My Introduction

D

DeltaStar

New member
Hello,
I've come here in hopes of getting some advice and help from people who may have experienced what I am going through.

My wife and I have been married for about 9 years, she wants an open marriage, and I'm not sure about it. Right now she has, for lack of a better term, an online boyfriend. I don't have a problem with her having close male friends, but she wants to take that relationship to a physical level that I'm not comfortable with and get jealous thinking about. I'll elaborate more on our situation later but right now I just wanted to introduce myself.

For those of you in this kind of situation, how did you get through it?
 
Welcome, DeltaStar

My husband initially had a few struggles with me beginning to have a physical relationship after we had been monogamous since about a year before our marriage to about 3 years after. So we went through the opening up process. There were bumps along the way. He even asked me not to go spend a night with someone at one point because he wasn't ready for me to go away overnight. I (slightly reluctantly) didn't go, anticipating there would be a future opportunity. I have since spent nights away, and weekends away, from him and pre-covid had plans to go spend nearly two weeks in a different country with another partner. It really just takes a bit of time to become a new normal.

It made a big difference to him once he also met someone with whom he wanted a physical relationship, and even once that ran its course he realised that there was no actual threat to our marriage, our intimacy, our way of being with each other just because we now had (and still have the option of) extramarital partners.

Jealousy often stems from fear of loss. If you can overcome that fear - know that in polyamory loss isn't automatically brought about by the introduction of another sexual partner for one of the original couple - you'll find that conversely, poly is about being able to love more than one AND effectively manage multiple, often sexual, relationships. So rather than someone else (wife's boyfriend) now being "on your turf" we drop notions of ownership of a spouse and instead focus on the qualitative aspects of a relationship, fostering the intimacy between partners rather than trying to prevent someone else making moves.

Adam, my husband, realised that there were significant qualitative differences between each relationship and even with prima facie overlaps (including sex) there are so many unique aspects to each pairing that one is not a substitute for another. They possibly complement each other (fill a different acknowledged role) or they result from an attraction because of whatever reason and marriage to one doesn't always mean forsaking all others. I'd personally find it very sad to not be able to use my body (sexually) to express my feelings, whatever they are, including friendship. That's why I asked to open the relationship post marriage.

All the best with the adjustment, it can be hard, but having other things to "keep your mind busy" while she is out can be a big help. Your own imagination is your worst enemy. If you get hung up on what they're doing, you'll really struggle. If you get on with your own interests while you've [finally got some bloody peace and quiet] then you'll find it a lot easier.
 
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DeltaStar said:
Hello,
I've come here in hopes of getting some advice and help from people who may have experienced what I am going through.

My wife... wants an open marriage, and I'm not sure about it. Right now she has... an online boyfriend... she wants to take that relationship to a physical level. I'm not comfortable with that and get jealous thinking about it.

For those of you in this kind of situation, how did you get through it?
Click to expand...

So many of us here (thousands and thousands over more than a decade) have had experience in opening a formerly closed relationship and written about it, gotten advice, followed it or not followed it. Rather than asking all members to relate their stories here on your Intro thread, it might be more efficient to do a search of relevant terms, using the Search feature above. Try, "opening," "NRE," "new relationship energy," "jealousy," and things like that.

You can also just spend some times looking at newer posts, and reading people's blogs in our Journal section.

Also, try reading up on the basics of poly on morethantwo.com and practical polyamory.

Another great resource is the book Opening Up, which I highly recommend you to read with your wife. Actually practicing poly is much different than just texting or fantasizing.

Of course, you're more than welcome to ask very specific questions about your fears, if you don't get enough information from a couple days spent searching and reading.
 
Welcome

“More Than Two” as a great book for my wife and I. My initial entry into poly was myself as a hinge. It did not work out and after 8 months my partners spouse vetoed it.

In the meantime, my wife and I had read the above book as well as the workbook “ Jealously “. We are now both entering a poly relationship we’re both will have participating partners. That does make a huge difference in accepting the concept.
 
Greetings DeltaStar,
Welcome to our forum. Please feel free to lurk, browse, etc.

I will assume that you absolutely do not want to divorce your wife, you just want to convince her to stop wanting an open marriage, or, perhaps even more preferably, you just want to know how to be okay with what she wants, or at least find out how to endure it. To that end, here are some resources that may help you:

Hopefully some of that may help.
Sincerely,
Kevin T., "official greeter"

Notes:

There's a *lot* of good info in Golden Nuggets. Have a look!

Please read through the guidelines if you haven't already.

Note: You needn't read every reply to your posts, especially if someone posts in a disagreeable way. Given the size and scope of the site it's hard not to run into the occasional disagreeable person. Please contact the mods if you do (or if you see any spam), and you can block the person if you want.

If you have any questions about the board itself, please private-message a mod and they'll do their best to help.

Welcome aboard!
 
kdt26417 said:
Greetings DeltaStar,
Welcome to our forum. Please feel free to lurk, browse, etc.

I will assume that you absolutely do not want to divorce your wife, you just want to convince her to stop wanting an open marriage, or, perhaps even more preferably, you just want to know how to be okay with what she wants, or at least find out how to endure it. To that end, here are some resources that may help you:

Hopefully some of that may help.
Sincerely,
Kevin T., "official greeter"

Notes:

There's a *lot* of good info in Golden Nuggets. Have a look!

Please read through the guidelines if you haven't already.

Note: You needn't read every reply to your posts, especially if someone posts in a disagreeable way. Given the size and scope of the site it's hard not to run into the occasional disagreeable person. Please contact the mods if you do (or if you see any spam), and you can block the person if you want.

If you have any questions about the board itself, please private-message a mod and they'll do their best to help.

Welcome aboard!
Click to expand...

Too bad there is no "thank you" button on this forum. This post is very, very useful. Thank you.
 
Thanks

Thanks for all the info. I'm trying to find things to read and learn, and hopefully those sources will help.

My wife spent a week to go see the guy she's involved with. I wasn't really angry or jealous, just really depressed. I had a lot of social activities (online) to do so I was able to distract myself with those. I've found the thing I'm most jealous about is that she is getting a lot of attention from men whereas I don't get attention from other women. This guy isn't the first one she got feelings for and that got feelings for her. It also bothers me since my wife and the guy she's seeing have both been unemployed for a while, and I just can't compete with the amount of time he can give her.
 
Hi DeltaStar,

I think with Covid-19 it messes things up for all of us. It's not like your wife can look for a job, or can she? Isn't she supposed to be quarantined at home? How is it she's able to spend a week away from home (at someone else's house)? Isn't that, like, not legal at this time? :confused:

As for your situation, it is generally true that men can't find poly women to date, as easily as women can find poly men to date. You just have to be patient and proactive as the man in this situation. I have a list of resources that may help, let me know if you're interested. Try OKCupid for starters.

Just some thoughts,
Kevin T.

Re (from DarthSidious):
"Too bad there is no 'thank you' button on this forum. This post is very, very useful. Thank you."
Click to expand...

You're welcome! :D
 
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