Wife Takes 'Year Off' for Sex With Strangers

California writer tells her story in 'The Wild Oats Project'
By Neal Colgrass,  Newser Staff
Posted Apr 4, 2015 4:30 PM CDT
Woman Takes 'Year Off' From Marriage for Sex With Strangers
   (Shutterstock)

A San Francisco writer's pledge to "take a year off" from marriage led her on a quest to sow a few wild oats with men she'd never met before, Time reports. In fact, Robin Rinaldi's book about her experience is called The Wild Oats Project. "Sometimes things call to you that aren’t in the blueprint, that make your friends raise their eyebrows, but that in your soul, you know, 'I gotta do this,'" she tells the Toronto Star. When her husband thwarted her desire for children by getting a vasectomy, Rinaldi made a deal with him: Each could sleep around for 12 months, providing it wasn't with friends, was with condoms, and never got serious. So at age 44, the woman who'd been monogamous for 18 years placed an ad for men who wanted to help explore her sexuality.

She started with Paul, someone she already knew; then came a Silicon Valley lawyer, an astrologer, a PhD student in spirituality, a 23-year-old in a Vegas hotel—the list goes on. Some she met while living at a sex-ed, urban commune, where residents got together at 6am for a quarter hour of clitoral stimulation: "Then I’d get dressed and go to work," says Rinaldi. "I felt very energized, like I’d had a brisk jog." Ultimately, it didn't save her marriage, but she developed a finer awareness of her sexuality ("Your body has wisdom, that is very powerful") and learned more about being married ("Expecting your spouse to provide passion and security and purpose, it’s a lot"). She also has a tip about sleeping around: "Sow your wild oats before you settle down—that’s a no-brainer," she says. See an excerpt at the New York Post. (Or see which state plans to legalize "living in sin.")

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