This post is a part of a series on how we came to slowly enter into the lifestyle. You may want to read Part One first to bring yourself up to speed on our young love story. It’s filled with closeted bisexual encounters, accidental pregnancies, and a depressing interlude in our sex life, followed by a resurgance so hot that I — self-proclaimed introvert and neurotic librarian — agreed to strut my stuff in the nude. If you want to get caught up on my journey into nudism, that’s Part Two.
Nudism brought me to the starting point in this period of my life that I now think of as my own personal “awakening,” a la Kate Chopin. As in, it literally brought me to the place where my eyes were opened to the possibilities before me — a nude beach, more specifically the nude beach and pool area called Sunset Beach, a part of Couples San Souci in Ocho Rios, Jamaica.
It was the summer of 2018. Like most story beginnings, I didn’t know that this would be my “call to adventure.” I was simply a thirty-six year old overworked mom of four young kids aching for a vacation; what I got instead was a whole new lifestyle. This wasn’t my first (or last) publicly nude experience. It was, however, when my mind was opened to the possibilities within my relationship, my sex life, and my psyche.
We’d overcome the hurdle of settling in to a week of nudity with strangers; after about a good hour of walking around nude and chatting it up with people in the nude, it’s quite amazing and refreshing how comfortable you already feel. I had only one freak out during our first night at dinner, when the wait for the food was just long enough that I had too much time to dwell on all the horrifying things that could possibly be going wrong with the kids back at home.
The next day was pure adult joy. Is there any better feeling waking up on the very first morning on your first full day at an all-inclusive tropical resort, with the sun shining and the possibilities of a week ahead stretched out before you? Okay, I know…orgasms and love, but you get what I mean.
Let’s get back to those swingers from Part Two, shall we?
If you read Part Two, it’s likely that you’ve continued reading my musings to find out what happened when we met the swingers. If you didn’t read Part Two, let me first sum up and tell you that we went to this resort to be nude, not to swing. It was our first all-nude trip, and Jack’s fantasy brought to fruition.
I was hesitant about being naked for a whole week initially, and I stalled like a dog not wanting to get into the car but longing to go to the dog park. Fast forward a couple hours into our time at the new beach, and I had a surprising jolt of self esteem kick in. As it turns out, I’m comfortable in my own skin, with a shred of vanity that eludes to an underlying self-confidence that I’d left behind in a pre-baby era. I felt young, fit, and surprisingly whole. Real. And yet, transcendent.
At Sunset Beach, people went onto the lounge chairs on the sand to be alone, to read, and to watch the ocean. The pool was the party, complete with pool bar and pool volleyball. It was much more crowded that afternoon compared to the previous day, and the people were younger, only slightly older than us — later thirties and early forties, and only a couple near 50.
I’m quite introverted, but liquor is indeed a social lubricant, and combined with my newfound confidence in nudity, I was having no qualms about chatting it up with everyone in the pool that afternoon.
“It’s kind of like a safe word.”
One conversation from that first day stands out in my mind. We were talking with a couple who were from a neighboring resort on a day pass. They had met in the Navy, fell in love, and now lived together. She was slender, tall, with long blonde hair and slightly bloodshot eyes from the ganja they’d clearly smoked. My own eyes rested on her toned shoulders, drifting down towards her biceps. They were exotic to us; after having traveled the world together, they shunned society’s expectations of marriage and children, and instead declared their love for each other with matching tattoos.
“So, why a pineapple?” I remember asking, pointing back and forth between their twin biceps tattoos.
The woman exchanged a long glance with her boyfriend. They laughed, then, lifting her arm in the air so that the pineapple is upside down, she said, “It’s kinda like a safe word…” She giggled and leaned in to whisper in my face, “You know what I mean, right?” I’m not sure if it’s my now tainted memory conjuring this image, but she may have also winked at me when she slurred that reply.
“Ohhhhh!” Jack and I both blurt out, laughing, delighted that the conversation had turned to sex, our favorite topic. “Yeah, we got you!” But we didn’t, not at all. We had no clue what she was referring to.
We know of safewords in the context of BDSM — red, yellow, or green to indicate if you want to stop, slow down, or keep going with kinky sex. We thought that she was saying that the word “pineapple” was their safe word for red.
That’s not what they were saying, not at all. I’m sure some of you readers are shaking your heads at me now, wondering how I could be so dense. Didn’t everyone who had used the internet to search up all things sexual know the meaning of pineapples? Nope, not me. I had spent much of the previous years pinning house projects and trying to figure out how to make babies sleep through the night. I had no clue, and yet her story still was funny from my frame of mind. Like, if our special safeword was penguins and we had penguin tattoos. Cute and kinda naughty, right? See, it’s funny. Not as funny as how clueless I was back then, but funny to me at the time.
Dare I embarrass myself further by admitting how sexually savvy we thought we were for knowing what a safeword (in the BDSM context) was? It’s true, Jack and I both thought we were OH-so-kinky. And while we had quite the repertoire together, with a gamut of activities ranging from (attempted) anal sex back in high school to sex in front of our friends in college, toys and ties and a sexual frequency that surely makes rabbits jealous, we did not understand the full spectrum of how other adults organized their sex lives. Nor did we realize, at that point, the expanse of possibilities that still lay ahead for us. We were young and arrogant, but we had promise, and the friends that we made over our week at the nude beach were patient with us.
I complimented the Navy Pineapple woman (as she lives in my memory, me being too tipsy at the time to commit her name to memory) her on her fun choice for a tattoo, and admitted that we were intrigued by bondage, too. If she was sober enough to catch that I didn’t “get” the pineapple symbol, she didn’t let on.
Are you clueless, too? Do you know the meaning that Navy Pineapple Girl was actually referring to? I have two Master’s degrees and an inflated ego about my intellect, so I am embarrassed to admit that it took me all week to discover the significance of this tasty tropical fruit. It’s not just “hospitality,” though I suppose that’s a part of it. Very hospitable, indeed.
When you make friends in the nude, you notice things…
We spent the week at Sunset Beach making friends — something that I’d never done on vacation before, at least not like this. The nude pool was filled with surprisingly relatable people, people that we actually had more in common with than most of our friends back home. People were open, speaking about not just family and jobs but also their relationships and sex. We formed a group amongst ourselves for that week, about eight couples in total that bonded and made plans to meet up in the pool every afternoon.
When you’re nude, you notice all the little, special things that people keep with them. At one point, Jack complimented a guy named Mark’s black wedding band. Moments later, his wife, Melissa, directed my attention to her water bottle that she brought to the pool each day. “Look,” she said, giggling, “I had this pineapple printed on my cup, but they printed it upside down!” My response? To reassure her: “Oh, but it looks cute like that, too!”
One standout couple was Mark and Melissa. He was tall and muscular, a fireman who could definitely handle saving me from a burning building. She was short like me, with long dark hair, pretty eyes set in a pretty face, and with voluptuous breasts that highlighted a slim waist and shapely hips. Though they were nearly a decade older than us, we clicked, and the conversation flowed even smoother than the all-inclusive cocktails.
Emboldened rather than reserved for a change, I even initiated conversations. I remember the first moment that I spotted Lauren, a woman near my own age with long, light brown hair, swollen, perky breasts, and doe eyes. She was smiling, having the time of her life, too, and I was attracted to her energy. When I heard her telling another couple about her dogs, I decided to interject. “I’ve been begging my husband to let us get a dog, but he says we’d regret it…what do you think?” She looked me square in the eyes, and gushed, “Oh, I love my dogs! You should definitely get a dog. Do you have kids?” And like that, a new friend. (Side note: we now have two dogs, and no regrets. Lauren was right.)
Lauren’s husband, Ryan, was like a Southern version of Jack: medium height but with a broad chest and muscular arms, topped off with a head full of light hair that defied his age. We clicked with them, too, delighted to talk openly with other couples about not just our young kids but also sex.
From across the volleyball “court” in the pool, I’d often catch Ryan and Lauren looking in our direction. Were we flirting? I wasn’t sure, but I quite liked the vibe. I had no qualms when I noticed their eyes lingering on my body; in fact, I returned the gaze. And I have no doubt that they’d caught Jack’s eyes on Lauren’s huge tits; the poor man loves boobs and I don’t have much to offer in that department (though my ass is another story). One afternoon, I even caught Ryan “helicoptering” his penis just before he jumping into the pool. Naughty! I’ve always had fun with people who can be both open and silly about all things sexual.
Would you like to join us…?
Ryan and Lauren were scheduled to leave in the middle of our week at the resort, and we all promised that we’d get together at least once before their departure to share a bowl or two of weed. On their second to last night, we caught up with them after dinner. It was dark as we sat on lounge chairs to the side of one of the pools, defying any rules there may have been about keeping the ganja under wraps. We passed the bowl several times, enjoying the freedom and expansion of mind and body that the pot settled upon us. It was like we’d known them our whole lives; in many ways, they were just as familiar to us as our high school friends, and yet there was something in the air. A tension, a flirtation, an aura of sensuality and intimacy from spending a week with this couple having fun in the sun, in the buff.
Jack doesn’t like sitting still, so he suggested we go dance where there was a DJ cranking out music, steps away. I didn’t feel like dancing, so Ryan and I hung back and commented on the dance moves of our spouses, who were sloppily but happily hitting up the dance floor together. I’ve never been the jealous type; it doesn’t bother me when Jack whips out his dance moves with other women. Across the room, their dancing slowed and turned into chatting.
Ryan lightly put his hand on the small of my back, as if to guide me. Why did I get a chill up my back? I giggled, exchanging a quick glance with Jack across the room. He’s not the jealous type, either. He used to let me get back massages from his good guy friends for fun at parties. Ryan’s hand on my back wasn’t a threat, as long as I didn’t feel threatened.
Ryan leaned in, and whispered in my ear in his Southern drawl, “Why don’t we get those two and go over there by the restaurant? We can talk where it’s quieter.” His breath against my neck was warm and it tickled. My legs suddenly felt strange. Was I just a little too high, imagining something that wasn’t there?
I’ll admit it. I liked the tension. Was I just fantasizing, though? I am always happy to leave loud music for chill conversation, so I obliged. The four of us drifted across the lawn to a table on the porch of an open-air restaurant, now empty except for a few waitstaff folding napkins and tablecloths in a corner.
“Just sitting and talking — just drinking water!” Ryan announced to them loudly — too loudly. They rolled their eyes and gave us a wave, indicating that it was fine and that they were aware of our intoxicated state. I don’t think it was what he said that caused all four of us to erupt into giggles. It was the ganja, and that tension. It had followed us to the restaurant. Was it just my imagination, or was it stronger now?
We spent another hour or so in what can be best described as a That 70s Show pot circle. I’ve never laughed so hard; Lauren and I kept having to sprint to the bathroom to avoid wetting ourselves. Whenever the conversation trailed off and our laughter momentarily relented, our eyes would lock over the table in a sort of four-way stare, unasked questions lingering in the thick, tropical night air as we examined each other’s faces for clues.
“So,” Ryan finally started, “would you guys like to go somewhere, like, uh…maybe go take a dip or go in the sauna…?”
He was interrupted by our other nude pool friends, who had spotted us and were running over from across the lawn, shouting, “We’re going skinny dipping in the mineral pool!” one of them shouted. “Come on! We’re invading! It’s gonna be hilarious!” What strange force had caused them to intervene at that exact moment?
Part of me felt saved. I wasn’t sure what Ryan was proposing, not exactly. I wasn’t totally naive; I’d had a few kinky group experiences back in college. But I didn’t know what this one would entail. We were adults now. We were married, and though I didn’t even have the right vocabulary at that point in time, I considered us monogamous — bound to each other and only each other. It was a choice that I hadn’t consciously made. I didn’t know that I — we — had any other options. We just assumed that was how things were, now that we were grown and married. Now that we had spoken our vows to each other in a church of God. Society imposed this upon us, never revealing another way in the media or among our friends or family. Marriage meant monogamy. Right?
And yet, I was aroused at this tension, this flirtation and lighthearted fun. I just didn’t know what to do with it, and I didn’t want to step outside the lines. I didn’t want to hurt Jack, and I needed desperately to know what he was thinking. He’s my partner, my Jiminy Cricket, and he would know if there was something going on here, or if I was just as high as a kite, tripping into paranoia.
So while I partly felt saved by our other friends, there was a part of me that was disappointed. I wanted to see what was going to happen next; I was intrigued by Ryan and Lauren and this aura of sex that still lingered in the air, surely thick enough that our other friends sensed it, too. Jack took the lead. He stood up, ready to get moving again and also eager to talk with me before letting anything go further with Ryan and Lauren.
The night shifted into party mode, and we were surrounded by our friends as we skinny dipped in the pool where we weren’t supposed to nude. Jack and I didn’t get a chance to talk about what was going on, but in the back the tension still lingered. We shyly removed our clothing to jump into the cool water, somehow feeling more vulnerable removing our clothes than actually being naked. Another hour or so later, the party died down and the pot had worn off, mostly. We chatted, polite and friendly and not so silly anymore, with Ryan and Lauren. It was just the four of us left putting our clothes back on in the quiet darkness.
I was sure that my intuition about them had been misplaced until Ryan offered again, “Would you guys like to join us in the sauna to dry off? It looks pretty quiet over there…”
My nerves flared. It was clear now, but I wasn’t ready. I was tempted, but Jack and I hadn’t talked. What was Jack thinking? Was he as aroused as I was by this offer? Was he unsure, too? I didn’t know what to do; I didn’t know what I wanted, and I didn’t know what was possible.
Jack always knows how to say what he means in the way he wants to say it; he’s the spokesperson for our family. He affably turned down their offer with a smile and suggested that we hang out again the next day, their last day. We all hugged goodnight.
It’s time to talk about what monogamy means to us.
Jack and I nearly sprinted back up the hill to our room, breathless and talking in hushed tones as we finally barged through our hotel room door and into the vestibule. We proceed to say up for hours more, recapping the night while ravaging each other, hungry with lust and passion, even more so than normal. Jack was positive they had been hitting on us, confirming that my intuition had nothing to do with the weed. No one I knew acted like that anymore. That was just something people did in college, right? Jack laughed at my apprehension. He was certain that they were trying to fool around with us, but he was also brainwashed into thinking that it wasn’t an option for us. Brainwashed, but with a nagging uncertainty that had yet to be fleshed out.
I liked the feelings that had crept back into my body that night. I liked that excitement that was growing in my gut, the tingly feelings in my arms and legs, the warmth in my vulva. I felt desired, stimulated. My heart was beating fast and my brain was fleeting through thoughts. I love Jack and I wanted him forever, so why was I suddenly feeling this rush of excitement from — or was it for — other people? Wasn’t this that old feeling I used to get when I dated, briefly in my teens, or when we would mess around in college with other people? What was this — attraction, lust, chemistry? How could I be sure? And what was I supposed to do with it?
We weren’t going to do anything, we decided. Well, not with anyone else — we had amazing sex with each other that night, though, our desire suddenly increasing tenfold. What had already been a surprisingly erotic vacation had just got taken up a notch.
Did we ooze sex? Apparently. As it turns out, nudity is not just natural to me. It’s sensual. I don’t just feel alive being in the nude; I also feel seen. I feel beautiful. And whenever we got back to our room after a day at the nude beach, I was ready to go.
That week at Couples, we had sex about two or three times a day on average, quite the uptick from our average three to four times a week at home. I felt constantly aroused, and Jack loves sex with me to the point where he simply does not have the willpower to turn it down whenever I offer. He did, however, gripe about his back aching and his penis getting raw from the increase in activity. Men.
We liked that Ryan and Lauren had been hitting on us. We liked the flirting, and we liked the openness and the sensuality. We played the scenes over again and again in our conversations, always coming to the same conclusion: we were soulmates. We were only ever interested in having sex with each other. We weren’t “slutty” (oh, the labels I used to use) and we didn’t want to be with others. We were just “really sexual people.” We had a lot of sexual energy, and we had to be careful not to lead anyone else on.
We parted with Ryan and Lauren on the best terms. Before they left the resort on the morning of their depature, they sought us out one more time, finally finding us devouring smoothies tucked back by the mineral pool. We hugged. They told us that they really liked us, enjoyed our company, and would love to meet up again in the future. Perhaps it wasn’t just about sex…did we make true friends, too? I was sorry to see them go, but also a little relieved. I didn’t know what to make of it all.
And then there were more swingers.
In the pool that same afternoon, Mark and Melissa pulled us aside. We’d been connecting with them all week, too, getting to know them and hearing their story. There was one more piece that they wanted to make clear to us: they were swingers. And they thought we’d make great swingers, too.
It’s a strange thing to hear from someone — particularly when you’re in drunken nude pool party mode — that you’re amazing, that someone sees you for who you truly are, and that they think you might enjoy an alternative sexual arrangement with your spouse. Mark and Melissa weren’t applying pressure, though they admitted that if we were interested, they were game. Rather, they could see that we are extremely connected to each other, communicate with each other at an expert level, and obviously love sex. (I suppose I do talk about it quite often and openly.)
We were flattered by Mark and Melissa; we truly liked them and found their encouragement kind, welcoming, and straight up interesting. We were intrigued by their nonchalant admission to being swingers. They seemed so…normal. Nothing like what I had previously pictured in my head, which was an image of Donna’s parents from That 70s Show. You know, afros and keys in the bowl. Not a polite, clean, sweet couple from Ohio with two kids and a penchant for rescue dogs and home renovations.
Our minds were still reeling from our connection with Ryan and Lauren, and now we had to weave Mark and Melissa’s revelation into our schema. We were no more ready to swing than we had been the day before. We were still shaking our heads, waking up with the realization that there were swingers — now plural — and they seemed…likeable. Relatable. Normal. Like…us? But Jack and I were on the same page now, and we politely turned them down, explaining that we were only interested in sex with each other.
Communication is the name of the game in any relationship, especially one that’s loaded with a rip roaring sex life. With no kids to interrupt us, we spent much of our remaining trip time analyzing this new-to-us knowledge together, in terms of our relationship, our feelings, and our desires. We didn’t have an easy wifi connection to enable us to Google things like, “What do swingers do?” Instead, we talked about us, and what we’d be willing to do. We were intrigued, but still didn’t see swinging as a possibility for wholesome high school sweethearts like ourselves. After all, we’d never had intercourse with anyone but each other…ever.
There were exhibitionists, too.
It seemed that everywhere we turned, there was something more to add to our considerations. A new couple joined us at the pool the day after our encounter with Mark and Melissa. They had just arrived from a week at Hedonism II, that infamous swinger’s resort across the island in Negril. Were they swingers, too? No, they were exhibitionists.
The woman, a stunning beauty who resembled Halle Berry, explained unabashedly that she enjoyed having other people watch them have sex. Her husband, an oncologist who spent most of his days doling out death sentences to his patients, shrugged his shoulders and said that he needed a little bit of fun in his life. It was their thing. After a week of showing off their wild, sexy side at Hedo, they’d come to Sunset Beach to relax in the beauty of Ocho Rios for another week before heading home.
The Halle Berry Double regaled us all with stories of Hedo as she sat perched on the side of the pool with a crowd of us gathered around her, like children around a teacher during storytime. “It’s not as beautiful as this place,” she said, “but it’s got a sexual atmosphere and freedom that’s amazing.” I found myself getting aroused as she detailed how some women would take turns positioning their bodies on a fountain, in public, letting the water caress them between the legs until they reached orgasm. I could never do that, but…why did it turn me on?
We met another couple, coincidentally from our same metropolitan area back home, who had been watching us interact as we took in all this information. They were twenty years older than us but they also had four kids who they were proud to say had all flown the nest. “You’ve got to try Hedo at least once,” they said. “It’s not for everybody, but it’s an experience. Don’t miss it.”
Finally, Silent Bob explains pineapples to me.
On our last full day at the pool, we were chatting it up with a couple that had been pretty quiet most of the week. He was a teacher, she was a veterinarian. They had two kids and were from a flyover state. He was a quiet guy who had spent most of the week collecting sea glass for his kids while his athletic wife played volleyball with us. Now in the pool altogether, he turned into Silent Bob in my mind — a quiet sidekick to his wife who suddenly explained what had been going on all week, offering clarity and connection when he flippantly made a comment about how many swingers were at this resort.
“You noticed that, too!?” I nearly shrieked, eager to talk about what had gone down this week with someone other than Jack.
“Yeah,” he shrugged. “Pineapples everywhere.”
I laughed. “I saw that, too. Does that mean something?”
He cocked his head at me. “Don’t you know? Pineapples are a symbol for swingers. An upside down pineapple means that they’re looking to hook up. Mark and Melissa were swingers…she had the upside down pineapple on her water bottle, and he had the black ring. That’s another swinger symbol. A lot of swingers come here to be nude, because they’re also open, and open to hooking up, too. Apparently about five percent of couples are in some kind of an open relationship…they’re everywhere, really. We tried messing around with some of our friends a few years ago, but it wasn’t really our scene, to be honest.”
That, my friends, is how you blow a sweet, Midwestern Catholic girl’s mind way open. I could not stop laughing. I laughed at myself, at how little I knew about people and the world and sex. I laughed at Jack and I for being so sexually in tune with each other, but so disconnected with how others enjoy sex. I laughed because I hadn’t realized, really realized until that moment, that the possibility of an alternative arrangement was so very possible.
I laughed, too, because I was still a little nervous, apprehensive, considering, even. I didn’t know what, exactly, I felt about all this just yet, and I wouldn’t for some time. Something still lingered. It’s a lot to digest, and “Silent Bob’s” revelation had wrapped up our trip neatly, with a bow. We went home emboldened with our new knowledge that swingers were real. They existed. And they were hidden in plain sight.
Back at home, our story continues…and takes a turn towards Hedo.
We friended all of the couples that we had met on Facebook, and for a few months we simply followed their lives as we scrolled through our feeds. Birthdays, pictures of puppies and kids, house renovations and parties. They were all so…normal, regular, seemingly average people. You wouldn’t know that they partied in the nude on vacation, and that several of them had wild sex lives with other people.
We lived our own life, busy with the kids and then heading back to school in the fall. We got our first dog. Our adventures in Jamaica became a funny story to share with friends, not a lifestyle. And yet, sharing this experience with others started to shape its context within my mind. With some, we would neglect to mention that all of this went down at a nude beach. Perhaps this sort of activity is expected at nude beaches? Other people, mostly Jack’s friends, chided him for not “going for it” with the swinger couples. Jack would patiently reply that we weren’t “into that,” but as often happens, things change. Perhaps our friends also saw this fire within us long before we could see it within ourselves.
When Ryan and Lauren posted a picture of themselves on a plane with the caption “Another trip to Jamaica,” we messaged them for details. They weren’t going back to Sunset Beach. They were going to Hedo.
Jack had certainly brought up Hedo time and again in our endless discussions about our past and future nude trips, but I still was uneasy, even after all that I had realized about myself and other people at Sunset Beach. Was Hedo still “dirty,” like it had been that one time we ventured over? And…we weren’t swingers, so would we be out of place? Would we be seen as just a “tease?” Would I be turned off if I saw someone having sex in public? We liked nude vacations, yes, I was all onboard with that now, so why couldn’t we just go back to Sunset Beach? Hedo made me nervous. I’m a high anxiety kind of girl, but sometimes that fuels me.
Jack messaged Ryan, and in turn Lauren messaged me. She reached out to me with reassurance and me something that felt like hope. Hedo had costume parties, a nude pool that was consistently a party, and tons of those open and honest people like I had met at Sunset Beach. She sent photos. She admitted that they were new to the swinging scene, just enjoying fooling around with others and looking for a “four-way connection” with another couple. Suddenly, I was emboldened by my sexy yet sweet new friend, along with the other encouragement that I had received while at Sunset Beach. I was convinced that Hedo was, indeed, worth a try.
We had taught Sunday School that morning, but after putting the kids to bed, sipping on wine in our dark kitchen, I felt a stir. When Jack suggested Hedo yet again, I agreed, for a variety of reasons. By Jack’s reaction, you’d have thought he had proposed marriage in some sappy rom-com, but nope, I was agreeing to a sex-positive party in the nude. We’d go party with the swingers again, and we’d see where that would take us. Life is an adventure, after all. Why not dip a toe in and test the waters? We just might like it.