Swinging, also called the alternative or 'alt' lifestyle, seems to be increasingly popular among mainstream, middle-aged married couples in America. With this increasing number of people who are into the lifestyle there is also a growing need for interactive ways to meet similar thinking couples.
They find the internet to be the ultimate way to interaction. Distance is no longer an issue to meet similar thinking others because of the increasing number of lifestyle lovers who join worldwide swingers community online.
According to swingers, the lifestyle can be a solution to (sexual) crises in relationships provided that the emotional bonding is still in tact. According to King (1996) one of the things that normally occurs in a relationship is sexual habituation. This will lead to changes in how we interact with our partners.
It will take about three to seven years into a relationship when partners need to increase the levels of stimulation, to obtain the same level of sexual interest in each other. This can be a stressful point in marriages, changes of infidelity are increasing and the divorce rate peaks. Couples who find a way to reconnect both physically and emotionally are more likely to make it through this period. Therefore swinging may be a creative solution.
Scientific studies show consistently that swingers bond better in a relationship than monogamous couples. Another interesting outcome of research is that swingers are happier in their relationships than the average person.
60 Percent of swingers said that swinging improved their relationship. Also swingers rate themselves happier (59% against 32% very happy). Overall they consider their lives much more exciting (76% against 54% exciting) than couples who don't consider swinging as a lifestyle.
The origin of swinging goes back to the 1950's when California military couples gathered at so called key clubs. Here husbands tossed their keys into a large bowl and the wives then drew a set of keys and the owner of those keys became her sexual partner for the night.
The media soon gave a name to this key swapping and described it as wife swapping. This early swinging lead in the 1960’s to the opening of the first organization for swingers, the "Sexual Freedom League” at Berkeley, California.
In later years up until the present swinging evolved to a widespread style of living. The uprising of the internet gave swinging an impulse. People from all over the world meet through the world wide web.
One of the most popular sites among swingers is http://www.sdc.com