My husband is my co-parent, friend and lover – but he isn’t the only person I have sex with: the inside story of an open marriage
Another way to look at this is that aristocratic marriage has moved down into the bourgeoisie. After all, once that heir and spare had been delivered it was thought somewhat uncouth to even try to determine the paternity of any others. The same being true of other such aristocratic marriages of course so it all evened out.
I admire someone who can bring themselves to read that.
As for shagging around, since I don’t have a wife, I’m perfectly happy with the consenting adults principle. However I’d always thought that the purpose of marriage is to convince hubby that he’s earning all that cash to support his own offspring.
However I suppose these days you are better off trusting the doctor testing that the kid is actually yours. Instead of what your wife claims.
An open marriage is usually just a way to allow the wife to commit adultery with the husband’s (reluctant) permission. Often the first step towards divorce.
The excellent Tim Newman could fisk articles like this in his sleep.
Whatever happened to him? His web site has been dormant for years!
I think he left his job in Paris (Elf Aquitaine?) where his role was to attend meetings and took up a new job (near Cambridge?) which was going to take up his time and energy as these things do if they’ve a purpose.
TtC,
He’s quite active on Twitter and is now working in the USA.
Could seeing other people be the secret to a happy home life?
Will fucking other people strengthen our relationship this time?
By Cassie Werber
and Cassie Werber’s massive hooked nose and beady little eyes.
Most of all, I wanted to tell my husband.
For plenty of people, the idea that I could be so excited about a new sexual encounter, and at the same time in a truly committed marriage, doesn’t compute.
She is “truly committed” to the cuckold she married and just publicly humiliated in The Guardian while he, I assume, masturbates furiously.
Are we courting disaster? I don’t think so.
The snake said it was okay.
In my experience, it’s kindness and honesty that keep a long relationship together, not the edict that our sexual selves only be expressed with one other person for the rest of our lives
But if she was kind, she would stop being a whore. That’s not kind to her husband, or good for her children.
Rainy day lovers don’t love any others,
That would not be kind.
So how did it happen? David and I are quite different (I’m an introvert and he’s an extrovert; I try far too hard to be cool, and he’s confidently daft), but we were also interested in some of the same things before we met, like dancing, theatre, and the kinds of exuberant festivals and parties where everyone dresses up and goes on strange and magical journeys
The kind of “magical journeys” that involve strange men’s semen in your wife.
Exploring London nightlife before we met, we’d both been to Torture Garden – scarily named, but actually a big, popular night that encompasses a huge range of tastes, from people into fetish to those who are curious about alternative relationships, to those who mainly go for the music and social scene.
Did The Nazis do anything wrong when they closed down such places in Weimar Germany? (N/N)
There are an infinite number of ways to be in an open relationship.
There’s an infinite number of ways to fuck up your life. I’m going to proselytise for Bloke in Spain’s benefit for a second: do we think it’s a mistake or a coincidence that all the major religions insist there’s only a narrow path to Good Things, while so many roads lead to Hell?
Or do we think those olden days (stale, probably pale, definitely racist and sexist) patriarchs who took us from the savannah to the city knew something about human nature, and what it takes to live in a society like men, instead of like beasts?
Even though I now know a lot of other couples in open relationships, I still think most people find it weird.
To be fair, it’s not only weird, it’s also disgusting and shameful.
We haven’t yet needed to talk to our children about our openness, or exactly how it works
“When a Mummy and Daddy don’t love each other very much, they go to fetish clubs and fuck randos.”
If one of us wants to go out, of course, the other has to take care of the kids. If we both want to go out together, we need people we love and trust to look after them.
I’m old enough to remember when it was the McCanns who were Parents of the Year.
This refusal to be “the same” made David uncomfortable, and I wasn’t able to be kind enough about it – I was flowing with a new kind of strength, defiant, excited by the idea of breaking out of old, restrictive ways of thinking and being.
And this is why you should keep your pimp hand strong, my brothers.
The sex I had in my teens (plenty, in retrospect, nice and non-traumatic) was very different from that of my 20s (still a bone of contention between myself and Cambridge University – intellectual hotbed, maybe, actual hot bed, no). My 30s were pretty great, with powerful sideswipes from pregnancy and breastfeeding. I’m tempted to say now is the best ever, with some caveats: the hormonal rollercoaster, which I’ve always ridden, is becoming more extreme.
The “hormonal rollercoaster” here is Bipolar Personality Disorder. Dis bish got more red flags than Pyongyang District Council.
Maybe, having access to freer spaces allows me to see below the external, making me question my assumptions about who people are, and letting them be their most authentic selves.
“Be authentic,” says woman whose marriage is a sham.
Fiction likes to teach us about the consequences of infidelity: usually destruction of the relationship and often of the self.
Funny, that. Almost as if people who lived on this planet before we got here learned some hard lessons.
As ever with these wrong ‘uns, I get the distinct impression that telling other people about it is a major part of the attraction.
They have a lot in common with big hairy blokes who dress as lay-deez: forcing innocent bystanders to become an audience is what it’s all about.
Thanks for the prosylising, Steve. But your usual bollocks.
People in open marriages are not that uncommon. If you’re talking a genuine open marriage, not a non-consenting one. Which are all too common.
I like to think there’s three separate things. Love, friendship & sex together. You can perm two of two. Love & friendship without sex together & friendship & sex together without love quite successfully. Getting all three is getting the jackpot. Love & sex together but no friendship is a fucking nightmare. Also quite common. If you both can keep the three separate in your heads, there’s nothing really precludes fun & games outside a marriage. Divided love mightn’t be too clever. It’s all down to the people. Not being jealous & having confidence in oneself & each other.
As for the religious aspect, oh fuck off. Religions have a nasty habit of having some very unequal rules about this sort of thing with some very nasty penalties for transgression. And no, followers of the Jewish acrobat don’t get a free pass on that one. And never seemed to stop people breaking them either.
Oh the acrobat reference goes back to being in the jewellery business & selling crucifixes. Horrible things to hang round kids necks because children are incapable of understanding religion. The question being, “Do they want it with or without?”
Funny, that, the Acrobat thing. I thought it might be because of all those Adobe houses in the Middle East.
And I think I understood religion better as a kid than I do now. Somehow it was ordinary then. It seems distinctly bonkers now.
BiS: Sort of: “I knew Tim Newman; Tim Newman was a friend of mine; Steve, you’re no Tim Newman”.
These people are the death of civilisation.
‘the atmosphere of freedom but also deep respect’
I can’t read this shit without chuckle-vomiting.
I await (not really) the follow-up article, where she rages about hubby bringing home a much younger, prettier model.
I look forward to when she brings home a much younger, prettier model. With great anticipation.
And I think I understood religion better as a kid than I do now.
I think believing is a very different thing from understanding. Kids believe all sorts of things they’re told. Simple narratives. It can all fall to pieces when they try to understand it. It makes less & less sense. I can’t understand why a putative deity would get off on worshippers singing its praises. That’s indistinguishable from Spud. One gets a vision of a bearded geezer sitting on a cloud wanking off furiously to Te Deum. Maybe it’s the choirboys doing the heavy lifting.
Going back to the couples thing. There’s a lot of couples where one of the partners (or both) doesn’t like the other having opposite sex friendships. Or same sex friendships for that matter. It’s a control thing. And people want control are always at heart dreadfully insecure. No self confidence. The other end of the spectrum.
If human society moves away from monogamy, it will effect society greatly.
I have no idea what the ultimate effects will be, but I’m sure they will be significant.
So I’m calling this Chesterton’s Vagina.
A few years wasn’t there some other woman boasting about her polyamorous arrangement in the papers with pictures of her draped over some young stud whilst her husband sat there looking incredibly sad. Everything was fine until a few weeks later when her husband kicked her out of the house and started divorce proceedings. I can’t remember the final outcome but the husband seemed to be much happier inlater photos.
Alan Peakall – BiS: Sort of: “I knew Tim Newman; Tim Newman was a friend of mine; Steve, you’re no Tim Newman”.
Why, did you think I was trying to be Tim Newman? Was I doing anything Tim Newmanish?
This confuses me. Tim Newman is not a friend of mine because I’ve never met the guy, however he always seemed like a good bloke to me, and the kind of man you’d be glad to have as a friend.
I apologise for not being Tim Newman.
On t’other, I regret to inform you that you’re no Steve. x
BiS – I like to think there’s three separate things. Love, friendship & sex together.
More than three, surely, because love itself comes in distinct forms: Eros, Agape, Storge and sucking off random gimp suited strangers in a London nightclub.
If you both can keep the three separate in your heads, there’s nothing really precludes fun & games outside a marriage.
But you can’t. Keep it separate in your heads, I mean. Somebody or many people always end up being badly hurt when people step outside the marriage.
It’s also sick and unnatural for a man to allow other men to plough the mother of his children. Sorry, it just is. Swingers were always disgusting. All horrible taches, Volvo car keys and Blue Nun.
As for the religious aspect, oh fuck off.
Shan’t. x
Religions have a nasty habit of having some very unequal rules about this sort of thing with some very nasty penalties for transgression.
Yes? Tell me why Mr Chesterton kept building fences in that particular area, my dear Bloke.
And no, followers of the Jewish acrobat don’t get a free pass on that one. And never seemed to stop people breaking them either.
Well, churches are full of liars, cheats and sinners like me. That’s who the pews are for.
Oh the acrobat reference goes back to being in the jewellery business & selling crucifixes. Horrible things to hang round kids necks because children are incapable of understanding religion. The question being, “Do they want it with or without?”
Nonsense. Britain was a better place when it was overtly and confidently Christian, so we’ve got some experience to go on. We are all children, compared to Eternity. We can scarcely hope to comprehend the Infinite as grown adults.
As every fule knows, even if you, personally are offended by the concept of God, it’s objectively true that religion serves a number of pro-social purposes which quite literally build communities, generates culture, and raises mutual trust. The very rapid decline of Christianity in Britain is not being accompanied by a corresponding increase in rationality or even, candidly, sanity. Most people probably don’t know their neighbours anymore. They’re closing primary schools due to lack of sprogs. Does this sound like a happier or healthier society with better prospects than, say, 1954 Britain to you?
Like this Guardian article. Fucking mental.
Witchie – And I think I understood religion better as a kid than I do now. Somehow it was ordinary then. It seems distinctly bonkers now.
I think I understood everything better about 10 years ago. It’s fucking weird out there now.
Interested – These people are the death of civilisation.
Yes, it does make you start hoping for random blond youths to start singing Tomorrow Belongs to Me.
Fuck Liza Minnelli.
bobby b – So I’m calling this Chesterton’s Vagina.
You win the Internet for this weekend, lol.
I see no sign Britain was a better place when it was overtly and confidently Christian It´s rather the dilution of religiosity it´s benefited from. First getting away from the Church of Rome & then Puritanism C18th rationalism. The retreat of the god botherers. You just have to look at the world. The more religious a society is, the poorer it is. I despair of South Americans brought up on a continent blighted by Catholicism. It´s almost impossible for them to understand cause & effect & divine intervention doesn´t put food on the table. And also leaves them vulnerable to charismatic politicians promising miracles And the latter day religions of communism & socialism. A belief system is a poor alternative to rational decision making. Why it´s so popular with the lazy & stupid & those would exploit them.
@BiS… I’m very much of the same opinion. The definition of “religion” that, in my not-so-humble opinion, best fits is “Religion is primitive mankind’s attempts to communicate with the weather”.
Of course nowadays it’s been upgraded and weather has become the God, and “climatologists” are the Prophets of God.
It´s man´s earliest attempt at science. Trying to explain the world. Some of us have progressed.
“Some of us have progressed.”
The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing.