7 Men I Made Out With When I Opened My Marriage
Dating apps were like a drug for me. Until they weren’t.
I asked for an open marriage as a last-ditch effort to save my dying relationship.
I had not felt truly desired by my partner for over a decade. But with two kids under 5, this was the only solution I could think of to avoid divorce.
When my husband reluctantly agreed to the arrangement, I dove into dating apps like a horny teenager. The attention from men was an instant high, and very quickly I became almost unrecognizable to my former self.
I went from being a tired, stressed out mom to someone whose dating app bio read “I just want to make out to Led Zeppelin in the back of your car.”
One of the instant joys of dating in an open marriage was the freedom from finding “the one.” If I had any sort of connection with someone, I’d be up for a make-out session. I didn’t care if their lives were a disaster, or if they lived in a tiny wooden house in a warehouse in the woods. This dating app freedom opened up a whole new world of men to me.
- Nico
Nico was my very first dating app connection, and I was definitely not ready for this interaction yet.
A recovering addict who worked at a top financial firm, he told me outright we couldn’t meet within several blocks of a bar. He also asked if I was down for a “kinky night,” which I misinterpreted to just mean “hot.” I was not prepared for his idea of “kinky” (essentially power play where I didn’t get to feel any pleasure and just serviced him — most definitely not what I signed up for).
So we made out a bit and then I called myself an Uber home. But not before I inadvertently exposed Nico to a fun new form of kink. I found out the hard way that when you’re a nursing mom your breast milk can actually leak all over your Tinder date during a make-out session.
2. Brad
Brad was hot. Wavy long hair, rugged physique. Surprisingly interesting to talk with. But Brad was also a mess who would be a literal disaster to date. He lived alone in the woods, over 5 hours away from our city. But he was in town to repair espresso machines at local restaurants because his job was to repair espresso machines. He was also a divorced dad of 3, a woodworker who was building his own tiny house inside a warehouse (where he currently lived), an aspiring paramedic, and a former traveling missionary. And probably a bunch of other things too.
Kissing him was fun. But when the espresso machines were fixed, I never heard from him again.
3. Jonah
Jonah and I really connected over our shared love for Led Zeppelin. We texted for days before we met, and I felt so excited and mentally unstable about the situation that I actually invited him to join me on an out-of-town birthday trip with my friends. This was before I had met him or mentioned to my friends that my husband and I were trying an open marriage. Jonah had enough sense to decline that offer.
But once we did meet in person and actually slept together, the red flags were just too numerous to ignore. To sum up the experience: he couldn’t go 30 seconds without taking a hit from his weed bowl because he had debilitating anxiety and needed it to function. For the record: sex in 30-second intervals is worse than no sex.
4. Nathan
I was initially attracted to Nathan because of his unusual level of persistence. After he accidentally swiped left on me, he tracked me down on LinkedIn and showed up in my inbox there.
Nathan was a recently separated dad who hadn’t been with another woman for over ten years. I was instantly charmed by his wit and good looks, and we soon made plans to sleep together … in his attic while his kids were asleep.
Always the gentleman, he purchased both regular and latex-free condoms for the event. But the sex was remarkably terrible. He admitted to me that his ex had a hard rule against all foreplay (???!!!), so he was out of practice. It’s a testament to Nathan’s wit and good looks that I kept coming back for more. Unfortunately, Nathan was open about his crush on a woman from work, and I was too into him to deal with the feelings that brought up for me. So I tearfully broke it off.
Regarding Nathan’s persistence: A few weeks later, I got several voicemails from him asking for donations to his budding political campaign. I did not contribute.
5. Will
Will was a charming, slightly lost 30-something who lived with tons of roommates and worked as a waiter. Talking to Will made me feel young again. In the sense that he reminded me of a cute 18-year-old stoner I might have chatted with in high school if I hung out with 18-year-old stoners in high school. But Will made me laugh and was most definitely down to party.
I was so thrilled to meet Will that I left work early to pick him up (Will did not own a car) and drive to a local park so that we could make out on a park bench. We got to second base, but his sweatshirt had dog hair all over it and his breath tasted like cigarettes. And that was the end of my time with Will.
6. Martín
Martín was a smooth operator with a fancy job. Originally from Colombia, he texted all the things a sexually amped up mom wanted to hear. For our first date he took me to a fancy restaurant followed by a salsa club. But it was all too much for me. Hadn’t he read what I said about just wanting to make out in a car?
The real deal-breaker was when the hostess at the restaurant called him Mr. Martín and brought him to his “table.” Somehow I just wanted Will and Martín to morph into one person and then have sex with that person.
7. Collin
This list stops with Collin, because Collin caused the end of my open marriage.
At first it was just a few flirtatious messages at the beginning of a global pandemic (I left out the part that my transformation to a sex-hungry lunatic happened just 2 months before COVID-19 shut down the whole world).
The pandemic put a halt to my face-to-face make-out sessions. But Collin and I struck up a conversation by text that lasted months. Eventually we decided to meet, and we had the best sex I have ever experienced. It’s as if sex didn’t exist before him. On top of that, I fell so in love with him that I would cling to his arm as he drove me home to extend the amount of time our bodies were touching.
Of course, falling in love with Collin was not in my open marriage plan. Our love affair lasted about 3 months, and it led to very difficult discussions at home. My husband was miserable and jealous. I brought up polyamory. I brought up divorce. Collin and I fantasized about being together for real. But no solution seemed like a good one aside from maintaining this fantasy world where I could continue to sleep with the man I loved just two nights a week.
Eventually, I made the painful decision to end things with Collin. My husband and I closed the book on our open marriage and started intensive marriage therapy. But that was over two years ago now, and it took a long time for me to stop longing for Collin.
My dating-app rampage was fun until it wasn’t. The validation from men that I was still a desirable, sexual woman gave me the jolt I needed to feel alive again. But I learned very quickly that I wasn’t actually looking for car make-out sessions. I was looking for real love.
I was and still am struggling through an unhappy marriage, and that cannot be solved by a dating app.
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