‘It’s risky business emotionally’: the social shift towards open relationships | Marriage

“W.We had an agreement, use common sense and don’t be blunt. It was supposed to be a payment, it was supposed to be with strangers,” says Lily Allen in her surprisingly frank and detailed album about her open relationship with her ex-husband.

The album brought the concept of non-monogamous relationships to the fore, and couples therapists report that an increasing number of their clients are choosing to go this route.

But as Allen’s album makes clear, while open marriages or consensual non-monogamy can work for some, they can also go very wrong, and there are a number of common pitfalls to avoid.

“It’s emotionally risky work. I’m seeing it more and more in the work I do, but how it manifests itself varies greatly,” said Katherine Cavallo, a psychotherapist and spokesperson for the UK Psychotherapy Council.

“It is normal for feelings of jealousy and insecurity to arise and they need to be responded to. The relationship and commitment that exists between the couple also needs to be maintained.

“And things can always change. There should be an ongoing process where everything is constantly reviewed to make sure agreement is reached.”

He said communication, consent and trust were important and if agreed boundaries were not respected it could lead to “serious emotional and relational trauma”.

People who choose to open up about their relationship after a partner has had an affair or who do so to “fix” something are cause for concern. “Following this route is bound to be problematic,” Cavallo said.

Katerina Georgiou, psychotherapist and senior accredited member of the British Association for Counseling and Psychotherapy, said there was an important distinction to be made between people who identified as polyamorous and heteronormative couples who chose to do so.

Second, he said, he might choose to open the marriage for the purpose of “agreement through sexual experimentation, creating intimacy by playing with sexual dynamics, or a period of separation, etc.”

The modern dating world and dating apps are also fueling this change, he said. “People are becoming more liberal, but I think some people might be under pressure about that, too. I’m seeing more of a sense that wanting straight monogamy is too commonplace.”

Juliet Rosenfeld, psychoanalyst and author of Affairs: True Stories of Love, Lies, Hope and Despair, said the growth of open relationships is part of a broader social trend in which “the idea of ​​the couple is changing radically.”

“This is a challenge for therapists because there are so many more diverse ways to be a couple now,” he said. “A lifelong monogamous relationship is not something that many people, especially women, want.”

Marriage and birth rates have fallen sharply in the UK and elsewhere in recent years; The proportion of adults in England and Wales who have never been in a legally registered partnership increased from 26.3% in 1991 to 37.9% in 2021.

Rosenfeld said starting a relationship has some potential upsides as well as downsides. “There’s a sense in marriage now that people want the other person to be everything — a spouse, a best friend, a teammate, a lover — which is very pressuring. So one way to look at an open marriage is a way to take away that pressure,” he said.

“But I’m trying to understand whether wanting others in the relationship is a way to avoid ending it. If you’re in an open marriage, how can you not know that your partner isn’t trying to replace you with someone else?”

He said open relationships are increasingly accepted and normalized, but there is still a lack of understanding about what exactly makes these relationships work well. “We don’t know enough about what kind of characterological capacity or strength people need to have in a consensual, non-monogamous relationship.

“For example, what happens if a person falls in love? What does the couple do then? What else do you take away when you take away sexual privilege? What else do you take away?”