Love In Many Pieces

One in five single americans has dabbled in nonmonogamy. Many more have thought about it. Why is the open relationship suddenly so hot? Arianne cohen dissects the sexual craze everyone is whispering about

Last year, Dani and Robert, both age 33, split after 14 years together. To many, they appeared to be typical high school sweethearts who had grown apart. This was not the case. For some time Dani had felt attracted to women. She began to crave new sexual experiences. So five years ago, Dani and Robert opened up their marriage.

First came brief stints on dating apps, which were quickly abandoned for the decidedly less turbid milieu of their friends group. Dani dated an acquaintance; they swung with another couple; that foursome eventually became a triad. And then a mutual friend rented the spare bedroom in their house. When he overstayed and began a fling with Dani, Robert wasn’t happy with the situation.

“I thought it was jealousy, that he didn’t trust men,” Dani tells me. “I was more and more liking the philosophy of polyamory and feeling polyamorous, and it was not working for me to have this blanket limitation.”

Dani eventually moved out. I first heard about their split through office gossip. Dani’s desk sits near mine at the Portland, Oregon co-working space we both frequent. We chatted benignly about her breakup one day over lunch; the way she told it, I assumed hers to be your standard monog amous marriage heading for divorce. There was no indication she and her husband had been polyamorous: engaging consensually in multiple romantic relationships. I learned that detail months later via — you guessed it — office gossip.