Where to begin? I guess at the beginning is always the best as this is my first time blogging...ever, lol. For those who read this blog, I'll warn you, I may ramble a bit, lol.

Jen and I have been involved in the lifestyle for almost as long as we've been married. Our interest started about a year after we got married. We've had some problems here and there, but for the most part, it's been a fun time and we've met some great people.

We got started in California, before I joined the military and we were involved with two or three great groups; they held meet and greets, attended clubs, took trips, pretty much anything you could think of, we did as a group. Some of the groups had two or three people that were in the same group, but most of the groups were comprised of different people, but there was no drama at all among the groups. Everybody got along with everybody else and there were no problems.

Then in 2004, the fun came to an end for us as we found out we going to start a family and I joined the military to support that family. We figured that the fun wouldn't end just because I was in the military as we heard there were a lot of people in the lifestyle in the military. We were wrong on that part, either that or we just didn't know where to look. Either way, it ended up being that my first duty station was overseas in Italy. Now you'd figure that Europe has a whole bunch of swing clubs, but not Italy (at least none that we found), and not really many people on websites are from overseas, so we took a break for 3 years while we were overseas.

My second duty station is currently where I'm at in Ohio. Our original intention was to pick up exactly where we left off 3 year prior, but that never happened as we were starting to have problems in our marriage that were unrelated with anything to do with the lifestyle. Not wanting to drag those problems where we went, we decided to wait and see what the future would hold as we were contemplating divorce at that time.

Luckily for us and our family, we were able to work through the majority of our problems. We still have problems now and then, but it's a normal marriage, who doesn't have problems now and then. The key is that we fixed what was broken and have decided to be active in the lifestyle once again. So, like anybody looking to meet people, we started checking out the websites and clubs in our area.

Mind you, while in California, we had already become members on what was at the time, a very active site and that's what we looked at. When we had little to no success, I found another site that was having a special price offer for lifetime memberships. I signed up on a whim just thinking it would be another sham website and not very popular. It turns out that the website is very popular in our area and has forums, which the previous website never had (or at least not very active forums).

If you ever meet us, you'll notice that I tend to be quiet until i get to know people and Jen is the bubbly one. While I'm quiet in person, I am a computer nerd through and through and would gladly spend all day on the computer if I could. So that's where I found myself spending most of my time, was on the forums, reading people's thoughts and opinions.

As I'm sure any of the frequent posters here can tell you, the more you post, the more people get to know you. Well, that's just what I did, I started posting and talking to people. It wasn't long before we got invited to join several groups, but my work schedule has changed since joining the military. I work nights now, and work most weekends so we don't get to go out except for once or twice a month (which is a good thing, in a way).

Jen and I consider ourselves drama free and we like to stay that way as much as possible. Unfortunately, now that we are starting all over (making new friends, meeting new groups), it seems so much easier to get involved in the drama that people have, whether directly or inadvertently.

We have been to a few clubs out here. The first club was hit or miss, sometimes it was clean, other times it was dirty. We had a problem there, but we've had problems at other clubs and still went back before. But every time we've gone, it just seems like there were not many people there at all so we decided to look around and see what other clubs were around us. Being in southwestern Ohio, there are a lot of clubs, either close, or a few hours drive away, it's just a matter of timing for us to attend.

For New Year's, I actually had it off (first time in over 4 years) and we decided to attend a different club, one that we had heard rumors of the members being rude and stuck up, but we decided to attend it anyway to see for ourselves. Jen is a plus size female and a good majority of the members in attendance were what could be considered "ken and barbie" couples, but we still had fun. Jen is a little sensitive about her weight as it was caused by a medical condition that she was diagnosed with and the medication that was used to treat it. While she is sensitive about it, she's comfortable with herself and we have played with "ken and barbie" couples before, no problem. We had fun on NYE and returned for additional fun the following night. The following night, one of the members came up to Jen and told her something along the lines that bbws were not wanted there and we should just go home. Jen was upset and we left.

I posted a forum the next day on the site that we belong to, purposefully not mentioning the club name. As professionally as I could, I relayed our experience at the club and the negative attitude towards bbw that we got Within minutes, one of the most popular people that goes to that club posted a reply identifying the club and from that moment, the thread mostly consisted of apologies and input from the club regulars.

The former club manager sent us an email saying that she had received complaints about the manner that the owners ran the club and that we should check out this other club that she was now promoting because of the way she was treated while she was manager.

A few days later, she posted a blog about her time as the manager and she was pretty much blasted by the owners of the club as well as the employees. They pretty much called her a liar and said that she left a lot of what she didn't want people to know about out of her blog.

Even though I don't owe these people anything...I've only met the club regulars once and have never met the former manager, I thought that somebody had to defend her as she was all by herself.

Today, in yet another forum, she was pretty much attacked. I feel guilty about it as it was a post I had put on there requesting to hear the other side of the story that pretty much started it all. I don't even know these people and here I am getting involved in their drama.

Today, I relearned an important lesson though. Just mind my own business. Once I extract myself from the drama I got myself into, I plan to do just that.

Notes

Mind you, I don't know the whole history of these people as there were plenty of personal attacks thrown out there from the person I was trying to defend.

For those that have read this, yes, I left names of sites and those involved out on purpose as I don't want to be anymore involved than I already am. I'm just here to record my observations and feelings about what happened, which is the reason I posted it here instead of on the blog sites that are used by the people discussed.

For those that are on this site that know what I'm talking about, this is just my point of view of what happened, nothing more.