u/Iron_Wave

First time poster, throwaway for obvious reasons.
For context, we have had multiple discussions about bringing another woman into the bedroom, and she has offered multiple times for me to sleep around due to her low libido. Neither of these things has happened until last night.
So while we were out, the wife and I got flirty with a woman we met. The woman, “Bar Girl”, made it clear she wanted to come home with me, or us. We stayed there till well after last call as were friends with the bartenders, at which point my wife says she is going to hang out with her friend for a while to make sure her friend was in a good head space. She tells me to take Bar Girl home, show her a good time, and to grab condoms on the way home. She also tells me to make sure I put towels on the bed as Bar Girl had already told my wife she squirts. After a lot of verification on my part that my wife was not joking, that she was in fact ok with what she was telling me to do, and not at all testing me or anything I agreed to take Bar Girl home. Throughout the night I was transparent with my wife, I kept her updated and asked about her night. When Wife got home however, she came upstairs and saw me with Bar Girl in our bed and immediately shut down and walked out. Once I started talking to her she made it clear that she felt it was completely disrespectful to have slept with Bar Girl in our bed, and also that she never expected me to have sex with this woman.
Normally, even when presented the opportunity I would not have taken it as I can’t help but feel like I would be cheating. Lately, however I have not been feeling desired or wanted at all by my wife, more like we’re roommates. And I have communicated this to my wife. Bar Girl made it obvious she wanted me and that triggered something in me and made me go through with it. Before wife got home I even had to talk with Bar Girl about how uncomfortable I felt with the situation, but we both agreed it was fine as we were essentially pushed into it by my wife.
Bar Girl is typically the women’s advocate and will side against the man in general, but she feels like nothing wrong was done and she doesn’t understand why my wife is mad at us. I have reached out to a mutual friend of me and my wife, and he agrees that no harm was done. Wife says I should have known better than to use the bed, but she explicitly told me to our towels down on the bed. We also have 7 dogs, so was I supposed to use the couch? It’s also worth mentioning that the only other beds in the house are children’s beds and I’m not going to bring a woman home and use our kids beds for having fun. Has anybody been in a similar situation? How did you get through it?
TL;DR my wife wing manned another woman for me to take home, made sure there were half a dozen witnesses, and now won’t talk to me because I went through with it

My wife (let’s call her W) and I opened our marriage around 3 years ago and while I went on some dates, I never had capacity to peruse anything and I was okay with that. My wife while having gone on dates ended up in a relationship with someone and they’ve been together now for 2+ years.

W and I own a house and at the beginning of May, gf and gf’s kid moved into our house and we are now all cohabitating. The honeymoon phase has worn off and now I’m starting to feel like a stranger in my own house and a third wheel to my own marriage. At the start of opening our marriage, we had such strong communication and now it’s like that all went out the window.

Since July of last year W had been spending most nights at gfs place so she has had time to adjust to living together, dynamics, etc where as I’m now coming into the picture and it feels like I’m supposed to just know live with an almost stranger. There were initial conversations regarding living together that all 3 of us were part of but as we got to the point of actually living together, there has been no further chats. Even fundamental things like expenses and who is paying what hasn’t been discussed, even after asking to have this conversation.

C and gf both are strong willed, stubborn, and dominant, whereas I’m a shy introvert who is a pushover the second someone is frustrated and terrible at social cues. My bedroom, and I say that in the sense C barely sleeps in there lately, has become the only place of reprieve for me but how long can that be sustainable. My instincts are telling me to just run away from it all, that it’s easier that way.

Im not sure what I’m expecting of posting this, maybe it’s to just say these things so if you’ve read this far, thanks.

I (30F) have been thinking about ENM for a while as I‘m curious to explore with women.

Last night I talked to my husband about it. I‘m visiting friends next weekend and would like to go out dancing and was hoping to flirt around a bit without attachments. I asked him how he would feel if I kissed a woman. He didn‘t take the hypothetical well, saying, very calmly but distressed, that he couldn‘t even handle the thought of it and that he would never change his mind.

He‘s afraid he‘ll make me feel resentful and caged, then he kind of started to spiral, tears were shed, hugs were given, but still I left the conversation with a horrible feeling.

We agreed on talking to our couples therapist about it next week and continue to talk about the matter from time to time.

He says he doesn‘t look at anyone but me and can’t fathom how I could feel different. I‘m not sure I would have ever initiated the conversation if I knew how he‘d react.

Edit: Thanks to everyone who took the time to leave helpful and understanding comments, thank you truly. I understand that you cannot discuss something like this on short notice, I also understand that he may never be ok with this. He did say that he was open to have further conversations about it, so we‘ll do that. Thanks again!

****Post Edited to Add more details!

Our marriage has been without romance for years.

I suggested we open our marriage. Not the type where we actually date people, just random hookups.

No, absolutely not, never going to happen, not a possibility at all. Never even considered it. Believe me when I say he was impossible to reason with and would not even really hear me out.

I would have loved for him to get a side gal—he might have been nicer to me! I just wanted to stay together for our son but couldn’t have sex with him.

He said he wasn’t going to support me while I screw other guys. Hello! That’s what divorce is! Except now we have to pay for him to have his own apartment and neither of us will see our kid as much as we want.

***ETA: I’m so grateful for every comment! This really got my wheels turning. It’s totally just a thought experiment now as we are divorcing. He is looking at places and likely signing a 12month lease on a 2 bedroom apt about 6 blocks away. I’m safe btw thank you to those that expressed concern.

IMO every counter to the open marriage I describe also exists with a less than amicable divorce. A lot of people brought up working through pain and jealousy and the strain it puts on both parents and the kids. What magic divorces are you all in where you don’t have to deal with jealousy issues? My thing is I loathe the idea of other women being around my kid in a stepmom role. And that likely could have been avoided in the open marriage I’m talking about but is not something I can expect as a divorced person.

Bad divorce seems similar to bad open marriage. To me it seems like the only benefit of divorcing is my husband moves 6 blocks away and can process his pain and jealousy in his own space. Is that worth it for our child to have 2 homes? We have a nice house with 4 bedrooms. It’s good for our finances for us to take on the rent at an additional property? We’re spending money on rent that would have otherwise gone to savings. He has to process that pain either way and it would have been nice to be able to keep our kid as unaffected as possible.

I might posit to say most of you that are divorced with kids are in some ways in open marriages. You wouldn’t call it that, but hopefully the goal is to stay family and be in each other’s lives just enough for your kids. Coparenting seems like a detached open marriage, whether it’s done well or poorly. Certainly it looks a lot different than if you’d divorced without children. My husband and I will still speak and even see each other multiple times a week for at least the next 5 years and probably well after that with some degree of contact for the next 20 years.

But PLEASE push back on me. I’m sure I have a lot to learn.

Last thing, for those of you trying to tell me that women don’t want casual anonymous sex—hi!!!!! It’s almost like you are unaware this post is written by a woman interested exclusively in casual anonymous sex!!