SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

On the other hand you could play along gather a list of names and expose the hell out of them. Were my W to ask I think I would go that way.

servrus, expose what about them? Seriously. If they're adults who aren't cheating and having consensual sex, what on earth would you be trying to expose? That's a pretty terrible thing to do to people just because you don't agree with their way of life.

OP, There is a big difference between open and poly. Open just means sex. Poly means romantic relationships too. And there is still a lot of ground to cover under both of those umbrellas. The main linkage is that both require everything to be ethical and aboveboard- no cheating. Some of the definitive statements you read here with regards to either type are not correct.

Seriously. If they're adults who aren't cheating and having consensual sex, what on earth would you be trying to expose?

I took Servrus’ post to mean playing along with his wife to find out details of the AP and expose the affair (I.e friends/family/possible OBS). I don’t think we know if the AP is cheating on someone as well and if he is, then the other BS ought to be told about it as well.

My husband discussed having an open relationship after d day when he was so messed up and he was in no place to make sense of anything.

It was a devestatimg realization. I felt that I could never be enough for him.

I was absolutely gutted, and desperate. I even considered it and told him so,

I was trying to play the pick me dance, not knowing it at the time, my judgment was definitely skewed.

Fast forward 5-6 months later. He was heavily into CODA, 12 step program, identifying all his FOO issues.....and there were so many dark and disturbing secrets from his childhood.

I was so messed up, still trying so hard to recover from the betrayal, hysterical bonding, you name it.

I went to France with girlfriends for a getaway and ended up having a fling. This was completely out of character for me.

Typical revenge affair. I was curious to have that experience with another person and see what I was missimg out on.

I honestly thought he wouldn’t be bothered since he seemed to welcome the idea 5-6 months earlier. Of course he was very upset.

Well, those who are in destruction mode don’t think clearly.

Now that he has healed and is a completely different person, he sees how irrational it was to think an open marriage was what he wanted,

He is an addict. He used to drink 20 years ago, gave that up for becoming a workaholic, then obsessed about fitness.

Sex, and affair sex is like a drug, when you are in the fog, it seems so rational.

Connections with others seem normal. He used to think polyamory was ideal.

He now truly believes that it isn’t healthy, normal and of any use in a loving and healthy union.

I wholeheartedly believe this to be true,

She lied to you and put your body in danger of STDs. She's going to lie to you again and again and again. She doesn't care about you. She's going to expose you even more now. Please respect yourself.

A relationship should be honest - whether monogamous, polyamorous, or open marriage.

I don't think many of the comments address your question. I cannot give you advice on an open marriage. All I know is that it is hard to be in a relationship with someone you don't trust. Just having an open marriage is not going to repair the trust, nor change the fact that your WW had an A.

I wish you luck on your future.

Anxioushusband: Now I am willing to give it a try, because I feel it could rejuvenate our stagnant and sexless marriage and give me an opportunity to rekindle our love.

My advice will be a little bit harsh, so I hope you accept it and understand that we are trying to help you!

Anxioushusband, to rejuvenate and rekindle your marriage can be done when your wife is highly attracted to you and emotionally invested in you!

That's not what's happening here!

You are in a sexless marriage because she is not attracted to you, yet you throw yourself under her feet!

You are very weak!

And because you are weak, and not masculine enough, she lost that attraction to you, and rather then fixing this problem you caved in to her demands and reg-swept her affair!

You already lost your wife who cheated on you, and even if you divorce and move on, you will lose the next relationship! Because you didn't work on yourself to be the best version of yourself, women will walk all over you, because you allow them to!

When you become weak and be a "Nice Guy" women lose attraction to you!

When men who always give women what they want and who let them get away with bad behavior are repulsive to women, and that's exactly what you are doing!

You are making a mistake after the other, rolling from a downhill to a cliff, and from a cliff to another downhill and so on!

You are to weak to do anything!

you didn't even have the courtesy to reply to the people who put time and effort into helping you!

I think every one here will be in a shock if you manage to man up, have some dignity and end this sham of a marriage!

Man, work on yourself to be the best version of yourself, you are so broken!

You will not rekindle your marriage!

You will come back later and ask for advice on your divorce!

And when you come back we will help you, because That's who we are!

[This message edited by Kaliber at 2:46 PM, November 3rd (Tuesday)]

Ok, I wasn’t going to post much about this but I’m hoping it will help you. For me, it was in 2005 before the first DDay when xWH wanted to try swinging. I reluctantly agreed to it because I wanted to save our marriage and thought we would be closer as we had drifted apart. At the time I didn’t know he was knee deep in an affair already.

What was your personal experience? My personal experience was that it was mortifying. I didn’t like having sex with other people around us, touching us. I especially couldn’t stomach watching xWH enjoy it so much.

- What makes an open, poly or non-monogamous relationship work or not work? I think both partners have to be completely excited about the idea. XWH wanted permission to be with other women and me agreeing to try swinging gave him permission . It made me sick every time because it wasn’t what I wanted but thought what our marriage “needed.”

- How can I get over my insecurity and work with my jealousy as my wife builds an emotional and sexual relationship with another man? I think this goes along with the last question in that you have to be willing to accept this and WANT it for yourself. Otherwise it is completely one-sided. And I know this because I tried. Several times. Went to many swinging parties but could inky allow myself to submit completely once, and we’d leave with him mad because I couldn’t do it.

- What do you think I will need to know or feel in order to decide if this is right for me and us? I personally think you already know. You don’t want to do it but are willing to try hoping it’ll help rekindle your love. I’m so sorry, but that isn’t what she is looking for. Seems like she has moved on and will “let you stay with her” if you abide by her rules. Completely disrespectful for a spouse to do this. But as always, it’s up to you.

Kaliber (and others)

FLAMING & SHAMING: Please refrain from attacking or shaming, publicly or by using the SI.com Private Message feature. Do not bait or call out others. This includes members and non-members.

If you feel the need to attack, please refrain from posting.

This is not getting out of or surviving infidelity. This is jumping headfirst into it. It seems that "staying married" to your wife is more important to you than having a monogamous partner you can trust.

So be it, but I'm not sure what sort of advice you're actually looking for? You've been walked all over in the worst possible way and your response is to flip over onto your stomach so she can walk across your back too.

Julia Cameron is a bestselling writer who has outlined the defining characteristics of crazymakers.

She recommends getting away from these people whenever possible, rather than continuing to embroil yourself in their self-created drama.

In bullying you into accepting a unilateral open marriage, your WW is most certainly acting as a crazymaker and doing it in a way that destroys order and sanity.

Here's the list describing crazymakers. Interestingly it lines up with almost every cheater on this site I've ever read about -- and it certainly seems to apply to your WW, no matter the platitudes or reasonable-sounding language she may try to deploy on you:

-Crazymakers spend your time and money

-Crazymakers break deals and destroy schedules

-Crazymakers expect special treatment

-Crazymakers discount your reality

-Crazymakers triangulate those they deal with

-Crazymakers are expert blamers

-Crazymakers create drama, but seldom where it belongs

-Crazymakers hate schedules-- except their own.

-Crazymakers hate order, so they introduce disorder.

-Crazymakers deny that they are Crazymakers.

Please think about this, I beg you.

Think about everything you are sacrificing to remain with a crazymaker, and what could possibly be the benefit to you?

SI Staff, I apologize if I come across as flaming or shaming, it was not my intent, but I think some 2x4 was needed, maybe just maybe OP will see his situation for what it is!

I will stop posting on his topic, I don't think I can add anything more then what every one has said or advised.

[This message edited by Kaliber at 4:10 PM, November 3rd (Tuesday)]

AHusband,

I hope these comments don't discourage you too much. In fact, I hope they embolden the doubts you already have.

Your gut is telling you something and you are trying very hard to ignore it.

ALWAYS PAY ATTENTION TO YOUR GUT.

PSTI,

You wrote,servrus, expose what about them? Seriously. If they're adults who aren't cheating and having consensual sex, what on earth would you be trying to expose? That's a pretty terrible thing to do to people just because you don't agree with their way of life.

Since the damage would already have been done to my W it would be best I keep a cool head and gather intel on who she was freaking with.

If some number of people had sex with my W I would track them down and expose them all at once suddenly and widely.

But there is also a question of who in their sub-community witnessed or encouraged the behavior or introduced her when they were aware she was married.

The response has to be in some ways equal to the transgression. I doubt my W would push this in my face the way Anxious WW did, as she knows I will act and have acted when lines were crossed before.

You should only consider an open Marriage if you are interested in this lifestyle.

You can certainly allow your wife to have an open lifestyle but it doesn’t mean you have to participate.

I just don’t think people can change the rules of a marriage unless both parties agree.

PSTI,

You wrote,servrus, expose what about them? Seriously. If they're adults who aren't cheating and having consensual sex, what on earth would you be trying to expose? That's a pretty terrible thing to do to people just because you don't agree with their way of life.

Since the damage would already have been done to my W it would be best I keep a cool head and gather intel on who she was freaking with.

If some number of people had sex with my W I would track them down and expose them all at once suddenly and widely.

But there is also a question of who in their sub-community witnessed or encouraged the behavior or introduced her when they were aware she was married.

The response has to be in some ways equal to the transgression. I doubt my W would push this in my face the way Anxious WW did, as she knows I will act and have acted when lines were crossed before.

That still seems way out of line to me. First of all, they may not even know she's not in an open relationship. Surprise surprise- liars lie.

Additionally, exposing people in alternative lifestyles isn't equivalent to exposing cheaters. They can suffer lasting damage to their lives as a result of this kind of exposure, up to and including job loss and having their children removed if they happen to hit the wrong people on a bad day. I'd say it's a pretty big overreaction to even consider that.

The kink communities tend not to be okay with cheating in general. I see more swingers okay with not asking- I've even had someone tell me she was there without her husband's consent and I immediately lost interest. But it's still not a generally acceptable thing at all. I seriously doubt people in most communities would know someone is cheating and either encourage that person or even invite them to events.

I mean, there are bad eggs everywhere. Choosing to engage in a different lifestyle sexually doesn't automatically make someone a more ethical person. But if they want to interact with others in the lifestyle... they kinda have to be or they get uninvited to things in a hurry. So either they lie, or they stick with stuff like Tinder.

[This message edited by PSTI at 10:23 AM, November 4th (Wednesday)]

Everyone that has posted in a non-negative way regarding an open marriage has stated that openness, trust and ground-rules are required. The OP not only asks about an open marriage – as in a way to fulfil a sexual want – but also a polyamorous relationship – as in a way to create, feed and maintain romantic emotions to another person.

In order for this relationship with this particular OM his wife is specifically asking about then it complies with the honesty that all stakeholders are aware of what’s going on. If OM is truly in an open marriage, then it should be OK to ask his wife. After all – she is in an open marriage. But is she in a polyamorous marriage? Is she fine with her husband getting his rocks off but not with him doubling his Valentine expenses?

It’s not about his marriage or the state of his marriage or the consequences of talking to OM. It’s about ensuring that the ground-rules you place on YOUR marriage are enforced.

The issue I find that will likely destroy this "marriage" is the coercive element. Anxious isn't being given a quid pro quo and it's clear he's not exactly enthusiastic about being told "to be married to me you have to do this my way, there is no other option". That's a very unhealthy foundation for any marriage, open or closed.

I'm not on expert on how to make this kind of relationships succeed. I guess I'm more like collateral damage from an open relationship than an expert on the positive elements of one. I'm hardly objective about it and don't pretend to be. I expect there are some good poly/open/swinger resources out there that might be of more service to Anxious's original post than SI.com.

Yes, and as others have noted, most people in polyamorous and/or open marriages who are doing it ethically and honestly would probably reject this particular scenario as insulting to their cause because it is unilateral, not honest and a quid pro quo bullying situation.

So OP, you've got several headwinds you need to think about:

1. The very small number statistically of successful open marriages that begin in an ethical and honest way, let alone one that has been unilaterally defined as an open marriage in an inauthentic way.

2. The fact that your WW is in fact bullying and/or coercing you, not asking, not "negotiating" and not being an honest broker.

3. The fact that your own values are indeed opposed to this and like many humans (if not most) you are naturally monogamous and that your inner core of authentic being seems to be crying out against this.

You should probably take all of that into consideration and really listen to your gut. I'm sorry if that's too negative for you, but I do believe I've outlined it here from a pretty objective standpoint.

Save your breath, he isn't coming back as no-one has told him what he wanted to hear.

Save your breath, he isn't coming back as no-one has told him what he wanted to hear.