It only works if both parties are perfectly comfortable with the idea (whether real or not) that the other party is fucking several other people.
I’m in one right now with an older woman who has accepted that, due the age difference, it will be nothing more than casual sex.
I struggle more with it than she does.
Straight-ish guy; have had a fair number of casual relationships. It can work fine as long as you’re both honest, open, and respectful. And, this is important, genuinely so. A lot of people THINK they’re being honest or open, but they’re deluding themselves or holding things back.
It takes some practice to get good at that. The hardest thing for me has been learning to say, “hey, this situation doesn’t seem to be good for you and maybe we need to talk things over.”
I’m in one now.
Neither of us fits into the other’s world and the two things we have in common are riding motorcycles and sex. He did check in on me while I was up north when my mom passed. The only thing we ask of each other is to give a heads up when we are seeing someone else. The sex stops for the duration until the one who halted it initiates contact again.
missred, middle aged straight woman.
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I’ve never been in such a relationship, but I always thought it would be like walking an emotional tightrope. Sexual intercourse, by its very nature, tends to draw people together emotionally (in general, in theory,) and to have a friends-with-benefits relationship in which neither side gets emotionally involved seems to require some extreme mental balancing/dexterity.
Can we talk about fuck enemies? Because there are some things about my ex I’d like to get off my chest 
As others have mentioned - seems to work best when there is:
The best ones are ones where we like each other, but see no future in it. For example I don’t want kids. No sense in leading a woman on (and I can’t even have kids right now) - and I’ve found a few that liked me and have wanted to be intimate, but were on the lookout for a guy that wanted kids.
We would even tell each other about other prospects we are dating/considering and you know give tips and stuff. It helps with mending broken hearts to some extent. I kinda like affection and stuff and have had FWB that ran from rather cool to you would think we were in love.
It’s also important that you can establish trust. My most recent one saw that I was very kind and good to her when I had to break things off (for a real girlfriend) and saw that she was supportive about my new relationship - we both hooked up about a year later when the girlfriend thing didn’t work out. We both have seen the other (or know about the other) with other partners and haven’t acted up (ended up with boombox on her lawn, wrote nasty things on facebook, etc).
As time goes by I am more and more convinced - even if she did want kids - we wouldn’t make a good relationship fit, but she is smart, trustworthy, fun to be with, and you know - the benefits. I care for her, am extremely attracted to her, but don’t want a relationship with her.
Sorry no advice here! I have, currently am and will always continue to fail with women but you get used to it.
I found this thread interesting. But I couldn’t help from wondering, why do this? You are putting the effort into this relationship, why keep it at such an emotional distance? Did you have troubles with relationships in the past? Were there relationship problems in your family growing up and this is a way you hope to avoid the risk of their problems of having your heart-broken, breaking up with someone, being dumped, or do you have some kind of trust issues?
My FBs have all been nice people and I even enjoyed just hanging out and talking with them, but they had qualities about them that made them incompatible with me for a serious relationship.
Qualities like:
Alcoholic/drugs.
Can’t hold onto a job.
Looking for a sugar daddy.
Weight issues.
Bigotry.
Republican. (Which is usually accompanied with a healthy dose of bigotry.)
A woman can be one or more of these things and I could still want to have sex with her. I wont, however, get involved with a woman seriously if she is even one of those things listed above. (Save Republican maybe)
I don’t think sex is inherently emotional for everyone. And while these relations always have some risk of someone getting hurt, so does every relationship. It’s not like normal dating has a great track record on avoiding heartache.
Because you can enjoy fun activities with all kinds of people that you aren’t interested in marrying. You have friends you don’t intend to marry, right? And maybe some friends you see in specific contexts, but otherwise don’t have a huge emotional connection with? It’s the same thing.
Are you emotionally stunted because you don’t want to have a deep emotional relationship and lifelong household commitment to the guy who you sometimes grab lunch with at work?
Some of us are solitary enough by nature that we’re pretty picky with whom we have a relationship but occasionally like to wake up next to another human being. It’s nice to have someone of a similar mindset with whom to do that.