Episode 24: Monogamish?

In this episode, we talk about open relationships, poly-amory and other types of non-monogamous relationships.
These types of relationships characterised by agreement between the parties concerned have been glamourised and offered as a solution for the monotony of monogamy in the last decade or so.
But what’s the real reason why people choose to enter these arrangements?
We talk about:

•  Richard’s personal experience of an open marriage with his first wife
•  Why open relationships are often the easier road when compared to conscious monogamy.
•  How intimacy can sometimes destroy sex drive
•  Some tough questions to ask yourself if you’re thinking non-monogamy is the root to solve your relationship problems

We want to hear your thoughts and questions, so if there's anything you would like us to cover on the show, please drop us a line on 

 info@thebone-zone.com

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:01

Welcome to the Bone Zone. I'm Sarah.

SPEAKER_02 0:05

And I'm Richard.

SPEAKER_01 0:06

And in this podcast, we excavate sex and relationship myths and uncover the truth of how it all really works. We bridge the esoteric and practical worlds to bring you grounded, sage, and tangible advice and tools, whether you're looking to attract a soulmate relationship or grow and expand within an existing one.

SPEAKER_02 0:34

Good morning, good afternoon, good evening.

SPEAKER_00 0:37

Hello.

SPEAKER_02 0:38

I haven't finished. My wife informs me that she's feeling in a particularly silly mood today, so I don't know what's going to happen.

SPEAKER_01 0:49

Okay, well also, how would you not finish by then? You said good morning, afternoon, and evening.

SPEAKER_02 0:54

I didn't say good night.

SPEAKER_00 0:57

Yeah. It's a bit weird to say goodnight.

SPEAKER_02 0:59

No, it's not weird to say goodnight. If it's night time, I'm not gonna say fucking good afternoon or good morning.

SPEAKER_00 1:05

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:05

Anyway, enough of that crap. Just wanted to quickly run something past you all. We have been doing this for about six months now.

SPEAKER_01 1:15

Has it been that long?

SPEAKER_02 1:17

Yeah, November.

SPEAKER_01 1:18

I don't know where the time goes. I say this constantly. Yeah, about six months.

SPEAKER_02 1:22

You're right, you're right. And um my wife has been um working on a few things because we you have.

SPEAKER_00 1:31

I have.

SPEAKER_02 1:32

You have uh we feel that our podcasts are full of good information. We feel that we have reached out to people because uh I can see the statistics. We have quite a few followers now and quite a lot of downloads. So we have well Sarah has because she has been doing this for a number of years with uh clients, has been outlining a group program, which we don't know when we're going to roll this out, but we will keep you in the loop, and uh because we feel we have a stuff to teach people. We come from a place where we speak from our own experience and the pain that we've been through in our own lives, we're up front, we tell the truth, and um we're finding that quite a few people are resonating with us. So um Sarah's outlined a group program which we will at some point advertise.

SPEAKER_01 2:41

Thank you, husband.

SPEAKER_02 2:42

You didn't know I was gonna say that, did you?

SPEAKER_01 2:44

No, I didn't, it was a surprise. Um a few things to add. We do have things to tell people, not we feel okay, yes, agreed. And in terms of who we envisage that this program will be for, we are envisaging that our first program will be centred around couples.

SPEAKER_02 3:14

Yes. And uh that is the This is just the the teaser. This is a teaser. We will not, as some people do, do this stupid shitty half an hour spiel at the beginning to send everyone into a fucking coma.

SPEAKER_01 3:34

At least I do it with you know you've probably been talking about it. Okay, that's it.

SPEAKER_02 3:38

Right, no, that's it. That's it, we're done. I'm done. That's it. We will let you know. In the meantime, um, please, for those of you who do like to listen to us, and for those who resonate with what we have to say, please do us a favour. Just fucking go out and tell people to follow us, or to at least suggest leave reviews like and leave a review.

SPEAKER_01 4:02

Subscribe I can't speak. Subscribe, subscribe, review, follow, etc.

SPEAKER_02 4:11

Yeah, and just just tell people about us if you think we're any good, which we know that we are, so you know, get up off your asses and go and do it.

SPEAKER_01 4:20

Godspeed.

SPEAKER_02 4:22

Godspeed. Right, today we are talking about um open relationships.

SPEAKER_01 4:30

Slash polyamory. I think this is gonna be and polyamory because completely different things.

SPEAKER_02 4:35

Yeah, at the end of the last the last episode, you said maybe on this one you would shut the fuck up. I distinctly remember you saying that. So I'm going to introduce it. I will allow you to talk at some point, although I feel I don't have any choice in the matter, and that you will just talk anyway, and I'll let you do your thing because well, actually, you have a personal story to show. I do, I do. But first of all, I'm gonna run some the very meager statistics that I actually found uh online. Um this does not factor in. I mean, they say yes, we did a cohort studies with 25,000 plus people asking them about uh monogamous and non-monogamous relationships, etc. etc. First of all, this does not factor in the bullshit side of things. How many people are actually telling the truth about their sexuality and how they really feel about that, um, especially that subject. And how many couples were asked? So, like a a guy who wants to fuck around, for example, and someone comes in and says, Oh, we're doing this study, and um, how do you feel about it? And he might sit there and say, Oh no, no, I'm completely monogamous when he's just sitting there looking at some woman's behind or something like that.

SPEAKER_01 5:54

Sorry, that doesn't make any sense to me because well, someone looking at someone else's behind is not an indication of an open relationship with the other.

SPEAKER_02 6:06

Okay, now you're being pedantic.

SPEAKER_01 6:07

I'm just talking about being pedantic, we're talking about actually having sex with other people, not just looking.

SPEAKER_02 6:15

Yes, okay, thank you, Dare. Yes, she's correct. But what I'm trying to say is do people really tell the truth on how they really feel about this stuff? Well, that being said, currently about five percent of those who were asked are in a non-monogamous relationship, and in people's lifetimes, about 20 to 22 percent have had or are in a non-monogamous relationship. 34% said it would be something maybe that they they don't want complete monogamy, but they don't want complete non-monogamy either, somewhere in between. Yes.

SPEAKER_01 6:59

Oh, I think that has a term, it's called monogamy ish. That's a thing. Is that for real? That's a thing, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 7:05

Okay, and that makes me think of the manosphere. It's like uh the guys want to go, I can have a non-monogamous relationship, but you can't.

SPEAKER_01 7:14

Well, that's still a form of uh non-monogamy.

SPEAKER_02 7:18

Well, it is sort of also somewhere in between because one can and one's not allowed.

SPEAKER_01 7:23

Yes, I mean I think we should define what we're talking about here specifically. If we're talking about open relationships and/slash or polyamory, we are talking about it's all out in the open between the couple. Exactly what it looks like might vary, whether it's an open relationship, one-sided monogamy, monogamous, whatever, but there is an agreement as as uh distinct from concealing the fact that you are non-monogamous, i.e. cheating. So that's a completely different thing, and we're not talking about cheating today, although to be honest, I'd have more to say about that, but not with you, darling, not with you.

SPEAKER_02 8:14

Well, I never cheated, and even if I did, I'm such a shit liar, I could never hide it from you anyway.

SPEAKER_01 8:19

You really are a shit liar, but which is great, actually.

SPEAKER_02 8:22

I was gonna cover what you just said. Okay, okay, so no, no.

SPEAKER_01 8:26

But actually, just just in the spirit of being open, I have never been in an open very funny, never been in an open relationship of any kind, but I have cheated on every partner that I've ever had.

SPEAKER_02 8:43

It fills me with fucking confidence, that does.

SPEAKER_01 8:45

Apart from Richard.

SPEAKER_02 8:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:48

Now, actually, we could probably do that. Can you shut up now? Let me carry on with my fucking statistics. Yeah, okay. We could do a whole separate episode on cheating, so I'll park that there for now. Okay and the reasons why people cheat.

SPEAKER_02 8:59

Okay. May I? Yes, please. Thank you so much. I really appreciate it. So these um levels are slightly higher in the L B T GQ.

SPEAKER_01 9:09

I can't remember how that LGBTQIA plus. Continue.

SPEAKER_02 9:13

Okay, I don't know what the last three are. Anyway, um at 32%, they're okay with non-monogamy. Um, and there is a report of equal levels of relationship and romantic satisfaction reported between both monogamous and non, which opens up a whole question for me is how can people think that they're having equal amount of relationship and romantic satisfaction by being in an open relationship, which is the word that keeps dropping into my head is intimacy or lack thereof.

SPEAKER_01 10:00

Well, I look at it this way: if you are in a monogamous relationship that has lost its spark and intimacy, you can see how getting that outside of the relationship might increase satisfaction within the relationship.

SPEAKER_02 10:23

So agreed monogamy, non-monogamy, then, agreed upon. Yes, otherwise it's cheating.

SPEAKER_01 10:28

However, the harder thing to do, actually, the harder but ultimately more rewarding thing to do, in my opinion, is to focus on creating that deep intimacy and conscious monogamy, conscious, intentional sexual spark within a monogamous relationship.

SPEAKER_02 10:55

Do you think people are running away from intimacy in general? Intuitively, there are no statistics on yeah, absolutely. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 11:02

I mean, I have committed to being intimate with myself and with you, and I still want to run away. I still want to run away from it sometimes. I'm like, where the hell? Why have I opened it? It's not easy. It's really difficult to A look at yourself and B to develop the level of intimacy with yourself that you can actually develop a very deep intimate relationship with someone else. Because it starts with you and having to look at yourself.

SPEAKER_02 11:42

Yeah, absolutely. So I'm gonna basically I'm the one who has a story here about open relationship. When I was 26, I met my first wife, that was nearly 30 years ago, and uh we developed a relationship, and we ended up getting married, we separated uh God, 14, I can't remember, a long time ago now. And at the beginning, we were partying, we were doing a lot of uh things like well not a lot, but on a regular basis doing ecstasy and doing the whole clubbing scene. And my partner at the time, my pre-wife, uh, would not have a problem. She said, Yeah, yeah, you can you can sleep with whoever you want. Um, you can tell me, you cannot tell me, I'm absolutely fine with that. And I was like, Yeah, this is like a really sweet deal. Everyone thought I was the luckiest man alive, and so did I. Until we, you know, after a certain time in this kind of scene, you stop you stop taking uh these um drugs, and suddenly a massive wave of realisation hits. I realize, and I didn't actually go out and look for it every weekend.

SPEAKER_00 13:18

I wasn't like um um a horn dog is the word that comes to you like a horn dog.

SPEAKER_02 13:27

I don't know, I feel like that's somebody who slept around consistently like I had to cart blanche, and so that I would abuse it, but there would be situations whether in the context of a group or a threesome or whatever, and obviously I thought, hey, this alien-powered fucking sex warrior, and that was just the drugs talking because it all came crashing down when I stopped actually doing all of that.

SPEAKER_01 13:50

Ashley, can we can we take uh pause before we get to the stopping taking drugs point?

SPEAKER_02 13:55

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 13:56

Now, did this carte blanche that you had actually mean that the sex was exciting within your relationship as well? Yes, okay.

SPEAKER_02 14:08

Yes, it was. Um we had a bit of a weird one because we right up to the point we were married, so I'd known her for the best part of ten years, we lived in separate flats. She was fiercely independent. That worked for me because it meant I could do whatever the fuck I wanted during the week. We would meet on the weekends, we would party, we would have great sex, sometimes with other people as well, and uh during the week, if if it happened, then I could take anyone I wanted home as well. Also, um it worked for her as well. I had no problem to um to if she wanted to to see someone else. The fact is that she didn't, and that comes not really. On a couple of occasions in all our time together, she went because she had a friend of hers, they went out, they got to know this guy, and then they did they took him home basically. However, I came to realise after we sobered up that this isn't really what I wanted anymore. I felt that I did not have the connection that I thought I had. It was like a giant fucking slap in the face. She was really reserved about sex, she didn't really want it. We didn't even have sex on our honeymoon.

SPEAKER_01 15:37

I actually only found this out recently. You only told me this recently.

SPEAKER_02 15:41

I was like, eh. No, and it there was it was a problem, and at that point, I actually I could have used my green card and gone in, but I didn't, I didn't. I said no, we've got to sort this out, which actually drove even more of a wedge between us. Um I think the wedge was more on my side. I started to form feelings of resentment, and let me tell you, that feeling in particular is one of the worst you can feel, you know, when you sort of I can't even describe it. It's just an awful feeling to have to someone that you love dearly. Um and I later kind of it clocked, it dawned on me rather that this whole thing was Richard, you go out and fuck who you want because it was a way of completely washing her hands of the responsibility of intimacy of having sex with me, of being together and everything else that was what I thought a marriage would be, or that it was. So this for me, this thing of open relationship is not a healthy thing. For some people, they might convince themselves that it is. I really don't believe, and even intuitively, I don't believe that it is a healthy thing. Are we naturally monogamous? Maybe we weren't in the past or thousands of years ago. Who who the hell knows? But nowadays I think you are better off within the context of a couple and being monogamous and having creating that container of intimacy between the both of you. I think that's probably the most healthy thing that you could possibly do.

SPEAKER_01 17:46

Also a hard thing to do.

SPEAKER_02 17:49

Yes, it's extremely difficult, hence why people run away from it.

SPEAKER_01 17:53

So actually, it is much easier and more exciting in many ways. Um, whilst you're doing all of this work to build intimacy, it's much easier and more exciting to be like, hey, I'll go have this exciting sex with someone I don't know, because you don't have the intimacy there. And I remember, you know, when I was first with Richard, his greatest fear as he voiced it is someone not having sex within a relationship because obviously he'd had his past experience. And I I can say this in retrospect, I was unable to have really intimate sex. I thought I was able to, but I wasn't. So it worked very well at the beginning, where the first six months where everything's just like, yo, bang, let's have sex for ages, let's have loads of alcohol and this and that and the other. Um but what many find, and I think they attribute it to the wrong thing, as the intimacy increases, the sex drive can actually drop, or that want to have sex with each other drops. Yes.

SPEAKER_02 19:14

And people attribute that to boredom and lack of a spark, we're not meant to be monogamous, blah blah blah.

SPEAKER_01 19:23

We've been together a long time, all of the things that we're programmed to believe, but essentially it's an intimacy wall that's come up, and what you choose to do with that is up to you. Um, because I think it was what was it, about two, two or three years ago we were going through a phase where I was like, Oh my god, I'm so bored sexually. Um I think we both were, and then they were then we were like, Oh, maybe we should like uh try something different, like a threesome or something.

SPEAKER_02 20:03

Well, that's another story. We went to this sex club, didn't we?

SPEAKER_01 20:07

Yeah, we were both just like this is fucking horrible.

SPEAKER_02 20:11

It was like really CD and like Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 20:14

It just was not we never ended up doing anything. No, we didn't know. But it's interesting that that's where our minds went to. Oh, this is what we need to do to make it more exciting within our relationship. We need to look outside.

SPEAKER_02 20:29

Outside in again, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 20:30

We need to look outside to make it more exciting rather than working on creating this feeling of excitement from the inside out.

SPEAKER_02 20:38

And it's it and the these are and this is a work in progress. Sarah and I are are a work in progress. This is why we want to do a um a program with people to work with on the on these kind of things, so we can sort of at least um give what we've discovered by ourselves without any real textbooks or anything, and to to be able to impart this information with others because it's fucking difficult, it's not easy sometimes. You want to give up, but um, you could call this a kind of a soul path, soul pool, a purpose.

SPEAKER_01 21:16

And here's the thing: relationships and sex are intertwined. Again, I mean romantic relationships, obviously not having relationships with my friends, but sorry, not having sex with my friends. Okay, tangible. Um relationships and sex are intertwined, and again, it's another cop out to say, oh, but we're such good buddies.

SPEAKER_02 21:47

Yes, it is a cop out.

SPEAKER_01 21:48

Um we're such good friends because you are missing out on one of the defining features of a romantic relationship over a

SPEAKER_02 22:00

platonic relationship obviously both have their place a hundred percent but let's talk about the difference the difference is sex and sexual feelings yeah absolutely are you passing the mic to me yes um I just agree we both have our own mics but yes sorry we both have our own mics so I'm not passing it to you thank you for uh showing everyone how pedantic you really are you so yes we have been working on this for for two two three years I didn't even know what intimacy was I thought actually when I was with my ex-wife I thought that intimacy was how dirty you can be in a bedroom that's what I thought what intimacy was which is how kinky you can be which is a whole lot fucking easier when you've had drugs and alcohol let's face it. It was I I realized how much of not a good lover I actually was when I started doing this work because I thought I was I always give pleasure to women they always have an orgasm blah blah blah blah blah blah but I realized of really how not much of a great lover I was when starting to do this work starting to look into myself and starting to remove my blockages fuck me and this has been this has been going on for years and I'm still working on it and uh we have seen the light at the end of the tunnel and that's really amazing to be able to experience that that we've been you know after eleven years we are opening it all up and allowing it to happen and allowing to be in a position of receiving it and not wanting to run away from it and working at it.

SPEAKER_01 24:01

What is it? The intimacy the intimacy sorry the the you know our own intimacy and also between each other yes and that's that's just it right the decision to be monogamous is and to also still have sex and have satisfying sex is basically a decision that you make every single day to be intimate with yourself and intimate with someone else. And being intimate with yourself does not mean wanking of a porn so let's actually just deal with that because I was talking about this with friends and um I was talking about self-pleasure and someone said to me oh well so you just mean wanking and I'm like well kind of yes but no we're not we're not talking about watching porn at the same time we're not talking about playing some kind of fantasy in your head or reading a piece of erotic literature which is firing you up we're not talking about the outside in we're talking about generating that pleasure from the inside out so being very much in your body not disassociating from it by being up in your head or watching just feeling the sensations basically yes exactly that's what I mean by self-pleasure Sarah is absolutely right it's um it's easy it's easier said than done and um well it's probably a bit more difficult for guys because traditionally they're the ones who've used pornography more I think that's a generalization but okay well talking to guys yeah but women still you use the realm of fantasy whether they're fantasizing about subwarrier or a piece of sporotic literature that's fine but you know there's an extra dimension to pornography of how yes pornography has its own let's say darkness shall we say um but in either case we're talking about disassociating from the present moment of being in your body yes absolutely and that's and that's the key and we're still working on this and I think we'll be working on this for as long as we will be living yes I I would actually like to close out this episode by saying that if you are within the context of a couple and you're telling yourself that sex is just boring it's not exciting I don't really want to have it I don't think we're really monogamous or I don't think humans are really monogamous I feel like maybe we should explore an open relationship or whatever maybe you're telling yourself all of these narratives I would just encourage you to ask yourself the question is that really true? So am I running away from something here that I feel like is too difficult to go there whether it's intimacy with yourself and slash or intimacy with the other person and once you've asked yourself that question is there something that I'm running away from simply making the intention to face that is a big step because in that way you're not settling for either what everyone tells you monogamy is which is like this really boring thing it's as boring as you make it yeah which is this really boring thing or you are being tempted by things outside of your relationship right so you're getting away from settling for one of those two dynamics and yes it might be a harder road but setting the intent to really build a form of conscious monogamy where the spark stays over the long term is something that will will really pay off dividends in the longer term.

SPEAKER_02 29:13

Yeah well that kind of wraps it up I mean I I think in terms of the polyamory part oh my god like literally if we decided to talk about this there's like a billion documentaries on Netflix yes polyamorous communities and all of that I well maybe we do a different episode on polyamory I don't think I think that's even more of a case of people running away from stuff number one yes number two if you really want to there's an interesting documentary called how to build a sex room on Netflix this woman goes round these various couples and and constructs this um nice play area for their activities and there's this one where there's this uh they talk about polyamory so if you're interested go and watch it and see what you think about the whole polyamory. I don't uh I just feel for me personally it's just running away even faster than running away from monogamy.

SPEAKER_01 30:15

But um hey well there's no easier way to avoid building uh intimacy with yourself or any one person than to have a circle of people on rotation.

SPEAKER_02 30:29

Yeah it's just we're all together not even on rotation these people were all together actually that's true that's true but I think centred around one individual yeah one individual yeah yeah so well that's all folks um I hope you enjoyed this one um it got quite intimate didn't it but uh yes we'll we'll catch you on the next one in the meantime be good bye for now bye we'd like to thank you for tuning in and listening to this episode today. If you like what you heard I invite you to follow our show and if you really liked our show head over and leave a review on your podcast app of choice we also want to hear your thoughts and questions so if there's anything you would like us to cover on the show please drop us a line on the email below. Thank you for listening and until next time