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What About Sexually Open Marriages / Relationships?


No book about alternative marriages would be complete without a discussion of sexually open marriages or relationships. The "Open Marriage" movement enjoyed but a brief heyday. The movie Bob & Carol and Ted & Alice (1969) and the book Open Marriage by Nena and George O'Neil (Avon Books, 1973), prompted people to consider the possibility of expanding the boundaries of marriage to include the freedom to sexually relate to other people. However, the movement took a real nose dive when the O'Neils filed for divorce a few years after their book made a big splash. No one else stepped forth to rally the cause, and no major revolution regarding sexually open marriages ever took place in this country.

I must confess that, as a young woman, I found the idea quite fascinating. Since love was such a wonderful thing, why not have as much of it in one’s life as possible? Wouldn’t it be great to have a primary relationship but also be able to have other lovers? I had certainly found that I could feel sexually attracted to more than one man at once. For me, this desire to sexually connect with more than one person was not prompted by a desire for sexual variety in a physical sense. It was simply that I could love more than one person at a time. Even if I had a primary partner with whom I was quite content sexually, emotionally, and intellectually, I would occasionally meet other men whom I also felt I could love. I was never one of those people who, when they fell in love with one person, just automatically stopped having attractions to other people.

Being the psychologically adventurous person that I was, I was determined to see if it was possible to openly and honestly have more than one lover. I therefore made several attempts to create a sexually open relationship, once when I was twenty-two, and several other times much later in life. I initially embraced the idea of a sexually open relationship with great enthusiasm and optimism. I believed that jealousy was an archaic emotion that evolved human beings could overcome. I was determined to try and “rise above” feelings of possessiveness. Well, with hindsight I can say it was a fascinating experience, but both times it was rather short lived and basically unsuccessful. I will try to summarize the conclusions my co-adventurous souls and I came to as to why sexually open relationships do not work.

I will start with the jealousy issue since that is the most obvious. I would have to say that, in essence, we were not able to overcome our feelings of jealousy despite our aspirations to do so. The way I have come to conceptualize my experiences with open relationships is that they don’t work because they create a situation of unequal emotional vulnerability with the auxiliary lover getting the short end of the stick.

When two people sexually and emotionally connect, a deep, intense bond develops between them. My fellow experimenters and I discovered that when you have this kind of connection to another person, there is a need, or at least very strong desire, to have access to him/her whenever you want. It feels uncomfortable or painful to have to share someone you are so deeply bonded with. Situations come up regularly when you simply do not want to be told “Sorry I have to be with my other lover tonight.”

Both times I asked men to be an “auxiliary lover” to my primary relationship or marriage they ended up saying it wasn’t workable for them. In both cases the person initially told me that he understood the parameters of the relationship I was offering him and thought he could handle it. But I remember quite vividly what one of them told me when he bailed out:

“I simply cannot do this. I cannot be your Tuesday and Saturday lover. What am I supposed to do with all the feelings and desires I have on the other five days? I can’t turn them on and off like a faucet. You go back to your primary lover on the other days but I feel lonely. Emotionally and sexually connecting with you creates a deep bond and attachment and it doesn’t work to only be able to be with you on a part time basis. It kind of feels like getting crumbs when I really need a whole loaf of bread.”

I tried briefly being an auxiliary lover years later. I thought I had a great strategy. I planned to stay detached to a certain degree because I knew my lover’s primary commitment was to the woman he was living with. But, I found that having to stay detached undermined the whole purpose for a deep, intimate, passionate relationship!!! It wasn’t very enjoyable because I had to constantly have the brakes on my feelings. In general, I very quickly decided that it took too much emotional energy to deal with all the complex feelings that arose.

This jealousy issue tends not to come up for the person who already has a primary partner. He or she has all the advantages of having a full time partner and then gets to have the excitement and stimulation of having an additional lover. Usually the auxiliary lover is willing to give the person in the primary relationship as much time and energy as he/she wants. Thus, the person in the primary relationship doesn’t have to deal with sharing issues. Of course jealousy issues can come up for a person in the primary relationship who does not have a current auxiliary lover. He or she may come to resent sharing his/her partner if/when he/she cannot find an appropriate auxiliary lover with whom he/she wants to spend time.

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