Does swinging and friendship mix?

[dragonfly_nc 16]

Just curious on what others take are on swinging and friendship. Is it really possibly for a couple to have a true friendship with another couple, if you play with others.

 

We have found that we have swinger friends that we do not swing with yet it is difficult to maintain a true friendship with people that you play with, due to emotions (jealousy etc), if you are not exclusive with them.

 

What's everyone's take on this?

[OhioCouple 40]

Great poll and question!

 

I voted for it having it's ups and downs. We do prefer to become friends first but have found that it hasn't worked out well in a couple of relationships. Specifically one that can't let go of the fact that we don't want to take it to a sexual level and they can't understand why since "we are friends " in areas that have no sexual meaning.

 

I am interested to hear others opinons on this and see how the poll turns out.

 

Lori

[Handyman69 15]

My husband and I discussed this...trying to see what we would vote and came up with "not able to vote". We have gone for the friendship part but as of yet are still looking for that. Seems the couple that we know fairly well....get togethers are on a sexual nature (due to distance). We currently are corresponding with a couple that looks promising in both areas but only time will tell.

 

We did soft swap with one couple that looked good on both ends but they ended up backing out of the lifestyle and the friendship ended...we think it is due to them not being able to trust each other in a non-sexual way.

 

Lots of couples that we have known and corresponded with..seems to be to say they want a friendship but don't pursue it. example: getting to gether when kids are home for playing cards, or going out for dinner, etc.

 

I know we are pretty new at this so are hopeful to have a couple on both levels.

 

 

Rhonda and John

[BiloxiCouple 695]

We see having friends as pretty difficult due to work and kids. When we do get out we try to make the most of it.

 

We have friends that don't swing. But it's hard to visit with them due to time constraints.

 

We have friends that are swingers but we don't party with. Just the way it is. We have friends that are swingers and party with regular.

 

You will run across swingers (new?) who may party one time and don't want the lifestyle after that for a multitude of reasons. Or more experienced swingers may have a change in their lives (financial, family etc.) that may cause them to get out of the lifestyle permanently or temporarily.

 

We've never had any luck using e-mail. And normally don't pursue e-mails. We are listed on a couple of sites with the stipulation if you want to meet it will be at a swingers club. If they can't meet you there then they probably aren't ready.

 

And I digress again.

[bimrdcpl 15]

We have met two couples that we have played with and became great friends with. One no longer is in the lifestyle but we are still friends with and the other one we are currently "seeing" if thats what you want to call it. We have done the dinner and card thing with all the kids running around like mad men screaming and yelling and having a great time. We have done birthday parties and housewarmings, and so on. We pretty much hang out but we set aside nights where its just adults when we want to play. Which is not that often do to kids wanting to run around like mad men and scream and yell. Which is ok with us because when we do get our time its that much better because there are no more awkward moments. Just a lot of fun.

[2New2it 19]

We have yet to find a couple with which we have 4-way comfort/attraction, so haven't done a full swap yet.

 

We do have a few men and women who have been in threesomes with us and we consider them friends, though not as close as our "normal" friends for daily activities. We do things with them outside the bedroom, but more often than not, we eventually end up there.

[dave_susie2001 15]

Whenever we get together with a couple, we never have any expectations. I’ve said that before. If we all hit it off and end up playing, that’s great. If not, that’s great too. We haven’t met too many people in this lifestyle that we don’t like. We have met many that we aren’t attracted to, but those are two different things.

 

Most of our friends are in the lifestyle. We love to meet new couples and we do as often as we can. Some we clique with, some we don’t. Some we do play with, but we don’t have sex every time we’re together. Some are great people and we become casual friends, but we never play with. Some (like your example Lori) can’t understand why we don’t want to play with them. Either the attraction is there for everyone, or it’s not. Just because you aren’t sexually attracted to someone, doesn’t mean that you can’t be friends. One couple we know we meet ONLY to have sex. Of course, dinner can and often is a part of our “date,” we only meet them when we all want to party.

 

We enjoy hanging out with our swing friends. Dinners, drinks, watching DVD’s, playing cards…what ever. We are more comfortable with swingers than “regular” people. We can talk about anything. Let’s face it, you can’t eat lunch with your average co-worker and tell him/her how your wife had 8 orgasms the night before at a friendly cocktail party. An evening of good fellowship is almost as much fun as an evening of playing.

 

As far as the kid goes, ours is grown (18) and can be more trouble than a toddler. Where you would have to watch what you say in front of a younger child, with an 18-year-old, you have to watch HOW you say it. They aren’t dumb. I’m sure our daughter has suspicions about why we go out overnight sometimes, or have friends over for dinner. But I know that she doesn’t even like to think about Susie and I having sex together. She’d NEVER believe that we have sex with other people. At least, I hope she wouldn’t.

[JustAskJulie 2,595]

For us, definately. Most of the couples we have swung with I would consider good friends and one or two I would put in the best friend category. The greatest thing about these relationships is that you can get together and talk about swinging and flirt and have fun but it takes the pressure off. There is no pressure to have sex and if you do it's just a bonus to a great friendship.

[Michcouple 15]

We have met many new and different friends in the lifestyle. Although, I do consider many of them friends I find it hard to consider them best friends. This hasn't been by choice...just seems to happen that way.

 

[Atlphotog 15]

We met this couple, it was our first couple about 8 months ago. This was first time I just didnt watch. We clicked with the couple really liked them,they liked us. They had never swung and were very emotional people. You would talk to the hubby and he would say she is not ready to full swing but I am. You would talk to the wife and she would say he is not ready to full swing but I am. It was a emotional roller coaster and because we liked them as people we stayed around alot longer then we would if we didnt see them as friends. Then they were gone for awhile came back to visit and hang out nothing sexually. Then two days later we get a email that they were saved and we were commiting the greatest sin in the world swinging. Now they are writing us wanting to hang out and just be friends, its just to weird.

[d and K 15]

A while back i would have thought that it was impossible to keep swinging and friendships toghther......After nearly a year, I have played with partied with traveled etc with the same couples....Sometimes its great jsut to go out or BBQ. Although a short time ago we did go out to a montreal bar and blow a few heads off ( 4 couples interchaning was a lot of fun , yet satsifying). I have run into a few folks that off at a party are gr4eat to play with yet if you run into them on the street or store, they wont aknoledge you

[Vjklander 138]

We belong to a few different 'lifestyle' groups, ie Swingers, BDSM, Nudists, Heathens, Libertarians ... and most of our friends are in one or more of those groups. A few 'nilla's here and there. But it seems natural to be friends with people who share our outlook on life. We happen to enjoy sharing pleasures with others and accept other people for who they are. We find that is a fairly common view in the kinky communities. We also have a very stable relationship that is a whole lot more like dating than marriage. We don't take anything for granted, especially each other. If you take a look around, you realize that every time I walk out the door in the morning it might be for the last time, every time we lay down in bed at night it might be the last time. Not to be morbid, but you never know, so we treat every moment of every day as special.

Jamie

[OhioCouple 40]

Originally posted by Vjklander

We also have a very stable relationship that is a whole lot more like dating than marriage. We don't take anything for granted, especially each other. If you take a look around, you realize that every time I walk out the door in the morning it might be for the last time, every time we lay down in bed at night it might be the last time. Not to be morbid, but you never know, so we treat every moment of every day as special.

Jamie

Jamie that is one of the better written assesments regarding relationships that I have read in a long time. Very well put and very true. I think that it is the foundation on which good relationships are built and that by having such you can enter into whatever activities that you enjoy without feeling pressure or worried about your love for each other.

 

Lori

[MattMann 17]

We have only "swung" with 5 couples (in 5 years of swinging) and have only found one pair that we became very good friends with. They are now our closest and best friends (actually, the wife and I are very, very close, my wife and her husband are just friendly). We get together very often, even vacation together, but we haven't done anything sexual for almost a year now. They live an hour away from us and have kids too, so when we meet it is usually always non-sexual (we have been almost caught outside in the hot tub on more than one occasion when we thought they were all asleep or watching a movie, so now we only do sexual things on adult-only meetings which are as rare as honest politicians). That's okay though, because the best thing about the relationship is the freedom of having open communication, being able to talk so non-chalantly about things you would never even allude to with your "normal" friends. Of course you still have to watch your mouth when the rugrats come around, so total freedom is still some years away.

[WesternSwing 504]

We have friendships with two couples we have swung with, but I still am suspicious about close friendships. I worry. My ex and I had some soft swing experiences years ago with my best friend and his wife. We were at their house or them at ours several nights a week for dinner and the kids playing together. Then the normal story of hot tubbing together, watching porn together, and things progressed to soft swinging. But then, one night my best friend's wife caught my ex giving him a blowjob in my ex's car out on the street in front of their house. Turned out it had been going on for several months, too. So we had gotten so close as friends that they developed feelings for each other. So you could say I'm a bit skittish and leary about getting too close to people we are swinging with.

 

Mr. WS

[Bama0468 93]

We have had our ups and downs, mostly UPS! As Jules said it is awesome ot have friends that you can be COMPLETELY you with, no preasure, occasional perks.

[twoready4fun 15]

We always try to be friends with our partners. I guess it is not always possible though.

[friendlycoupl63 15]

i voted it has it's ups and downs.......this is the male half of the couple.....after about 4 yrs in the LS, we found a couple that we both got along with, which most of you know, not all get along and couples sometimes just don't work out. it was so nice to find this other couple that we didn't see what was coming at all..........we all got along great, and we even had dinners together with all the kids playing, and doing what ever........video games, running around in the yard, you know normal things lol. we did all that, and when ever we had our adult time for our shared fun........well one day, after a couple of months of us all playing and having our new friendship with them........the male half of the couple tells his wife that he wants to put their marriage on hold, and may not even want a woman in his life at all..........he wants to see if his feels of having a male to male relationship is what he wants, and that she can still have a female to female relationship with who ever she wants but no guys...........so here we are again, still very much involved in her life, since they became such good friends, but here we are again looking for that special couple to have fun and a friendship with.......but it does work having friends with the bonus of fun in the bedroom too.......i guess thats why theres so many single out there, you only have to get along with one person........just my two cents on this post.........hope everyone has fun and a great time in the style. j

[willyoats 324]

It's a mixed bag. Most of the couples we have had sex with are a distant memory and are out of contact. A few are now what you would call acquaintences, i.e., folks you know and can have a good time with, but who are not what anybody would classify as friends. There are ony two exceptions out of dozens of encounters, i.e., folks we have had some form of sex with but who are good friends beyond the sexual relationship. .

 

Then there are the non-swinging nudist who are quite good friends. They know that we are swingers, but they don't hold it against us. In a couple of instances, we have swung with another couple at a party and then go to stay the night in our (non-swinging ) friend's RV. They know what we were doing, and sometimes we even talk about it, but they aren't interested in having a sexual relationship within the friendship. They sometimes go to the swing parties, or even host one, without swinging.

 

Finally, there are two women I had sex with as part of a foursome more than 10 years ago, with whom I still have a sexual realtionship without my wife or their husband being involved any more. In one case we are truly lovers. In the other, we are really just good friends who just happen to have sex with each other a few times a year.

[Pensacolapair 394]

It's a mixed bag. Most of the couples we have had sex with are a distant memory and are out of contact. A few are now what you would call acquaintences, i.e., folks you know and can have a good time with.....

 

That's very close to how our 'bag' is mixed...except we do have a few couples we have known for years with whom great friendships have formed. Although we live quite a distance from each other now, we still communicate on a regular basis, visit when an opportunity presents itself, etc.

[bbwcouple38 15]

We try to be friends first. We have met a few cpls that we became friends with but they wouldn't understand that we was just not attracted to them in a sexual way. Needless to say we are no longer friends with them. So we voted ups and downs.

[Frognlisa 15]

I saw without any hesitation YES!!!! You can swing and be friends with playmates. We like friends, we like playmates, we liking swinging playmates as friends.

Our play group, we have had family outtings, the rules there are simple keep it vanilla and show respect to all, like no tongue kissing Billiesue in front of her kids, and John keeping his hands off Sally's boobs. It worked out great and all had a fab time!!!

 

We have been here for weddings, divorces, births, miscarriages, births and unfortunately death.

 

We are blessed with such great friends we are just one big kinky happy family.

[WeMayTryIt 120]

When we started, we pretty much just wanted no-strings-attached sex. While we obviously had to have something in common with people we played with we preferred to keep swinging totally separated from our vanilla life. Well, we now have become good friends with a couple, and it's been great. We all have a lot in common, there's attraction all around, as well as a comfort level. We can get together in a vanilla setting, with or without kids, just as we would any other vanilla couple. They're the kind of people that we'd hang out with if we were all vanilla. So far, friends with benefits is really working out better than we'd ever imagined.. It's very nice to have friends with whom there is nothing to be on guard about. With the exception of light flirting, we do keep our cross-couple contact strictly to the bedroom, during active play time. Having that clear delineation helps avoid any misunderstandings of possible inappropriate emotional attachment.

[velbuzz 17]

No matter what one is doing, to find a friend is always a good thing.

[des1re06 200]

This is a difficult topic. Do we have friends in the LS, Yes.

 

We have dear friends (the type that will visit you in the hospital) and some acquaintances.

 

We don't own our friends, and they don't own us. If we're at a party at the same time, we don't have to stick by their side and only play with them, and vice versa.

 

If someone becomes too possessive, we're likely to back off. I hear all the time comments like: "We were having a great time, and they suddenly won't contact us anymore."

 

My advice to newbies wanting friends first is: don't become possessive. If that great friend suddenly withdraws, you'll know why.

[LFM2 1,482]

Yeah, we're casual friends with the ones that we've played with and we love making friends with those people we haven't met yet. We're not into friends first before we play but if we end up friends, that's cool.

[Malachista 170]

No

I can not play with LS people who have become close to me in a friendship kind of way. This even goes as far as that I will leave a public room if I see that they are there engaged in play with someone else.

[tittietwister 126]

As a couple who has felt on the fringes of the lifestyle because of our friends first preference I have to say the poll results and comments are encouraging, to say the least. I sense that some may have different views on what constitutes an emotional connection but regardless, this is great!

[JustMrJ 178]

I voted "yes, made a lot of great friends"

 

I will qualify that with this... we have, so far, made quite a few 'casual' friends. Nothing close or like 'best' friends yet. All the couples we have met have been very nice and friendly and we all get along well.

 

Hope that helps. *HUGS*

[sweet_tna 680]

We've made quite a few friends from swinging--not all are playmates, but a lot are. Like with vanilla friends, we're closer with some than others.

 

=)

[cvcple 16]

We have played with a few couples that we actually consider friends now and we are still playing. We have made some friends in the lifestyle that we have never played with. It all depends on the couple and what other interests they have besides swinging. So far we have been fortunate and none of the friendship and jelously issues have come up.

[tj680 28]

Having played with our friends - we vote don’t do it!!!! It can and does lead to complications. It’s not about bonding or jealousy but things will and do get weird and it is not predictable!

[GoldCoCouple 4,066]

That's why we don't recommend playing with friends, but making friends out of the people that we play with...

[lisampsas 51]

When I was married my husband loved watching my sessions but hated it when he couldn't. It ultimately didn't last because I have sessions when I want.

[padoc 1,703]

We have swinger friends and vanilla friends. Our swinger friends are a LOT more fun, with or without sex.

[EastInWest 1,524]

[unintended double post.]

[EastInWest 1,524]

On one hand, mixing with vanilla friendships with swinging is obviously a recipe for trouble and should be cautioned against.

 

On the other hand, for practical reasons of opportunities that came to us, we've played with a couple and a single female that we've had vanilla friendships with and so far, no disasters. Doesn't mean we'd start fucking all our friends, but I understand why it happens. She's also formed a pretty close friendship with the woman in the other couple we play with.

[the Nomads 78]

So this seems to touch on two different angles. Its been discussed at great lengths about playing with vanilla friends and I understand that angle. I've stated my opinion on it. This is an interesting reversal. With the risk of your lifestyle choice getting out to your family and vanilla friends is it wise to invite your lifestyle friends too deeply into your vanilla world? I'm curious how many people who maintain significant friendships with people they have met in the lifestyle invite them to non-lifestyle functions like having a bbq at the house with friends or some other group activity? Is it a matter of the the two worlds shall never meet or is it that friends in the lifestyle know how to act and can be trusted? Or do we all sooner or later have that friend that likes to push it a little too far like dropping LS specific words in public.

 

Mr. Nomad

[Numex 2,420]

..We get together very often, even vacation together, but we haven't done anything sexual for almost a year now. They live an hour away from us and have kids too, so when we meet it is usually always non-sexual...

Why not do threesomes? Alone play? For us and those who we play with, all married couples, our outside sex is more without our spouses than with for the reasons you give. It's much easier when the spouses watch the kids and the two others go at it, or even one watches both sets of children and the others have a threesome. With one couple, their oldest daughter is old enough to babysit and we pay her.

[Numex 2,420]

.. I'm curious how many people who maintain significant friendships with people they have met in the lifestyle invite them to non-lifestyle functions like having a bbq at the house with friends or some other group activity?

We don't find it difficult at all not to discuss our sex lives when other people are around. It's the default setting in our brains. After the vanillas have left then we consciously flip the switch to talking and doing things with our special friends.

[lcmim 1,082]

Or do we all sooner or later have that friend that likes to push it a little too far like dropping LS specific words in public.

 

Mr. Nomad

 

Our problem is just the opposite.

 

Some of our vanilla friends think it odd when we hear some perfectly innocent comment from one of them and we look at each other and burst out laughing.

My wife has a hard time in the greeting card section . While looking at "serious" birthday greetings a while back. Card after card had hilarious double entendres.