Stick a Fork in the Loser, Stick Your Thingy in Your Wife

Dear Jen,
Maybe you can help me on the dueling perspectives of staying with someone you love for who they are (even though they don't have job or major aspirations), or ditching them in hopes of finding someone who shares your progressive ideas, doesn't smoke a pack and a half a day, and doesn't try to cheat the welfare system.

Your thoughts on that?

P.S. He takes care of his whole family, including a handicapped nephew, which leaves little time for a job. I know, I know, excuses.
- In Love With a Loser

Dear Loser,
as someone who has dated the homeless, the drug addicted, and a guy who gave me nothing but crabs for my birthday (no card even!), I have no patience left for fixer uppers. I realize this isn't about me and my issues, but I figured you could learn from my skid row of experiences.

We choose the things in this life that we think we deserve, whether we do it consciously or subconsciously. When I was spending romantic evenings in the conjugal visit trailer, for example, one could safely say I was suffering from a severe bout of the low self esteems. Which is what I'm going to attribute your present situation to. If you were living up to your full potential, being the super goddess that you landed on this earth to be, loved yourself, knew what a catch you were - don't you think you'd choose to be with someone who isn't going to be breathing through a hole in his neck someday? I don't doubt that he's a great guy (my little crack addict wrote me the sweetest poems), but there are great guys out there who can challenge and inspire you, take care of themselves and their loved ones, and reach for goals farther away than the remote.

It sounds to me like one of the only things you two have in common is that you both love to play doctor: he takes care of his family, you (and the federal government) take care of him. This is a very lovely and noble trait indeed, but when you do it at your own expense, it reeks of disfunction and denial. You know when you're on an airplane and the stewardess does that little demonstration with the oxygen mask that drops down from the ceiling? She always tells you to put yours on first before helping out the person or child next to you with theirs. And so it is in life. You will be much more valuable to everyone involved if you're coming from a healthy place.

Let me put it this way: if you saw one of your heroes with someone like him, wouldn't you wonder what the hell she was doing? It's time to be your own hero. Get rid of him and find someone you deserve.

Dear Jen,
My wife of 19 plus years and I began experimenting with swinging three years ago and it's been f*@&*! great!  I love so much about it, especially seeing my wife with other guys.  Lately however, my urge to screw other women (the one swinging act that my wife can't handle) has become a bit of a distraction.

We communicate really well and have discussed this at length. She understands my desires, but she's worried the visual will be troubling for her after the act, and so she steadfastly remains opposed.

What would give her the confidence to know that the sight of me with someone else might actually be stimulating?  None of this is worth losing my relationship over by the way - I know how good I have it that my wife actually enjoys her sexuality - but is it  bad to want more? Should I just try and give up this fantasy?
- Too Much is Not Enough

Dear Too Much,
First of all, my congratulations to you for handling this often very tricky lifestyle with such flair!  Not only have you maintained a loving, communicative, and juicy marriage for almost two decades, you've tossed in the hand grenade of extra marital sex and marched out unharmed and victorious, with someone else's toothmarks on your wife's nipples. 

 It's precisely because you're such a superstar in the communication arena that I'm certain you already know my answer to your question.  Your letter was just a last ditch effort to see if you could somehow turn fact into fiction.  Just like that time in high school when my Mom busted me and Lisa Miletti smoking behind the shed in our backyard and I said, "What? You're cool if I smoke, right?" - you know the answer.  You're just hoping for a miracle. 

As you so astutely put it, none of this is worth losing your relationship over.  You are lucky to have a wife who actually enjoys her sexuality.  It's not bad to want more (we always want more) but it's silly, and potentially destructive, to continue seeking it out when it goes against her wishes. 

Why not put all that pent up energy into coming up with a brand new fantasy?  Surely you can whip up something that's erotically mind blowing to both of you.  It's my opinion that every single human brain houses a vast resource of sexual creativity, and that most people go through life just skimming the surface.  People can be lazy, ashamed, and perhaps a little afraid of how much they'll get off on dressing up like Little Bo Peep.  So it always makes me happy when I hear of someone putting time and effort into this area of their life.  Keep up the good work, and invite that wife of yours to skip off to some unexplored corners of your dirty mind.