I am swinger AMA

[AMA097155]

As the title says really. I think there's a lot of misconceptions about my/our choices so I'd thought I'd post.

I am what some term a 'hotwife', although that word gives me the ick.

(A hotwife in the swinging and consensual non-monogamy community is a married or committed woman who has sex with other men with the full knowledge, consent, and active encouragement of her husband)

I have sex with people other than my husband, a a friend with benefits whom I'd seen for a over a year, and friends all within the swinging world.

My husband joins socially and for things like a party but isn't so keen on meeting women solo. We've also jointly attended a club, but the dynamic wasn't for us.

If you have any questions, ask away.

My rulebook for me. I accept that not everyone feels that way, clearly. As I said - I understand that many women can't orgasm through PIV, and even never orgasm. I was just questioning whether they really genuinely were ok with that. Satisfied even. Turns out they are. It wouldn't satisfy me at all - I would genuinely rather not have sex if I couldn't orgasm as it would frustrate me too much, but we are all different.

Oh for goodness sake I’m terribly sorry. 😂

I thought ‘supposed’ was a strange word to use, in either direction.

It's personal. I know a friend married for decades who has never had an orgasm. she isn't that bothered. Some women like the emotional and physical closeness and for them that is enough.

If you read the online stats a very large percentage of women do not orgasm every time they have sex. Our biology is very different to men. The human species would die out if men didn't ejaculate during sex. It's far far easier for them.

Yes and the other people they have sex with 😂

I'm pretty sure we've all typed the wrong word at times online. I have a very close family member who broke their back 6 weeks ago and is just out of hospital and my mind has been on other things. I should have said expected to.

Hopefully that clarifies.

It is absolutely possible yes.

Verbena, I’m not sure if you are saying this to the OP or me, who just posted about the word Vanilla?

My post just before yours might partly answer your question. Vanilla is not largely meant to mean boring- just a shorthand for ‘not lifestyle/conventionally accepted’.

yes, there are certainly exciting elements about lifestyle sex. But the assumption that I am always confounded by, is that this is somehow incompatible with all the meaningful connection you cite. People who play sexually ALSO outside the lifestyle, have kids, community, deep love, commitment, grief, aspirations…. Everything you do. They just also have unconventional sex sometimes. They don’t think it’s the be all and end all. It’s not their whole identity. It’s something on top. Just like going scuba diving, or enjoying hiking. It doesn’t throw away everything else meaningful about life.

Also, while some people are sexual in a very casual way, others (including myself) have very deep connections in the lifestyle. With your partner, it is likely you are more transparent with each other about all your feelings, needs and fantasies for intimacy of all kinds, because so few topics are taboo. You also have to work really really hard together to confront insecurities, to work out boundaries, to trust, to communicate in unusual circumstances for which you are writing your own rule book together. And you have to truly release your desire to control them to focus on and embrace their pleasure over your insecurity. And your friendships on the lifestyle tend to be beautifully transparent and connecting. They often go more deeply ‘straight to the heart of the matter’ - and have fewer taboos, and much less about social standing (I have deep friendships from every walk of life, across all professions and none, because we connect purely as people with a shared philosophy, not because our kids are at the same school or we are at the same company, and have an image to uphold).

the key difference is that in ‘vanilla thinking’ love, connection and meaning are all inextricably bound to sexual exclusivity…. Making the logical conclusion if you are not sexually exclusive, then you don’t have those things in a healthy way. But that’s a false premise. People on the lifestyle have and value all those things. They have just decoupled them from sexual exclusivity. So they have all that love, commitment, connection….. and then they do some extra stuff on top- which doesn’t break the connection, because they have a different belief system. It is not necessary to search for and assume mental or emotional brokenness. For me, it is about beliefs and hard emotional work to rethink what we have all been taught about what love and connection really relies on.

I hope that helps.

I think so. There's still hopefully physical pleasure as well as emotional closeness hopefully if in a relationship.

Obviously it is surely better with an orgasm, but that doesn't mean it can't be enjoyable at all without.

I don't think orgasm itself is physically hard for most women, as you say it's specifically orgasm in PIV that's harder, depending on the position of the clitoris.

I don't think women who aren't having it are having pointless sex,,but I think it's a shame if they never do. Orgasm is unlikely to be impossible for most women at least, physically.

shared philosophy/belief system- sounds very deep. Can you elaborate on these beliefs?

When you say have sex, do you mean PIV? Or does that include oral and manual too?

I can understand people having fulfilling sex lives without orgasm but I still think it's a shame as most people do enjoy them, after all. Obviously there are forms of pleasure apart from orgasm.

I suspect another factor in whether someone orgasms could be emotional state : it's harder if stressed, stuff on your mind etc

I’m sorry to hear about your family member.

Thank you for clarifying. My comments were intended to be lighthearted and your reaction is somewhat defensive IMO, but I do understand that you are perhaps feeling more sensitive than usual due to your situation.

Personally I think the orgasm question is relevant to swinging as if you're sleeping with someone you love and you don't orgasm, there's still emotional connection and hopefully also you have some physical enjoyment, they know what you like.

But can you have this with swinging? Thus I'd think in casual sex generally, including swinging, orgasm would be more important.

When you say have sex, do you mean PIV? Or does that include oral and manual too?

Not just PIV- any form of stimulation.

I cannot say I have considered swinging when I was in a relationship, however I was a +1 in a couple of threesomes in my past.
I totally get the excitement. I get it is different and you can do things that two of you cannot. I understand the ability to enjoy sex without it being a relationship thing. I understand how the co-planning and discussing would make things very exciting. And I get that it can be social.
I just think it is so far from most people's experience and outside of usual UK culture that we all get tied in a knot about it. If I separate what others might think, something I need to be much better at doing, then swinging, recreational sex, small group sex etc is something I have no issues with.

@Jane3212sure, happy to elaborate.

As I explored in the lifestyle, I found myself confronted by and struggling to overcome a lot of embedded beliefs - some of them explicitly pushed by society and others implicit, which I hadn’t even realised I had. So some of these…

the biggest is probably obvious - belief 1- that sexual exclusivity is the hallmark of true love and commitment and trust between a couple. That is huge. We are taught this in a ton of ways- from traditional marriage vows, to the belief if ‘someone truly loved you they would be jealous at the very thought of you with someone else’; in the norms within couples to have to ‘only have eyes for each other; in the seeming danger inherent in even admitting to your partner that you find someone beautiful or attractive in any way….. all of these things are set up to protect couples as exclusive- largely through repression, diplomacy/light levels of deception (eg not saying someone else is beautiful or sexy, even though we all know there are tons of beautiful sexy people on the world), and also through social condemnation of any straying. Particularly women of course. Women always get the hard end of the bargain and are judged worse for being non-exclusive.

Belief 2- An extension of this belief is that almost all sex is in some way dirty, lacking in moral standards, transgressant, will lead you down a slippery slope to hell etc….. blatantly obvious in religion, but also in modesty standards for dressing, and you can see it in this thread plenty. Again, women get the worst of this in slut shaming and policing of their dress and behaviour.

Related to this, belief 3- A woman’s value is linked to her purity. If she is having lots of sex with lots of people she can’t possibly be right in the head or heart. In many cultures, a woman who is not a virgin is not marriage material. Even in more enlightened cultures, women are condemned for their ’body count’…. Men talk about women being good for the bedroom OR good marriage material - they can’t be both. Women who take care of their appearance and have objectively attractive bodies and faces are dismissed as not intelligent/ not taken seriously professionally etc… etc etc…..

Belief 4- That the ideal configuration and aspiration in life is a heterosexual, exclusive married man and woman of the same race and roughly the same age, with children. Anything that deviates from this is a bit seedy and immoral and has to fight for the right to exist and convince others it’s ok, and that we are moral people too. Some of those battles have been somewhat won in some areas of the world. Many not even close.

Belief 5- Physically women should be young and beautiful to show themselves at all and even more so if they want to dare to be sexual beings. We see this everywhere. And you hear it on this thread in the agist dismissal of women in their fifties, who might be big, daring to seek a sex life - how disgusting that is in some posters’ views.

I could go on, but these are some of the beliefs, many embedded in me from society, despite my feminism, that I have worked to overcome, through being in the lifestyle.

New beliefs that most lifestyle friends would ascribe to: I know my husband is utterly committed to me and loves me passionately, AND does not require sexual exclusivity from me. That radical honesty and respect of the boundaries we have written together are the foundations of our trust and love, not shutting down our sexual desires. I know and welcome the numerous ways, configurations for people to be in relationship and enjoy sexual and sensual contact, without judgement as long as it is consensual and high integrity/honest between all involved. I am 49 years old and not perfect physically in a million ways, but my physical worth is not dependent on that and I am and can be desireable. Sexual intimacy can be beautiful, and connecting without being on an automatic elevator to marriage. I embrace experiences and integrity and treating people well - not my body count - as a measure of my decency. I have had incredible sexual experiences with a lot of people that gave me lots of pleasure without that meaning I am less than or immoral in some way. Etc etc etc……

I noticed more people disgusted by the way OP was trying to glamorise prostitution with some unrealistic fantasies, and who were (realistically) pointing out that in the sex work game, one can't just enter as an ordinary-looking 50-year-old and immediately start making big bucks with clients who include 'young and handsome' professionals. People rightly pointed out that it was nonsense. I'm not sure what was 'nasty', exactly?

No, but if you do anything that could be destabilising or deeply upsetting to your children, you need to accept that there's a good chance they might find out.

My teenagers know my DH and I have sex as they're not idiots and they know healthy marriages involve sex, so if they found a run-of-the-mill sex toy they'd be a bit grossed out, but it wouldn't be a big deal. We'd probably get a 'damn, go mum/dad, good for you guys' and have it laughed off with a bit of embarrassment, if anything.

If they discovered we had an entire secret life where he enjoyed watching me be railed by other men while banging other women (note: this is not what we do!), I can imagine my teenagers (and most teenagers) would actually find that really upsetting and destabilising.

Erm...are they not? I'm pretty sure they are, if you're doing sex right. And more than once should really be standard, given that women are capable of being multi-orgasmic.

If that's not happening, then something is not working right. That's not uncommon, with all the shame around female sexual pleasure, with women not being great at centring their pleasure, and men being terrible at providing it, statistically speaking...but it's really very sad, given women should be orgasming at least once during the average sexual session.

Please don’t use the term clean to describe someone who tests negative for STIs and HIV. This would infer that anyone testing positive is dirty. I’m not dirty - I shower regularly ☺️.

I would also add that anyone who says they are clear/tested negative for any STIs tested for this only as good as their last test + about 3 months before that.
Tests do not take into account the window period where anything more recently contracted might not show up in a test. This is why it’s best to use condoms consistently and correctly. PrEP can be taken to prevent HIV - or PEP and Doxypep in the event that the condom breaks.

Regarding herpes it’s a difficult one. Maybe google dental dams if they're something you want to consider .

I suppose what pp means maybe is that PIV alone isn't really designed for orgasm for a lot of women... But that doesn't mean women aren't 'supposed' to orgasm usually! It just means they might need oral as well, or different positions etc etc

Thank you, very interesting post.

'social condemnation of any straying. '- re this, I understand you and your husband have an honest & loving relationship including swinging and I imagine others do too but I don't think this is a huge number of people. I think most people are hardwired to want fidelity- there's biological reasons why, among others.

I don't think your setup is bad as you both sound happy, but I don't think society is wrong to generally treat fidelity as needed and condemn straying. Otoh I understand it's not needed for everyone and people shouldn't assume that relationships like yours are impossible/unreal.

Ohhh! I guess that makes sense, but I'm surprised that people assume sex = PIV. I always think of sex as including foreplay, or really any sexual activity that involves the genitals - so oral sex, digital sex, mutual masturbation, etc. I honestly didn't realise people might just mean PIV, because surely a sexual session has to involve more than that, right?

Interesting to see that PP assume sex has to end with the orgasm too. It might for some people, but for others an orgasm is often best at the beginning of sex, with more pleasure and orgasms to follow. A few PP also said sex is pleasurable enough without orgasms - and yes, obviously it's pleasurable, but having orgasms too is just...better. No man is going to say he'd 'rather not' have orgasms.

I'm starting to think that a lot of people are just having very bad, boring sex, and don't know any better 🤔 I'm a little shocked by all the 'women don't need orgasms!' language, which seems to be just trying to paper over the fact that women aren't being properly sexually satisfied, and so have to put up with and justify the crumbs they do get. It's not very sexually liberated.

Reported. And I never said anything about benefits cheats. I was asking if you had never made a judgement on someone on the internet.