No, it is not POJA. POJA is not ever intended to include DESTRUCTIVE activities. Swinging, which is adultery, is devastating to marriages. Openness about destructive behavior does not make the destruction any less.


When these situations blow up, and they almost always do, I would agree that the problem is much more than what can be alleviated by Plans A and B, since there is the problem of a severely broken moral compass and a basic lack of respect for marriage. Marriage Builders can help in some ways, but not all.

can't POJA drunk driving either

Like many others here that I have seen over the years, the swinging and open marriages became a way to fix a marriage in trouble. It's crazy I know but I am not the only one. I think it starts with the distancing and loss of emotional intimacy that occurs when our needs are not being met. You are afraid to leave, fixing it seems so difficult, and you somehow you think you just need some excitement.

This next part is going to be difficult to understand. When you finally cross over that line to swinging its as if you are closer than you have ever been. You feel like you have the most honest relationship in the world because you can actually have sex with others and talk about. You feel unique, immune to any affairs, and special. Its a complete illusion but the illusion seems real.

This illusion of the perfect marraige lasts until there is a problem. Someone "forgets" to tell the other person about a phone call or an email. Suspicions start, but you are told that jealousy is normal in the lifestyle and its your problem to deal with. You find out when you were out of town that your wife decided it was ok to see someone. Your feelings about this are dismissed because you were a willing participant and somehow you agree that you really never got around to figuring out what the rules are. You try to set some rules and boundaries but by then it's too late. You are told by the swinging crowd that as long as there is honesty you don't need rules. Anything goes as long as you tell each other about it. You are told you are too controlling and demanding. She says "I don't think I want to stop just because you say so, but I will, but reluctantly"

This becomes the big lie. She doesn't stop and just continues underground. It becomes a full blown affair and you feel like its 100% your fault because you were a swinger.

So the fantasy world you both created comes crashing down for the person that wakes up out of this insane fog. Exposure ineffective in my case and in fact enabled her to continue. The only truth was between me and God.

If I were to do it all over again I would leave the past swinging history behind and expose the affair for what it is in this moment - adultry, cheating, and betrayal. If my WW wants to blame it on swinging, she should be the one to try to convince everyone that she was the victim. I would have never lost the support of family and friends if I just exposed the affair and not the swinging. Big mistake. Big lesson for others to learn. These things ARE different.

The second big lesson is don't waste your time in Plan A. The WS needs an immediate, strong wake-up call to snap them out of this fog. Draw the new monogamous marriage boundary and go to Plan B directly without passing Go. Give them a Plan B letter, shut the door, wait, and pray. Use the threat of exposing the swinging activities as leverage to get them out of the house. No one wants to be exposed as swinger. It's a lot more difficult and embarrassing to explain that you are a swinger than just having an affair. Look how MB treats swingers on here. They are lepers of the worst kind.

So when I suggested a special topic area for recovering from open marriages, this is what I had in mind. Lessons learned and a moderated place for the BS to go without the stonings. A place of grace for those that made some terrible choices in their life.

CC,

"You are afraid to leave, fixing it seems so difficult, and you somehow you think you just need some excitement."

Would you consider swinging as distraction?

"Its a complete illusion but the illusion seems real."

A false substitute for real intimacy. I understand.

As if radical honesty were lacking...so distract with this illusion...embrace it as if it were real...and believe the illusion?


"This becomes the big lie. She doesn't stop and just continues underground. It becomes a full blown affair and you feel like its 100% your fault because you were a swinger."

Would you consider this was part of it all along? If you aren't going to be my everything, then it's your fault when I get what I want from others...piece myself together through others...because of you? Failure to protect, provide, fill up and make...would this be close?

Almost like the inside out of love..."If you loved me enough you would..." and then in retrospect, the opposite..."Had you loved me enough you would've..."?

The fault lies in the other...until you take back yourself, your choices...constructing your moral compass?

Can you really separate the swinging from the adultery? Would that be perpetrating the illusion in a way?

LA

This place IS moderated to the satisfaction of the board owners. I realize you are brand new here, but I have never seen a need in 6 years here for a "special" board for swingers, but you are always free to make suggestions to the board owners. I don't know how you can come here and after 3 short weeks know something the rest of us don't, though, so I can't say I agree with you.

I know that some wayward wives once requested a "special" board where they weren't subjected to the comments of betrayed spouses, but there was never any interest. Mostly, the ones who have trouble here are the fogbound and the dishonest [usually the same thing] because they looking for appeasement rather than challenges to their fog. Challenges are usually the BEST medicine, IMO.

Oh didn't think in a minute that I am brand new. More like 4 years. Different names because every new issue I had in my situation brought the crusades out when they searched my history. I just get tired of it and move on with a different name. The life of a leper.

"brought the crusades out "

Man, isn't that the truth!!!

I read what you posted and it makes sense to me. Many couples go down destructive paths when trying to bring "fun" back into their marriage. You shouldn't be treated like a leper IMO. I don't know why they feel the need to get so freaked out. You aren't here saying swinging is a good idea, quite the opposite actually. I have known couples who have tried it and it never goes well.

You do sound very new since you don't understand even very basic principles. Sounds like you are hiding out, though, and just couldn't take the heat, which doesn't help your credibility much either. Sounds pretty cowardly to me.

Are you saying that protecting these BS's from feeling attacked is like the special board request for WW's wanting to be protected from BS's?

Or are you saying that PN, in your opinion, was in a fog and dishonest...looking for appeasement...or CC?

LA

Here is what I am saying:


did you read that?

Challanges are what makes this board. It makes people think about future actions. There is nothing wrong with a 2x4 once in awhile if its used constructively.

The problem is there is way to much use of the 2x4s for open marriage behavior that the BS participated in the past. The hurting BS goes away with their tales between their legs and the crowd goes wild because God is rightous and MB is only for those that deserve grace. THATs the problem that needs to be moderated more effectively.

Suggestion: why don't you just send Steve Harley an email telling him about his "problem" and that his board does not meet your high personal standards? He is under the illusion that his board is run pretty darn well and is quite a success, and I know for a fact that he reads here.

Why don't you send him an email and just set him straight? Admin@MarriageBuilders.com

p.s. I would also suggest that is futile to make posts complaining about how the board is moderated, since the other posters have no control over that. You are addressing your complaints to the wrong party.

Only the moderators, tempest and Steve Harley have that control. I would take it directly TO THEM since they are the only ones who have any control.

CC,

Well, Mel's correct. We have no power to change the posters here. We have the ignore button, which can filter out some really helpful truths as well as bullying statements. Won't know which, still a helpful tool provided by the moderators for a reason.

ML:


Yes, I did. You know I did.

Your beliefs are so fragmented and flippable, I wanted to clarify my perception that this was another flipover before addressing it.

Protect BS's...which PN and CC are...and not WS's. Keep AM's of 12 or more years and past open marriages away from MB to protect BS's by hammering at them.

I get that. I don't understand your ethics. I'm not sure I want to anymore.

I'm grateful I can still see the kernels of truth in your posts through all the chafing.

CC -

Please consider what ML said in her previous post. Do not run away from your past by changing names. To do so is to run away from yourself. Stand by yourself...know you are NOT a leper. Know that your life has import for others lurking, reading, hurting and healing. Stay brave and true to yourself and stop self-betraying.

You are equal to everyone on this board. Know it.

Know your posts can help save marriages...you know that for each person who wakes up from the self-deception fog...stops the cycle of fog people can live in all their lives.

Each person helped changes the future...marriages, their children's marriages...it ripples.

So does the gaslighting...hurts the person who does it as much as the person they are doing it to. ML understands amends...she's knows them well. Doesn't mean she'll choose to do them. Up to us to stay vigilant of our own.

LA

LA, I can't imagine what your perception really is, because it is always so convoluted and disconnected from reality, but your interpretation of my post was nothing close to its real meaning. I felt it might help your comprehension if I reposted it. Nor do I have any idea what a "flipover" is. Is that a psychobabble phrase?

As to the rest of your post, I dont' have the slightest idea what it means because your posts are incomprehensible to me.

Are you on narcotics?

ML,

I understand you don't know what a flipover is...and also that you wouldn't ask to know, either.

I'm very sad that you've lost your hold on owning your actions, ML. You felt you might help my comprehension if you reposted what you wrote. Then you asked if I'd read it.

Are you on narcotics?

LA

No, I am not on narcotics and have no problem answering that question. How about yourself?


Don't be sad, LA, because this is your issue, not mine. I am not sad.

Common narcotics would be wacky tobacky [marihoochie weed], crack, painkillers, tranquilizers, nerve pills like Xanax. My father spent the last 5 years of his life zoned out on Xanax and his thinking was very convoluted and muddled. No one could ever make any sense of him.

Good to now know what narcotics exist. Nope, I don't have any of those.

I know a lady who was prescribed Xanax...which I won't confuse with Xantac now. Though I think she said that made her whacky.

LA

That doesn't answer my question, though. Are you on narcotics?