Letting the spouse know you want to swing.

[JasmineGld]

Thank you, mixtupcpl, for the invitation to this thread.

Let me tell you about the audience I initially wrote the essay for. As a brand new Internet user Lo! these many years ago, I posted on general message boards. I needed a place to talk about my open marriage, and here, finally, was a little bit of anonymity where I could say things I couldn't say anywhere else.

But I hadn't yet found anyone who agreed with me. The people on these message boards reacted, for the most part, with extremely hostility to everything I said. They regularly attacked me verbally. One of the comments that recurred frequently was, "Just get a divorce! If you can't be monogamous, just get a divorce!"

Eventually, I wrote up my little essay open marriage as a way of answering the questions/accusations of the people on the message board that I frequented most often. The question I intended to address had NOTHING to do with "What if your marriage is in trouble?" No, not at all.

The question I intended to address was, "If monogamy isn't satisfying to a married person, what options do they have?" Divorce IS one option, as my message board-mates routinely hounded me about. One crazy thing I've learned is that sometimes couples with perfectly happy and healthy marriages will divorce over reasons that seem pretty minor and resolvable to me. Like a need for nonmonogamy.

My essay was never meant to explore all the deepest nuances of open marriage. I was writing for a specific audience with limited time, limited interest, and short attention spans. I could have expanded it to a book, if I intended to deal carefully with all of the above, plus the complexities and ethics of balancing one's own needs with one's partner's needs, plus the complications of sexual nonmonogamy versus emotional nonmonogamy, plus all the other layers that I never even touched, such as religious implications -- a special interest of mine.

And yet, short and sweet essays get read, while lengthy and thorough treatments get set aside to read another day. So a couple years later, I posted the article on a polyamory website "for what it was worth," complete with all its flaws. Clearly incomplete, but a starting place that's at least a little bit accessible to staunch monogamists.

BTW, my husband and I have been married for 32 years, an open marriage for 19 of them.
Jasmine

[ncmd_couple]

Jasmine,

Welcome to the Swinger's Board! Thanks for coming by and explaining the history. Now that you know about us, hopefully you will hang around where you will be welcomed with open arms, and you can say what you want with getting flamed.

S

[nllswing]

Jasmine, I want to thank you for the wonderful essay. It is short, precise, and right on point. I like your post in this thread even more, especially the punch line where you mention the length of your marriage. I think you could use this line as a signature each time you write to people who subscribe to more “generally accepted” ideas.
The Fuse, I want to thank you for making is so clear that one can be married to their best match and still benefit from outside experience.
My wife and I believe that we are the best match for each other. Until recently, before finding this board, I thought that we were one of the very few couples out there who share everything with each other and who trust each other greatly. I am blessed to be married (four years so far) to a very good and very intelligent person who is also my best friend. Every day is filled with lots of hugs and kisses, plenty of them. People sometimes think that we are newlyweds. We have shared most of our fantasies, including who has a crush on whom.
I have been having strong sexual fantasies since time immemorial but I was hoping that fantasizing and masturbating would be sufficient, just as it was for many years. However, it gets harder and harder and the feel of “a need” started to feel like a burning. Maybe one reason was realizing that, as time goes on, I may never live any of my fantasies. Another is maybe the fact that we moved from a small state to just outside of NYC, making the finding of a partner possible. Knowing that the temptation is just behind the corner is hard to resist.
Doing anything that would hurt or upset my wife is out of question, therefore cheating was not an option. She would either agree by her own will or it would be “tough luck” for me. Being open to each other we discussed it a few times, with my wife generally opposing to the pursuit of outside adventures not because there is something wrong with that but because she finds our relationship so special that even a small risk breaking it would make outside pursuits unjustifiable. I agreed with her and decided to not stress her for a while (life if stressful enough, thanks) and try to nag her again at a later time. A couple of days ago, just before her bedtime, she saw me reading Jasmine’s essay and after a short talk I told her that I had not read it yet, but it started with an interesting argument and it would be worth reading (I was on the second paragraph) and that she could look at it on a later day.
Jasmine and The Fuse: yesterday, December 19, when my dear wife read your posts she told me that she is willing to let me pursue my fantasies, subject to some reasonable conditions, same rights for her, and maybe finding a couple to play together with (if our workloads and schedules ever allow). Rejoice heart! What a gift of trust and understanding. Now, the mere thought that things are “maybe” as opposed to “no way” makes my life brighter. Few hours after conversation, we saw Mamma Mia on Broadway, for which we had bought tickets long ago. Listening to the music I like, being next to the person I love, and savoring over the possibilities that are now open to us made my cry.

Now is like 36 hours since our “agreement to open.” The quality of my life appears to have changed much to the positive, simply by the fact that there is no longer a prohibition. Since we are currently busy and under some stress, we won’t even make a move until some months later, but who cares. We went back on the subject for several times, almost like co-conspirators
THANK YOU ALL FOR HELPING COUPLES LIKE US