]

I have been friends with my college roomate & her husband for over 20 years ... the group sex gets better & better with age. Another couple in our group, we have been swinging with for the past 2 years.

It has been our exerience to become friends first and expand ... if it expands to sex great, if it does not no problem we are still friends.

We prefer swinging with friends only because we know them and trust them where as strangers or people we don't know it can become scary ... adventuresome too, but the bottom line is we do not swing with others until we get to know them first.

[hilltop]

I think Julie hit it right.

A lot of the warnings you see are about having a physical relationship with vanilla (non-swinging) friends.

Starting something with existing friends is a call only you as a couple can make but it carries some risks.

For myself, I've never swung with close vanilla friends. If a friendship rises from swinging . . . what a great bonus!

A friend and her husband have what seems to be a very successful poly relationship with another couple.

To each their own.

Good luck!!

[bear_and_babe]

We have a couple who we are very close to. They are the ones who taught us about the lifestyle, but we have never played with them. There is some very strong sexual tension going on, but we decided not to play. We all talked about it and the fear for us is that if something went wrong, then we would loose the close friendship. We can get sex anywhere, but good friends are hard to come by. We were in a exclusive relationship with another couple who we really thought were good friends. Well, we had a bad break- up and now we hardly speak to each other. Losing the sex was hard, but losing their friendship has been the most painful. We don't ever want to go through that again, so for us, we kind of keep our friendships in the lifestyle at arms length.

[barbells2]

Close friends of our's actually introduced us to swinging. We really did a lot of thinking re having sex with our close friends. For us it worked out just fine. However we have a clear distinction between play time and normal friendly social interaction with our friends. We simply adopt the appropriate response at the appropriate time.

[valley]

I read in a Lifestyle magazine....."make swingers into friends but never friends into swingers".I believe that to be very good advice.

[DBL D]

Originally Posted by luvinit

We have been playing with close friends for almost a year now. Its what we were looking for, we are not interested in one night stands. It is truly friends with benefits. We went on family vacation together this summer with our kids, we go boating, shopping and just hang out. The best part is the "girlfriend" relationship didnt know I was bi either did she we have had a lot of fun discovering we are, and our husbands love it. The biggest thing is COMMUNICATION. We are very upfront about what is happening, or not happening and respect each others boundaries, even if they change between play times!

This is the kind of thing we've been wanting too. You will find that lots of people say they want to be friends but really don't follow up on their desires.
Their idea of "friendship" is pretty loosely defined. Be prepared to find a lot of folk like that. You'll be very disappointed by some of them that you had really hoped to have an LTR with but...keep searching and hopefully your life will become fulfilled.

Maybe part of the problem with these "friendseekers" is that they seem not to know where a strong sexual/social friendship ends and polyamory begins and they just hold back and become friendly but not a friend, if you get my drift.

BTW, I'm not slamming those that just want to have loose relationships. There's room for all types.

Male D

[AZ Dreaming]

I think that luvinit has it right... the biggest thing is COMMUNICATION!! And it must come before any play has started. We had something start with some friends of ours and there was not enough communication. They wanted a full polyamorous relationship. They even started talking, 6 months into all this, about living in the same house and getting old together. It really was a wake up call for us as we just want the friends with " benifits" thing. It was alot of drama to get it all broke off with them and now we are no longer friends with them. We have taken the last year off from the whole thing to regroup from all of it and are just starting to get back into the "swing" of things.

"make swingers into friends but never friends into swingers"

I love this saying and we will never make the same mistake again.