Shock read: ‘My open marriage was a disaster’

The first rule was the time limit: two weeks maximum. The second was that the affair should take place far from home, preferably abroad.

The third was that each of us had the power of veto: if we felt even the remotest bit uncomfortable, we could say to the other, ‘Stop!’

And kisses didn’t count. Kisses were just for fun.

These were the rules of my open marriage – rules I followed during the eight years I was with my husband, the writer Adam Nicolson.

And rules that ultimately led to our very painful divorce eight years later.

Of course, anyone reading this will scoff, ‘Well, of course it led to divorce. What did she honestly expect?’ But to the young 20-something me, it wasn’t obvious at all.

How pleased we were with ourselves, Adam and I. How smug.

I remember looking around at a railway station, in a lift, in a library, and thinking, gleefully, ‘Any one of these men could be my lover, if I wanted.’ I relished that power, that sense of limitless possibility, while feeling safe in my belief that my marriage was indestructible.

Only, it didn’t work. Open marriages very seldom do. In the end, my husband fell in love with someone else and left me. And it broke my heart.

I met Adam at Cambridge when I was 18. We made our open contract almost as soon as we started going out together. Both of us enjoyed short-lived flirtations with other people, but nothing serious. Our contract was still firmly in place when we took our vows, at a church wedding in 1982 (the forsaking all others bit we simply parroted on autopilot). I didn’t feel like a fraud: I loved Adam with all my heart and thought we’d be married for life.

It was to be three years before our rules would be tested. Adam was in the US researching a book. The phone call came, the permission was sought.

Open and honest

‘Of course!’ I said. ‘Go ahead!’ And when Adam came home, we congratulated each other on how brilliantly we had handled it and never spoke of her again.

The next affair was mine, four years later. I had recently given birth to our third son; our older boys were still under four. Our house smelt of nappies, with toys everywhere.

Perhaps Adam thought, ‘What happened to the girl I married? What happened to that romantic life we envisioned for ourselves?’ Whatever his motives, he suddenly said, ‘You look like you could do with an affair.’

I laughed. I was lying on the sofa in my baggy maternity clothes. ‘You’ve got to be joking,’ I said. ‘Me? An affair?’

‘It would do you good,’ he insisted. ‘You look terribly mumsy, if you don’t mind me saying.’

‘And who exactly would I have an affair with?’ I asked him. ‘Look in your address book,’ he suggested. So that’s exactly what I did. I sat on our double bed and searched through my address book looking for a possible lover.

Was I angry with Adam? Not in the slightest. I even thought he was right. I had let myself go. It was time to get my

life back. The man I hit upon was called Peter, someone I’d kissed at university. I remembered an Italian boy, with huge, expressive dark eyes and a swarthy complexion. That very night, I rang him. Remarkably, he picked up.

Falling madly in love

We chatted a while, he told me about his life – he’d married, had a son, separated – and I told him about mine. We arranged to meet in the summer. We could rent a cottage on the Suffolk coast.

I never shared any of my plans with Adam, though he might have picked up that there was a new lightness in my step, even a new wardrobe (I gleefully put a stop to ‘mumsy’). If he did, he never mentioned it.

Plus, I was obeying the rules. Only a week. Miles from anywhere. Adam could veto it at any stage.

Peter and I had a wonderful time. Walks along the beach, hand in hand,

sunsets, the full works. And I fell madly in love. When Peter confessed at the end of our glorious week that he was in love with a girl in Tuscany, I was surprised by how much it hurt. I never saw him again.

A year later, it was Adam’s turn. He wanted to go skiing with a group of friends. I wasn’t a very good skier, so I agreed to stay at home with the boys.

A few days in, there was a phone call. He said he’d met a woman he wanted to sleep with. Was that OK?

Yes, of course it was, I said. Only a week, preferably overseas and never to be repeated. Those were the rules.

Only a very different Adam came home. He could barely look me in the eye. He seemed distracted, absent. Then he told me he wanted to see her again. Just once. This was a flagrant breach of our rules, but I so wanted to please him. I wanted him to come back and say, ‘Thank you! I’ve sorted things out now!’ So I agreed. But, of course, he didn’t. He was in love, and I couldn’t bring him back. For the next nine months, we limped along. He stuck to the rules; he didn’t see her, but the atmosphere was unbearable.

Emptiness at the end

There wasn’t any nastiness – tempestuous rows and reconciliations, I could have coped with – it was the politeness and emptiness that I couldn’t tolerate.

Eventually he said to me, ‘I have done everything I can to get over this, but it’s no good.’ So he moved out and we divorced on the grounds of his adultery.

I married my second husband, Mark, three years later. And he made it quite clear from the outset: he was having none of this open relationship malarkey.

Adam went on to marry his skiingholiday fling, and they’ve stuck together very happily. All four of us meet up at our sons’ weddings and there are regular phone calls, too. I would like to think of us as friends.

I’ve been married to Mark for 27 years, and what I’ve learned is that fidelity is more important than sex. We have this idea in our society that you have to be permanently thrilled – and if you’re not, something must be wrong with you.

Marriages require openness, honesty, mutual respect and affection. Sex is simply part of that package, and a good part, too. You may not get the goosebumps of an illicit encounter, but something infinitely richer and longer-lasting.

In fact, I only really understood what a wonderful thing a marriage is, a family is, when I lost them first time round. I feel so lucky to have been given a second chance.

by Olivia Fane (£16.99, Mensch Publishing) is available now