By Dan Savage

I'm male, primarily hetero, and my wife and I are in our early 40s. We've been married for six years, have two great kids, a nice house, and life is good, except ... for a couple of decades I've wanted to have a threesome with two women. (In college I did several guy-guy-girl threeways, and it was fun.) My wife has never been interested in my fantasy, but before we married she agreed that she'd explore it with me. In turn, I agreed to have kids, a notion I was leery of at the time.

I'm sure you can see this coming: After we got married and had a child, my wife changed her mind about the threesome. Sometimes she denies she ever agreed to it, other times she says she was "pressured" into it (I didn't "pressure" her any more than she "pressured" me to have kids!), or that she didn't think I was really serious. Her reasons change constantly but the end result is that (a) She doesn't want to do it, and (b) She doesn't want me to go out and do it without her.

I don't want to cheat on her. I don't want to coerce her into doing something she now claims she finds distasteful. I don't want to divorce her over this. But I would like to realize my fantasy, and I'm severely bummed and feel cheated. We've seen a couple of counselors, each of whom instantly concluded, "Well, she changed her mind, you need to deal with it." That seems unfair. Shouldn't the possibility of her "opening up sexually" at least be discussed? Can you see a way out of this?

-- WBS

The way I see it, WBS, you have four options: You can cheat on your wife and have a threesome with two other women. You can coerce your wife into having a threesome that neither of you will enjoy. You can divorce your wife and have threesomes with other women. Or you can give in to your wife and never have a threesome. While all four options are unpleasant, they're not equally unpleasant. What you have to do is figure out which is the least unpleasant option, and the answer seems obvious to me: You're going to have to cheat on your wife.

In fact, under the circumstances, it's not only your absolute, gold-plated, carved-in-marble right to cheat on your wife -- it's your responsibility. The resentment you feel for your wife is growing, and if you don't find a way to dispel it, eventually it will destroy your marriage. For no other reason than to save your marriage, you must cheat on your wife.

Of course, if she finds out you cheated on her, your marriage may be destroyed, so do your best not to get caught. Sometimes even the best and most experienced cheaters get caught, so there's something you need to say to your wife now that will enable your marriage to survive should your wife find out you had a threesome without her at any point in the future. Provoke one last fight on the subject, and throw your best arguments at her: She promised, she owes you, she lied. You didn't back out on kids, and she shouldn't back out on this. (Of course, the point of this fight is NOT to convince her to have a threeway under duress; trust me, a threeway in which one person is there under duress is no fun for anyone involved.)

But when the fight is winding down and you're both weary and weepy, look as sad as you possibly can and give this speech: "Let's never talk about this again, OK? I'm sorry this desire of mine has caused so much pain in our relationship. But I have to warn you that if under some insane set of circumstances two women ever threw themselves at me, well, I don't know what I would do. I might not be able to resist. God, even saying that makes me feel awful."

Then kiss, make up, and go look for it. Take out a long-shot personal ad. If you travel on business, spend a lot of time in hotel bars. Or just hire a couple of escorts. If the wife finds out you had a threeway, tell her that two women threw themselves at you and -- just like you warned her -- you weren't able to resist. Then get on your knees and beg her not to divorce your ass.

Next Week: All Nader, all the time!

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