Sex File: I fantasise that other women fancy him but have no desire for an open marriage

You both acknowledge that you have fleeting crushes on other people and maybe these fantasies are your way of exploring what might happen if one of these was reciprocated

Mon, 28 Apr, 2025 - 02:00

Suzi Godson

My husband and I have been married for years and have no problem with each other having random crushes, but recently I've been fantasising about other women fancying him.

I hate the thought of him being with another woman in real life, and I have no desire to open up our marriage, so what might this mean?

Fantasy can be a safe way to explore things you are curious about but would be too scared to try in real life.

You both acknowledge that you have fleeting crushes on other people and maybe these fantasies are your way of exploring what might happen if one of these was reciprocated - but as you get to write the script your fantasies never veer into threatening territory.

They tell a story that intrigues you and in a sense they help you to see your relationship through a different lens.

I touched on this recently when I wrote about how helpful it can be to remind yourself that your partner is someone who is attractive to other women. Seeing them as someone who is separate from you and desirable to others creates a degree of psychological distance that makes them more desirable to you too. Thinking about someone else wanting your partner is a way to reset your own appreciation of them.

The discomfort you feel has its own erotic potential. While they should be at opposite ends of the emotional spectrum, there is often a confusing crossover between mild to moderate anxiety and sexual arousal.

Both states activate the autonomic nervous system, the part of your body that controls automatic functions you don't think about (breathing, heartbeat, digestion), and they trigger very similar physiological responses.

When you are anxious your body floods with adrenaline, which makes your heart beat faster. Your muscles tense, your breathing gets shallow and your awareness is heightened. When you are sexually aroused by someone, your body can respond in a similar way.

It is the tension between opposite states that makes these sensations so powerful. It is something researchers have examined. For example, in the late '90s the sexologists John Bancroft and Erick Janssen proposed a dual control model to explain how sexual response is a continual balance between excitation and inhibition.

They suggested that the "excitation system" is responsible for you noticing, responding to and getting turned on by sexual stimuli (your sexual fantasy), whereas the "inhibition system" puts on the brakes by making you think about consequences, as well as giving you feelings of anxiety, guilt or fear (the psychological discomfort it causes).

The reality is that you are getting a sexual buzz from thinking about other women fancying your husband. There is nothing wrong with that. Although you might not understand why you are having these thoughts, rest assured that you are in complete control.

If you weren't the narratives would not stop where they do but would carry on unfolding and you would end up somewhere darker. As things stand, you are mixing your own little pleasure-pain cocktail but you get to decide what goes into it.

A splash of fantasy, shaken by risk and stirred with a measure of clear-eyed certainty that if any woman hit on your husband in real life, you would stop them in their tracks.