How To Have The “I’d Like To Open Up Our Marriage” Conversation? Have you been married for a couple of decades or been in a long-term relationship and your love life has flatlined? You’ve heard of people “swinging” or even, worse, having affairs, to spice up their sex life. Rather than cheat, having a conversation about possibly having an open marriage could be an alternative. Typically one person in the relationship wants to open the door to outside connections and the other hasn’t ever even considered the possibility and is totally shocked by the idea. A lot of people don’t even think about monogamy until they make a connection with someone and don’t necessarily want to give up their primary relationship (husband/wife) or get a divorce and split up the children and any other resources the couple has acquired.
As a Marriage Counselor who understands and works with non-traditional relationships, I help people who are experiencing a dry spell in their sexual connection who come in wanting to know how to reconnect or enhance what they once knew was an intense bond. They are conflicted as their relationship was established under conventional and need help with other ways of relating that require care, thought, practice and work.
Without threatening your primary relationship by acting out your fantasies with others through affairs with people you find interesting or sexually attractive, having the conversation with your partner is much more appropriate. Betrayal and deceit are much more difficult to recover from than merely having a discussion about what it would look like to open up your marriage. The mere fact that you are having a dialogue about the subject makes you both more vulnerable. This risk-taking interaction can bring about an intimacy which creates a positive change in the way you interact emotionally and sexually. Feelings of closeness and preferring to be with your significant other can surprise you as a result of the conversation. When you are free to “be” in a relationship rather than “obligated to,” or “have to” due to a sense of “duty,” the choice enables you to want to be with the individual who is ok with your choice.
Case in point, As a Marriage Counselor, I work with non-traditional relationships that include LGBTQ and Polyamory relationships. In my work helping this population, I have come to appreciate the many different ways in which people can develop caring and loving relationships. In that I believe not one person can satisfy all our needs, perhaps it is necessary to open up our realm of how we get other needs met in good and thoughtful ways with other people while exercising ethical non-monogamy while in our primary relationships. As those who believe and want to be in Monogamous relationships, I am reaching out to those who want something more than what has been handed down to us about Monogamy by its definition.
I don’t believe people are wired to be monogamous. Monogamy is a choice that I respect. As with all choices, I respect and want to assist those who are looking for something as an alternative. If you believe in consensual nonmonogamy and a non-traditional relationship is what you are looking to develop, please contact me at (858) 735-1139. I can help guide you to make thoughtful and informed decisions about how you want to live your life.
So, is non-monogamy infidelity? As a Marriage Counselor, working with couples in the above-mentioned relationship-styles, I say, it is not accurate to say that non-monogamy is infidelity as long as there is an agreement between both partners within the primary relationship specifying the way in which they want their relationship to work. Answer being “no.” As a Couples Counselor, specializing in 