Locker Room Talk & Shots Podcast
Locker Room Talk & Shots Podcast
Open Monogamy. Can You Really Have it All?
In this Locker Room Talk & Shots Podcast episode, I’m diving deep into the world of open monogamy with renowned sex and relationship expert, Dr. Tammy Nelson. We’ll unravel the mysteries and misconceptions surrounding this evolving relationship style (one I'm personally invested in), where couples redefine traditional monogamy and explore new levels of intimacy, trust, and connection. Whether you’re curious, skeptical, or already on board with open relationships, Dr. Tammy brings her expert insight, wit, and years of experience to the table, offering real-life advice on navigating this complex terrain without losing the love.
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Cheers!
Do the sex Think fun, honest and feminist as fuck, and always with the goal of fighting the patriarchy. One female orgasm at a time. Welcome to the locker room. Today's locker room and Jets topic is open monogamy. Can you really have it all Now?
Speaker 1:My longtime listeners know, of course, that I have tried a variety of relationship styles across my life, everything from ultra monogamous to open and polyamorous. I am still single, so, but I have recently said, oftentimes, moving forward, should I ever fall in love again and decide to get committed, I want something that's monogamous Now. I think that might be in alignment with what open monogamy is, but I don't know. I do have an expert today who's going to guide me through what open monogamy is and how I can give it a shot, or you can if you want to. But before we dive in, I want to share some statistics, some information that was shared with me, with you guys. Stats that came from a YouGov survey of the US general population found that more than 50% of Americans say they are not fully monogamous. Now you might think men are the driver behind this move to non-monogamy, but, contrary to stereotypes, the survey found that more women were in a disclosed non-monogamous relationship than men. 29% of women versus 20% of men and 24% of women say that they tried monogamy but it wasn't working for them and wanted to experiment with other options. Only 17% of men said the same thing. I find this exciting because I think it's like women are kind of breaking the chains of patriarchal monogamy, in my opinion, and asking for what they want. But I'm not going to comment too much because I have an expert here today who's really going to give us the lowdown on the truth about open monogamy.
Speaker 1:My guest today is Tammy Nelson. She is a sex and relationship therapist, a TEDx speaker and host of the podcast the Trouble with Sex. She is the author of six books, including Open Monogamy, a Guide to Co-Creating your Ideal Relationship Agreement. I could have used this so many times in the past, but whatever, moving forward, I'll have it. Tammy, will you tell my listeners a little bit more about you?
Speaker 2:I've been a therapist for about 30 years or more and I'm a certified sex therapist and I'm a relationship therapist and I've been seeing couples and different varieties of people in relationships for a long time and I think that we have morphed over time, particularly since the pandemic to define what monogamy really means, in different ways. So you know, what I've seen in my practice is that this is not your grandmother's monogamy, and I also have an institute it's the Integrative Sex Therapy Institute. So I train, you know, hundreds and hundreds of therapists and I think that over the years we've seen more of a shift over the generations, I think around what it means to be in a committed relationship and what commitment really means. And you know, when I first wrote my book, the New Monogamy, which was about I don't know 12 years ago now, maybe more I remember getting so much flack from people mostly therapists who said I was trying to create affairs and I was ruining the sanctity of marriage and really I was just trying to talk about how to put your relationship together after some kind of betrayal and that you had a choice of how you wanted to create your committed relationship.
Speaker 2:But it was so controversial then to create your committed relationship. But it was so controversial then and now people are like we're like, well, do we have to have an affair to define our monogamy? And that's really why I wrote this book. So my career path has really gone from working as a I was an art therapist to working as a couples therapist. To why doesn't anyone talk about sex in couples therapy trainings, to being a sex therapist, to being a psychedelic therapist, to really focusing on what does it really mean for people to be in relationship, either to their own narrative about what relationships mean or to being in relationship with other people.
Speaker 1:So, listeners, I want you to listen to the end and here's why Tammy and I have talked and you're not only going to learn what open monogamy is. You're going to, by the end of this podcast, be able to figure out if you are someone that this might be a good fit for, and then you're going to have a little starter pack of information. Whether you are single and looking for a relationship right now, or you're in a relationship that maybe needs to move in a direction, or you've been playing with the idea of polyamory, but you're both like that's too much. You're going to have, like, a really good idea about what open monogamy is and how you could start moving into it or give it a try. I assume Again, I don't know what it is by the end of this episode. I'm excited because I feel like this is going to resonate, hopefully, with my desires for my future. So, tammy, guide me into my next relationship style. Let's get ready to talk about relationship, sex and open monogamy. Cheers, cheers. Let's dive in. Tell me what is open monogamy.
Speaker 2:So open monogamy is partly what it sounds like. It's really having an open conversation about how you want to define your relationship. And you know monogamy for generations and decades, and a couple centuries now, has been defined by other people right the church, your community, your parents, your synagogue. You know it's been a way to really keep the belongings of a marriage, belongings of a union, passed down to the next generation. So it was a way to guarantee that you could really be clear that your offspring were yours. So it was really a way to you know police women and women's sexuality.
Speaker 2:And today you know women don't really have to get married. There's really no rule or meaning or need for women today to get married. We don't need to get married to have children. We don't need to get married to have sex. We don't need to get married to get life insurance or health insurance. We don't need to get married to have a mortgage. No, there's really no absolute necessity to get married unless we want that type of companionship.
Speaker 2:And so because it's optional for women, we become the gatekeepers of monogamy. We decide now how it's going to be, and women have changed over the past couple hundred years and we won't settle necessarily for. Number one bad sex. Number two the idea of ownership. You know, less women take their partner's last name than ever before.
Speaker 2:I mean, if they do, it's a choice, and the idea of being a full partner to someone whether you're gay, straight, trans is much more acceptable than it was even 20 or 30 years ago. So when we get to decide what monogamy looks like, it's really partly based on what your parents or your grandparents did in their relationship, and if they cheated or got divorced, you're much more likely to say you know what. I would rather have an open monogamous relationship where we can be honest and disclose and be transparent and more flexible and fluid around. What our monogamy is going to look like is for people who want a primary or committed relationship but they still want some kind of flexible, fluid agreement, whether that's around sex or romance or emotion. You can define it any way you want and we can talk about that like what is the monogamy continuum and how do you want your relationship to look?
Speaker 1:Yeah Well, so how does it differ? How does open monogamy differ? Well, from monogamy? It's pretty obvious. But what about from polyamory and non-monogamy?
Speaker 2:Well, I define open monogamy as having a central or primary relationship. Not all open relationships do Not all polyamorists define their relationship as being committed to one person primarily, so you don't have to define your relationship by anyone else's standards. But there is a continuum here of monogamy. So all the way to the left is really traditional monogamy, what we think of as sexual fidelity. It may even be as strict as if you fantasize about someone else, you should go home and tell your partner. Right, that's like a slippery slope.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's a real thing. That's a real thing. There are and I was going to say women, because I feel like it's usually women who come out with this, but that's me stereotyping but there are situations where people think looking at porn is cheating, that texting a woman or liking a woman's picture online is cheating, and that's pretty extreme and that's pretty extreme.
Speaker 2:Well, for some people it's extreme. For other people it can feel like you know, when we made a commitment or got married, I was going to be the only one touching you, and it looks like if you're touching yourself, looking at pornography, it can feel like a betrayal right. So any kind of sexual interaction, even if it's with yourself, can feel like wait a minute, that's taking away from us. So for some people that really is a slippery slope and it can be right. It can be an exit from your sexual relationship. Like why are you putting all that energy into something else or someone else and not towards me?
Speaker 2:Other people they walk in on their partner masturbating to porn and they're like you're cheating on me, in on their partner masturbating to porn and they're like you're cheating on me and the person masturbating to porn is like what are you talking about? I've been doing this since I was 10. Like it's nothing to do with you and it can be very compartmentalized. But those are things that we don't talk about when we make a commitment to monogamy. We don't say I promise to love, honor you and tell you every time I masturbate in the shower. You say I promise to love, honor you and tell you every time I masturbate in the shower. It's not really an open conversation, but if you're going to have a monogamy agreement these days, these are things that you have to talk about. Like you said, is it cheating to text someone or send a picture to an ex or like someone's photos on social media? Those are all pretty new developments that your grandmother never had to agree to.
Speaker 1:That's true. I hadn't thought about that. That if you really think about the most extreme version of monogamy, there was just really an expectation of like you don't talk to other women or men, or if you do, it's only in situations where I'm there. I hadn't thought about the masturbation thing, but I do know. When I think back to when I was younger, it's so hard for me to undo all of my experiences since then, but I do remember people getting upset, catching their partners masturbating. Now to me that seems absolutely ridiculous. So you would have never thought that when I get into a monogamous relationship, we really need to go through. What does that all mean?
Speaker 1:And I do think a lot of people accuse people of cheating on them now based on things that are really a gray area, right Like I've heard. People think that their partners are cheating because they like someone's picture on Instagram or because they go out with their girls and guys come up and talk to the group and the girl talks to the men. That's cheating. To me. That seems ridiculous, but that would be. It sounds like part of what this open monogamy is Like. How much freedom do I have to go out and maybe be a little flirty or look at other people online, and so on and so forth.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, these days you can, that's exactly right. And these days you can cheat on your partner lying in bed next to them, you know, because we have these handheld devices where we can be in a full engaged sexual relationship with someone and your partner may never know. So there is a risk of, you know, all kinds of infidelity or betrayal today that we do have to talk about. Like it's one thing to like someone's photo, it's another thing to be engaged with that person. Say, send me more bikini picturesini pictures. It's one thing to say, I love the dancing cowboy videos on TikTok, the guys with no shirt, but it's one thing to say, oh, I love that video. And it's another thing to say, dude, send me naked pictures of yourself.
Speaker 1:And I think that that's where maybe a lot of these terms have risen gaslighting and stuff like that because I think of things, situations. I've struggled in something like this, then I'm sure plenty of other people are. But you know, my ex had gone somewhere and had talked about having gotten it was a reunion phone numbers from people he hadn't seen in a while. And I asked very specifically did you get phone numbers from women? And in the moment he said no, no, he wasn't the best liar and something inside of me was like flag that, flag that. And later on I brought it up again and I'm like did you get a phone number from a woman? Because something felt off right. And he said, well, I mean yeah, but just as a friendship, just as a you know what I mean and I said but you lied to me, you told me that you didn't. He's like well, but I didn't as anything more than you know, just as a friend, which I think this is where we talk about betrayals.
Speaker 1:We talk about it gets dicey, trying to figure out, like you know, what is cheating, what is not, whether you're monogamous or open, monogamous or non-monogamous, like it has to, I think, when lying comes into play when we start feeling like we have to hide but we don't even know why. Right option of open monogamy. It's like what we're really saying is we're really going to dive down and map out these little details and figure out what level of freedom we want, because even within the overarching definition of monogamy there are gray areas or options for still getting to do that flirting or all the way up to I assume it sounds like the far end of this is actually being able to go out and make out with someone. Or does open monogamy include other relationships with other people?
Speaker 2:Annette, the making out with other people is still way at the left side.
Speaker 1:Okay, so tell me that I'm curious about the spectrum of options in open monogamy.
Speaker 2:No, I love that you asked that question because I think that the more honest you can be about what you want and what you can do, the less risk there is of betrayal, like you're saying right.
Speaker 2:So if you're, if you really agree that you know what, when I'm on vacation, I am going to flirt with people, I'm going to dance with people, I might even make out with people, then at least you don't have that extreme feeling of betrayal when your partner comes home and says, yeah, I met some people, but I didn't take any numbers, but I did make out with someone, but we did sexy dance, but I did have drinks with people. You know, like, as long as that's something that the two of you have agreed, bring some energy to your relationship, so you can say, ooh, tell me about that, was that hot for you? And you can kind of have some compersion, which is like some excitement, because your partner was excited, but it doesn't threaten your monogamy, it doesn't threaten your commitment. And then you know, going up the continuum, there is like maybe we can do stuff together, maybe we can have a threesome occasionally.
Speaker 1:I mean that's what I want. I'm like give me monogamy, but we got to have some like threesomes and group play together, Like just a little bit, just a little bit of something, something that's good Spicy.
Speaker 2:That's what Annette is looking for. So if anyone out there that's what she wants and that's super common, you know people do want threesomes. That's a really common fantasy that people have, but it's also kind of emotionally messy. So you have to really talk about would it be with a man? Would it be with a woman who would be doing what you know how? Would you talk about it? Would you contact each other after? Would you have what? If one of you texted the person? Would you have coffee? You know like it's very common to also cheat in an open relationship. Just because you're open doesn't mean you can't cheat on each other.
Speaker 1:Well, I mean, I think that that's the thing. For me, cheating is the lying, the withholding, the putting something in a gray area where you can play with what's really going on and then blow it off as like, oh, you're being sensitive or oh, but I really didn't, because here's the. You know. You know what I mean to me and non-monogamy and my experiences in it. I have seen a lot of that. People do non-monogamy or polyamory because you know they want to be able to participate in and love and have relationships and sex with other people. But I think that oftentimes people dive in and they don't recognize this is also a relationship style in which you can absolutely cheat and you have to be honest with everybody, and I think it's been interesting to watch. I've seen poly communities be as messy and destructive and hurtful as monogamous folks. It's like there is cheating and betrayal in both.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think if you're going to do this, the whole key word here is the open part. So, being super open and talking about your concerns, I always tell people to have what I call a what-if conversation and to talk it to death before you take anything into action. So what if we did this? What if we did have a threesome? What if we invited a woman over? What if we invited a man over? What if we invited a gay woman over a gay man or a trans person? What would that be like and who would do what and where would you sit and what would I be doing and how long would they stay and would they sleep over?
Speaker 2:And what are the boundaries that we both feel comfortable with? Not the rules, because rules tend to parentify the situation and you don't want to have to like police your partner that they're following the rules. So because you feel like, then you feel like the parent and it desexualizes the whole thing. But you should share your own boundaries, like what you're comfortable with, like I would only be comfortable doing this if we didn't make out with the person, or it's really important that it's with someone that neither of us knows. It can't be with a friend, or it can't be with someone from work, or it's really important we only do it once with this person, or maybe it's the opposite.
Speaker 2:Maybe we have to do with someone we really care about and have feelings for and they're really good friends, or you know, those are the boundaries that you have to talk about, and I think you should talk about it until you feel what I call communication fatigue, where you're like oh my God, we can't talk about this anymore. I'm so tired of talking about it, because Until you do that, you don't really know, you haven't really explored what the potential consequences could be and you still don't know until you do it. But the bonus is maybe you just need to talk about it so that it can be really hot erotic energy and you don't ever really need to take it into action. Maybe it's just a great fantasy to talk about and maybe that's enough on. Your monogamy continuum is just exploring the fantasies together.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, I think that that can be really exciting with a partner you know and then you also get to know sort of there's that you get to be part of their inside fantasy world, because we all have that and I think it's extremely bonding to have that opportunity right. What would you say if someone's out there listening right now and they're trying to figure out if they're a good candidate for this type of relationship style? What are some markers or bullet points? If you X, y and Z, this might be right for you. And also then I want to follow that up with if someone is currently in a relationship, is moving from, let's say, monogamy or from a polyamorous model to this a good idea when you're in the middle of a relationship? So let's start with the who. Is an open, monogamous relationship good for? Let's bullet point, some markers for that.
Speaker 2:Well, I think it could be good for anyone if and this is the caveat if, number one, you know how to share, number two, you know how to communicate. If number one, you know how to share, number two, you know how to communicate. And number three, you're not doing it to save your relationship. You're not doing it because you're at your wit's end and this is the last chance saloon and you don't want to be in a relationship where you feel coerced into doing it, like your partner says, you know we need to open our relationship or else I'm going to break up with you. Or you know I'm going to have an affair, or you know you don't want to do it because you feel manipulated. You have to both be willing.
Speaker 2:Now there can be a monogamy gap, like a gap between what you're each comfortable with, like your partner might want to. You know, it's really interesting because in heterosexual relationships a lot of times it's the man that wants to start and the woman takes longer to decide and think about it. And what exactly do I want to do on the monogamy continuum, like, do I want to just do stuff together, maybe go to sex parties, maybe just look and come home and have sex together. Or maybe I want to date other people separately and come home and tell you about it, or maybe we're going to give each other permission to like have full romantic relationships with other people. But thinking about all that and talking about it and discussing it, and then a lot of times the male in the hetero relationship will say okay, now I'm done okay, that was enough and the woman will say, oh no, this is good, I'm just getting into this now.
Speaker 2:I wrapped my mind around, I thought about it, we talked about it and this is a great opportunity for me to explore my own sexuality and my own desirability. And I'm kind of into this and I'll decide when we're done.
Speaker 1:So can I say that I think part of the reason that this happens both men and women don't understand this that I believe, when it comes to the sexual and intimate world, women are the gatekeepers. So, men being all full of themselves, feeling like the man because maybe they're getting some flirty feelings out there from the bigger world, they're like, oh, I'm gonna open it up and I'm gonna go out and just fuck everyone. They open it up and what blows their mind is it's the woman who goes out and once she puts the like the green light up, she's literally fighting off options. And the man's like got you know a trickle of maybe a couple of women who is not really that interested. And then he's looking at his partner and he's like oh, you are hot, Everybody does want you. I want you all to myself again. And she's like I am hot, Everybody does want me.
Speaker 1:And when I was with you and just you, and monogamous, you didn't give me any attention and you wanted attention from other women. Why the fuck would I go back to that? I think that is literally what happens, because I don't think most women really realize their power out in the sexual world. And then, when they do realize it. It's like you cannot shut off that faucet, right, Well, I think you're right in that women really don't realize their power.
Speaker 2:I think if we really stepped into the power of pleasure and accessed our ability and gave ourselves permission to be in pleasure, we could take over the planet.
Speaker 1:You know, every expert says this. Every expert says this. I'm like how do we get the word out more than this? Right, I agree with you Absolutely. I think the reason why women are so oppressed and shamed around sex is because if we were fully empowered in our sexuality, it would not be men running this world. I am absolutely confident of that, and I think that's why that kind of oppression started early, early, early in our human history.
Speaker 2:Oh, 100%. And it's why we are regressing now in our culture and you know, we have this male patriarchy that's trying to control our womb, which is really just controlling our sexuality. So, you know, the idea of the freedom of an open relationship means that we get to make choices around, basically, around our sexuality and around pleasure, and that's an incredibly powerful thing. And it's not that we I don't think men should be threatened by that, it's not that we're going to leave you. It's actually that we're going to bring back the pleasure and the power around that. So the people that it really works for experience the pleasure and the power of opening their relationship, that it enhances their relationship, that they feel more sexual with their partners, that they, you know, feel more love and more appreciation for each other as a result of opening their relationship.
Speaker 2:And if you have, you know, a feeling of being threatened or jealous, or insecure, I think you need to pay attention to that and say whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. We need to slow down a bit and take notice. That's like a canary in the coal mine. Let's just see what's happening and trust your intuition that there's something that we need to take a look at. I don't think people in open relationships have less jealousy than other people. I think that they talk about it more frequently and they give it a valid place in the conversation and they honor their feelings and say you know, we need to veto this person or we need to slow down the polyamory or whatever it is. You know, they just talk more about any feelings that they have positive and negative, about what's happening.
Speaker 1:What is the core difference between open monogamy and polyamory? Where would you say, okay, now we're stepping out of open monogamy and into polyamory or open relationship world.
Speaker 2:Relationship is just an umbrella term and it can encompass the whole continuum of monogamy. So you might say, oh, we're in an open relationship because we, you know, talk about our fantasies. Other people might say we're in an open relationship because we have multiple partners and we all have breakfast together, you know, after a night of spending, spending sexual freedom nights in the same house. So I think open relationships or consensual non-monogamy, it's all kind of a umbrella term. But polyamory really means many loves. So polyamory is the acceptance of the fact that you can love more than one person and just because you're married you're not dead. Like you're going to be attracted to more than one person. You're going to maybe have feelings for more than one person and it doesn't necessarily mean you have to trade your partner in for someone else, that there's a multiplicity around the potential for relationship. You know it's kind of like having kids, like you can love more than one kid. But that feels very threatening, like we have been in this, you know, sort of myopic view of relationship that you know you can have one partner and if that partner has any attraction to anyone else, it takes away from us instead of adding to us. But people who are polyamorous really have the capacity to have and hold more relationships than just a marriage or committed partner. Now, that doesn't mean that everybody does it right, like you were saying before, but polyamory in and of itself has a continuum. So it might mean that you and your partner have another couple that you have a relationship with and the four of you spend weekends together and go on vacation together, and the four of you have sex together and go on vacation together and the four of you have sex together and it's you don't do anything in separate rooms and you really have feelings for each other, you know you're close friends and you care about each other. It could mean that you have this anarchy where no one is more important than anyone else and you have, you know, a bunch of partners.
Speaker 2:I have a podcast it's called the with Sex, and I just did a season of interviewing people that were in open relationships and open monogamous relationships, and some people are like I have a couple where he invites men over and interviews them so his wife can sleep with them in the other room, and then they come out and all have cocktails together. And then there's another guy who I think he has like seven or eight different partners, all different structures. Some are married, some are in poly relationships themselves, and he is solo poly, like he does not want a committed partner, he does not want to get married, but he is very interested in having real relationships with all those people, not just sexual. So I mean there's such a wide range of how people view polyamory. There are some people in the therapy world that really don't like the term open monogamy because they say it's the opposite of polyamory.
Speaker 2:But polyamorous people can be very committed to each other and many of them do have a marriage or a committed partner at home and then have multiple partners as well. They can have what's called kitchen table polyamory, where everyone knows each other, gets along, they're friends with each other's, what are called metamors, like your partner's lovers or whatever, and it can be feel like a big happy family. For some people it's. They have outside partners that they don't want to know. It's a don't ask, don't tell you go, do your thing and you know, make sure you're home by Friday.
Speaker 1:Yeah, there is such a. I have over the last couple of years stumbled into different groups, open groups and what. What I've learned about myself is I don't function well and especially I mean and this can be non sexual groups, but we're talking about more of relationship style groups, where things aren't clearly defined, where people are just sort of like you know one group like to go out and have competitions to see who is going to make out with more people that evening, and for me that feels very yucky and confusing and like potentially messy, and then people would say it was okay and then people would get their feelings hurt and everyone would talk behind each other's back and I don't function well that way. I don't know how people make that work for them, but they do. I mean they do and you know.
Speaker 1:And then I stumbled into another group that was more. They had kind of been based out of swinging and then moved into kind of dabbling and poly and the unicorns would go in and out, and that felt yucky to me too and and not defined well enough or like for me I need a very I want to be humanized 100% and valued and adored on whatever level I am in relationship with someone and then kind of coming out of I had been in a long-term deeply in love at least from my end relationship, and so I've spent the last year kind of reflecting on all my experience because I really have experienced the fucking you know array. Experienced the fucking you know array, and I read and why I found this term that you offer, like it really kind of spoke to my heart a little bit because I love deep, deeply connected one on one relationships like I like to go super deep and and and when I love and I'm in love with someone like I just like, really love people, like I'm like in it, right, and I don't doubt that I could do that with more than one person. But I think that being realistic in my life at this point and everything I have going on, the deep friendships I have, that what would be best or what I desire, what is my fantasy, is definitely finding that like a person right. But I'm also realistic about myself, my little inner slutty self and how I love pleasure and I love sexual adventures and it's just built into me Like I'm a very sensual like you know, throw up like a new sexy thing going on and like and I would love to have a partner to go and experience those things with. For me also, if I'm in love with someone, like I understand we're humans and, again, I'm very in touch with my own little like spicy self.
Speaker 1:For me, if my partner is out and makes out with someone, even if we haven't discussed it, for me that would not be a deal breaker.
Speaker 1:It would be like let's figure this out right so that if that's gonna happen, we're both on board with each other and it's not gonna like create distrust in our relationship, because that's ultimately for me, the most sacred thing.
Speaker 1:Like I don't trust a lot of people maybe two, three people in my life and I want a lover, I want a partner that makes when I'm with them I feel safe, and I don't feel safe with a lot of people and I really desire that in a sexy relationship. And so that's why I've been saying I think what I want, like I'm okay being non monogamous when I'm dating, but when I fall in love, like I think that like my heart wants to be more monogamous. And so I was like, well, maybe monogamish will work because you know we can, I can find someone who kind of wants that, but then we can be like spicy and sexy and adventurous and, you know, maybe jump in a little orgy every now and then and swim around and come back together. I don't know. So does that sound in line with what you're offering up? Because that really just speaks to my like heart.
Speaker 2:Yeah, totally. I mean you're definitely on the orgy spot on the continuum.
Speaker 1:I was just trying to like say, just in case we happen to stumble into one, can we not high five and like hold hands and I don't know?
Speaker 2:That sounds lovely. I mean, you know you would have to set boundaries like only use protection and we only can stay in the same room. And, like you know, you would have to set boundaries like only use protection and we only can stay in the same room. And, like you know, all those things that you talk about makes it safe so that you can trust each other to have freedom. You know we all want safety and connection and we all want freedom to be ourselves. So you're really looking for a balance between that feeling of safety and the feeling of freedom, a balance between that feeling of safety and the feeling of freedom.
Speaker 2:And I don't think there's anything more powerful than to be in a relationship where you could have the freedom to really be all the parts of you. You know that's what I call integrity. You're integrating all the parts of you that you feel like you don't have to compartmentalize or hide a part of you or shut off or or distill a part of yourself to be in a loving relationship. That's a real, true partnership. You know to say, yeah, I really love you, but I also want to sleep with women. You know I'm not totally hetero and I want that experience and so to have a partner say, oh, I love that part of you and I want to support that part of you, and you know let's look for women for you online. You know like to have that support from a partner. I mean, how can you not feel like you could trust that person because they want to help you grow and there's room for all of you in the relationship, that's a really powerful experience for people.
Speaker 1:I think people thought of monogamy as the source of what would make them feel safe and secure in a relationship, and what people have learned over and over again is that is not the case at all. Like I have been my most insecure in monogamous relationships, but I don't think people have even thought or learned how to feel truly secure in a relationship and discuss like what's going to make me feel safe, what's going to make me feel secure and that needs to be discussed whether you're in a poly relationship or an open monogamous relationship or a monogamous relationship and if you cannot agree on that, whatever style you're doing is going to blow up in your fucking face Like absolutely. I think the reason why most relationships disintegrate is because really the trust was never fully established. The security, the feeling safe, whatever that is, you know, physically safe, sexually safe, emotionally safe, safe to be your full self. I don't think I would argue that probably most of us don't feel like we can be our full, authentic selves in relationships.
Speaker 2:I don't think that's true. I think, if you don't feel that way, you should go to couples therapy and you can call me. Do you think, do you?
Speaker 1:think people know, though, that that that is maybe at the um. Do you think people know that that might be at the core of their relationship problems, that they are afraid to, like you know? Think about the poor guy masturbating. Who gets in trouble for that Like, can we like go back to that? That's like being your authentic self and some level.
Speaker 2:There's a lot of projection about what we should be doing and what monogamy should look like, and even the people that say they're monogamous. You know, 50% of those people are getting divorced and a large part of the people that stay together and say, oh no, we're monogamous, they're cheating on each other. So for a lot of people it's better to appear on the surface as if you're traditionally monogamous than it would be to have a more open style of conversation about it and so that pretend monogamy, you know, is aligned with the social construct that they've grown up with and that they think will give them the least amount of guilt, will give them the least amount of guilt. So it feels less guilt inducing to pretend we're monogamous and cheat than it is to stretch the idea of monogamy and trust that we can stay together if we do that. So A lot of that comes from, you know, this projection and this expectation of what a relationship is supposed to be that people learn in their childhood. You know you end up with people with different attachment needs. So for sure there's people that are in open relationships because they're avoidantly attached and they really can't commit. They really can't commit and so it's a way of saying you know, it's sort of a.
Speaker 2:It's like a stage of development for many of us. We tell people look, you're young, don't commit, don't settle down, just date around until you figure out the one you know. Don't be monogamous. We encourage people when they're young to be non-monogamous. We encourage people when they're young to be non-monogamous. And it's funny, now on dating sites these people in their like early 20s identify as consensually non-monogamous. And I'm just thinking, I just think you're young, like, you're just dating, like that's exactly appropriate for you. My day we just said we were dating. I don't know, we didn't call it that, we were dating I don't know, we didn't call it that.
Speaker 2:And then a lot of people will search for an attachment to feel secure and safe because they want to start a family. Whether you're gay or straight, or get a dog or have a kid, there is a period of life, there's a stage of development where you want that safe attachment. And if you're with someone who's securely attached and had the capacity for that as a kid, then many times you will go through what I call the sweatpants phase of your life and you feel comfortable and you relax and you're like, oh phew, I finally found this person and then you go into the boring phase of life. Right, monogamy equals boring for a lot of people, and that's the trade-off, that's the sacrifice you make. Like, oh, marriage sucks, you know.
Speaker 2:Like there's this meme about marriage and how it gets boring after a while. It's not marriage that sucks, it's not marriage that's boring, it's not committed relationships, it's safety that's boring, it's safety that kills your sex life. And so we sacrifice excitement and adventure and eroticism because we want to feel like family, and family and eroticism are antithetical to each other. Like you don't want to be sexual with your family. So the closer you feel, the more familiar you are with your partner, the more like family, the less you want to have sex with them. So we do go through another phase when our kids grow up, move out or whatever what I call second adolescence, where we're like I can find my sexuality again. Let's party, you know, let's do drugs, let's go have sex with people, let's go to concerts. Like there's this period of life now where people live longer than ever. They stay sexual well into their eighties. You know it used to be.
Speaker 2:You turned 60 and you were like done, and now people are like no, I got a whole nother life ahead of me and people in their six, fifties and sixties are much more prone to opening their relationship and still staying together, not getting divorced, which wasn't happening 20 years ago. They were just getting divorced and having another monogamous relationship. So part of this is developmental, part of it is attachment issues, part of it is exploration and part of it is, you know, second adolescence. Part of it is really feeling like how risk averse you are. You know some people are like I really can't take any risks, risks and I really need to be in a safe space. And it also depends on where you live you know California, new York it's easier to find partners to be in open relationships with than it is in the middle of the country.
Speaker 1:Right right, portland, where I'm at, it's hard to find anyone who's not in an open relationship. Yeah, I think you're right, although it does seem to seemed like people go through this second adolescent and then they try open relationships. So they had the earlier years in a monogamous relationship and then they go into more of an open, whether it's open monogamy or, but you said, those relationships tend to last.
Speaker 2:I mean, you know again when you go to the next phase of development, when you get into your 70s, 80s, 90s. You're just too tired to do it.
Speaker 1:So you're like, whatever happens.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you rock on the front porch because more and more people there are identifying as being in open relationships. Like 20% of their 85 million subscribers say now that they're in open relationships. Like people are really shifting, like you said, everywhere. I mean that's an international community. Your point is well taken that it really is spreading regardless of the age group. So right, we're younger people and more older people and women whose kids have now gotten old enough to put themselves on the bus, make their own breakfast. You know now they're like oh, I want to find my sexuality.
Speaker 1:I and I. I really one thing I appreciate about where I am in life is I feel truly. This is the first time in my life I've been able to really figure out what I want. I have enough experience now that I've tried a lot of things, but when I was younger I did not have the information that young people have today, so it's interesting. I have a 22-year-old daughter information that young people have today, so it's interesting. I have a 22 year old daughter and when we talk about relationships and what we want, she is almost at the same level as me.
Speaker 1:Of course, I have some wisdom, some that kind of I can contribute more to our conversations, but I there are moments where I am fucking wowed. I'm like and I realized that in my age group and I would, I would argue, 40 and up we just didn't have access to the information that younger people do today. And so right now I do feel almost like a 20 year old learning like what do I want in a relationship? Like what makes me feel safe? What would really, what are traits when I meet someone? That even if I meet them and there's butterflies or physical attraction, like that's cool. But here are all of these other things I had no idea when I was younger. I was just stumbling into people I thought were hot and then we'd go on dates and have sex and we'd be together.
Speaker 1:And now I'm making a conscious choice. Now I get to decide going forward. I have relationship style options. I didn't even know about the concept of open monogamy, which feels like a very resonant with me, you know, because I have tried the other ones and I know, like my own temperament, my, my nervous system, what it can handle. You know my mouth, how much I can keep shut when people are pissing me off, which isn't a lot, and so it's really cool and I think maybe that's why it's. You know, now we see people of all ages, we doing things because our age range, the older age range, is kind of we're behind the game, we're babes. We're babes in this world and younger folks are educating us.
Speaker 2:I think they, you know, have gone through a couple of, we've gone through a couple of generations where marriage you know the experiment of marriage didn't really work. You know the nuclear family thing is done Like just financially, which, you know, it worked maybe in the 50s, but women don't stay home anymore Now. Women make more money, they have better jobs, they're exposed to more people, that thing is done. So we're still sort of going on the same mystique of what it's supposed to look like. But that's over.
Speaker 1:And I think the younger kids know because they didn't grow up in the 50s or the 60s so it is going to look different. So for my listeners they now know sort of how to like figure out if it might be something to look into. What is your piece of advice? Let's give them kind of a starter pack. Let's say they've listened to the podcast and they're like all right. Well, I've tried non-monogamy and monogamy and I think maybe this is a better option for me and I want to look into it. What are some steps they can start to take tonight to figure it out, either with themselves or their partners a partner and move forward?
Speaker 2:or their partners a partner and move forward. Well, I think that the most important way to start your open monogamy agreement is, first of all, people can email me at Tammy, at Dr Tammy Nelsoncom. I'll give them a free open monogamy agreement form. If they say that they know you and that they heard me on this podcast, they can buy my book, open Monogamy, which has a lot of guidelines like how to have a conversation, particularly if you're just starting or if you want to, like you said before, like how do we change our relationship? If we've been one way, how do we shift it around? And I think that was a really good, insightful question, because most people don't necessarily go into a relationship with, like this is how we're going to be. You know, we morph over time and that's why I think you should renew your monogamy agreement really often, just like you renew your passport, your driver's license. Don't say, well, you know, well, we made this agreement when we got married and I'll let you know when I change my mind. You know, like, really, talk about it often and have the what if?
Speaker 2:Conversations Say you know, I heard Annette on her podcast and she was talking about this and I'm just curious, like, what do you think about it and what would happen if we did this? And how do you feel about that? Like, really open the conversation, not like, oh, we have to do this. And how do you feel about that? Like, really open the conversation, not like, oh, we have to do this, I want to do that. But what if we did it this way? What would happen? And then honor that there's going to be a gap between you. You're not going to agree on everything. Talk about your fantasies first before you take anything into action and do your research. So know that there's a lot of apps out there where you can meet people. There's Field and some other ones where people are already interested in being in open sorts of relationships. And you know, stay safe, share your boundaries with each other.
Speaker 1:Right. So it sounds like you start with a what-if conversation. At some point you make your open monogamy agreement, I assume in a right. Do you do this in writing, because I I guess that's what I would do in the future?
Speaker 2:you can, but I want you to keep it in pencil, so you can keep it flexible.
Speaker 1:I like that. I like that. I'm like, I feel like for me maybe writing is going to be a thing in the future and then you move forward, but carefully, with you know seeing what happens. I love it. So, guys, go forth and try open monogamy and then report back. Can you tell people where they can find you?
Speaker 2:Yes, you can go to drtammynelsoncom. That's drtammynelsoncom. Yes, you can go to drtammynelsoncom. That's drtammynelsoncom you could also go to. I have a new landing page called openmonogamytoolkitcom openmonogamytoolkitcom, and there's a lot of resources on that as well, so you could download like an agreement, monogamy agreement and stuff from there, and you can find the book on Amazon or on my website.
Speaker 1:All right, guys. If you have any questions about open monogamy and you are on my YouTube channel, which is at TalkSexWithAnnette, drop a comment below this video. That way I keep your comments, your questions, all organized. If you are on my audio podcast, please make sure to scroll down, leave a message, send a message on my speak pipe or you can email me directly at Annette, at TalkSexWithAnnettecom. You guys know how to get in touch with me. Thank you so much for joining me today.
Speaker 2:Thank, you, Annette, and I hope you know you get a lot of responses from this podcast. With people like I, would love to be in a relationship with you, Annette. You sound perfect, Perfect.
Speaker 1:Oh, I don't know if I'm ready for that yet. We'll see. We'll see my little heart's kind of opening. We'll see. So, listeners, as always, until next time I'll see you in the locker room. Cheers, ring loop.