TL;DR - My wife (35f) and I (35m) recently started exploring swinging. Shortly thereafter, she realized that she was more interested in solo dating, which I am both curious and nervous about. It’s been a challenging start with high highs and low lows, and I am seeking advice on how to proceed. Sorry that the post is so long … hopefully the details are helpful. 

My wife and I are in our mid-thirties and have been together for 13 years, married for 6 years. We have a loving, supportive marriage and a healthy sex life. We were monogamous until recently, though have been regular listeners of Dan Savage throughout our marriage and so have both been curious about “monogam-ish” relationships for some time. About 1 year ago we learned that some close friends had opened up their relationship, which inspired us to give it a try. 

We both did some reading on open relationships, and I found myself most interested in swinging as a good way to dip our toes into ENM. I liked that the swinging community is very couple-focused and so there was theoretically less risk of catching feelings for someone else or growing apart from one another relative to dating solo, though I recognize that’s definitely not a given. I wasn’t opposed to trying solo dating, but it didn’t feel like the place to start. 

My wife was happy to start with swinging as well, so over the course of the past 12 months we’ve gone to a few parties, joined some apps, and gone on two dates with other couples. It was a pretty slow start though. My wife didn’t love the party atmosphere or find that she felt that attracted to any of the guys, so we only played together at the first couple of parties (which we quite enjoyed!). And while we went on one good date with another couple, we haven’t had a chance to play together yet. We did end up having a light threesome with a woman - let’s call her J - at the most recent party we went to a couple of months ago - my wife and J made out while I played with my wife. We then met up with J again a few weeks ago and had a threesome where we all played together - which I loved and my wife also enjoyed, though she doesn’t identify as bisexual, so it wasn’t exactly her thing (though she said she’d be down to do it again). It was my first time sleeping with a woman who wasn’t my wife in ~13 years, and I also enjoyed having my wife in the mix. 

Around the same time as the threesome, my wife brought up that she was interested in solo dating for a few reasons including:

1. The parties weren’t really doing it for her because she’s more demisexual and doesn’t feel attraction without knowing someone a bit more. And we were not having much success meeting other couples on the apps, in part because we live in a town where there aren’t a ton of people on Feeld. We’re 1.5 hours from SF, but driving so far for a date that might be a flop isn’t all that appealing. 
2. She felt like it would be a very different and perhaps better dynamic for her to date without me there. We went on one date with a guy together before that because we are both interested in MMF threesome, and it made her feel that she wouldn’t be able to tap into potential romantic energy in the way that she would want to with me there.  

Perhaps not surprisingly, she already had an idea of who she might want to go on a date with, and it was a guy from her gym - let’s call him P. She thinks P is a good candidate because he’s moving out of state at the end of the year, so there’s a definitive time limit. I was a bit taken aback by this, but also wanted to be supportive of her exploring ENM as I had been the one driving our exploration before this. I was also theoretically open to and excited about solo dating, as it’s logistically simpler and also sounded fun. We also agreed that we were going to explore friends-with-benefits without emotional attachments, rather than polyamory (though I recognize that’s easier said than done).  I gave my blessing for her to invite P out for a drink. This is when we started encountering some challenges.  

I started feeling quite jealous in the hours before her date and raised those feelings to her. She assured me I had nothing to worry about and said that she’d give me a special treat later that night. She also agreed to no sex on the first date and offered to send me sexy updates throughout the night. Long story short, she didn’t really send any updates or clearly communicate when she would be home. She ended up staying out until 1am with him, though they didn’t hook up at all and he actually rejected her advance because he had just gotten out of an LTR (sounds implausible, but I 100% believe her). I went to bed alone that night pretty angry because I felt like she had blown off our post-date hookup plans and showed extremely little consideration for my feelings. The next morning she apologized profusely and said that getting rejected by him kinda shook her (she’s gorgeous so not used to getting rejected), and so she just felt like staying out drinking and chatting. We talked through it and made up.

Fast forward a week or so and the guy asks her for a ride home from the gym. She considerately checks with me to make sure I’m OK with that, which I was. A couple of days later she and I are talking about potential MMF threesomes and she brings up that maybe this guy would be down. I’m surprised because last I heard he had rejected her, but apparently, during the ride back to his house, he expressed that he is in fact interested. She asks for permission to go on another solo date with him. I wanted to be supportive and also felt a bit that I “owed” my wife for the threesome, so I gave my permission and also gave her permission to sleep with him. I was pretty anxious the night of her date, and we hadn’t yet set any rules about curfew, etc., so it was pretty painful to be in bed alone trying to sleep. She got home around 11pm when I was still awake. I asked if she slept with him. She had. 

I was completely crushed in a way that I did not anticipate and had what was in retrospect a minor panic attack. This was very new for me, as I am usually very emotionally stable. I communicated to her how hurt I was, even though I recognized that I had given her explicit permission to sleep with him. She did try to comfort me and said nice things about how great I am relative to him, but when I asked her how she felt about my reaction, she communicated that she felt frustrated because I had been encouraging us to explore ENM more deeply, and now that she had found something in ENM that she was really excited about (i.e. dating solo), I was seemingly not OK with it. She also said that she really wanted me to explore where my intense emotional reaction was coming from as it suggests there may be some underlying issue, and she wanted me to work through that because she was excited to continue dating solo. I think her perspective is 100% valid, but in my deeply vulnerable state, it was not easy to hear. In retrospect, I needed her to show me physical and emotional affection and tell me that we could slow things down, rather than be frank with me that solo dating was now feeling important to her so she hoped I could get over my initial extremely negative reaction. I barely slept that night and was a mess the next day. 

I was extremely disappointed in myself for my reaction, as I have never been a jealous person and want to be self-confident and sexy. But I also just felt so betrayed and hurt, even though she didn’t break any rules. She agreed to put things on pause for a couple of weeks, but encouraged me to go on solo dates so that I could see that new people can be fun, but really can’t compare to the bond that she and I share. I went on a solo date, which was fun, and also - with my wife’s permission - made plans to go to a swinger party with J (the woman from the threesome) because my wife didn’t want to go. 

After lots of reflection and introspection, I thought that I could be OK with here going on more solo dates with a few more rules - at least while we get started - including a curfew, a limit on the number of dates with the same person per month, and also not telling me about whether they have sex, as I want to be ignorant for now. A couple of nights ago she went out on another date with P (the guy from her gym) with my blessing. It was much easier to deal with - in part because I had a solo date that night - and also because I had gotten more used to the idea of her sleeping with him. I still had some anxiety, but we had sex when she got home and I didn’t feel too bad. She’s going on her final date with P this weekend while I’m at the swinger party with J. It’s the final date because we are traveling starting next week, and P is moving out of state before we get back. I am not feeling too anxious about it, and I am pretty excited to go to the party with J. 

With our upcoming travel and gym guy moving away, I think will be a nice break for us to reevaluate things. If it were purely up to me, I’d probably want to stop solo dating and just go back to trying swinging, assuming my wife is still interested in swinging. We have found some more potential matches on Feeld, so I’m thinking we could likely make something happen without going to the parties that my wife doesn’t enjoy. And while I am somewhat excited about solo dating, it doesn’t feel worth the heartache and risk to me. I also worry that even though I’ve had some good early connections, it’s going to be a lot harder for me to find other women to see than it will be for her to find other men.

However, I am pretty sure my wife will want to keep solo dating, and I am worried about letting her down if I try to pull the plug. Despite some really intense emotional pain, our exploration so far has also brought good things to our relationship - lots of open and honest communication, even stronger sexual desire between us, feeling motivated to be a better partner and not take her for granted because I feel threatened by other suitors. I want to be the type of person who is confident enough in our relationship to continue exploring together and solo, and I am confident in the strength of our bond. That being said, r/swingers is filled with testimonials of how solo dating can ruin a marriage, and I really don’t want to jeopardize what we have. It feels like we are opening Pandora’s box with solo dating - more so than with swinging - and I personally could get the fun and excitement that I’m looking for with just swinging. I wish my wife could too.

I am in the process of looking for a therapist to discuss my initial reaction to her first sleeping with P, as I do think that warrants further introspection. We are also going to start couples therapy to help us work through some of these issues related to ENM, as well as other issues in our relationship. 

I would love to crowdsource wisdom and advice on how to proceed. My gut is telling me to ask my wife to put solo dating on hold until we can work through more of these issues in couples therapy. If that means putting swinging on hold as well, I am fine with that.