How to Crash and Burn in the Lifestyle

In today's episode, we're diving into the wrong reasons to get into the lifestyle.

We'll share why Swinging is Not Therapy.

A story about the female half of a couple who got pushed into it before she was ready.

How manipulation, imbalance and desperation lead to.

Disaster, and what a solid foundation actually looks like.

Before you start.

If you're here to spice things up, great.

If you're here to save something that's already sinking, listen closely.

Welcome to Coming Out Swinging, a raw.

Real look at modern relationships.

I'm Dave arena.

And I'm Vict Arena.

We've been together nearly 30 years, married over 24, and swinging for more than 22.

We're starting this podcast now because for too long, fear kept us from living authentically, from being open about who we are and what our relationship actually looks like.

Maybe this is our modern day scarlet.

Letter, but we're here to be both the example and the invitation to help others own their desires and question the scripts we've all been handed.

What's broken in today's relationships?

Is monogamy even natural for humans?

Encourage.

Could the secret to a relationship that doesn't drain your soul be owning other people?

This show explores how love, sex, and identity often buckle under the weight of societal expectations, especially monogamy.

Subscribe to Coming Out Swinging, the podcast that redefines couple goals straight from the.

Motherfucking OG Today, we are going to talk about some of the wrong reasons to get into the lifestyle.

Well, it's not, it's not a bad.

Swinging isn't a band aid.

Right.

I think we should start, though, by kind of going over what we feel a solid foundation looks like or what I guess healthy would be.

Look like.

Healthy of a solid foundation.

Go figure, right?

Some people, some people will be like, what?

Right.

Those people are whack.

I think that because I also don't want to make it sound like everything has to be completely rosy in your relationship when you start this, because that's not always the case.

I mean, I think for us, we were.

I mean, we started when we were so young that we, and we've.

We've said this on earlier episodes.

We didn't really have that problem.

We, we weren't trying to spice things up.

We didn't have.

We didn't have.

I mean, I, I guess in a way you could say we were, but we weren't.

We weren't.

We weren't fixing anything.

Right.

But we were freshly married and we didn't have those communication issues.

So I don't, I don't think you.

I've lightened my stance on this, I guess, is what I'm saying.

I used to say, like, any kind of relationship issues, you shouldn't really go into this lifestyle.

But I feel that if you overall have a healthy, loving relationship, you don't.

Want to go anywhere else.

Right, Right.

But maybe it's just a lull, as we know with kids and life and life happens and whatever communication starts, you know, suffering.

Yeah.

And maybe there's a lull and maybe you are trying to get a spark back or you're trying to get that communication back.

I think it can work in those situations.

I agree.

I think that it.

As long as the relationship is solid.

Now, what we want to get into in this episode is more about what does it look like when it's not healthy.

Like, if it's a.

I mean, there's a couple things we're going to touch on in terms of manipulation and different specific reasons.

But what I'm talking about here is it's not going to.

Well, you said Band Aid.

It's not going to fit me.

Tell you, when I.

When we say manipulation, I would say eight times out of 10, it's on the guy side.

But we have seen women manipulate the situation, too.

So I don't want to just put it on men.

I have seen women manipulate the situation in this world.

Yeah.

But even.

But even before we get into those specific reasons, I want to talk about the fact you brought up that it's not a band aid.

Meaning if your relationship is just shitty.

Yeah.

Like, if you're already in a broken room.

Now I'm.

And why.

I prefaced it with you're already imploding.

On different things in your marriage.

Right.

I don't care if it's money stuff.

I don't care if it's.

Yeah.

You know, that's a good point.

It doesn't have to be sexual.

Yeah.

There's just a lot of stress in your relationship, and then you think you're gonna go do this.

Good luck.

Yeah.

It only makes the cracks in the bridge wider, for sure.

So that's why I prefaced it with, you could have a healthy relationship that's maybe just going through a lull or.

And you want to spice things up, I think that's fine.

But I'm talking about, like a broken.

Relationship specifically because to be in this lifestyle, it's kind of not cheap.

Right.

Yeah.

To go to these events, and some of it, you got to buy a membership.

You've got to buy.

Yeah.

The Night feed.

You've got to buy your alcohol for the night because a lot of them are byob.

Sure.

The girl wants to look good, so she's going to want to go tanning, get her nails done, get her hair done.

You don't want to go looking like a slob.

Right.

You know, so, you know, there's the financial thing about it all.

So then you're the guys, make up, be like, oh, we had so much fun this night, maybe we can go the next weekend.

But then financially, you can't kick it up the next weekend to go.

Yeah, we've seen that.

Yeah.

But I think your main point is just that no matter what the stress is or, or if the relationship is just, if you're doing this to fix a broken relationship, good luck.

Yeah, it's not, it's not happening.

Yeah, that's.

That's.

In fact, it'll accelerate the end, which sometimes is good.

Yeah, it's going to cut your foot on the gas.

We have no qualms about saying that either.

Like, hey, if you're in a shitty relationship and this can help you get out of it quicker, then, hey, do it.

You're welcome.

Right.

But yeah, you're not.

It's not gonna happen.

But what I want to talk about is you talked about the manipulation and we have a specific story.

Yeah, that's a good example of that.

We've had many.

Yeah.

Oh, yeah.

I mean, I've seen a thousand and one.

I think this one hits home because it was a great friend.

Yeah, she was a friend.

She's a friend of mine.

Yes.

Still.

Still, yes.

And of course, we never name names, you know, to protect everybody, but do you wanna.

Well, I think what.

We met them in the lifestyle, so we did meet them in the world at a club.

Yeah.

And I can say, you know, I remember.

I mean, if you, you want to paint this picture.

Door opens of a club, this girl walks through the door.

And I mean, if you had like the perfect Hollywood scene, it'd be like smoke was blowing, her hair's going through the air, she's walking through the door slowly.

This per.

Picture perfect hot chick walked through the door.

Young, like what, 20 something at the time.

And I was like, God, that girl's just.

I mean, she's adorable.

Like, she's.

And I don't want to be mean or insult the club, but the club we were at, you just don't see.

You don't see.

Yeah, you didn't see her Caliber very.

Yeah, yeah, she stuck out.

She had it Put together.

I was.

I'm always put together.

But not everybody else in the club is.

So when you see somebody your standard walk through the door and you're like, oh, yeah.

And she also was comfortable enough to talk to us.

Well, no, she was comfortable enough to wear.

Eventually change into the lingerie and the skimpy stuff.

Even out in the bar area.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So she played that part too, where it was like, holy.

Okay.

Like, people, all eyes were on her.

Yeah, definitely.

And her boyfriend at the time, they were not married.

They weren't even engaged.

Was our age.

Yes.

So probably 20 years her senior, I would assume, somewhere in that neighborhood.

Not that that necessarily matters, but I guess the thing we got from the situation was it was a unique situ.

What he had on his arm.

Yeah, He.

He peacocked around like that.

Right.

There were a couple things that struck us as.

As.

I don't want to say odd, but what struck us about the situation was he was very eager beaver, which we see a lot with newbies.

So that's not unusual, but he was very, very eager for stuff to happen.

But what was interesting about their dynamic, which was unusual, was that she was allowed to play and he wasn't.

Yeah.

And that was because she wasn't ready to share them, right?

Oh, yeah, yeah.

Because she said if they weren't married yet, she felt like if they.

Maybe once they were married, they could get.

Go full.

Go into the lifestyle.

But because he wasn't fully hers yet, she felt in terms of marriage that he.

She wasn't ready to share.

Now, all of that on its own is not necessarily a red flag.

I think when you combine all the factors, the fact that he was so eager about this and so willing to participate without him being able to play, and that may be hypocritical, but I'm a guy, Right.

So that's, like, very unusual that the guy would be like, okay.

Like, I mean, even though.

So here's what's weird about it.

Oftentimes that's our dynamic.

Like, we do way more stuff in the moment with single guys and you than we do with, like, full swap couples or.

I do stuff with single guys.

You.

Yeah.

Well, I always say we because I'm usually participating as well.

With you.

With you.

Yeah.

Let's just clarify that.

But I.

We do that way more.

We do that way more often.

Right.

Through him, if I can.

Well, you always do if I let her do this.

And it wasn't that she needed this.

I.

I got to know her very well.

He saw a Straight lane over into his world where he was gonna have his whatever he wanted.

Yeah.

So that's what I'm trying to say.

I'm not saying that the situation was.

Even though it was unusual, it wasn't a red flag on its own because we do plenty of.

Or you do plenty of things with single guys, as opposed to us being with couples or even single women.

But, and, and we, we have a, A lot of excitement with that.

And I get off on that.

Right.

But so I, I, Right.

So I, I can.

The things he said.

Exactly.

So I understood where he was coming from, that he would be excited about this and that that could be a way in.

But it was the other stuff you saw, like you were saying.

Yeah, yeah, you saw.

Well, first of all, you saw a little bit too much eagerness, but you also saw the manipulation.

Big time.

Yeah.

And they had a couple of incidents.

Incidents happen that I thought she had stated her rules with him and he was not even glancing at her rules.

Like he was going right beyond those.

You know, he had one instance where she said, no, I am not playing with that man.

I don't want to play with that man.

You know, whatever.

And it was a blindfold situation.

And sure as that's the guy he brought in the room.

And I tried to interrupt, it caused a huge scene because I knew that she didn't want to be with that guy.

And then he got, you know, iffy with me or whatever, and she was like, holy crap, thank you so much for stopping that, you know, type of situation.

And I really don't want to go too much into that because, you know, whatever.

But, you know, there was that instance.

Well, that was a good, that was a, A real eye opening one.

Because first of all, that is wrong on so many levels.

And I don't want to get too deep here, but like, like, I mean, that's almost bordering on some sort of.

I mean, am I crossing a line by saying that that is bordering on almost sexual assault?

Very much so, because, yeah, she was blindfolded.

She told her.

She told him.

No.

Yes.

Now, she obviously agreed to be blindfolded, but we had, we knew, we knew the exact guy she was talking about.

She was very adamant.

He knew the exact guy she was talking about.

So even though she agreed to the blindfold, she had said no prior.

Correct.

And, and this guy had a woman.

So this would have been her man's first interaction with another woman in the club.

And he, he wanted to get with her.

Yeah.

So if he could keep her blindfolded with this guy who she said no to.

And he can get a little action.

From the chicken without her knowing.

Without her knowing.

Or when the blindfold already came off and she was into it, or so she thought she would be.

Right.

So it's.

It's.

When we say manipulation, it's probably more than that in this specific case.

But what we're saying is, like, first of all, that's why setting boundaries and rules are so important.

And so when he did that, you and I both realize this dude is not like, he doesn't get this at all.

No, he didn't.

Or he.

Or not.

Let's.

Let's be real.

He wasn't.

He wasn't dumb.

It wasn't like he didn't get it.

He didn't.

He was doing this on pleasure.

Exactly.

And.

And that's just a big no no.

I mean, that's a big no no all the way around.

And this is an extreme case, but you could see where, you know, this kind of stuff happens, even in, you know, I guess, less serious ways as well.

Yeah, all the time.

Yeah, absolutely.

And then, I mean, it just got worse for them from there.

I mean, they got engaged.

So it.

It again, you call things early on.

And when we say early on, you called this.

I mean, this incident that happened.

Happened with the blindfold was very early on from us meeting them.

Yeah.

So you knew this right away.

You even tried to communicate that.

And what ended up unfolding was exactly what you said.

Eventually he did wiggle his way into where, you know, he just knew by if I keep pressing the envelope, if we keep getting comfortable doing this, eventually she's going to.

There's gonna be a night where things just happen.

And what happened with them is they.

They almost did opposite of what we did.

So when we initially got into the lifestyle, yes, we did meet people online, and we did get to know people and go out with people.

And then we realized that's not what we were into.

We wanted more spontaneous and decided the club atmosphere was more for us because we didn't have to like, you know, script book the night or playbook the night type of thing.

And things were going to be a lot more spontaneous.

We didn't have to worry about dating someone.

They went the opposite way.

Decided that, you know, clubs weren't really, you know, it wasn't club.

It wasn't just that they were going to start meeting people out, meeting couples out.

Yeah.

And meeting people online after the club situations and, you know, having people come over to their house and whatever Else.

And so they started getting close with like a couple of different couples.

And you know, he was, you know, catching feelings for one of the, you know, he became very enamored with one of the women.

And one of the couples, she.

They got and get, you know, this.

They end up getting engaged, got married.

You know, she started finding things on his phone and not with just this girl from this couple, but with other women, like from like porn sites and.

Stuff, like, and even Snapchat and meeting people out.

Full blown cheating.

Yeah, full blown cheating.

And he would, he was trying to, you know, say it's nothing, it's nothing.

You know, it's just stuff we could talk about in the bedroom, things like that to her.

And it was just, it was full blown.

She was cheating on her people, he was cheating on her.

Right.

But it started with the manipulation of the lifestyle and.

Yeah.

Where the reason why we wanted to do a whole episode on this and, and there's other reasons too, to get into it for the wrong reason.

Like there, you know, there's often times one partner is more gung ho than the other and they're dragging the other partner into it.

I guess it's all kind of the same, maybe different sides of the same coin.

Because what we're really saying here is you have to be careful and you have to make sure that you are both on the same page and completely communicating.

Now, are we suggesting that it is going to be this dramatic of an example?

No, no.

But what we're saying is, what we're saying is this is like when we, like you said, this is still a friend to this day.

A close friend of yours.

Yeah.

And unfortunately she got a sour taste in her mouth on the lifestyle in general, which is totally justified because she looked back on it now, even though you were telling her this whole time.

But hey, this is the way it goes.

Right.

It wasn't until, you know, now they're divorced, she looked back on it and realized all the manipulation.

She realized all the things that weren't really about the.

Them doing this together and them getting into this.

He had his own agenda and his own reason for pushing into this lifestyle.

So sneaky about it.

Right.

And it ended up being where it really was, just about his needs.

And that carried over again, like you.

Said, into the cheating that she noticed that she really respected about us.

She said, I always just respected your guys communication with each other.

We've never had that.

Yeah.

She said they never had communication.

He always swept it under the carpet and that was it.

And she's like I would have felt more.

I would have felt better talking about it.

Talking, talking it out after even the experience.

After.

He never wanted to talk about the experience after.

We never reconnected.

Right.

Which is why that's so big for you.

I mean that's the.

Yeah.

They never like said one thing was hot over the other.

He took it, kept it to his, under his cuff and I don't know, whacked off to it himself.

I don't know.

Right.

I don't know.

Right.

But it was, it was a one sided.

It was always for him and him.

And he never like experienced it with her.

And let's clarify in the moment, it wasn't like she was a non willing participant.

She, she was willing and she was having.

There, there were expensive experiences that were.

Wait for her that were great for her at least.

I mean I think looking back on it, maybe she got soured a bit just because of everything that ended up happening.

But yeah, it wasn't like she was being dragged kicking and screaming into this.

She.

She was a willing participant.

And, and in some ways I think that makes it worse because she thought, oh, we're doing this together.

We're getting, we're both, we're both getting something out of it.

And then you realize it was only one sided and there was a whole nother agenda.

Yeah, for sure.

And that's, that's the sad part of it.

But that's.

You have to be doing it for the right reasons and you have to be on the same page, you know?

So I think, I know we're trying.

To be like cautious because it's, it's such a good one to talk about.

It's deeper than I would have liked to gone.

But because it's not always like such a.

You know what I mean?

Like it's sometimes it's just like you can tell like, oh, this person really isn't as into it as that is the, you know.

Yeah.

And here's the thing.

Here's my biggest thing.

Fantasies are fantasies.

You should not be shamed for a fantasy in a relationship.

Right.

So your partner comes to you and you're like, dude, I didn't know you were this freaky, you know, or, or whatever.

Accept, accept it and talk about it as a couple.

Like don't immediately shame your partner for wanting to talk about these things with you or wanting to be spicy in.

The bedroom or even if you never act on it.

Never.

Yes.

Even if you never act on it.

Even if you say, whoa, dude, pump the brakes.

Like a good.

I'm not ready for that yet, or.

Yeah.

A good example of that is there was a couple that, you know, again, we.

We always.

They seem to gravitate toward us in the club, but we had a newbie couple that was there for the first night, and they were having some issues in their marriage.

They were not having sex at all.

She was going through some stuff herself.

They weren't communicating.

So they went to traditional talk therapy, couples therapy, and they were trying to work it out.

And this.

The lifestyle actually got brought up in therapy.

And they said, well, you know, maybe that's an avenue to try.

And you could tell right away when we were talking with them that she was never going to do anything, especially that night, at least.

Which is.

Which is fine.

But they asked us for our advice, and we said, well, why don't you just use this as an opportunity to, you know, you're here.

Use it as an opportunity to watch and to see if that sparks anything.

In your own bedroom.

Right.

So you go back home and you have a good.

You know, maybe that gives you the spark that you need or the channel of open communication.

Right.

And that brings us full circle to where we started, the episode where that, I think, is still healthy.

I think you have to work through those issues, what have you.

But sometimes marriages go to a club.

To do it, but.

Right.

And you don't ever have to, like, act on anything.

But what I'm saying is that I think if you're in a spot where it's like, hey, we love each other, the relationship is good.

We're not going anywhere.

We're just going through something like whether it's sexual or what have you.

And even confidence for the woman.

Right.

She might be going through that part of her life where she's just not feeling sexy.

Yeah.

You know, and she's just not feeling up to par with other women around her or, you know, she may have caught him checking somebody out, you know, whatever.

Use that to set.

To bring that back into your conversation in your.

Your four walls.

Yeah.

Don't include anybody else.

And I think what was nice about that conversation, too, is, like, you could tell she was.

You could tell she was very uptight and kind of nervous.

Oh, yeah.

Which, I mean, understandably so.

But I think she really calmed down after talking to us because she realized, whoa, you're right.

The pressure's off.

We don't have to do anything.

We can literally just watch at someone's door or watch in the group room.

Watch from a corner.

Right.

We don't have to come up to your bed, right.

Take it back home and see if, you know, is this the kind of thing that, you know, we may never.

Step foot in here again.

Right.

But maybe that's the spark or at least it gets you talking or what have you.

I think that's still a healthy, you know, even though your relationship may not be right where you want it to be at that moment.

It's not a broken relationship.

A lot of times it's not like, you know, what we're talking about is like when you are just like, like you're just in a shitty situation or with a shitty person.

Like the example we gave of your friend where what that ended up doing is it just.

He was going to.

Here's what I'm trying to say.

He was going to be a cheater no matter what.

This just accelerated it.

It just put the few on the fire.

Do you get what I'm.

And that's the.

Those are the situations you can't get into.

Yeah, that's not.

This lifestyle is not going to fix those situations.

Right.

So hopefully, hopefully those two examples, those two stories are kind of one end of the spectrum, you know what I mean?

Jealousy, it's not gonna fix, you know, anything.

It's not even gonna fix if you're just a shitty individual and you're gonna.

If you're gonna manipulate and cheat.

Yeah.

You're just gonna be an.

It's gonna make it worse, which it did.

And it magnifies it.

It magnifies it.

Exactly.

So, you know, you just gotta.

Going to blow your up.

Right?

So you just gotta really be careful of like, what situation am I in here and why am I doing this and why is my partner suggesting this or are we doing this together?

And, and I'm.

I'm here to tell you there are women that walk in and I'm like, she is so hot.

Is there a jealousy side of me?

I don't know if it's actually a jealousy side, but it's a.

She does.

She's going to get all the attention tonight.

You know what I mean?

Or things like that.

That's natural.

You are going.

That is a natural human nature thing.

Of course my husband's going to look at her because crazy not to look at her.

I'm pointing her out to him.

You know what I mean?

So jealousy is a, is a natural human instinct.

The problem comes if you're doing this because you're trying to make somebody jealous or you're trying to fix something.

You saw that was a jealousy thing, you know, like, that's what we're saying.

Like, if there's those cracks in those.

Or.

Or if you're trying to make it to where, like, pay.

I hope he's gonna pay attention to me now if we're into this where he never, like.

Like, where.

Like.

I guess what we're saying is, like, even though there could be a hot chick at the club, you never have to worry about me putting my attention elsewhere in terms of, like, our marriage.

And also.

Yes.

And me always finding you attract.

Like, you know how I feel about you.

Yeah.

Our marriage is still gonna come first just because you found somebody hot.

Well.

And I also always feel you're the hottest, too, so thanks.

Right.

But what I'm.

What you're saying is you may not feel that way.

Right.

But, you know, I feel that way.

Yes.

But if you're trying to, like, do it to be like, well, maybe he'll start paying attention to me more.

Like, you just.

You're.

You just have a shitty husband or boyfriend.

Like, there's.

You know what I mean?

There's nothing.

This is just gonna accelerate.

An asshole.

Yeah.

And this is just gonna make it.

It's just gonna get you to the end quicker, which, again, is sometimes a good thing.

Like, for them, it lasted even longer than it should have.

But I think this definitely accelerated things to where she saw.

Oh, you know, now she can look back and see all the signs that we were trying to point out.

Starts to lead to, like, detective skills and.

Yeah.

When you start getting into covering all kinds of crap.

Yeah.

When you start getting into that, you're just like, yeah, there was no hope for this relationship.

You just made it.

Yeah, it was.

And I think it's.

You know, we talked about this in other episodes where it's.

I.

You have to be careful about things that are veiled.

Right.

A lot of times people are.

They're hiding other things through this lifestyle.

Does that make sense?

Yeah.

They're like.

With him, we always joke that it was almost a way for him to, like, not that it was a way for him to cheat, because that's a different thing, but it was almost like them just being in this gave him latitude to, like, get him do other things.

Yeah.

I don't know if that even makes sense to people that aren't in this lifestyle, but it's like.

Yeah, it's.

He.

He used that excuse for a lot of stuff.

And that's what I mean.

And it's the using.

Like, we don't.

Because we, because this has been our lifestyle for so long and we take it.

I don't know, maybe taking it serious isn't the right word.

But like, we, we have the.

We feel that it's a great lifestyle when everything is healthy and, and you're doing things the way you should be.

I think we take it more to heart when people are using the lifestyle for manipulation or for other agendas, I guess, is what I'm trying to say.

And that was this case for sure.

Yeah, definitely.

So, you know, if you're considering swinging, that's one of the big things.

Make sure the communication is there.

Make sure, you know.

Yeah.

Make sure you know why you're getting into it.

And if you're not strong, go in it with this communication that you're going to be strong, you're going to stay a unit and you're in this together and you know, really, really define that for the two of you.

And if you're not sure about that or you just feel like you're in a sinking ship relationship, non monogamy is definitely not fixed.

Definitely not.

It'll just, it'll blow it up, which.

Is fine because then you're out again, like we said earlier.

You're welcome.

We'll see you next time.

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We'D love to help you redefine couple goals through Non Monogamy without the mess.

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