Update On Our Coming Out

TLDR: It Was A Good Move

November is our ENM anniversary month.

Crazy to think about all that’s happened both with Kate and I and the world at large since November of 2019. The world was a different place, that’s for sure. I suppose November 1939 to November 1945 was more consequential, but this has no doubt been a humdinger of a 6 year span.

I should say something about Medium. Some may know, some may not, I”m sure some don’t care, either way, we’ve left the Medium platform. I downloaded our archive, and deleted our account.

Not a decision that was taken lightly, Medium was the first home for Sam&Kate, and we have fond memories of the people we interacted with there. Hopefully they’ve all found their way over here.

I wish Medium well, and hope that they find their way back from the abyss it’s evolved into.

If you’re reading us for the first time……Kate and I are a married couple in our 50’s whose relationship is Ethically Non-Monogamous (ENM). We’re swingers, our marriage is open; we have sex with other people. We’re in a committed relationship, and somewhere on the polyamorous and cuckold spectrums; Kate has a boyfriend (or two) and is a Hotwife. It’s neither of our first marriages. We met in a 12 step meeting; we’re each more than a decade sober now. If you’re curious about how this all works, we talk about our relationship in varying degrees of depth in other posts. We have an email address listed in our “about” page if you would like to contact us.

One of the bigger parts of the journey Kate and I have been on is that we’ve outed ourselves to our kids.

I don’t think this is at all a common thing in the ENM world; nor is it unheard of. Sitting on the couch at 0338 on a blustery early November morning, I’d guess that 20-25% of ENM couples are out to their kids. Unfortunately, given that Clifford, Billie and all the Chow Hound Cats are curled up and sleeping somewhere else in Casa Da Sam & Kate, I have no way of verifying that number.

Sure, having that talk with each of our 4 adult kids was scary. A year and a half on from those scary days, I’m 100% convinced that it was the right thing to do.

Out of the 4 kids, 3 are totally fine with it. The 4th, Ben, hasn’t made much discussion of it and honestly has bigger fish to fry in his life than the comings and goings of Kate and I. We did get some sense that he and his wife aren’t the biggest fans, and they did try to…..IDK, control us seems a bit much, but in that neighborhood. It was made known to us that they weren’t comfortable being at our house. Well, that’s an option available to them. We gave them space and kept our powder dry.

In the end, I suspect that energy was them trying to whitewash issues in their own relationship. Kate and I are pretty good with boundaries at this point, and had no issue meeting them where they were at the time. We’re going to live our lives while treating everyone with respect and kindness. Sure enough, a year later and they’re comfortable with who Kate and I are and are working on their relationship. Actually, Ben had dinner with us earlier this week after helping with a mid sized project. He brought pumpkin cupcakes along with him…..nothing says all’s well more clearly than sweat equity and baked goods.

There was a post on Reddit recently about an open couple being found out by one of their kids in about the worst way possible. Given this is Reddit, take it all with a grain of salt; the whole story could be bullshit, but it rang at least true-ish to me.

Turns out that a friend of the kids was bragging to said kid about hooking up with an older woman and showed a pic of her….well, you guessed it, it was his mom. Sooooo….he rightly looses his shit and there’s a big nasty confrontation about adultery and all the bad stuff.

Personally, I’m 100% on the kids side. I did the mental exercise of picturing this with 40 year ago me and my mom. I can’t imagine how I would have reacted, but I’m for sure that it wouldn’t have been good.

One of the many bits of wisdom that’s been dropped on us via our recovery fellowship is that you don’t need to show up to every fight you’re invited to. Perhaps Ben was looking to stir the pot, perhaps not, either way, how we responded was on us, not him.

Sure, we could have gotten on our high horses and been full of piss and vinegar about it, and honestly, when it was just us two in the room, we did more than once. That’s in bounds. It’s AOK to have honest and real conversations with your partner about anything.

We’ve long since learned to not hold ourselves accountable for every last word or thought we process while dealing with something. I trust Kate will keep what’s a processing thought as just that, a processing thought, a point along a path, not the destination. I’m the same with her. Part of honest and open communication with your partner is not keeping score or weaponizing thoughts from talks like that.

Suffice to say, we didn’t make a big deal about Ben. We’ve lived our lives in our way and have made no apology for being who we are or speaking our truth to him and his siblings.

Hopefully the parents of the kid in the Reddit post were able to hold space and take a step back as well. Some fights just don’t have a winner, and everyone loses.

As far as our other 3 kids, our being ENM is now just part of the background. There’s an occasional joke, maybe a question or conversation that stems from something they saw or read. We’re not obnoxious about it, don’t flaunt it or make a big deal about it. Pretty sure that each of the other 3, (the three girls, probably not a huge surprise) know that Kate spends the occasional night with other men.

Kids are resilient and they want for us parents pretty much what us parents want from them: that they’re decent people who do right things, and for them to be happy and content. Kate and I clearly are, so there’s no real drama about our relationship dynamic with them.

IDK if we’ve written about our first orgy experience, I think we have, many moons ago. Along those lines, here’s a public reminder for me to get an index going. Anyway….

It was a small house party, I’d guess 10 couples or so. The host was a guy who to this day is my mental image of the definition of a swinger. John is 100% central casting for a stereotypical ‘70’s swinger; chest hair, gold necklace, and always looking to fuck.

If memory serves, he and Kate had sex a couple times that night. Once just the two of them, the other with Kate on her knees, her face between a woman’s thighs, and John doing her doggy style. The woman Kate was going down on was blowing me at the moment. That, comma, was a good moment.

Fast forward a few years and Kate had to contact a garage about something being done on one of her work vehicles. Well, wouldn’t ya just know that her POC at the garage is also named John…..

Kate ended up calling swinger John instead of garage John. Swinger John, who had Kate as “Hot Chick” in his contacts, answered the call. Soon as he said hello, off Kate goes on a tire tangent much to Swinger John’s surprise I’m sure. Swinger John has done very well for himself and as he took the call was on a golf course in Florida.

After a moment or two they each realized what was going on and had a good laugh about it. Swinger John promised to reach out when they get back to PA in the spring.

I guess that’s it for now. I’m hoping to get back on a loose weekly cadence again. I’ve got a couple topics sitting on the back burner, and our lifestyle calander is looking to have some story material pretty quickly…..

Thanks for reading!! Be kind to yourself and others,

Sam & Kate