CBC News Viewpoint
Story By: Georgie Binks
As people celebrate Valentine's Day with a loved one, it's amazing how many of them have more than just "one" special person in their lives.
With the advent of the dating site www.ashleymadison.com, thousands of people may be in a polygamous relationship without realizing there is a third (or fourth) person in the mix. If you aren't familiar with the website, it's for "women seeking romantic affairs and the men who want to fulfill them." The banner across the website is "When Monogamy Becomes Monotony."
Sharon Sharalike, the pseudonym of the woman who has penned The Ashley Madison Diaries about her adventures on the website, told me recently she encountered men who wanted everything from sexual intimacy to simple conversation. She says most men were trying to meet women without their wives' knowledge – some even going as far as saying they loved their wives very much. Her conclusion was, "I don't buy it. I don't think you can truly be in love with somebody and engage in that kind of activity. There's dishonesty involved. You know the other person is going to be hurt. I don't think you can deceive people you love."
A married man I know tells me he has slept with about 60 women in the past few years, ever since he started surfing internet dating sites. He doesn't feel his marriage is compromised – rather he's simply augmenting the sex part. However, last year when he started a serious affair with a woman, he forced himself to sleep on the couch at home, so that he would be faithful to the affair.
This brings up an interesting question: once sex turns into affection, is it possible to love more than one person? Yes, he could have sex with one, and love and occasional sex with the other, but loving both women was too difficult for him. Eventually he broke off the affair and went back to having sex with different women who meant nothing to him (oh, and enjoying Sunday dinner with his wife and kids). Perhaps he, as did Flaubert's Madame Bovary, had found in adultery all the banalities of marriage – not that it stopped him.
Some couples are honest with each other about wanting to bring another person into the mix, not for a long-term relationship, but simply for sex. Sue McGarvie, a sex therapist, www.sexwithsue.com , says, "Fifty per cent of people can do it well, but for 50 per cent it's absolutely a disaster." As a sex therapist, she recommends if a couple is exploring the idea, they go to an adult couples club.
Angie, with Club Xtabi, a couples club in Mississauga, on the edge of Toronto, says, "A couple that can bring someone into the relationship is a couple that has a very deep, understanding relationship built on communication and honesty. The people who are bored are the people who have an affair on the side without their spouse. The lifestyle couples are happy with their relationships – it's for sexual pleasure only." However, she feels it actually strengthens some relationships, saying, "It's another part of their lives they are sharing together. They don't have to have that secret liaison with someone else."
She has only seen a few couples where one partner left the other to go off with the person they played around with. For people who want simply to have affairs and keep them secret, McGarvie advises, "There are people who are incapable of being monogamous, who love their partners, but have several relationships along with their marriages. If you are going to have an affair, don't tell your partner. That is the most selfish thing I can imagine. If you're going to do the infidelity, you have to live with it."
I always remember one woman proudly telling me years ago, how she was having an affair with her husband's best friend. She'd been cheating on him right under his nose for years, and no one was any the wiser. She loved them both, would never leave her husband, and it all worked just fine – for her. And it would until, of course, someone arrived home from work one day at the wrong time.
According to last year's Tainted Love poll, conducted by Ipsos Reid, 31 per cent of Canadians said a partner had cheated on them. Those are the people who know – how many don't know?
It seems to me it isn't the sex that's the killer or the glue in relationships. After all, when the deceit of an adulterer is discovered it often ends a marriage, but when a couple knowingly takes a lover it can fuel their passion. It seems to be the honesty or lack of it that can be the real deal-breaker. Better the devil you can see than the one you can't – the one that looms quietly over a "happy marriage" waiting to strike.
With the advent of the dating site www.ashleymadison.com, thousands of people may be in a polygamous relationship without realizing there is a third (or fourth) person in the mix. If you aren't familiar with the website, it's for "women seeking romantic affairs and the men who want to fulfill them." The banner across the website is "When Monogamy Becomes Monotony."
Sharon Sharalike, the pseudonym of the woman who has penned The Ashley Madison Diaries about her adventures on the website, told me recently she encountered men who wanted everything from sexual intimacy to simple conversation. She says most men were trying to meet women without their wives' knowledge – some even going as far as saying they loved their wives very much. Her conclusion was, "I don't buy it. I don't think you can truly be in love with somebody and engage in that kind of activity. There's dishonesty involved. You know the other person is going to be hurt. I don't think you can deceive people you love."
A married man I know tells me he has slept with about 60 women in the past few years, ever since he started surfing internet dating sites. He doesn't feel his marriage is compromised – rather he's simply augmenting the sex part. However, last year when he started a serious affair with a woman, he forced himself to sleep on the couch at home, so that he would be faithful to the affair.
This brings up an interesting question: once sex turns into affection, is it possible to love more than one person? Yes, he could have sex with one, and love and occasional sex with the other, but loving both women was too difficult for him. Eventually he broke off the affair and went back to having sex with different women who meant nothing to him (oh, and enjoying Sunday dinner with his wife and kids). Perhaps he, as did Flaubert's Madame Bovary, had found in adultery all the banalities of marriage – not that it stopped him.
Some couples are honest with each other about wanting to bring another person into the mix, not for a long-term relationship, but simply for sex. Sue McGarvie, a sex therapist, www.sexwithsue.com , says, "Fifty per cent of people can do it well, but for 50 per cent it's absolutely a disaster." As a sex therapist, she recommends if a couple is exploring the idea, they go to an adult couples club.
Angie, with Club Xtabi, a couples club in Mississauga, on the edge of Toronto, says, "A couple that can bring someone into the relationship is a couple that has a very deep, understanding relationship built on communication and honesty. The people who are bored are the people who have an affair on the side without their spouse. The lifestyle couples are happy with their relationships – it's for sexual pleasure only." However, she feels it actually strengthens some relationships, saying, "It's another part of their lives they are sharing together. They don't have to have that secret liaison with someone else."
She has only seen a few couples where one partner left the other to go off with the person they played around with. For people who want simply to have affairs and keep them secret, McGarvie advises, "There are people who are incapable of being monogamous, who love their partners, but have several relationships along with their marriages. If you are going to have an affair, don't tell your partner. That is the most selfish thing I can imagine. If you're going to do the infidelity, you have to live with it."
I always remember one woman proudly telling me years ago, how she was having an affair with her husband's best friend. She'd been cheating on him right under his nose for years, and no one was any the wiser. She loved them both, would never leave her husband, and it all worked just fine – for her. And it would until, of course, someone arrived home from work one day at the wrong time.
According to last year's Tainted Love poll, conducted by Ipsos Reid, 31 per cent of Canadians said a partner had cheated on them. Those are the people who know – how many don't know?
It seems to me it isn't the sex that's the killer or the glue in relationships. After all, when the deceit of an adulterer is discovered it often ends a marriage, but when a couple knowingly takes a lover it can fuel their passion. It seems to be the honesty or lack of it that can be the real deal-breaker. Better the devil you can see than the one you can't – the one that looms quietly over a "happy marriage" waiting to strike.
© Copyright 2005 CBC
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