I met two friends for lunch last week and although lunch was great, the drinks were even better. Nothing like some wicked day-drinking to start the week right. Ok, in all honesty I balk at the term “day-drinking”. It’s stupid. It’s just drinking. But the best and perhaps most disturbing part of lunch was the conversation. I wasn’t personally disturbed, but I felt like an ambassador for society during a conversation about monogamy which just ripped the concept to shreds. The source? Two married women. Neither of them faithful to their husbands. It made me wonder…is monogamy just a lie?
When Love is not Enough
Abby has been married for 8 years and has two daughters, 3 and 6. She and her husband dated for four years before they got married. From the outside it looks like Abby is happy and content with her life, both personally and professionally. Actually, from the inside as well. She told us that she loves her husband and they are great friends and partners, but she just doesn’t really like having sex with him. Whaaaat?!
“Abby what do you mean?” He doesn’t turn her on. He doesn’t excite her. Sex with him does NOTHING for her. “Oh, ok, that’s what you mean. Got it”. I almost cried, because when you are single and loving the mingle, and you watch cute married couples with their kids doing their thing, both attractive, finances all good, and loving on each other in public, a girl gets in her feelings sometimes, like…”couple goals!” But whack sex? I decline.
“Abby, we need more details”. Believe me, my inquiries were in no way salicious. I was a bit bummed out for her, because my single ass can jump up and move on to the next one if loverboy can’t deliver my way right away. She can’t. But the best part? She doesn’t want to! Whaaaat? “Abby explain.”
The Details: From the beginning he didn’t satisfy her in bed. He lacked the passion, fire and freak that she needed to get turned out. Why did she stay? She had kissed many frogs before him and decided that he would be a good partner in a major way, so she chose him. Any regrets? No.
Why she won’t leave? He still is a great partner. She can live with a husband who can’t please her in bed, because she can get pleasure from someone else. “Well fuck me!”
When the Sex is Great but You Want More…Sex
Then there was Sara. This girl is a piece of work. She’s been married for 5 years and has a two year old. She and her husband dated for 3 years before getting married. They too have a good-looking thing going on, in every way, so much so that her story really confused me. Apparently she and hubby have GREAT sex, and a lot of it. “How much is a lot Sara?” Every day, at least once. Well that’s a lot. Especially since you both work full-time and then there’s that kid. And apparently the sex is dirty, filthy, lovely.
Sara has a roster of men. Many many, many many many. She recently got her groove back in a major way. Like damn girl you are glowing kind of groove back. She ran through some of the list of her conquests for us while we sipped Cosmopolitans and picked our jaws up off the floor from time to time. She was having a lot of sex, and she was happy. There was not even a glimmer of guilt, regret, restraint evident in her. Just blatant “I’m having fun doing what I want to do.” Period.
Monogamy – What is Really Going on Here?
By the end of lunch as I was on my Uber ride back to the office I had a lot to process. Why were my married girlfriends living as much of a single-lady life as I was? Why did they have dates and lovers and no guilt? No guilt!
After the initial shock into this “new” insight, the fog started to clear and I began to understand things more clearly. Both were happy with their family lives, and therefore saw no need and had no desire to uproot it to search for mates who would be more compatible. They accepted that there was no one man who could be everything for them, and chose men who could be enough.
Then they drew a big line in the sand of their lives, and on the other side of that line was them. Just them, and what the hell else would make them even happier. On that side of the line were the other men. The men you don’t marry or procreate with, or even some who could have had a chance had they been around at the time but were certainly not enough to warrant a life-upheaval. Men who could, as in Abby’s case, fuck. Men who could, as in Sara’s case, thrill, in some way. I still think with her the thrill lies in the numbers as much as in anything else. My friends knew what made them happy, and they proceeded to put it all together. And just as you can’t build a team of one man, neither can my friends.
What I learned is that if my friends are snuffing monogamy, so are many other men and women out there. We see the stats, 50% of marriages end in divorce, many if not most also due to infidelity. But as for those who do stay together like Jay-Z and Beyoncé, well, it seems they are stepping out too. This could drive a person insane, like in Beyoncé’s Lemonade album. So why is monogamy such a big deal? It’s a lie darlings. A fantasy that I still think serves a purpose of giving us something to reach for. “Couple goals!”. But the flesh is weak, and the urge is strong. So fuck it.