Opening Up summary

Imagine your partner reveals to you that he has a foot fetish, and all he wants to do is nibble on your toes. But the very idea creeps you out – you think feet are gross, and don’t want to participate. What do you do?

One approach that nonmonogamous couples take when their levels of sexual desire don’t match is to open their relationships up to casual sex with other people. That way, your partner can find someone who shares his fetish and can enjoy some no-strings-attached sex that doesn’t involve you.

Some people think of nonmonogamy as a free-for-all of endless sex, swinging, and parties. They might be disappointed to know that, more often, it involves endless conversations about boundaries, consent, and who’s going to take the kids to school.

As we’ve seen, there’s no cookie-cutter template for nonmonogamous relationships. That can be incredibly freeing. But it also means that you need to learn how to communicate very well, or the whole thing will fall apart. If you’ve been in a previously monogamous couple, you’ll need to have an honest conversation before you can even consider opening up your relationship, and figure out exactly what the ground rules are.

Designing strong nonmonogamous relationships involves making very clear agreements with all of your partners. These agreements center on what kinds of relationships are permitted, how much time everyone can spend with different partners, and what kinds of safe sex practices are allowed within and outside the couple or group.

It’s no exaggeration to say that these agreements are sacred. Everyone involved puts a lot of time and effort into agreeing on boundaries. People also make themselves vulnerable when they articulate clearly what they want and need. That’s why violation of these agreements can feel like as much of a betrayal as cheating in monogamous relationships.

Imagine you’re on the couch in an old T-shirt after a hard day of work. You’re exhausted and craving some cuddles with your partner – and then in she saunters, dressed to the nines, with a sparkle in her eye. She’s going out on a date with a new love interest! You immediately feel left out, and jealousy rears its ugly head.

Jealousy comes up in all relationships. In fact, in monogamous relationships we’re taught that we should be jealous if our partners so much as flirt with anyone else – it’s a way of showing we care!

Let’s do another thought experiment. You’re at home, on the couch again, in your ratty old T-shirt. Your partner is out on a date, which would usually drive you wild with jealousy. But this time, as you think of him dancing and making out with his hot date, something else happens. The thought of them together actually turns you on, and makes you feel elated.

This sensation of vicarious joy and excitement for your partner is called compersion. Instead of viewing his relationships with others as depriving you of something, you start to see them as adding to your life, because they make your partner happy and excited.

Coming out to friends and family can be one of the hardest parts of being in a nonmonogamous relationship. While society has started to accept lesbian and gay relationships, there’s still an expectation that these will mirror conventional monogamous structures as much as possible.

People are often threatened by the seeming ambiguity of multipartner relationships. And they may have few references for open or polyamorous relationships besides what they see on TV about “sister wives” and polygamy. What’s more, nonmonogamy may challenge their own monogamous ideals, which can be reinforced by deep-seated moral and religious values.

A common concern that people have about nonmonogamy is that it’ll destroy the family unit, which today is thought of as being a nuclear structure consisting of two heterosexual parents and their children.

But this concept of the family is quite recent. It used to be much more common for several generations of a family to live together under one roof, sharing domestic tasks. Over the last century this has changed, and there’s now much more pressure on parents to hold everything together without much support from other family members.