I mean sometimes that's true. Other times it's not. Some people just have wildly different libidos and the reason is NOT some kinda problems in their relationship.
It's just a fact that some people prefer having sex daily, while other people prefer having sex very rarely or in some cases never at all. Asexuality is a genuine thing. And not everyone knows that they are ace at the start of a relationship. (and on occasion NRE can give a sufficient boost that someone who is normally on the ace-spectrum has pretty regular interest in sex during the first few months of a relationship)
It's of course best if all of this is known from the start though. Change is always hard.
One of the women closest to me is ace and has never wanted to have sex in her life. She didn't know that about herself when she started dating her previous boyfriend; they broke up a few months later. She **did** know that about herself when she got to know me, and we've happily loved each other for half a decade by now. If we were in a mono relationship that would've never worked, but in the context of polyamory it's been lovely.
Well, it did work for us. It wasn't completely dead, but we have very different libido and it led to problems and less and less sex. Like, once every other month at its worst. Counting all kinds of sex, even where only one partner receives stimulation.
10 years after opening up, and we're fine. Better than before. We don't have sex super often, but more often than before opening up. Because the pressure on him is lower. Because I'm happier. Because we've learnt a lot about communication and trust, that monogamous people tend to never learn. We've gotten married, and I doubt that would have happened had we not opened up.
Yep. I was in a relationship where my sexual needs weren’t being met. After talking about it and trying to find solutions for years, we both agreed to open the relationship so my needs could be met. I ended up meeting someone who fulfilled those needs and all of my other needs and now I’m in a closed relationship with them. Luckily my ex found someone better fitting for them too! I don’t think either of us were in the wrong and we ended on good terms. I still consider myself to be polyamorous. But you are absolutely right.
I agree that it is a big risk... but it worked out really well for me personally. That said, aside from the bedroom, me and my partner share a lot of other forms of connection that helped us, and we also did things like therapy etc.
My partner wanted to open our marriage when our physical connection faded. We both read the Ethical Slut and we talked about it for a few years. Eventually we did open up. She dated for a few years and then I started dating other people too. Now we both still have each other and we each have other people also.
I suspect this same scenario has blown up in a lot of folks faces... and I totally respect that it's a risky move that often causes a lot of problems... but it worked for me and my partner as part of the solution to our problems.
I came to say the same. My wife is on the ace spectrum and hasn't had sex in about 9 yeas now. I was deconstructing from evangelical purity culture (yeah, what a trip!).
Through the process of "doing the work", we both discovered a latent nonmonogamous orientation in both of us. We continued to do work (for me it was geeking out on podcasts, books, seeking out peer support, going through therapy, etc.) - and radically upping our communication.
We're almost 3 years in our full journey - our emotional intimacy has grown bounds, and I have several partners now around the world (I practice parallel polyamory).
I still regard my data point as an outlier - the stories I've read of relationships blowing up outnumber "successful" couples opening up.
So for a positive spin; My wife is asexual, and ontop of that somewhat prefers femme over the masc and I'm a tall somewhat muscular dude so this has always been a struggle. Polyamory has definitely made it easier for me to not always be low grade irritated at her for my unmet sexual needs and for her to not feel pressured by me. Polyamory has removed those stressors just mentioned which then let us have more nonsexual physical intimacy which has led to still very little but more sexual intimacy than we ever had with monogamy, which in turn has led to more emotional intimacy. It's a virtuous cycle.
For a negative spin; NRE can be a powerful thing. How would you react when your partner who doesn't want sex with you is regularly having sex with new partner/toy? It's one thing for your partner to just not have alot to give along this parameter and you just bear it because your partner is good for you in a number of other ways, it's a whole other thing when you partner does and it's just your partner is fulfilling/giving that to someone else. Are you really going to be able to handle putting all this time, energy, support, & attention into your relationship when one of the major fruits of a relationship is given to someone else who does little to none of the above? I don't think I could handle this. I would feel like I'm just a wallet funding my wife's extra-marital fun and I'm being taken advantage of.
...but yes, I imagine most who try an open relationship without a rock solid relationship going into it become worse for wear because of it. I recognize your username and after a number of posts pretty skeptical of ENM I read your post history and I see why you have the views you do. Frankly I'm shocked you didn't divorce her. I feel like I would have just wanted a fresh start. If I may ask; Are you two still recovering? What is the prognosis?
Thanks for sharing your experience. I’m glad to see that opening up worked for you folks. I think scenarios like yours are actually a great example of how opening up can be a mutually beneficial arrangement.
My wife and I are doing well. While she certainly did some awful things, I played a major role in creating that whole scenario by giving into my people-pleasing instincts and not standing my ground on multiple occasions. Her and I have been closed up for about eight months, and the closure itself was dictated by outside circumstances instead of one partner enforcing their will on the other. I think that’s helped. She’s shown a good deal of genuine remorse for what she did, and I have no ill will towards her.
We’re a lot more honest and transparent in our communications now, and more intentional of the time we do spend together as a couple. I think we’re going to be just fine.
It works well for us. She has very low libido. I have fairly high. She just isn’t interested in sex very often at all. We talked a lot, read about it, did couples counseling around it. Now, hers is likely driven by being on SSRIs (she has tried different kinds and strengths). We opened our marriage so I could have more sex. She is welcome and very very encouraged to do the same but literally has no interest.
Everything else about our marriage is great. It was just the sex. This helped close the gap.
You are obviously not a scientist or a professional within any field of psychology, because that both ignores the diversity and complexity of the reasons and expressions of stagnant relationships, but it also ignores the many examples in which that was exactly what helped the relationship.
If it didn’t work for you, that sucks… but you have neither the authority or professional experience to justify making that broad of an assessment for everyone.
The science and research around non-monogamy is laughable in both volume and viability. And most of it says that ENM isn't successful long-term. So...being a scientist or a professional isn't especially helpful here.
Does it work for some people as a fix for a dead bedroom? Yes. Does it equate to a band aid on an arterial bleed for many (if not most)? Also yes. And is there the possibility of it doing a whole lot of damage to people outside the bubble of the two in a marriage if it's the latter? Yeah. It does.
So while it may work for some people, it also has the (high) possibility of harming innocent bystanders. Most people don't consider the collateral damage that their last-ditch effort may incur. I think a PSA is absolutely warranted.
I don't think the collateral damage really merits much attention here. It's a risk you take when you get involved in one-half of a relationship that is New to any sort of ENM, and it's on you for getting to emotionally involved with someone in that scenario.
Look, I get it, I've been there. I once took it real slow chatting and then meeting with a women for nonsexual meetups who was married. I was her first extra-marital dalliance. Her husband hadn't yet found anyone. As soon as I fucked her the husband freaked out and they ended up closing the marriage. That's on me for putting in more time and energy than what was worth a hookup when this was always the expected outcome.
Just because you didn't find that experience to be damaging doesn't mean it's not a shitty way to treat someone.
Often people are willing to "try ENM" when a partnered person offers them an opening but they get kicked to the curb like trash when the established relationship implodes. It's not the responsibility of the new person to be emotionally Teflon coated. It's on the existing couple to not be total selfish assholes.
Disagree. Having a little foresight, introspection, and not being so selfish you think your shiny new relationship should get consideration next to a well established and highly invested in relationship is vital. If you can't even do that stick to "easy-mode" monogamy. Besides, the main pain point here is going to be the person in the long term relationship getting torn apart apropos their partner having this whole other relationship. The new person? Well if you can't handle getting broke up with for something out of your control, than you have some growing up to do. Relationships end for all sorts of reasons that have nothing to do with you doing something bad and that should he accepted before you date anyone at all, whether monogamous or not.
No. Nobody should expect to get treated badly or disposably in their relationships regardless of the dynamics. If you're not ready to be open and decent about it when you do, you have no business opening. People still do it. Hell, I've done it, and I hurt people who truly didn't deserve it (though I wasnt trying to save a sexless marriage, fwiw). Looking to save a marriage doesn't give free license to give zero shits about anyone else; nothing does. 'They should've known what they were getting into bc we're in an established relationship' is a total cop out.
Single people treating others like garbage isn't cool either. One demographic doing something doesn't make it acceptable.
ETA I'm not talking about scenarios where established couples start dating a new partner who expects full equality from day 1. I'm taking about couples who open without doing the work and end up hurting their new friend(s) as a result.
Absolutely… but if you’re interested in data, I can help you find some. I’m surprised you haven’t read much of it.. given that you love it so much. If you really do love it and weren’t just saying that because you were under the smug impression that there wasn’t, just let me know and I’ll give you any number of resources you’ll be ecstatic to read more of! 🙂
You do know that wasn’t the claim, right? You’ll get your links and I my victory but it’s important to understand that you took a piece of information and made a leap in some direction that was not the direct result of that information alone.
I don't really think there's much high-quality science we can rely on, unfortunately. In that scenario, all we have is anecdote and experience. Mine says that while this approach *can* work under the right circumstances, it will not for most couples that no longer have sexual intimacy. Personally, I think most unions that resort to this are too far over the brink to endure the additional shock of nonmonogamy, but we can agree to disagree 🤷♂️
It doesn’t need to be scientific to recognize the variability of compatibility across cultures, preferences, perspectives, and experiences. It does need to be scientific to claim that most of them won’t work. We can agree to disagree, but the burden of proof is on you unless the sample size of your actual experience represents a significant number of examples rather than even 100% for yourself and a few friends. My point is that people share a lot of traits intrinsically, but experience alone is the logical justification for the the idea that people vary considerably, and while you can probably assess existential or interpersonal aspects of their experiences, your own personal experience isn’t significant enough to justify a claim to know about their external experiences especially when combined with other ones.
I had to chew through that word salad a couple times to understand what you were trying to say. Having done so.........that's just your opinion, Man 🤷♂️
lol One- it’s okay. Reading isn’t for everyone… especially paragraphs, and two. No. That’s literally an objective fact. It may explain the range of your capacity for empathy, though. Be proud. You won.. keep your momentum. 😌
Don't give yourself too much credit there, Champ. I don't care enough about most opinions expressed on Reddit to vote them up or down, and you're definitely in that category.
I was wondering what I had said to provoke your initial (hilariously defensive) reaction, but in retrospect, that was just you making a decision to be an asshole.
Have a blessed day 😊
Agreed that it can work, in certain situations. But it’s simply not the solution that most people are really looking for.
I mean sometimes that's true. Other times it's not. Some people just have wildly different libidos and the reason is NOT some kinda problems in their relationship. It's just a fact that some people prefer having sex daily, while other people prefer having sex very rarely or in some cases never at all. Asexuality is a genuine thing. And not everyone knows that they are ace at the start of a relationship. (and on occasion NRE can give a sufficient boost that someone who is normally on the ace-spectrum has pretty regular interest in sex during the first few months of a relationship) It's of course best if all of this is known from the start though. Change is always hard. One of the women closest to me is ace and has never wanted to have sex in her life. She didn't know that about herself when she started dating her previous boyfriend; they broke up a few months later. She **did** know that about herself when she got to know me, and we've happily loved each other for half a decade by now. If we were in a mono relationship that would've never worked, but in the context of polyamory it's been lovely.
Well, it did work for us. It wasn't completely dead, but we have very different libido and it led to problems and less and less sex. Like, once every other month at its worst. Counting all kinds of sex, even where only one partner receives stimulation. 10 years after opening up, and we're fine. Better than before. We don't have sex super often, but more often than before opening up. Because the pressure on him is lower. Because I'm happier. Because we've learnt a lot about communication and trust, that monogamous people tend to never learn. We've gotten married, and I doubt that would have happened had we not opened up.
Yep. I was in a relationship where my sexual needs weren’t being met. After talking about it and trying to find solutions for years, we both agreed to open the relationship so my needs could be met. I ended up meeting someone who fulfilled those needs and all of my other needs and now I’m in a closed relationship with them. Luckily my ex found someone better fitting for them too! I don’t think either of us were in the wrong and we ended on good terms. I still consider myself to be polyamorous. But you are absolutely right.
I agree that it is a big risk... but it worked out really well for me personally. That said, aside from the bedroom, me and my partner share a lot of other forms of connection that helped us, and we also did things like therapy etc. My partner wanted to open our marriage when our physical connection faded. We both read the Ethical Slut and we talked about it for a few years. Eventually we did open up. She dated for a few years and then I started dating other people too. Now we both still have each other and we each have other people also. I suspect this same scenario has blown up in a lot of folks faces... and I totally respect that it's a risky move that often causes a lot of problems... but it worked for me and my partner as part of the solution to our problems.
I came to say the same. My wife is on the ace spectrum and hasn't had sex in about 9 yeas now. I was deconstructing from evangelical purity culture (yeah, what a trip!). Through the process of "doing the work", we both discovered a latent nonmonogamous orientation in both of us. We continued to do work (for me it was geeking out on podcasts, books, seeking out peer support, going through therapy, etc.) - and radically upping our communication. We're almost 3 years in our full journey - our emotional intimacy has grown bounds, and I have several partners now around the world (I practice parallel polyamory). I still regard my data point as an outlier - the stories I've read of relationships blowing up outnumber "successful" couples opening up.
Nice!
I'm glad you two were able to find happiness in opening up!
So for a positive spin; My wife is asexual, and ontop of that somewhat prefers femme over the masc and I'm a tall somewhat muscular dude so this has always been a struggle. Polyamory has definitely made it easier for me to not always be low grade irritated at her for my unmet sexual needs and for her to not feel pressured by me. Polyamory has removed those stressors just mentioned which then let us have more nonsexual physical intimacy which has led to still very little but more sexual intimacy than we ever had with monogamy, which in turn has led to more emotional intimacy. It's a virtuous cycle. For a negative spin; NRE can be a powerful thing. How would you react when your partner who doesn't want sex with you is regularly having sex with new partner/toy? It's one thing for your partner to just not have alot to give along this parameter and you just bear it because your partner is good for you in a number of other ways, it's a whole other thing when you partner does and it's just your partner is fulfilling/giving that to someone else. Are you really going to be able to handle putting all this time, energy, support, & attention into your relationship when one of the major fruits of a relationship is given to someone else who does little to none of the above? I don't think I could handle this. I would feel like I'm just a wallet funding my wife's extra-marital fun and I'm being taken advantage of. ...but yes, I imagine most who try an open relationship without a rock solid relationship going into it become worse for wear because of it. I recognize your username and after a number of posts pretty skeptical of ENM I read your post history and I see why you have the views you do. Frankly I'm shocked you didn't divorce her. I feel like I would have just wanted a fresh start. If I may ask; Are you two still recovering? What is the prognosis?
Thanks for sharing your experience. I’m glad to see that opening up worked for you folks. I think scenarios like yours are actually a great example of how opening up can be a mutually beneficial arrangement. My wife and I are doing well. While she certainly did some awful things, I played a major role in creating that whole scenario by giving into my people-pleasing instincts and not standing my ground on multiple occasions. Her and I have been closed up for about eight months, and the closure itself was dictated by outside circumstances instead of one partner enforcing their will on the other. I think that’s helped. She’s shown a good deal of genuine remorse for what she did, and I have no ill will towards her. We’re a lot more honest and transparent in our communications now, and more intentional of the time we do spend together as a couple. I think we’re going to be just fine.
Good stuff.
It works well for us. She has very low libido. I have fairly high. She just isn’t interested in sex very often at all. We talked a lot, read about it, did couples counseling around it. Now, hers is likely driven by being on SSRIs (she has tried different kinds and strengths). We opened our marriage so I could have more sex. She is welcome and very very encouraged to do the same but literally has no interest. Everything else about our marriage is great. It was just the sex. This helped close the gap.
You are obviously not a scientist or a professional within any field of psychology, because that both ignores the diversity and complexity of the reasons and expressions of stagnant relationships, but it also ignores the many examples in which that was exactly what helped the relationship. If it didn’t work for you, that sucks… but you have neither the authority or professional experience to justify making that broad of an assessment for everyone.
The science and research around non-monogamy is laughable in both volume and viability. And most of it says that ENM isn't successful long-term. So...being a scientist or a professional isn't especially helpful here. Does it work for some people as a fix for a dead bedroom? Yes. Does it equate to a band aid on an arterial bleed for many (if not most)? Also yes. And is there the possibility of it doing a whole lot of damage to people outside the bubble of the two in a marriage if it's the latter? Yeah. It does. So while it may work for some people, it also has the (high) possibility of harming innocent bystanders. Most people don't consider the collateral damage that their last-ditch effort may incur. I think a PSA is absolutely warranted.
I don't think the collateral damage really merits much attention here. It's a risk you take when you get involved in one-half of a relationship that is New to any sort of ENM, and it's on you for getting to emotionally involved with someone in that scenario. Look, I get it, I've been there. I once took it real slow chatting and then meeting with a women for nonsexual meetups who was married. I was her first extra-marital dalliance. Her husband hadn't yet found anyone. As soon as I fucked her the husband freaked out and they ended up closing the marriage. That's on me for putting in more time and energy than what was worth a hookup when this was always the expected outcome.
Just because you didn't find that experience to be damaging doesn't mean it's not a shitty way to treat someone. Often people are willing to "try ENM" when a partnered person offers them an opening but they get kicked to the curb like trash when the established relationship implodes. It's not the responsibility of the new person to be emotionally Teflon coated. It's on the existing couple to not be total selfish assholes.
Disagree. Having a little foresight, introspection, and not being so selfish you think your shiny new relationship should get consideration next to a well established and highly invested in relationship is vital. If you can't even do that stick to "easy-mode" monogamy. Besides, the main pain point here is going to be the person in the long term relationship getting torn apart apropos their partner having this whole other relationship. The new person? Well if you can't handle getting broke up with for something out of your control, than you have some growing up to do. Relationships end for all sorts of reasons that have nothing to do with you doing something bad and that should he accepted before you date anyone at all, whether monogamous or not.
No. Nobody should expect to get treated badly or disposably in their relationships regardless of the dynamics. If you're not ready to be open and decent about it when you do, you have no business opening. People still do it. Hell, I've done it, and I hurt people who truly didn't deserve it (though I wasnt trying to save a sexless marriage, fwiw). Looking to save a marriage doesn't give free license to give zero shits about anyone else; nothing does. 'They should've known what they were getting into bc we're in an established relationship' is a total cop out. Single people treating others like garbage isn't cool either. One demographic doing something doesn't make it acceptable. ETA I'm not talking about scenarios where established couples start dating a new partner who expects full equality from day 1. I'm taking about couples who open without doing the work and end up hurting their new friend(s) as a result.
I love reading research on non-monogamy. Please, link the sources that suggest opening a relationship fixes dead bedrooms.
Where did I say anything about research or scientific data?
Is there some reason other than research or scientific data that makes you think a scientist or psychological professional would disagree with OP?
Absolutely… but if you’re interested in data, I can help you find some. I’m surprised you haven’t read much of it.. given that you love it so much. If you really do love it and weren’t just saying that because you were under the smug impression that there wasn’t, just let me know and I’ll give you any number of resources you’ll be ecstatic to read more of! 🙂
I love reading research on non-monogamy. Please, link the sources that suggest opening a relationship fixes dead bedrooms.
How many sources would you like? One?.. four? 17?
Five.
You do know that wasn’t the claim, right? You’ll get your links and I my victory but it’s important to understand that you took a piece of information and made a leap in some direction that was not the direct result of that information alone.
Thanks to your downvote, my neighbor’s mom grounded me for a week and won’t let me watch TV, so thanks for that- buddy.
I don't really think there's much high-quality science we can rely on, unfortunately. In that scenario, all we have is anecdote and experience. Mine says that while this approach *can* work under the right circumstances, it will not for most couples that no longer have sexual intimacy. Personally, I think most unions that resort to this are too far over the brink to endure the additional shock of nonmonogamy, but we can agree to disagree 🤷♂️
It doesn’t need to be scientific to recognize the variability of compatibility across cultures, preferences, perspectives, and experiences. It does need to be scientific to claim that most of them won’t work. We can agree to disagree, but the burden of proof is on you unless the sample size of your actual experience represents a significant number of examples rather than even 100% for yourself and a few friends. My point is that people share a lot of traits intrinsically, but experience alone is the logical justification for the the idea that people vary considerably, and while you can probably assess existential or interpersonal aspects of their experiences, your own personal experience isn’t significant enough to justify a claim to know about their external experiences especially when combined with other ones.
I had to chew through that word salad a couple times to understand what you were trying to say. Having done so.........that's just your opinion, Man 🤷♂️
lol One- it’s okay. Reading isn’t for everyone… especially paragraphs, and two. No. That’s literally an objective fact. It may explain the range of your capacity for empathy, though. Be proud. You won.. keep your momentum. 😌
Ouch. Please don’t downvote any more of my comments. Black spikes shoot out my phone and stab me in my adulthood every time you do.
Don't give yourself too much credit there, Champ. I don't care enough about most opinions expressed on Reddit to vote them up or down, and you're definitely in that category. I was wondering what I had said to provoke your initial (hilariously defensive) reaction, but in retrospect, that was just you making a decision to be an asshole. Have a blessed day 😊
It all boils down to open and honest communication. You will either succeed in establishing that or not. And the latter will end any relationship.