Monogamy or Open Marriage?

Ask Wendy: Dating, Sex & Relationship Advice for the Bold

Hey Wendy,

I’ve been married to my wife for nearly 20 years. About five years ago we made the decision to open the marriage, and while I think the decision has been great, lately we’ve run into some complications.

What underlies our arrangement is that she has been losing interest in sex in general. She’s going through menopause and is on antidepressants (which doesn’t help). With the open marriage I got the sexual connections I craved while she was alleviated the burden of being the sole source of my sexual attention. It worked well for both of us.

The challenge is that my wife is now having second thoughts. She’s thinking she might not be as amenable to the open marriage as she originally thought. She tells me she did it because she feels I’m a good guy and I should have what I want. But she’s no longer sure it’s what she wants.

In fact, it’s starting to cause marital trouble. Which leads me to my question.

I’d prefer to keep the marriage intact if possible. We’re best friends and good co-parents, and I’d like to grow old and die with her. On the other hand, the past five years have made me realize how much I value an open relationship. I treasure the wonderful web of delicious and close connections I’ve made and don’t want to give them up for the world.

But she’s not sure she can live with it anymore. I could keep the marriage together if I agree to close it again. Or risk losing it if I dig in my heels and insist on keeping it open. Hence my conundrum.

While I have my own opinion of what I should do, I would love to hear what you advise.

Thanks,

Kevin T.

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Hey Kevin,

Conundrum. Yup, that’s what you’ve got here. You’re trapped between your love for your wife and the need for sexual connection, and that’s not an enviable position.

We’re going to get to your marriage, but first, we need to address the framing of your deal: You’re a “good guy,” so she let you “have what you want” reads patronizing to me.

Many women believe (and our culture widely promotes this mindset) that wanting sex is like wanting a cookie. “If you’re a good boy, you get a cookie.”

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Sex is not a self-indulgent whim; it’s a need. Wanting a sweet treat and needing sex are not the same things. Sex lives more in the “need air” camp than it does in the “need-chocolate-chips-now” camp for most guys, and denying this will ultimately make you the bad guy in this storyline.

So, I wish I could tell you how to keep your marriage open and have her be in good emotional shape in 140 characters or less, but sadly, I can’t. And when you pit your biological, sexual needs up against your love and integrity, guess which one wins almost every time? Don’t let this be your story.

THE WORK OF A MARRIAGE

I’m pulling for you two to figure it out.

To be in a healthy, happy marriage that will last, you each need to do your part in understanding your baseline needs and finding a creative solution (or three) that will sort this out and get you both to “okay.”

Do some soul-searching. Find your true answer to this tough question: Will it be enough for you to be with only your wife if she could provide your minimum amount of sexual contact, connection, and sensual energy?

Can you wrap your head all the way around the possibility of being monogamous again?

At this point, are you willing to do it?

Can you look at the last five years as a series of amazing adventures that are now behind you as your life takes a different direction?

And if you do choose monogamy again, what exactly would “enough” sexual connection look like? (Think specific, measurable results here.)

You’ll both need to articulate and negotiate the conditions for a closed marriage ahead of time so that you don’t end up resenting each other if your baseline needs go unmet.

OPEN MARRIAGE IS A VIABLE OPTION FOR SEXUAL INCOMPATIBILITY

Opening up the marriage so that your wife isn’t the sole source of your sexual attention was smart. Sometimes sharing the workload is a good thing if you can’t get all of it done yourself. And I’m guessing that’s how it might feel for her — like work.

But one thing’s for sure: If we lose interest in sex and our partner doesn’t, it’s not fair to expect our partner to suddenly be okay with a sexless relationship.

Listen, I get it — not feeling sexual around menopause is for reals. When I hit 50, my body was like, “Sex? Meh.” But your wife is going to have to do what millions of other women and I have done, and that’s to be accountable for nurturing sexual health. Just like we have to eat our vegetables and do cardio, nurturing our sexual self takes dedication, reinvention, and, yes, sometimes a little extra effort. We owe it to ourselves and to our partners to not let that part of our life go.

Ebbs and flows? Sure. Nobody expects perfection all the time.

But it’s unfair for a spouse to say, “I don’t want sex anymore, and I still expect sexual exclusivity from you even though we’re not having sex.”

In other words, “You can’t have sex with me, but you can’t have sex with anyone else, either.”

This is not okay.

So, if you stay and you flip to monogamy, this piece needs to get resolved, and that resolution might be quite a journey for her.

So your job is to stay open, honest, and — most importantly — understanding of her position in this conversation. She’s got some work to do. And I don’t mean taking one for the team (“Lie back and think of England” and all that), but instead figuring out a way to tap back into her sexuality in an authentic way that works for her. Again, not an easy feat when medication and age are throwing obstacle after obstacle in her path, but it’s totally possible.

Here’s a hot tip: It’s not medical advice, and she should consult with a doctor first, but may I suggest weed lube or even weed gummies as an assist? I hear it helps for some women.

And maybe she could speak with a psychologist about switching up her depression meds. Antidepressants are the goldilocks of medication: it can take a while to find one that’s juuuust right. One might kill her sex drive stone dead, whereas another might affect it much less severely. Worth a conversation, right?

There are also a wealth of classes, workshops, and therapy options out there for this sort of thing if that’s something you two think might work out for you.

D-I-V-O-R-C-E

I hope you kids work it out, but if you can’t, I’m here from the other side to tell you divorce is going to be hard. Harder than you ever realized.

I left a decade-plus marriage. It was the hardest thing I’ve ever done in my entire life (and I’ve battled cancer). The pain of hurting a good person — of breaking their heart and breaking your promise to be with them forever and always is devastating. It’s been almost two decades since I left that marriage, and I’ll never be completely over it. But as painful as it was, it was the right thing to do for both of us. Let me say that again: It was the right thing to do. I love my life and my husband, and I also still love my ex-husband very much.

STAYING MARRIED DOESN’T MEAN STAYING HAPPY

I don’t believe a lifelong marriage automatically equals success. I know waayyy too many unhappily married people who stay because they said they would, and they torture each other every moment of every day because of it.

If you two can work together in partnership to create solutions that work for you, well done! And if you can’t, I hope you don’t see this as a failure but as a great success that stands for what you need in your lives now.

You can bask in your success at being able to support and love each other through the transition (and throughout the rest of your lives if you want to) as great friends who live two houses down from each other.

Stay together or don’t — either way, if you both want it, you can set your mind to being best friends, good co-parents, and even to growing old and dying together. Divorce doesn’t mean you have to disconnect. What it does mean is that you’re both free to get what you need out of life without disenfranchising each other person. You don’t need to lose the love.

Good luck!

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Wendy Newman is the author of 121 First Dates. She’s a dating, sex, and relationship expert who’s led hundreds of workshops and revolutionized the lives of over 78,000+ women internationally. For tools and advice, visit wendyspeaks.com

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This post was previously published on medium.com.

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