Opening up your relationship can be challenging. How can you do that and keep your relationship healthy?
With Cathy Vartuli from http://www.TheIntimacyDojo.com, Andi Cortland from http://www.LevelUpSex.com and Raj.
Cathy: How do you open up your relationship and still keep it really vital and alive? I’m Cathy Vartuli from http://www.TheIntimacyDojo.com.
Andi: I’m Andi Cortland from http://www.LevelUpSex.com.
Raj: I’m Raj, I’m married to Andi.
Cathy: We’re really blessed to have you guys here because you’ve been through this and you’ve done so much research as you went through the opening up process. I’d love for you to share what was the process like? Can you each share? I know you have different perspectives and different experiences about this?
Andi: From my perspective, we started in late 2008? He knew that I was bisexual, and I said, “What would you think about me sleeping with women?” That kicked off 9 months of negotiation about what does this mean? What does it look like? We talked to friends who have had open relationships. We bought all of the books that were on the market at that time, which weren’t very many, and read all of them and talked through it. How do you think it started?
Raj: Yeah, something like that. Then I happened to have a friend from grad school, a woman I knew was bisexual. We were very good friends, who had just come up in relationship with a couple. Conveniently enough, I called her and asked her if she would be interested in something like this.
Andi: I met her and we really hit it off. This was well before we knew the term unicorn hunting.
Cathy: You got one of the [crosstalk 00:01:26]
Raj: [crosstalk 00:01:27].
Andi: We weren’t even looking for that specifically. She just came up and said, “I’ve just got out of a relationship with a couple. I’d love to date another couple. You 2 seem really interesting.”
Cathy: If you’re not familiar with the term unicorn, it’s a single, usually female, bisexual person that wants to be in a relationship with both people in a couple.
Raj: It’s very rare and it’s generally frowned upon in open relationship communities to be hunting a unicorn.
Cathy: Though it happens a lot.
Andi: Though it happens a lot and one just happened to walk into our lives.
Cathy: How did that feel? You were all of a sudden opening up your relationship, bringing in this other woman.
Raj: That was great, that particular relationship and I think having that first relationship that works well often really makes a difference for couples.
Cathy: You’ve done your research too. You’ve read the books so you had the communication skills.
Andi: We read all the books.
Raj: Right, and what made it truly a unicorn relationship was that I had known her as a friend for a long time and we had a great relationship in that way, very much trusting and comfortable. I was comfortable that she … Of course, as a really good person who would respect our boundaries and [crosstalk 00:02:39]
Cathy: Not threatening the relationship.
Raj: Not threatening the relationship and all of that. She and Andi got along really, really well too.
Cathy: That’s perfect. What a nice way. Then after that, you took it further [inaudible 00:02:51] more.
Andi: Right. After that, I was a graduate student flirting with a woman at a graduate student picnic. Then we separated and then she meets Raj and says, “Why are you here? Are you in the department?” He says, “No, my partner is in this department.” She says, “Who is your partner?” Then he points to me, and you just see this huge shock on her face. Her jaw drops to the floor and goes because she wasn’t thinking that I was partner or interested in men at all. Then I’m not a single lesbian. I was a married, bisexual, open person. Fast forward, I happened to fall in love with this person. Then that was a challenge for us because she was gay so there was no way there was going to be a relationship with Raj.
Raj: We were friends. Obviously we got along, but there wasn’t a sexual relationship at all between the both of us. That’s when also we started realizing that our relationship requirements and sex drives were very, very different. Andi is a much more of a sexual person than I am. That was obviously something to recognize and felt challenging at times. To me, it felt for a while that there was something wrong with me.
Cathy: Or society says men are supposed to be the sexual aggressors. We’re taught so many rules about that.
Raj: Right. Whereas a lot of times I was just happy that someone else was taking care of her.
Andi: He would actually call my girlfriend and say, “Hey, Andi really needs sex right now, and I cannot do this. Would you mind coming over?”
Raj: It was challenging though to see my partner fall in love with someone else for the first time. That was definitely the first time it happened.
Cathy: Yeah, we’re not taught how to handle that. Society doesn’t role model that at all.
Raj: This was something that felt … For all of us, it was a difficult situation because of all the emotions that came up and we were also living in Atlanta. We didn’t have any community around us we could talk about this. It was a challenging time.
Cathy: I really appreciate … You’re really great about sharing the vulnerability that you went through, but also modeling the generosity that can be there if it’s right for people. You were telling a story earlier. Can I share it?
Andi: Yeah.
Cathy: They were trying strap-ons.
Raj: I can say that. Andi and her partner decided to experiment with strap-ons, so they acquired this really beautiful strap-on with a dildo from a website. Then they opened it up and they couldn’t figure out how to put it on. Me being the engineer had to help them. I helped her partner put on the strap-on, strap it in or strap it on all up tight.
Andi: She had a beautiful leather jaguar harness.
Raj: Beautiful harness. Yes, I agree with that. It smelt like leather. Then they started fucking and then her partner I realized didn’t really know how to thrust and then I had to be like, “Hey, let me teach you how to thrust like a guy.” Basically this was a great experience of … This also made me reflect on, “This is something that women don’t really know.” It was interesting.
Andi: Or learn by default. There are many ways to learn this thing, but it was really awesome that you were able to be part of that process and you have first experience.
Raj: Yeah, it was really. Experiences like that also helped me feel included. Even though this was a relationship between these 2 people, which is very intimate, and I was a little bit on the outside, being part of that process helped a lot.
Cathy: It’s beautiful. Thank you for sharing so vulnerably. Everybody opens relationships up differently if it’s right for them. Getting support and learning what other people did can make the transition so much easier. Thank you for being willing to share that. Please leave your comments below. We’d love to know what you think and what issues you might be running into around this.
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