My own marriage is sexually monogamous. That said, what you say above is profoundly depressing. Are you yourself married? If so, do you really feel like the only thing that makes your relationship with your spouse special is the fact that (s)he will only have sexual intercourse with you?
Meanwhile, it always amazes me how people need to believe that folks who make choices different from their own must be damaged or secretly miserable (see Pookah and AHunter, neatly illustrating the tendency from both directions).
If my spouse approached me with a suggestion like the one in the OP, I’d be willing to discuss it, though I’d be deeply surprised. And it most certainly would not be a deal-breaker for me, if she insisted; the quote shown above notwithstanding, there is much, much more to marriage than sexual monogamy.
I don’t think I’m the closed-minded person that you make me seem. It’s true I can’t get my head round open relationships at all. But then I can’t get my head around wanting to make love to a woman either. However, when someone tells me they like making love to women, 99.99% of the time I feel zero reason to doubt that those are their true and honest feelings. With these “monogamish” things - not even half that percentage. Basically, people delude themselves because of a love/low self-esteem combo all the time (been there myself and often, though not in this particularly guise) and convince themselves they are happy with what are basically crumbs. I’ve seen the gritted-teeth “I’m really totally okay with this, honestly” thing many times and I trust my intellect and instinct too well to think that I’m dubious because I’m afraid of “other choices”.
That’s an excellent question, and one I’ve given a lot of thought (and not a few therapy sessions!) My ultimate answer is: “no.” The open part worked well because we were constantly cognizant of the possible perils, and worked on that part with honesty, compassion and respect for one another. The rest of our marriage we weren’t looking for trouble and we got lazy, lost compassion and lost respect for one another and treated each other like crap. If I’d realized what was going on earlier and said, “Look, I wouldn’t let you talk to me like this in a discussion about my other partner, I’m not going to let you talk to me like this in a discussion about housekeeping,” things might have been different in the end.
That’s the thing- I’m not sure I would be emotionally devastated. If he was having a romantic dating relationship, or going on vacation with, or planning a family with another woman, that would be a huge problem. But if he just wanted to remember what it’s like to touch a different body? At first the thought bothers me, but after thinking it through, it just doesn’t seem like that huge of a deal. The human sex drive is strong and forever is a long, long time. I’m not sure a little moderated exploration at a few points in the relationship needs to be a problem.
I know two couples right now who are going through some major marriage issues. They both married and had kids right out of high school, and are in their late 20s with kids. They have grown up together and built their lives together, but have run into problems because they just never had a time to mature on their own. In both cases the women have cheated, the men have become angry and defensive and retreated into substance abuse, and the relationships have become deeply unstable and often unhappy.
I have to think they would be better off saying “hey, we got married young and we have kids to raise and we are committed to this, but we both have serious things to work out. Let’s drop the lies and the hurt and be non-exclusive for a while without giving up on everything we do have. Hopefully we’ll figure out our path and become more exclusive in the future, but what we’ve got going here isn’t working.” Maybe the relationship will ultimately break up, but there is a good chance of it breaking up anyway.
Paradoxically, that’s where people get into trouble. Openness only works when everyone is on the same page. The possibility that A’s purely physical thing will turn into a romantic (even if temporarily lust-based) attachment while B is still attached to A would be needlessly devastating–even if B is out knocking boots all along. If a breakup is in the offing, that’s not the time to start experimenting.
On the other hand, if A&B realize that neither of them cared about Latin dancing or scuba diving ten years ago but loved learning and experiencing it together, well that’s something else. That touches (hahah) on the “remember what it’s like to touch a different body” thing.
Still that would be the end for me. A breach that severe cannot be patched and there is no excuse. None. Even if I forgave her one day (repeat “if”), I would never again trust her, and clearly she wasn’t the person I thought I married as well, so see ya in court.
Unless the relationship has been that way all along, I think trying to go from monogamy to “monogamish” will almost always end train wreck-ish.
This bit, I completely agree with. My marriage is my primary commitment, and all other relationships must be secondary to that. But they will be relationships, not “bits of strange”.
This, I don’t get. I would have a hard time having sex with people who don’t mean more to me than that. If I didn’t have a close emotional connection with them, the sex would be rather awkward and unpleasant, but if I did have sex with someone repeatedly, an emotional connection would form even if it wasn’t there to begin with. That’s just how it works for me.
This is paramount in a poly relationship – if there is deception involved, it’s not poly, it’s cheating.
This is another thing I don’t get, which I suppose is why I’m poly and not “monogamish”. I would want at the very least to be introduced to my husband’s partners (my “metamours”, as it were), even if there wasn’t any particular relationship between them and me. Ideally, we would at the very least be cordial friends, if not BFFs. And even if my husband doesn’t need the same level of disclosure or connection with mine, I couldn’t have a significant relationship with anyone who wasn’t at the very least willing to meet him. My ideal situation would be for all partners to be friendly with each other, even if not all romantically connected.
As for sharing information, I would want to know what was going on, to whatever degree his sense of privacy permitted. My sense of compersion (the joy in sharing one’s partner with others) is heightened by the thought of him with someone I know and like – it is absent, even threatened, at the thought of him with someone I don’t know at all.
there are swingers that don’t allow anymore than the most casual conversation for fear of getting to know and then like the other people. there are also swingers that don’t allow kissing because that is too intimate (i.e. what you do with someone you love).
relationship disclaimer
the above is not intended to reflect negatively on any nonmonogamous (polygamy, polyamory, swinging) or monogamous behavior. some people can do them without harming others or themselves and others can’t.