Negotiated Infidelity as seen on Dr. Phil

Ok, this is going to be long, but its worth it!

So I was just catching up on the Dr. Phil episodes that I taped on my dvr (I don't ever like to miss that show- I've even got the hubby hooked, tho he'll never admit it!) And the episodes that aired on October 28th and 29th were very interesting to me.

It was a two-episode story of a man who had been habitually cheating on his wife and getting caught with the same woman over the course of 5 YEARS! Basically, he is proposing the idea to his wife of an open marriage and she is not down with it. She married him and had his kids wanting and expecting a life-long monogamous relationship and she's not about to settle for "half a husband" (as Dr. Phil puts it). His idea of his proposed arrangement is that he would live with his wife and kids, spend a good amount/majority of the time with them, but basically whenever he felt like it, he could go spend time with his "girlfriend" and have a romantic and emotional relationship with her, too.

“What man would not want to have a wife and a girlfriend?” Scott asks. "It would be like having two different cars. You have a weekend car and a weekday car.”
“So [Chrissy] could run the house and take care of the kids, and then this other woman you would have for sex, and outings, and travel and that sort of thing..." asks Dr. Phil.

The guy has been lying to both of them, saying that he is not having sex with the other, even though he is having unprotected sex with both, but I guess in his perfect scenario they would both know and not care that he was having sex with them both. His kids also know that their daddy has a girlfriend and the kids have asked him to stop seeing her and to pay more attention to mommy, so that is clearly unhealthy. The wife has begged the other woman to leave her husband alone and break it off (as it was first a long distance relationship), only to find out that the other woman moved from a different state to be closer to her husband!

This guy was really acting like a jerk through all of this, with really rude comments such as something like- I don't know who I love more, my wife or my girlfriend, because there are different types of loves, like how you can love a person or love a dog... So it makes it really easy for me to side with the wife and say this negotiating infidelity thing is ridiculous. But then a woman comes on the show whose pen name is Holly Hill, author of SugarBabe who has a very different perception.

Holly Hill thinks that a mistress can save a marriage because sometimes a man has needs that his wife can not or will not fulfill. (It bothered me that she was only referencing male needs that women don't fulfill and not the possibility of the other way around. grrr.) So in her opinion, it would be beneficial for the marriage for the woman to agree to let her husband be with another woman in whichever way he needed so that his needs would be satisfied and it would not be considered cheating because she agreed to it. I think her point was that the divorce rate is so high and the main reason for divorce due to infidelity is not the act itself, but rather the deception, lying, lack of trust, etc. and not that he actually slept with someone else. So if the infidelity was agreed to, there would be less hurt, pain, and ultimately, divorce.

I honestly don't know what I think about this, I mean, I have opinions for sure, but not necessarily a particular stance on the issue one way or the other. What does everyone here think? Could negotiated infidelity save a marriage? Is it healthy for the marriage or should the couple just work on it between themselves? What if one party is not willing to do some of the things that the other needs to be satisfied, even if it is just a matter of frequency, but their relationship is otherwise good- should the one person just be sexually frustrated, or should they cheat or just get a divorce straightaway, or is this a viable option? What are the consequences of each? less

I don't see anything wrong with polygomous relationships, perhaps it might work. If the lady (Chrissy?) isn't willing to agree with the negotiation then they will have to find another way of working things out.

What I find very cool is that Holly Hill came and gave a different perspective, that of having wife and girlfriend, which could sort of be eye-opening for some people.

If they both value their relatonship they should both work at a compramise, where both are satisfied.

I hope Airen sees this post, she could be quite insightful about this due to her life experiences. less

First of all let's clear the air here...what he is proposing is polyAMORY not polygamy. Polygamy is the practice wherein a man marries more than one woman. Generally the women are sisters at the dinner table (though not necesarily related by blood) and there is no group sex dynamic. It is also, usually, a religious choice. The women are not allowed to seek other men or have an outside relationship with another man.
Polyandry would be the opposite though in the form it's most often practiced the woman marries all the sons of a family, again it is a religious choice or a lack of women (most frequently) and there is no group sex dynamic. The men are also not afforded the right to seek other females.
Polyamory is the practice of having more than one ~committed~ relationship at the same time. There are so many permutations of polyamory in practice that even polyamorists cannot adequately define the parameters. There can be no group sex dynamic and there could be LOTS of group sex. It depends on the participants in the relationship.
An open marriage means the participants are agreeing that each partner may have lovers who do not become part of the family dynamic or short term affairs. The couple may also "swing" in an open relationship and a polyamorist relationship.
This would be why I tell people that I am part of a polyamorist triad and ALSO have an open marriage. Our triad is the family part (for us) and the others are playmates until the decision is made to invite them to be more. This is all up front BEFORE any hearts are on the line, so to speak. We do not cheat and have no reason to lie to each other; Sigel, Arch and I. We do not condone cheating and demand honesty from any person before we play.
From my understanding about this show (understand I do not respect Dr. Phil nor do I respect his world view. I don't expect everyone to feel the same way I do and I mean no disrespect those who may feel Dr. Phil has helped them.) this was a cheating dog who got caught and THEN decided he was polyamorous. I call bullshit. He knew after the second time he was caught he loved this other woman but chose to continue lying to each of his loves. This is a cheater not a polyamorist. Do I believe this guy should have his cake and eat it too? Sure! Why not? Ummmm because his wife isn't interested in what he's offering. He has a choice, either abide by the boundaries he can negotiate with his wife or leave her entirely. Ethically and morally he has no other choice.
Do I think polyamory can work? Hell yes I do, I am living proof that it can work. Negotiated infidelity, or as I like to put it: redefining what fidelity means to us, saved our marriage and our lives. I've been pretty honest on this forum and on Eden Cafe about that. The difference between our relationship and this couple's (triple's?) is I wanted my husband to be happy and I enjoy watching him with other women. I enjoy hearing about how much fun he had with a playmate and I wish he could find a woman who wasn't so hell bent on making him monogamous! Sigel feels the same way and knows what a prize we have in Arch.
Meh, they call women like what I'm talking about Unicorns for a reason! I got my unicorn in Arch and if we are blessed with another then WOW will we be one happy polyamorous family. LOL
You are totally correct sasweetheart89 it isn't fair of him to commit to a monogamous marriage and then say he's changed his mind...but he's human, as humans we DO change our minds. Do I believe he went into the marriage intending to be fidelitous? I dunno only he knows that but he did know his wife was intending to be faithful and he should have honored the original vows or negotiated to change the agreements, HONESTLY. What he did by using polyamory as an excuse or a way to have it all is wrong and unfair. This is not what happened in my relationship though...we learned about polyamory after we had committed to our relationship with Arch and opened our marriage. We learned about polyamory because we were looking for a word to call what we had.
As far as the kids begging Daddy to spend his time with Mom...SHAME on Mom for using her children this way! Maybe she doesn't lean on them and maybe they feel her sorrow from afar but I sincerely doubt that. My children are in the trenches WITH us and they very rarely know when things get unbalanced between their father's and I. We save our adult dealings for when they won't be affected by it as much as possible and so should she. She needs to pull herself up and make a decision. Either live with the fact that her husband loves her and loves another woman or leave and try to find someone who can give her the monogamy she desires. If she decides to live with it she can negotiate some boundaries and time management to be sure she gets her fair share of his time and attention. These are her only choices if she wants to get her children off the battlefield. Then again if she was interested in leaving the battlefield she wouldn't be on tv airing her dirty laundry to strangers. less

I would take any advice "Holly Hill" offers with a grain of salt. She's an ex-hooker with Daddy issues trying to get women to buy her book by not-so-subtly blaming them for their husbands' infidelity.

I agree with what Airen said: this isn't someone who is polyamorous, this is someone who got caught with another woman and is trying to find a way to eat his cake or pussy or whatever. less

Ok, this is going to be long, but its worth it!

So I was just catching up on the Dr. Phil episodes that I taped on my dvr (I don't ever like to miss that show- I've even got the hubby hooked, tho he'll never admit it!) And the episodes that aired on October 28th and 29th were very interesting to me.

It was a two-episode story of a man who had been habitually cheating on his wife and getting caught with the same woman over the course of 5 YEARS! Basically, he is proposing the idea to his wife of an open marriage and she is not down with it. She married him and had his kids wanting and expecting a life-long monogamous relationship and she's not about to settle for "half a husband" (as Dr. Phil puts it). His idea of his proposed arrangement is that he would live with his wife and kids, spend a good amount/majority of the time with them, but basically whenever he felt like it, he could go spend time with his "girlfriend" and have a romantic and emotional relationship with her, too.

“What man would not want to have a wife and a girlfriend?” Scott asks. "It would be like having two different cars. You have a weekend car and a weekday car.”
“So [Chrissy] could run the house and take care of the kids, and then this other woman you would have for sex, and outings, and travel and that sort of thing..." asks Dr. Phil.

The guy has been lying to both of them, saying that he is not having sex with the other, even though he is having unprotected sex with both, but I guess in his perfect scenario they would both know and not care that he was having sex with them both. His kids also know that their daddy has a girlfriend and the kids have asked him to stop seeing her and to pay more attention to mommy, so that is clearly unhealthy. The wife has begged the other woman to leave her husband alone and break it off (as it was first a long distance relationship), only to find out that the other woman moved from a different state to be closer to her husband!

This guy was really acting like a jerk through all of this, with really rude comments such as something like- I don't know who I love more, my wife or my girlfriend, because there are different types of loves, like how you can love a person or love a dog... So it makes it really easy for me to side with the wife and say this negotiating infidelity thing is ridiculous. But then a woman comes on the show whose pen name is Holly Hill, author of SugarBabe who has a very different perception.

Holly Hill thinks that a mistress can save a marriage because sometimes a man has needs that his wife can not or will not fulfill. (It bothered me that she was only referencing male needs that women don't fulfill and not the possibility of the other way around. grrr.) So in her opinion, it would be beneficial for the marriage for the woman to agree to let her husband be with another woman in whichever way he needed so that his needs would be satisfied and it would not be considered cheating because she agreed to it. I think her point was that the divorce rate is so high and the main reason for divorce due to infidelity is not the act itself, but rather the deception, lying, lack of trust, etc. and not that he actually slept with someone else. So if the infidelity was agreed to, there would be less hurt, pain, and ultimately, divorce.

I honestly don't know what I think about this, I mean, I have opinions for sure, but not necessarily a particular stance on the issue one way or the other. What does everyone here think? Could negotiated infidelity save a marriage? Is it healthy for the marriage or should the couple just work on it between themselves? What if one party is not willing to do some of the things that the other needs to be satisfied, even if it is just a matter of frequency, but their relationship is otherwise good- should the one person just be sexually frustrated, or should they cheat or just get a divorce straightaway, or is this a viable option? What are the consequences of each? less

Wow, thanks for all the interesting and well thought out posts! It's really interesting for me to hear all of your points from different perspectives from people with different-that-mainstr eam lifestyles.

Sarahbear, it seems like you saw the episode too, did you?

Dame Demi, you make me lol. thats all. less

First of all let's clear the air here...what he is proposing is polyAMORY not polygamy. Polygamy is the practice wherein a man marries more than one woman. Generally the women are sisters at the dinner table (though not necesarily related by blood) and there is no group sex dynamic. It is also, usually, a religious choice. The women are not allowed to seek other men or have an outside relationship with another man.
Polyandry would be the opposite though in the form it's most often practiced the woman marries all the sons of a family, again it is a religious choice or a lack of women (most frequently) and there is no group sex dynamic. The men are also not afforded the right to seek other females.
Polyamory is the practice of having more than one ~committed~ relationship at the same time. There are so many permutations of polyamory in practice that even polyamorists cannot adequately define the parameters. There can be no group sex dynamic and there could be LOTS of group sex. It depends on the participants in the relationship.
An open marriage means the participants are agreeing that each partner may have lovers who do not become part of the family dynamic or short term affairs. The couple may also "swing" in an open relationship and a polyamorist relationship.
This would be why I tell people that I am part of a polyamorist triad and ALSO have an open marriage. Our triad is the family part (for us) and the others are playmates until the decision is made to invite them to be more. This is all up front BEFORE any hearts are on the line, so to speak. We do not cheat and have no reason to lie to each other; Sigel, Arch and I. We do not condone cheating and demand honesty from any person before we play.
From my understanding about this show (understand I do not respect Dr. Phil nor do I respect his world view. I don't expect everyone to feel the same way I do and I mean no disrespect those who may feel Dr. Phil has helped them.) this was a cheating dog who got caught and THEN decided he was polyamorous. I call bullshit. He knew after the second time he was caught he loved this other woman but chose to continue lying to each of his loves. This is a cheater not a polyamorist. Do I believe this guy should have his cake and eat it too? Sure! Why not? Ummmm because his wife isn't interested in what he's offering. He has a choice, either abide by the boundaries he can negotiate with his wife or leave her entirely. Ethically and morally he has no other choice.
Do I think polyamory can work? Hell yes I do, I am living proof that it can work. Negotiated infidelity, or as I like to put it: redefining what fidelity means to us, saved our marriage and our lives. I've been pretty honest on this forum and on Eden Cafe about that. The difference between our relationship and this couple's (triple's?) is I wanted my husband to be happy and I enjoy watching him with other women. I enjoy hearing about how much fun he had with a playmate and I wish he could find a woman who wasn't so hell bent on making him monogamous! Sigel feels the same way and knows what a prize we have in Arch.
Meh, they call women like what I'm talking about Unicorns for a reason! I got my unicorn in Arch and if we are blessed with another then WOW will we be one happy polyamorous family. LOL
You are totally correct sasweetheart89 it isn't fair of him to commit to a monogamous marriage and then say he's changed his mind...but he's human, as humans we DO change our minds. Do I believe he went into the marriage intending to be fidelitous? I dunno only he knows that but he did know his wife was intending to be faithful and he should have honored the original vows or negotiated to change the agreements, HONESTLY. What he did by using polyamory as an excuse or a way to have it all is wrong and unfair. This is not what happened in my relationship though...we learned about polyamory after we had committed to our relationship with Arch and opened our marriage. We learned about polyamory because we were looking for a word to call what we had.
As far as the kids begging Daddy to spend his time with Mom...SHAME on Mom for using her children this way! Maybe she doesn't lean on them and maybe they feel her sorrow from afar but I sincerely doubt that. My children are in the trenches WITH us and they very rarely know when things get unbalanced between their father's and I. We save our adult dealings for when they won't be affected by it as much as possible and so should she. She needs to pull herself up and make a decision. Either live with the fact that her husband loves her and loves another woman or leave and try to find someone who can give her the monogamy she desires. If she decides to live with it she can negotiate some boundaries and time management to be sure she gets her fair share of his time and attention. These are her only choices if she wants to get her children off the battlefield. Then again if she was interested in leaving the battlefield she wouldn't be on tv airing her dirty laundry to strangers. less