Ha! I don’t have the energy to be actively poly anymore. There’s the irony for ya. Young, stamina, stupid. Old enough to emotionally handle it, too tired for dating…
(Okay, now I’m back at a laptop and can type more than you could possibly want to read.)
Rule number one: Forget everything Bianca thought. She’s not an expert at polyamory. She sounds like she’s very lousy at polyamory, in fact. So take the things she said on the topic, crumble them up into a mental ball and toss them into your psychic wastebasket.
There are two schools of thought, and I don’t know that either one is entirely correct. One holds that polyamory is a thing you do, a lifestyle, perhaps, and that any person who wants to can be poly. Anyone can learn to control, redirect or not feel jealousy, and anyone can choose to have multiple romantic and sexual relationships, and be accepting of their partner having multiple romantic and sexual relationships. The only reason most of us don’t do this already is that we’re brainwashed by the religious patriarchy and books/movies/music/television which teaches us from a very young age that there is The One out there for us, and that anyone who has more than one partner is a scandalously selfish, horrible, no good very bad person, or is immature, or is a horny bastard who can’t keep it in his/her pants. This is the line of thinking that tends to lead to accusations of monogamy being “less evolved” than polyamory, for which I have no patience.
The other school of thought is that being poly isn’t a choice so much as it is something very like an orientation. That there’s a spectrum of partner tolerance much like a spectrum of gender preference. Some people are totally uberPoly, and only want to date in groups, with groups, never make or accept fidelity promises…and some people are strongly monogamous, have one partner their entire lives and won’t find another even after the death of a spouse. In between are poly folks who might sometimes be in a poly relationship and sometimes be in a monogamous one, the poly people who are okay with their partner dating others but don’t want to themselves, the poly people who want to date multiple people but expect exclusivity from each of them, the chronic cheaters who say they’re monogamous but don’t act like it, and also the serial monogamists (who make up the largest group). Much like the sexual orientation spectrum, it can take some time and making of mistakes to figure out where you actually lie on the poly-mono spectrum.
I tend to fall more into the Orientation camp. I am polyamorous. It’s part of who I am, part of my identity. Even before I knew what polyamory was, I thought like a polyamorous person. I was never able to understand why I should be angry with my boyfriend who cheated on me. I knew I was supposed to, my culture and friends made that abundantly clear, but I just wasn’t feeling it. I didn’t understand, fundamentally and deep down, why I should care what he was doing with his time when I wasn’t with him, and why it was so different and horrible that he was spending his time with another woman instead of his male friends. Why sex was a worse hobby than D&D. I just didn’t grok it. I didn’t like his lying about it, but the cheating itself didn’t bother me, although I couldn’t convince him of that. Likewise, I found that I could truly love more than one guy at a time, that my attention and affection was 100% with the man I was with when I was with him, and with someone else when I was with them. I never felt guilty about loving more than one person (although I felt horribly guilty about lying about it.) I wished that there was a way we could give each other permission to be with other people, to avoid the lying and guilt parts. Finding out about polyamory was finding out that there was a label for this thing I felt to be true about myself all along.
I was in an open marriage for 10 years. It eventually ended in divorce for reasons entirely unrelated to the polyamory. (It ended because my husband just wasn’t a very nice person to me. He’s much nicer now that we’re divorced.) Before we were married, when we began to navigate polyamory together (my first poly relationship, his second or third), I discovered that my parents were poly, and those “roommates” whose company I’d enjoyed as a child were in fact my parents’ lovers. Yeah. I was raised in a poly household, and I had no idea. Neither did my brothers - one of whom is poly as an adult and one who is mono. That’s how much it “warps” the kids. 
I am now in a monogamous marriage to another man. Am I still poly? Yes, I think I am. I still feel like being poly is a part of my identity. When I see a post on a message board about polyamory, it feels like it’s about “my” thing, not just in a past sense, but a present one. Yet my husband is my only partner, and will be my only partner until he dies. Why? Because he’s monogamous, and I love him enough that I chose him knowing that.
This is where the orientation thing comes in: I’m poly. That means I’m capable of having open and honest romantic and sexual relationships with more than one person at a time. That’s all it means. It doesn’t mean I have to have open and honest romantic and sexual relationships with more than one person at a time.
A bisexual person can marry a man. She can marry a woman. She doesn’t have to marry a man *and *a woman. She is *capable *of having a relationship with either gender, but that doesn’t mean she has to have a relationship with both genders to be complete and happy.
So…I don’t know if that’s helpful or not. But I think it’s entirely possible to be a polyamorous person in a monogamous relationship, if that’s what you want to do. (I also think it’s possible to be a monogamous person in a polyamorous relationship; I’ve seen that happen, and it’s horrible and not to be encouraged.)
In EVERY relationship, mono or poly, honesty begins with being honest with *yourself *about what you want and what you’re willing to do. If you are honestly committed to your wife, and only your wife, then that’s wonderful. Cheating is a choice, and it’s a choice that is made both in poly and mono relationships. Bianca cheated on you, poly or no. You don’t have to cheat on your wife. That has nothing to do with being polyamorous or monogamous, that has to do with being a person of integrity and good character.
Do you ever hear anything about Bianca? She sounds lost. I hope she found some happiness for herself.
COGNO. I’m so, so glad you’re working through some things via posting. You’ve come a long way.
Out of curiosity I looked up what the protagonists were up to these days. Bianca is now, of all things, a mental health counselor. That is a little troubling to me, that somebody so emotionally manipulative is doing that now. I hope she turned a corner. I think–if the internet alias she used back then is the same one she uses now–she has been in a steady relationship for the past three years. That is a good sign I think.
Alison is fine. I never worried about her. She is a very strong person.
It is strange doing this. I have over shared too much in real life sometimes and I am often overly honest. My ex wife used to tell me she didn’t worry about me cheating on her because I’d probably just tell her about it. (Spoiler alert: she was cheating on me when she said that.) If I go too far in this thread do tell me. I have a tendency to TMI.
WhyNot, very well said and fits my personal experience almost exactly. (Not that I am a perfect person and I have done some stupid things.) It’s a thing I am, not a thing I do.
I also thought it was a very well-written post and that I’d agree with most of it.
Speaking for myself, I don’t know whether I’m innately poly or if it is a choice I made. I tend to embrace ideas that have a lot of resonance for me and I cobbled together ideas from the countercultural notion of “free love” plus feminist criticisms of propertarian patriarchal institutions and structures; when I first read about polyamory I was not so much “how provocative” as “yes this, of course”. Never done sexual exclusivity as an official arrangement (but like WhyNot I have at times been in one relationship without outside experiences).
Thanks. And also, I don’t think I made it quite clear enough that I do think it’s a little from column A, and a lot from column B, for me. Yes, there’s no doubt that culture influences how we perceive the “right” kind of relationship, and I’m no exception to that. I had to work through a lot of cultural programming about jealousy, despite my internal lower level of jealousy than your average bear. It wasn’t that I had no jealousy at all, I just had less of it, and I had assigned the usual meanings to that (that I was being treated badly) and I did have to deprogram that and realize that my jealousy means I’m afraid of something and I need to speak up, not that the other person is an inconsiderate jerk. I did find a bit of delicious rebellion early on my journey, and I do still laugh to myself about how many Hollywood plots would be so easily solved with polyamory. 
So I don’t mean to discount the Lifestyle stance completely. There is some truth there, clearly, as I’ve chosen not to have a polyamorous lifestyle right now. But I don’t think that *everyone *can choose to be poly. Some people just aren’t, and there’s nothing wrong with them. They’re just different. They also outnumber us, so if we’re going to smack a “normal” label on one way, it would have to be serial monogamy.
Do you have a “type”? Are Alison and Bianca attractive to you in similar ways, or did each of them bring something distinctly different to the table?
As a side note, I always thought it was kind of sad that Hugh Hefner had a stable of more-or-less identical women in his grotto hot tub. Six blondes sounds nice, but I think I’d want an Asian girl in there, and a redhead as well.
I thought WhyNot’s post was extremely well written as well. The best writing makes one think, and her post gave me space to think.
I had experience with a cheating partner before I had a poly experience as well. But my reaction to it was different. I was really hurt by what I saw as a betrayal, but not so much her betrayal. I grew up in a very conservative area and was a devout Christian as a teenager. My first wife was devout as well and we had a large group of friends at church. Her ex boyfriend was a member of the same church but I did not worry about that. When we had problems in her marriage, as many couples do early on, I thought the church would help us. Instead she sought solace in her ex. I learned later that not only did other members of the church, people I considered friends, not only knew about it but encouraged her to do so after she lied to them about me and what I had allegedly done. After we separated those friends supported her and her ex instead of me. I felt left behind by my friends and by God. I never returned.
Soon afterwards I had a nervous breakdown and was hospitalized. Nobody from the church supported me. But I did find solace in a mental health support group. I became very close to one person, a gay man who patiently listened to my problems and dispensed a lot of wise advice. (It wasn’t lost on me that he was willing to support me through relationship troubles and the church turned its back on me.). He encouraged me to try to have some fun in my encounters with women and not to think about relationships for a while. That didn’t happen but I did start thinking about non-traditional relationships.
When I was ready to date again a lot of people who knew me pushed me into dating women like my ex. There were a lot of bad dates and a couple good ones. I eventually took my friend’s advice on board and started looking for someone who would make me happy regardless of what relationship they were looking for. The first woman I dated who was like that was Alison. She’d been through a divorce too and was the first one who didn’t say “OK, what color should the bridesmaids wear?”
Over time Alison and I started noticing there was not a lot of jealousy in our relationship. It’s hard to say how that eventually became “let’s seek extra-relationship activities together.” There were landmarks. Alison made a random comment about someone that I thought I took the wrong way, I didn’t. When we were drinking she admitted that she had a fantasy of watching me with another woman, then admitted she wanted to join in; I thought that was just the alcohol talking but the next day she formally came out to me as bi. I admitted that I wouldn’t mind seeing her with either another guy or another girl. Finally one night she started flirting heavily with a waitress, then spent the rest of the night upset because she hadn’t convinced her to come home with us. Then we decided to look into the swinging scene.
At the time we weren’t interested in polyamory because I don’t think we were really aware of it. I think had we been it would have suited us well. We were both dissatisfied with traditional relationships and were looking for something else even if we didn’t realize it. In hindsight that would have made sense and we could have gotten more prepared.
On orientation vs. behavior. This was something I learned a lot about through Alison. She had always considered herself bi, but she hadn’t had any same-sex experience before meeting Bianca. Her orientation was bi but her experiences had been heterosexual. This hadn’t been a big problem for her and she hadn’t felt particularly suppressed.
If poly is an orientation, then one could say the same was true of me with regards to poly. I’m not certain I’m convinced. I think a lot more people are capable of poly relationships than actually do them. Some people seem better suited to them. But does that make it an orientation? I think it’s hard to separate the situation from the inclination. I had an opportunity to enter into a relationship with two willing partners. I never sought that out or intended to. I have not sought one out since and haven’t really thought about it (other than the odd daydream). Bianca told me (I know, I know) that she thought I was poly-oriented, despite all our problems it seemed obvious to her I was a natural for the lifestyle. At the time I agreed. But now I feel more like I was adapting to the situation at hand.
I don’t think others couldn’t be poly-oriented, just that I am likely not. Maybe. VERY occasionally the desire to go poly again comes to the surface when I remember the good times. I just feel it is more nostalgia than anything else.
Now that I’ve talked a little about orientation vs. behavior I can address this question. As I mentioned above Alison was tall and thin, Bianca short and curvy. To be honest I couldn’t keep my hands off either of them. In practice I probably do like tall women but I’m not sure I have a type. I appreciated their differences and really was attracted to each of them for who they were. I loved their personalities more. And those were different too so I don’t think I have a type there. My orientation in that regard is “for females”.
Alison was a little more discerning than I was. There were things she did not like about Bianca and was quite vocal about.
I’m in more than one mind in how to address this. On one hand I could say " this wasn’t (all) about sex" and wave it away. But on the other hand, well I suppose it might have been difficult to be with two women who were very similar. Not that I would confuse them and call one by the other’s name (I never did that!) but it was a bit easier to not treat each of them the same way. They were different enough in personality that I couldn’t just modify my behavior. I really had to approach each of them with a different mindset. They were not “Girl #1” and “Girl #2”, they were Alison and Bianca and everything that Alison and Bianca meant.
Think of how your own relationships are not just with “some girl” who happens to be a redhead or Asian. I mean if you’re reducing women to those labels that’s your bag, but probably you attribute personality and character and humanity to those women you’re in a relationship with. My relationship with Bianca wasn’t with a cardboard cutout, it was as deep and complex as any other relationship I’ve ever had (maybe more than most). That I think is the difference between me and Hef. Well that and the robe, the circular bed, and the rotating group of women. I do think I got more out of my situation.
For me, rather than me being highly picky about which women are sufficiently pretty for me to be attracted to them, it’s about which women have the personality and behavioral patterns that enable us to mesh good. Honestly, I’m pretty slutty about women’s form factor —the overwhelming vast majority are quite delicious enough for me to feel a craving on that level, so there’s no need to do much filtering. Meanwhile, I’m weird and not just anyone is going to share enough of those weirdnesses and/or have a complementary set of weirdnesses for us to make good connections, so that’s mostly the kind of thing they have in common.
I think this goes a little beyond polyamory in general but I largely agree. Why would I want to be in a relationship with someone who shares all my experiences, thoughts, and idiosyncrasies? Bianca wasn’t like any woman I had ever dated before but that was not a bad thing. We bonded over sharing each other’s experiences. We weren’t always on the same wavelength with regard to love and life though and that was a struggle. Alison and I were more in sync that way. Even if Bianca hadn’t turned out to be so manipulative I probably would have eventually favored Alison, even if we hadn’t already had a prior relationship.
I’ll chime in as another poly person if anyone wants to ask me questions. I’ve been with my wife for 13 years and my other partner for almost 6 years. I recently broke up with a third, very casual partner of 3 years. All women. Partner 2 is married to a man.
Sex and love (beyond friendship) is between couples only.
That was an interesting post, shy kat. Firstly I wonder from your username and the fact that you specified that Partner 2 was “married to a man”…are you female? Some poly people are in serial heterosexual relationships, but others like the one I was in involve LGBTQ relationships. On the poly board I was on there seemed to be a little bit of tension between the straight and the LGBTQ posters, but I’m not sure I can put my finger on why.
Secondly I’m a little confused by the sentence “sex and love (beyond friendship) is between couples only.” You didn’t mean the married couples, right? Or is that contained within the plural relationship? I suppose you could also mean that you aren’t expressing love and affection with your wife and Partner 2 at the same time. There are so many ways to take a situation.
One of the things I found on the poly board was that relationships would be explained in great, sometimes agonizing detail (at least by some of the more circumspect posters). “Well I see Bob on weekends but I have to be with Ted on holidays. Except Thanksgiving. I can go on dates with Ted if Bob says it’s OK but I can go on dates with Bob at any time. But I can have sex with Ted without telling Bob at least four times a year, or on holidays. Who do you think my primary is?”
How about money in this relationship.
-
Of the 3 of you which one of you made the most?
-
Was any of you what I would describe as “poor”?
-
Who owned the house or who’s name was on the apartment?
-
Who paid for when you all went out?
-
Did you all 3 do expensive things together like vacations?
Money was a bit of a problem in our relationship. Bianca was really epicly bad with money. Her marriage had broken up over her spending habits, and the business that she and her ex-husband started had crashed over her inability to budget. To her credit she realized that it was a problem for her and never dated suggest we combine finances. I don’t know what would have happened if she had moved in with us like she pushed us to. Money was a big reason Alison pushed back against that.
-
I did, though Alison had a good job too. Bianca was…working from time to time. She mostly worked nights. And that did put a welcome check on our relationship, as it turned into a weekend affair mainly. Seeing her every day would have been a lot of drama.
-
Bianca never had a lot of money and she declared bankruptcy only a few months before we met her. I guess you could have called her working poor but she didn’t think of herself that way.
-
We didn’t all live together (whew). Alison and I shared a place. Bianca lived on her own.
-
We rotated though I liked to treat them. I realized that could lead to power imbalances though so I tried to not make a big deal of it. Bianca did buy Alison a decent sized present right before everything went sour. Alison was embarrassed about it because she didn’t think Bianca could afford it, but she couldn’t bring herself to return it. After the breakup I thought she would burn it or give it away but she never got around to it. I have no idea what she ended up doing with it.
Come to think of it I have a bit of Bianca’s jewelry somewhere. We traded two personal items, when we were on our ill-fated date. I don’t know where it is. I was going to send it back to her but I didn’t want to contact her, then I lost track of where she was, now I know where she is but I don’t want to bother her. It’s not worth a lot in cash so I wouldn’t bother selling it. I could do something dramatic with it like throw it over Niagara Falls, if I could find it. The piece I gave her I had had for close to 15 years and it had a lot of sentimental value. I would like it back but I am resigned to it being gone.
- No. Bianca wanted to go on vacation with us. But Alison and I hadn’t been on vacation for two years anyway. We did go after the three of us broke up and actually had a good time.
I don’t understand this statement in a context involving a poly triad. If you were a triad, why would Alison not agree to you and Bianca dating? And why the “platonic” part?
There are no defaults in polyamory, so every relationship requires negotiated boundaries. It’s not unheard of for a triad to agree to group dating, but not two person dating, to avoid jealousy issues. It’s also not unheard of for sex to be okay, but platonic (not-sex) activities to be off limits, to reduce emotional intimacy, which can also trigger jealousy issues…although that’s more in the realm of swinging, but if I’m reading it right, that’s where the OP and Alison started, as swingers, so that makes sense.
People often think of polyamory as carefree and rules free, no limits, because there’s sex happening with more than one person. In reality, I spent WAY more time talking about boundaries and rules with all my poly relationships than my monogamous ones. We don’t need to talk so much about monogamous relationships’ boundaries, because we know the “default” rules already. They’ve been pounded into us since we were children.
I’m starting to think some people go into these types of relationships mostly, if not at least partially, as a way to get a free place to live.