Partner wants me to sleep with other men…

[AnOddOne]

I’ve nc for this.

Has anyone else had experience of this? I’ve expressed no interest in sleeping around and I’m perfectly happy with my partner. We’ve been together for nearly twenty years (I’m mid-fifties, he’s early 60s) and have a regular, fun and interesting sex life. He has ED which we’ve worked through together (with the help of Viagra) so that isn’t an issue and at no point have I said it is one. I’m post-menopause and while I’m confident in my skin and still enjoy sex I really have no urge to get involved with anyone new.

Increasingly regularly, he’s suggested I can sleep with other men ‘if I want’. He says he gets off on the idea. A threesome would make more sense to me (although it isn’t something we’ve done) but I just don’t understand why he’d want me to go off and do that. However hard I try to think about it rationally I can’t come up with anything because it isn’t rational. Like a lot of women, I couldn’t shag someone without becoming close to them.

Does anyone have any insight into why he’s suggesting this? I’ve asked if it’s because he wants to do the same but he says he has no interest in that and he just wants me to ‘enjoy myself’. But I do, with him! Everything else about our relationship is lovely, more so I suspect because we don’t live together and only see each other a couple of days a week.

When he makes these suggestions it makes me feel as though he thinks our most intimate times are unimportant. When I’ve put this to him he says I’m being silly and it doesn’t mean that at all.

Any insights? I really don’t want to ‘LTB’ because everything else about our relationship is great.

You have implied that you play with Dom/sub and humiliation stuff. Assuming that he’s the sub there, then this is a (radical) extension of his submissive fantasies. It’s almost certainly nothing to do with him being gay, having an affair or undervaluing you in his mind. It’s a submission kink that has developed. I say this with…er… some certainty.

It’s ok for him to raise it. But once you say absolutely not, he should stfu about it. I don’t think it’s a problem that our partners might harbour fantasies that don’t interest us. But we don’t have to enact them, and neither do they.

I'm interested in how you differentiate between those who can indulge in same sex sexual 'behaviour' & those who basically couldn't if they tried.

Having in the past discussed people we know who have participated in this, although DH & I have nothing at all against same sex relationships we agreed personally we would have absolutely no desire or even the ability to participate. In this respect I also feel people need to be bisexual to have the ability to perform in this way, although again it's only an opinion based on our own feelings on the subject.

i can't remember if you're the other poster on this thread who has done swinging too? If so you get that you may try something and decide it's not for you or try something and find surprisingly you liked it. And some things are a flat no. Part of what I enjoy about our unconventional sex life is exploring my boundaries and there's fun in that by itself. There's also fun in the energy of a group dynamic and to an extent in the performance of it all. There's also a lot of genuine pleasure in watching, and that requires both sexes to be present (for me anyway)
I know some/most people won't understand how a straight person can have fun in a sexual context with other people of the same sex but they can and do. We aren't the only straight couple on the scene who engage in mixed group activities! Within that we all have our personal boundaries of things we will and won't do, and there are things we have both tried that we're not for us so we didn't try them again. No regrets though! I'd rather know than wonder..:

Um... it's a really common fantasy for straight men.

An MMF threesome doesn't mean the two men actually touch each other or have any sexual attraction to each other. In fact, I'd say that it very rarely does. It means they both have sex with the woman. They rarely have any physical contact with each other at all; they're usually either both doing stuff with the woman at the same time, or one's doing stuff and the other one's watching, but their focus is the woman and the men rarely do anything to each other at all. It's probably one of the most common themes in straight porn and one of the most common things straight people do/are looking for in swingers' clubs etc.

I appreciate you might never have heard of this but it's not at all unusual. If a bloke gets off on 'sharing' a woman with another man or watching another man with his partner, that absolutely does not mean they're gay or bisexual and it's massively misleading and alarmist to suggest that it does.

Yes, exactly.

Hi OP,

I'm a man with this kink. Engaged in it with a previous partner a couple of times.

Mentioned it once to current DP as part of a broader conversation about fantasies, and she was very much not into the idea, so dropped it like a hot rock and have never brought it up again.

It's a hard one to explain why it's something I'm into, but I think most posters are on the wrong track when they talk about your husband potentially being gay or wanting an excuse to shag someone else. While I am bisexual, for me when I fantasise about it the fantasy is very much about my partner, the man doesn't really feature except as someone for my partner to get pleasure from.

And that is what the fantasy is about for me, my partners pleasure. Its about wanting to see her trying something new, something different, without being directly involved myself. Unlike your husband, I don't really see the point of doing it unless I'd be watching, but I suppose I do find it hot when DP talks about experiences from prior to meeting me, so I can see why just hearing about it after the fact might be exciting for him.

At the end of the day though, the entire fantasy for me is built around DP enjoying it. Even if I did convince her to do it, she'd only be doing it for me, which defeats the point, so what on earth would be the point of me ever bringing it up again.

The fact that your husband keeps bringing it up despite the fact that you've said you're not interested, suggests that this is far more about his own wants than any misplaced belief that you'd enjoy it it you only let yourself. I'd be reading him the riot act at an absolute minimum, and leaving him if he ever brought it up again.

100% no, I'm not that person & couldn't if I tried. I'm satisfied with who & what I have😂

Sorry OP, but if you were my friend I'd be pushing you to go to the sexual health clinic for a check up. You say he's been curious about having sex with other men, and has suddenly started to push you to have sex with other men; its possible he's been experimenting and thinks this will 'even things up'.

Dont get that. It doesnt make sense.

If it really is based only around seeing her enjoying herself, why would watching her using a toy on herself not do the trick?

It was a gloomy 3am when I wrote that and I was trying to put down how I felt about this type of thing and how it affected my marriage etc....whilst bidding on something on eBay! 🙂

But inviting someone into our marriage and going down that road saved our marriage in some ways. It cured my ED which was around for a few years because it was obviously a turn on but also took the pressure off me, sexually. I didn't have to worry about sexual performance.

But, our relationship suffered. We lost some of the softness, I suppose. We're good together. We go holiday. Our daughter got married last year and we're both close to retirement. But we're a different now, as a couple.

OP, I experienced a similar thing with my ex. He even went as far as inviting a man to our home. ( it didn't happen as I kicked off) He was a very macho bloke but I truly think he wanted to have sex with a man. Weirdly his new girlfriend looks very masculine.

He would regret it if you did. He's probably relying on the fact he doesn't think you know anyone who you'd actually do it with.

If you said, ok I'll do it with your brother. What would he say?
Or bring up a page of male escorts who mostly serve men and have inhumane sized penises and start picking them out? Presumably he's paying?

Haha. He's a mug who doesn't know what he wants.

Don't get me wrong, that's fun, but it's not quite the same. If DP does that, then it's for my benefit. If she's masturbating in front of me, it's not because she wants to masturbate, it's because she knows I find it hot and turns me on. It's the same the other way round. I enjoy masturbating, but it's not something I'd choose to do when in DPs company. I'd rather she be getting me off instead. I have done it in front of her, but its because she wanted to see it rather than because it's something I wanted to do in the moment.

Effectively, she's putting on a show for me. And thats not what I'm looking for with this specific kink. It's the same if we were actually to go through with her having sex with someone else. I don't want her to do it for me, I don't want her to put on a show. I'd want her to be doing it because it's something she wants to do, I'm just a fly on the wall.

Agreed. It's very clearly about HIM getting something out of seeing her do that particular thing, probably because of its taboo nature, because of a cuckolding kink, or because of some degree of sexual feelings towards the other male.
Which is fine if she's into it, but let's not pretend it's all about him just wanting to please her.

Because if the fantasy was ONLY about wanting to see your partner have a fantastic time with loads of pleasure - and even try something new! - then there's no need to involve another person. It can be done within the relationship in a myriad of ways.
There's obviously another driving motivation there (which again, is fine if both people are equally into it).

But all that would still apply if she was doing it with another man. Putting on a show for you. I appreciate you haven't pushed her to do this but I honestly don't see the difference if the kink really is just about her enjoying herself, because she'd be enjoying herself doing that, and either way, by having you watch it's about putting on a show for you.

I don't know, I guess kinks aren't always logical, but I don't think this one really is based solely on her pleasure.

It doesn't have to make sense to you, because it's not your relationship. If it makes sense to the people involved, that's all that matters.

I dont mean that. I mean what's the difference between marriage and relationship. She said it was good for one not the other and I didnt understand what distinction she was making between the two.

Several years ago DH and I were discussing fantasies and he admitted that this was one of his. I admitted it was one of mine too.

That's where it has stayed. A mutual fantasy.

It hasn't changed our relationship at all. There is certainly no inadequacy on either part. We have a very healthy sex life and neither of us are gay or having/had an affair. It's nothing to do with humiliation. Quite the opposite.

Everybody is different.

That's kind of my point though.

So, with my ex who I did experience this with, it was fairly casual. We weren't dating anyone else, but if one of us pulled on a night out, we weren't bothered. So, when she slept with someone else, it was because she wanted to sleep with someone else. The two times I watched while that happened, I really was just a fly on the wall. She was shagging him because she wanted to shag him, I was just along for the ride. And yes, she might have behaved slightly differently because I was there, but that wasn't the point.

With DP, that would never happen. I'm what I'd term as emotionally monogamous rather than sexually monogamous. While I only want to be in a relationship with one person, I could quite happily have sex outside of that relationship. I don't, because the person I've chosen to be with would not be up for that.

DP on the other hand is both emotionally and sexually monogamous. She only wants to be having sex with the person she's in a relationship with. So if she ever decided to make this fantasy a reality, then she'd by definition be doing it for me. It'd be an act. And that's not the point of the fantasy.

To give an equivalent that doesn't involve a third person -

DP likes having hot candle wax dripped on her. To be honest, dripping hot wax on her does nothing for me, but I do it because she likes it, and doing it is no skin off my nose. DP knows I'm not getting turned on by it, but that doesn't change the fact that she enjoys it.

DP would also enjoy tipping hot candle wax on me. We've tried it, and again, it does nothing for me. In this case, DPs enjoyment of it is reliant on me enjoying it, so because I don't get off on it, DP doesn't. I could put on an act and pretend it's doing something for me, but what's the point really. I wouldn't get anything from it, and DP probably would see through my act and it wouldn't turn her on either.

Its the same with my fantasy. It'd only turn me on if it turned her on.

I’m not sure I perceive it as a fantastic relationship if he’s trying to get you to shag other men, not respecting your boundaries, clearly lying to you and possibly gay, it doesn’t meet my own definition of a fantastic relationship

My DH suggested something I wasn't comfortable with. I think sometimes it's difficult to separate fantasies from what reality would be like. I think as men get older they have a feeling they want to live out fantasies.

A quick reminder of the grim reality should hopefully make him understand the difference (it did for mine!)

While I appreciate your pov - I do - I think alarmist is way off base. No pearl clutching here! 😂

Hi Op apologies for that post, I truly hope you get a conclusion.

I am definitely not limiting myself, and he is not having his cake and eating it. And this says 'Prove it'. Prove that this is who YOU really are, and not something he's pressuring you into - which I can only do by continuing to see others - AND prove that this relationship is as valid as a monogamous one - which I can only do by not seeing others (because if it was as good as that I wouldn't want to. (Even though you don't measure monogamous relationships by whether people want others. Only by whether they deprive themselves of them.) So this just won't fit your model. And that's why I 'talked him up' as you put it. It's not for HIM. I'd never need to do that. (He'd laugh if I did!) it's to show that a relationship need not be 'less' in any way because tiny fraction of one part of it isn't exclusive. It's just not the big deal to me that it is to you.

I measure his value to me on what he gives me. Not what he doesn't give others. If anything, he is compromising harder than me, because he is mildly jealous of other men and I really don't care about other women. But those feelings are HIS responsibility. He deals with them on his own dime. It's up to him to decide whether to accept my terms, and I trust him to decide if it's a big deal and discuss change, or handle it himself. There are ABSOLUTELY men out there who would say that you could and then whine and pout and need a lot of emotional soothing and petting when you did, so you decide it's easier not to. And that would be having his cake and eating it and only a notional freedom. I have experienced that and left those men in the dust. That's what usually happens when men want to open up monogamous relationships. And that's precisely why I go into a relationship with these boundaries. It's much harder for me to open a relationship than close one.

When I said the best lover I meant sex. But this is independently the best relationship I've ever had. I hadn't really thought about it, but I think I would consider it if he asked for exclusivity. It's a small sacrifice and on balance it would be worth it. But, why rescind a privilege that hasn't been asked for? Also, I wonder if the mere possibility stops him falling into the patriarchal norm of making me responsible for holding that bar and giving me a little less all the time until I set a boundary? Maybe it's a great relationship BECAUSE he can't just settle into complacency? There is a theory that men who are into being cuckolded (as the OPs husband is) do it partly because it relieves the immense pressure they feel on their masculinity to be everything a woman needs in bed, especially when ED is a thing. Maybe I've got the flip side of that?