I’ve had two ongoing relationships with married men. The first was when I was in my early 20’s and he was much older. For him, I think it was mostly wanting to have a sexual partner who would indulge some of his kinkier desires. He was into some mild bondage and discipline. I’d never tried those things before, but was game. His wife really wasn’t into it. He also seemed to enjoy the role of being kind of a mentor to me, showing me things, explaining things, introducing me to new experiences. I’d met him and his wife through other friends, and we all hung out socially. I never knew for sure if his wife knew we were having a sexual relationship, but she was not a stupid woman, so she must have picked up on it. She was always nice to me, and I liked her. I think she may have been OK with her husband satisfying some of his kinkier desires with someone else. Maybe it was some kind of agreement they had between them.

My other relationship started about 15 years ago. We were both about age 50 at the time. He was a co-worker, but not one I worked with all the time. We had an opportunity to chat and get to know each other one slow night, and we really clicked. We had a lot in common in many ways, except that I was a never-married, single person, and he’d been married for 30 years.

His problem was that his wife just wasn’t into sex anymore, and he was a really sexual guy who wanted and needed it. His wife would accommodate him once in awhile, but he said he could tell that she did it more out of obligation than any real desire. And her lack of enthusiasm made it harder for him to really get into it and enjoy it. He tried to encourage her in all kinds of different ways, but she just wasn’t having it. He said she’d been a lot more sexual when she was younger, but even then was very vanilla. She wouldn’t give him oral sex, for example, feeling that was dirty or disgusting. She’d been raised with a lot of shame and uptightness about sex. He thought it was really sad that she had so many hang-ups about trying anything different. He loved her, and thought their life together could be so much better if she’d loosen up and get into it more. Unfortunately, he said, she’d probably be perfectly happy if she never had sex again in her life. It just wasn’t something she cared about anymore.

He’d never actually cheated and had sex with any other woman before me. He’d flirted around, and come close a couple times, but hadn’t actually gone through with it. He felt a certain moral responsibility to be faithful to his wife that conflicted with his sexual urges. He told me from the beginning that he would never leave his wife, even if she never wanted to have sex with him again. He loved her, and didn’t want to hurt her, but at the same time didn’t want to be condemned to a life where his only choices were either masturbating or going without.

He told me that being with me was really enjoyable for him because I gave myself to him so freely. I was really into it, unlike his wife, and it enabled him to become more aroused and experience more pleasure. Sometimes he’d get caught up in guilt, and would back off from seeing me for awhile, but then we’d resume seeing each other again. He said he wished his wife would at least give him official “permission” to see someone else for his sexual needs, since she wasn’t interested anymore. But noooo…. He said she told him that if he took up with some other woman, she would kill her. (Probably not literally.)

I took the side of my married lover. I think it was really unfair of his wife to decide that she’s just not interested in sex anymore, and only does her “wifely duties” occasionally to be accommodating, and expects that should be enough to keep her husband happy. It’s not like he hadn’t tried to encourage her, and coax her into doing more. I really enjoyed him in bed. He was a really passionate kisser, and really good at fucking. I couldn’t believe she didn’t seem to appreciate how lucky she was to have a man like him. I found out much later that she wasn’t even into passionate kissing (making out)! He said he loved the way I kissed him, and that his wife wouldn’t do that. (Yikes!) I wasn’t trying to take him away from her, or break up their marriage or anything, but I really didn’t feel guilty about “borrowing” him, when she didn’t seem to care about having sex with him.

Some men just love the chase. They can’t stay faithful. They have to have the variety. They seem to need continual reinforcement that they are virile and desirable. No matter how beautiful or sensual or willing their wives are, it’s never enough for them. They always have to seek out something new.

But for many other men, like my married lover, they have spouses that just don’t care about sex for whatever reason, or just aren’t very accommodating. They aren’t willing to try new things, explore, spend some time getting into it, etc. The guy may really love his wife, but if his efforts to get more (or better) sex from her at home aren’t working, he’s probably, eventually, going to step out and find it elsewhere. And I don’t think you can blame him (or her) for doing that under the circumstances.