ANSWERS: 1
  • It is situational to some extent. As we have discussed, my gf and I have had multiple sex partners - mostly in the early days - and she even coaxed me into having a gay relationship. (Mostly sex, but it became, for a time, a little more than that.) She was fine with that - and I was fine with her being with other men - so long as either of us knew about it, or in a few cases that we were watching to get turned on. I won't lie, I would get jealous from time to time when she was with other men, but I loved her, realized that she had sexual needs, too, and basically trusted her love for me. Funny thing - as time wore on we found we didn't WANT to be with other people. We became monogamous - with a few exceptions just for fun - or you remember the story of my birthday gift - and since we became parents we have had a threesome all of two times - with women friends of her. To me, at least, the crux of the issue is knowledge. If my gf came to me and said that she wanted to have sex with another man, yup, I would be hurt, but I would understand. She, at the least, has done the same for me. On the other hand, if I found out she was having sex with another man behind my back, that would be something else. The line between fidelity and infidelity is NOT necessarily sex, it is rather trust and love or the absence of the same. P.S. Unrelated note. I wanted you to know that I read your reply on your abortion and it touched me very much. I wrote something in reply. Not sure if you saw it but wanted to draw your attention to it.
    • officegirl
      Thank you but I don't think we can label it "infidelity" if both people are on board with it. Then it becomes "consenting adults" . I meant when people think of it as that. We can be very liberal with our spouse/s/o but there always is a point at which some kind of line is crossed. Wish we had the ability to message privately on here because would be interesting to discuss our feelings of jealousy. I understand there are different kinds of unfaithfulness. How far can we go and still be yours? I put my husband through a lot especially at the beginning of our marriage and I know he was not OK with some of it though he is too much a gentleman to mention it as he had accepted me as I was because he found it interesting and had come to the conclusion that there must be something else besides absolute sexual "fidelity". He did a lot with me at first then pulled back because he was clearly not comfortable with some of it. He enjoys women but he is less interested in sex generally . I mean he is interested but after an hour or gets antsy and wants to do something else. I appreciate the stretch he initially made to accommodate me but eventually it got so he didn't want to be around if I were with young men. Men closer to our age and friends and people he trusts he is OK with but my feeling is he thinks I am comparing him with younger men which is not so at all.
    • dorat
      Yes, actually, you are right. My point was that it becomes infidelity the moment we go from knowledge to concealment. Strictly speaking, infidelity is any deviation from monogamy. Fidelity is an attachment to one person. Anything that is not that is infidelity - and here I make the distinction between infidelity and unfaithfulness, the latter implying a moral commitment whereas the former, strictly speaking, does not. At any rate, I do agree with you, but took a more literal reading of the term than you did. Beyond that, we don't have the option to private message, but feel free to use this forum. Obviously, the limit on your side will be your own comfort level, but on my side, you know me. I will be be pretty straightforward and if I think I am crossing a line in terms of my relationships, I will either ask my gf if she would object to my saying something, or alternatively, if I think I cannot answer a question, I will just tell you outright. I will "save" this question so that I can easily check it. Your choice, of course, and I can certainly see why, for reasons of your own privacy you may not want to run with this idea. Let me know either way - but I have certainly found my conversations with you to be interesting and profitable. (In fact, I asked a question tonight that was inspired by something I told you but that I realized I had never mentioned to my gf. (A hypothetical about raising her baby if I was not the father.) When I told her, she was A) very touched, and B) impressed and said to me, why don't you see what others on the site think? Anyhow, sorry for the digression. Bottom line, I tend to see infidelity/unfaithfulness as the point where deception comes into play. I think, beyond that, I have given you a general sense of where I am coming from, but would be happy to discuss it further.
    • dorat
      By the way, I neglected after all of that to mention my own general view. Look, I am a guy. I have pride and I love my gf with all my heart and although we were "easy going" when it came to sex, I won't lie and tell you there were not moments - when I watched another guy having sex with her - that I was not jealous. It came out of nowhere in a lot of ways. I had been thinking, "This is soooooo hot," and then I would be thinking to myself, "No! She is mine and I love her and I DON'T want to share her with anyone." For all the particulars, every guy wants his s/o to think he is the best provider (and father if appropriate) and the best friend and the best stud in bed. It is our sexual instincts, and it is the fact that we need to feel loved and respected. We continued to play around for a bit, but over time I think she could tell how I was feeling and she told me that she loved me too and we came to realize that we were more happy when it was just us. Every now and then we still go crazy - but now it is less, say, a threesome, than we will do something like having sex in the backyard or something like that. Of course, having little ones has also limited us. (Which is why we always make sure to have a date night once a month and why, since our "anniversary" is by coincidence right around Valentine's Day, we always book a long weekend around that day either in the city or on the Bay, leave the kids with my gfd's sister, and do a grown-up weekend. Sorry, again I digress.) Bottom line, though, I did get jealous but two things. 1) We were doing what we did for fun and I had no business changing the game, and 2) I love my gf and want her to be happy and sexually fulfilled and because I love her I trusted her. I knew the difference between our, sorry, animal instincts and our deeper love. So I trusted her - and frankly, it paid off. She appreciated my openness because I did it for her, and she trusted me. Where would I draw the line? Concealment for sure - and if I also found out my gf was bad mouthing me to someone else she was having sex with - or anyone really. That I would take as a betrayal without doubt. (Also, if she started to refuse to have sex with me while still having it with someone else.) Those are my obvious lines - and they are a bit blurry given that we are now much more monogamous then we were.) Hope that gives you a start on where I am coming from. Feel free to respond if you are comfortable doing so.
    • officegirl
      Isn't "infidelity" the Latin for "unfaithful"?
    • officegirl
      I guess you can save what you want but most of these subjects are of continuing interest to me so would not have to relate just to a particular question. Do you really ask her if she thinks its OK for you to answer a particular question? I always knew what most men wanted from me and many times I would try and be like that but I did spend a good amount of time sneaking around. And the way I looked at it (or perhaps justified it) was in thinking that because of the way I was no man would ever really "love" me so I had to go with what was available to me. I was such a non-entity as a teenager - almost like I wasn't there, didn't exist. The drugs into which I escaped of course did not help matters. But sex affirmed me - besides feeling great it made me feel wanted and beautiful. So of course I sought it. It was maybe all I could do at that time that was acceptable to people. Besides work in the kitchen. I was very idealistic and I just bristled at the notion that anyone could dictate to me who and under what circumstances I was to give myself. I needed the close continuing relationships and I drew strength as well as knowledge from them. And I truly did not want to hurt anyone. So I just concluded that because they would not understand I could not tell them.. A lot of it was I would get off from whatever menial job I had and my boyfriend would be working and I would get stir-crazy. So I would get in my old Mercury Cougar and drive to someone's house (mostly unannounced I should add) where I knew I would find welcome and love. That is if he were not otherwise busy or with someone else. Mostly casual things with men I liked, often former boyfriends, with whom I knew I would feel good and be accepted and affirmed. Before my mid 20s I never had any real other interests. Nor any fulfilling work. Sometimes my boyfriends would find out and it would lecture me in the middle of the night. "Don't you have any self-respect", "why do you hate me", "why do you need to do this", "Its either him or me" etc. Which always made me feel I had not been careful enough in trying to conceal my activities. Sometimes I was not at all. I remember I spent a weekend with someone and told my boyfriend I was "visiting friends". But when I got back he opened my diaphragm while I was asleep and saw I had used it. My boyfriends all liked me and having me around but they were never I don't think really in love with me. Cause I was just too different and I always saw them in more conventional relationships with girls I could never even hope to compete with. . So when they would find out things would sort of continue the same for awhile but now knowing about me I could feel them usually cool towards me and disconnect from me. Which meant I had overstayed my welcome and it was time for me to move on. Interestingly I was most often the person who physically ended it. But always sort of left the door open so I could be casual with them in the future if they wanted it. Your gf did not seek out activity with other men but rather engaged in it as part of your relationship which is something a lot different than the way I was. Now I have lost my thread of thought and duty here calls so I must jump off for the time being. Thank you.
    • dorat
      You misread what I wrote. 1) To get the minor point out of the way, faithful and fidelity have the same Latin root, but the usage differs somewhat. 2) I said I would "Save" this question to make it easier for us to correspond. You said that you wanted to correspond. I figured that it would be easier to go back and forth using one question rather than chasing each other all over the site. 3) In that connection, I said I would ask my gf if I was about to say something that might be regarded as too personal, given that if we were going to correspond everything we said would end up in a public forum since there is no private e-mail option. In short, yes, I would ask my gf if it is something that involves her because I care about her and I try to put her feelings and thoughts uppermost in my mind. I know much of how she thinks, but it would be rude and a case of taking her for granted if I simply said whatever I wanted out in public without considering her feelings. As you noted, I have been very blunt on this site and have talked about many personal things, but I draw the VERY sharpest line when it comes to my gf and to my children.
    • dorat
      Okay, with those things out of the way, I will focus on the rest of what you wrote. (Please note that I separated out the three points above to make them easier to read since we are not allowed - on this site - to write in paragraphs.) Anyhow, a couple of things. I took your question to mean where would I draw the line within a committed relationship. If I have a one night stand or casual sex, the person I slept with does not need to know anything about me. My gf, on the other hand, is certainly another matter. I want her to trust me and I want to trust her. To get that, I need to be open and honest. Of course, when it came to sex, my gf and I were rather libertine to start, but that's the funny thing. As time wore on we realized that while the casual sex was fun, we enjoyed sex the most when we shared it just the two of us. Yes, we still do "risque" things - did I mention the hotel pool in the Caribbean? Yes, every now and then we do something unconventional - I think I told you about my birthday present a few years ago, and in that case it actually became something of an argument between us until I realized how much it meant to her to give me that gift. However, mostly, I want to share myself with my gf. Sex serves two functions for a man - not counting reproduction. 1) It is the way we show a girl we love them. 2) It is the way we satisfy our most basic biological urges. Often those two things conflict and my gf is unusually tolerant if I need to find other sexual outlets. (In fact, more often than not, she is more open than I need her to be.) I owe her at least that much in return. What makes it work - I love her and trust her and will be honest with her. (Of course, as I say, we are largely monogamous now.) In a way, if you don't mind my saying, you were your own worst enemy in terms of having a committed relationship. You said you thought that no man would love you when you were a teen - and so you made sure none did. I am not surprised that a guy who found out you were having sex with other men would conclude that you were not interested in him except to have a good time. Given that men use sex to satisfy their urges as well as express love, they rolled with having sex and any chance at love went out the window. They would be cool toward you? I am not surprised. The thing with my gf is that, after everything I had been through, my affair and the abortion and all of that, we started monogamous. Then as we fell in love more and more we started to think of ways that sex would be more fun as well. Then we tried things like threesomes - and I think I told you that I was having gay sex for a while. (Interestingly, my gf started it and asked me to end it. Short version: The guy and I had been having sex - mostly in front of my gf but sometimes, because that is what he asked for in return, just he and I. My gf went out of town and the guy asked if he could spend the week with me. My gf said yes - but when she got home she told me that she was beginning to feel uncomfortable about the whole thing and would I mind if we ended it. I was relieved in one sense and agreed, though the guy - his name was Mike - and I had become quite close and if I am to be fully honest there was a somewhat romantic feel about our friendship.) Anyhow, I digress. So we partied for a while but as time has worn on, we have settled down, so to speak, and again, sex has been about just us. You sort of reversed the order - and that I think, no offense, made it harder for you to meet someone. The bottom line is that, no matter how wild it got, the sex always came back to us. Personally, I think you underestimate yourself. I bet you were - and are - more attractive physically and interesting conversationally, than you give yourself credit for. Somebody told you that you were not and you bought it. Too bad, there are a lot of guys out there who would have benefited by knowing you. (I think again of your brothers....
    • dorat
      Sorry, but young successful good looking guys don't sleep with their sisters if they think she is ugly and useless. Somewhere along the line, someone convinced you that you were not attractive. Baloney! I bet you were - and even now are - a looker, as the old expression went. Anyhow, I hope I have not offended or been too personal. It is just that I get tired of hearing you running yourself down. Although you have your moments, gosh knows, I have found you on the whole to be an intelligent and sensitive person. You deserve better and I will bet my next paycheck that what you will find with your husband is that the sex he loves best is the sex he has with you. (He may not be, I sense, the most sensitive lover, but as you know, guys can be like that.) Well, now you've heard it. I do get on my high horse - the result of a career in politics I guess - and at this point my gf would smile, roll her eyes and give me a peck on the cheek with maybe an, "Okay, honey" thrown in. Now you can sympathize with what every day of her life for the last ten years - actually more if you count before she moved in with me - is like. Think how much better off YOU are. Cheers!
    • dorat
      Last PS, if you get the time, would you mind answering my most recent question? I will explain later why it came to my mind.

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