Last month, my Wife and I began seriously talking about what it would look like for us to enter the lifestyle. For the first time in our relationship, no topic was off limits: hotwifing, cuckolding, ethical non-monogamy, our traditional upbringing and vanilla marriage, jealousy, comparison, contrast, the different kinds of love…the list went on and on. We likely logged two or three full days worth of talking in that first month. It was just that – talking – until it wasn’t. We (she) decided that it was something we wanted to pursue and as soon as we both realized that the only thing standing in our way was us, it felt real. If the weeks leading up to that realization were lighter fluid, that moment was a match. Our relationship exploded into a new realm that we had never experience before.
One evening, my Wife brought up that despite all of our time in relationship together, it took us thinking about other people for Her to experience this sexual awakening and our marriage to be invigorated. What did that mean? What did that mean about Her? About me? This led to us discussing a topic we never felt free to before: fulfillment. Did She just want more than me or did She need more? On the flip side, did I need this dynamic to feel satisfied with our sex life or could I ever be content with it being just the two of us (is the song playing in your head now?).
We pressed further into these uncomfortable questions and reminisced on our relationship, particularly the past two years when the “awful vanilla sex” (her words, not mine) that defined most of our marriage started to turn into something more in 2019. That was the year that we decided to invest in couple’s therapy. It was some of the best time and money we’ve ever spent. It helped us address some issues that had been weighing on us for a while and neither person wanted to touch. I think that was the first time, seven years into our marriage, that we tackled something serious together as a team, actually resolved it and came out better on the other side. That experience was the beginning of a new chapter of opening up to each other and making our relationship what we we wanted it to be. We broke through the repression and dysfunction of our youth and discovered our true sexual potential with one another. It was an experience that we never knew existed. Our bedroom ceased being a place of routine maintenance and transformed into a truly freeing, intimate, explorative play environment.
We came to the conclusion that wanting to push that exploration even beyond our bedroom didn’t have to mean anything about either of us, except for perhaps the obvious: variety is spicy. For us it’s about adding more flavors to the ones we already enjoy. Sure, there are tons that we can taste ourselves but who doesn’t love something new? Her texting and sexting someone else? A new flavor. Her going out, dating and sharing her adventures with me? Delicious. Making a friend and playing all together? Yes please. Cleaning up? Definitely a flavor. We want to dive in, start tasting and find the ones we really love.
Some Body To Love
One of the first real things we did after deciding that we wanted to dip our toes into the non-monogamous water was sign up for a dating site. After just a few days She ended up matching with a guy that is, to put it mildly, fucking gorgeous. He is unfair amounts of beautiful from head to toe. This presented an opportunity for us to once again talk about flavors as one evening, my Wife said the most direct and brave thing I have ever heard Her say to me. We were talking about the difference between his body and mine and why She enjoys them both in different ways. In the course of Her explanation, She said that if we were in a lineup on Tinder, She would obviously pick his body over mine.
I was equal parts proud of her courage and stunned by the implications of her comment. Did I need to start working out more? I’m not going to lie, that was my first instinct: to compete. My ego was bruised. She assured me that She didn’t want me to change. This triggered me even more! She wouldn’t want me to look hot like this guy if I could? Does She not see me that way anymore? In my anxious spiral, I totally misinterpreted Her comment as saying that She didn’t want me to work on myself or be more sexy for Her. In a moment of love, what She was actually saying was that I didn’t need to do that. The way She loves my body is wrapped up in so much more complexity than simply what it looks like. It’s our history. It’s our relationship. It fulfills so many more needs for Her than just “looking hot” or sex. Although that is not what my ego wanted to hear, it’s what my heart needed.
She confronted me that I wouldn’t pick her body out of a lineup either. I still actively disagree with my Wife on this point. Her body is my type. I love ogling, touching, worshipping and playing with it and I wouldn’t change a thing about it. I have never wanted more. However, I have to admit that She is the only woman I’ve ever been with. The way I enjoy her body is inseparable from my experience with Her as my Wife and the one I love. I’d probably enjoy other flavors too if I cared to try them but I don’t. However, She does want to try them and that’s okay. It’s not a reflection on me. I had to think for a second if it’s okay that She wants to try other flavors of people and I don’t, but it is. Why would us both getting what we want ever be wrong?
The Gift
While my Wife and I were pressing deeper into the uncomfortable questions of fulfillment in our marriage, I brought up a point that one of my friends, who is poly, shared with me. Eli Finkel, a social psychology professor at Northwestern University, studied married couples and found that those who were able to outsource certain needs were much more happy and satisfied in their relationships. In other words, one person was never meant to completely satisfy their spouse in everything. Of course that doesn’t mean that every relationship needs to be open. You can outsource to family and friends. You can outsource romance without sex or sex without romance. The possibilities are as endless as you want them to be.
Initially, neither of us felt like we had anything to outsource. We felt very satisfied with each other within the limits of what we felt was possible. However, we were now expanding the boundaries of what we ever thought possible and I thought of at least one thing (besides a huge cock) that I could never provide for my Wife: the excitement of a new relationship. It was never going to happen, by virtue of the thing that committed relationships aspire to: time. The more successful I am as her husband, the less I’m able to provide that incredible new relationship energy (NRE) for Her. We’ve been together for 11 years and married for 9. We’re in a much different phase of life than we were 11 years ago when we first met – better, but different. Those first weeks and months of butterflies have long since flown away. What if She wanted to experience those feelings again, while remaining grounded in the love and safety of her husband? What if She could?
That evening as we deconstructed all things fulfillment, my Wife looked at me and said the thing that inspired me to write this blog to begin with. She said that in a way, I am the one ultimately providing that fulfillment for Her, by being brave enough to outsource it to someone else. It is a gift that I give Her that deepens Her love, respect and passion for me. That is the beauty of the cuckold lifestyle to Her and I could not agree more wholeheartedly. At this point in our journey, I had no doubts that She already had a healthy understanding of what we were getting ourselves into but in that moment, She had surpassed my expectations by giving me a perspective on the lifestyle that I had either forgotten about or never heard before. After all the time of my sharing with Her, She was now teaching me about what cuckolding meant to Her. That moment was everything for me.
It is that moment and many other small ones leading up to it that make me feel safe to take Her hand and step side by side into something more. I feel so fortunate that all those years ago, I married a woman who would have more deep love and care for me than I could have ever imagined back then, yet such courage now to ask for even more and be willing to take it. Neither one of us knew what was lying in wait for our marriage and in this moment, we don’t know what lies past today. What we do know is the things we’ve heard and read of experiences beyond satisfaction and that is what we want to venture towards together.