Polyamory: Lots of sex, even more scheduling

[Bramblethorn]

I'm glad to hear the ones open to discussion existed! I always figured they could. The FB group I mentioned just doesn't seem to accept that possibility. For the most part. One post did come up where a bisexual woman who had been living with a couple was all like, I've been in this arrangement and we all love it but now I'm seeing it's unethical and I'm really worried I'm doing something bad. On that one post only, people came out to say positive things like if it works for all it's fine. That poor poster nearly allowed the group think to lead them to second guess and harm their own successful relationship.

I agree about the problems that have been pointed out about the wrong way of doing things. And I understand people are wary of situations like that because they have run into them in practice. But if a triad relationship is going to exist at all, unless the three people meet at the same time and all fall in love at first sight, it's likely to start as a couple and then add a third. As long as the people involved are respectful and treat each other as equal partners it should be possible.

"Start as a couple and then add a third" isn't necessarily a "Unicorn Hunter" situation. What makes it so is deciding on that particular structure before the third person is even identified.

In monogamous terms, it's something like the difference between "My girlfriend is Asian" and "I don't know who my next girlfriend will be, but I've decided she's going to be Asian". One of those is unremarkable, the other is a red flag.

I agree that relationships should grow from the people, and it's less likely to work for a couple to look for something too specific. That's how monogamous relationships are too. But it still makes sense to know what you hope to find. Maybe that V closes into a triangle as the individuals grow together, maybe it doesn't. Maybe it does for awhile and then that doesn't work out. But it makes perfect sense to me to want it to, to hope it does, to express and discuss those hopes and desires, and to be happy if that happens.

It's good to know what one wants, sure. I want to be cuddled, I want intellectual stimulation, I want good sex, I want time for solo pursuits, I want an occasional sanity check.
But for most people "MFF triad" isn't an emotional goal in itself. It's a pathway to fulfilling those kinds of goals, one of many possible options. Mistaking the pathway for the goal is unlikely to work out well.

Getting back to the previous analogy: when somebody says "I need an Asian girlfriend", usually the underlying reason is that they want a girlfriend with a particular kind of personality, and they have a stereotype in their head that says Asian women have that personality. Those guys very often end up disappointed when they find that not everybody matches the stereotype.

The lack of allowance for that in the group is what bothered me a little. Well not bothered, really; what made me think, maybe I'm not exactly on the same page with these people. I don't practice poly, I just have lots of ideas about how I might like it to be. So I'm not experienced with it or anything. And may never be; it's not that important. But the way I'd like it to be if it were a thing is, a group of 3 or 4 or however many people who are all very close friends living together and comfortable in every orientation compatible sexual arrangement. Raising kids together, retiring together, buying land and building a home, whatever. Real, long connection. Which may not be realistic; like I said, if it never happens, no big deal. But I hardly think I'm the only one who thinks this sounds good.

That sounds lovely, in the same kind of way as winning the lottery sounds lovely. But if one's taking this beyond the realm of "fun to fantasise about" and making it a life goal, to the exclusion of other scenarios, it's basically a relationship version of Geek Social Fallacy #4.

So I was struck by the way the group, to me, feels like they envision things more like, every poly person is an atom, bumping into and joining up with other atoms into molecules, then breaking off to form other molecules. Every suggestion to every issue is 'I'd deescalate with them ' or 'exercise your boundaries are move on from that entanglement '.

(FWIW, I do think some poly folk over-emphasise this line of advice; some relationships are worth working on.)

Whereas I like the idea of forming a molecule with strong covalent bonds that doesn't break apart.

The thing about forming highly interconnected molecules with strong covalent bonds is that it's difficult to do. There's a reason compounds like cyclopropane are rarely found in nature.

I mean of course it might have to break apart at some point but if it's well established with shared kids and everything it should be about as big a deal as divorce.

So about a couple 'decoupling' to make room for a third... It's semantics. If that just means, stop having a united front against the third, and treat them like an equal, yes I agree. But if it means weaken the relationship between the couple to the point that them breaking up is no big deal because each individual is such a free agent, bouncing around with no long term commitments in a relationship plasma, well that doesn't appeal to me so much. I'd rather strengthen all connections to be as strong as marriage, over time of course, than weaken all connections to be as tenuous as dating.

But how feasible is that?

Marriage is a big commitment. If your spouse is sick, or they've lost their job, or a loved one, there's a pretty strong expectation that you'll be there to offer them comfort. If they find their dream job but it means moving to another city, there's an expectation that you'd at least consider moving.

If you're making that level of commitment to multiple people at once, there are going to be times when those commitments clash and you have to make hard choices. If Partner #1 happens to have a health crisis on the same day that Partner #2's mother is being buried, I cannot be there for both of them. Even in monogamy these things can be hard; surviving polyamory without depending heavily on luck requires acknowledging that time, resources, and energy are finite, and that a commitment to one partner puts limits on what one can promise to another.

 

[djrip]

But how feasible is that?

So feasible that I have zero expectation of it ever happening! But, for me, that covers the more feasible versions of poly, too, so about as feasible as any other kind of poly, for me, lol!

Marriage is a big commitment. If your spouse is sick, or they've lost their job, or a loved one, there's a pretty strong expectation that you'll be there to offer them comfort. If they find their dream job but it means moving to another city, there's an expectation that you'd at least consider moving.

If you're making that level of commitment to multiple people at once, there are going to be times when those commitments clash and you have to make hard choices.

In monogamous marriage, you make a commitment. Then if you get offered the big job in LA and she gets offered the big job in NY, you talk and one of you doesn't take the job. (Or if one is temporary you might go long distance for a time.) You probably talked before applying, and decided one of the applications was a backup plan. Same for three or four - you prioritize the family over other things. Yes, I realize this can be difficult or involve sacrifice.

Based on some terms I've picked up, I guess this has all been a long way of saying, my preferred kind of poly would be kitchen table, and I find the idea of parallel or dadt kind of off-putting personally.

 

[Bramblethorn]

In monogamous marriage, you make a commitment. Then if you get offered the big job in LA and she gets offered the big job in NY, you talk and one of you doesn't take the job. (Or if one is temporary you might go long distance for a time.) You probably talked before applying, and decided one of the applications was a backup plan. Same for three or four - you prioritize the family over other things. Yes, I realize this can be difficult or involve sacrifice.

Yep, even in monogamy there are times when you have to make those tradeoffs. But the more commitments one makes, the more often they're going to conflict. If I'm making big commitments to a new partner, realistically that will sometimes stop me from being there for the current one. Even when we talk it over and agree on what the compromise will be, somebody's still giving up something.

If a couple go into poly expecting that their existing relationship will go on functioning exactly the same as it always did, then they're not offering the new partner the same level of commitment they've already given one another.

That's not necessarily a problem. Sometimes people don't want that level of commitment, especially if they already have commitments of their own. But if they're expecting their "third" to be as dependable for them as they are for one another, without returning that same level of commitment to the third, that's probably going to end in tears.

I don't mean to suggest that poly always has to be a zero-sum game. Often it works out to everybody's benefit - some couples who might not work as a monogamous couple because of incompatible sexual needs can be very happy with one another when poly provides another channel for meeting those needs, and some people who need a lot of alone time might be happier in a lower-commitment relationship where they don't have to be somebody's everything.

But a new relationship is a big step that has consequences.

Based on some terms I've picked up, I guess this has all been a long way of saying, my preferred kind of poly would be kitchen table, and I find the idea of parallel or dadt kind of off-putting personally.

Different strokes for different folks; DADT wouldn't work for me either. But there's plenty of middle ground in between those styles.

 

[Kumquatqueen]

The thing about forming highly interconnected molecules with strong covalent bonds is that it's difficult to do. There's a reason compounds like cyclopropane are rarely found in nature.

That made me laugh. Once upon a time, I was at a party with many poly bisexual friends, and someone started drawing a diagram of who was going out with whom. Which made a long line. After a couple hours and remarkably little 'can we call that a relationship or are they just fucking?', we ended up with a long line of names like a hydrocarbon molecule, with about 30 names on it. And a couple extra polymerisation cross-links and a blobby bit.

I was on one end of the line of names. Cue people calling that I should start going out with X or Y to make the whole thing into a loop. And X (a man with significant issues) cornering me later and saying "I'd go for Y, if I were you." Didn't think much of it, but eventually it got to the point where Y tried to cheer me up when I was heartbroken, and offered a date, and I figured it was worth a shot. 20-odd years later...

But the interesting thing is how much of that line is still intact, but more like an unsaturated molecule, with alternate double and single bonds. Due to commitments and moving and all, it's worked out that most of us have ended up in couples-plus, rather than triad households etc. It's not that I love Y any less deeply than the spouse, but of necessity, he's had to have a narrower slice of my life, and I of his, than we might have liked.

And then there's children. Poly is a very good training for having kids, who are the most demanding and unreasonable life partners ever. Apart from sometimes having extra help to deal with said kids, the poly men I've known haven't had that shock that other guys often seem to have when they become fathers, of it hitting them that they aren't their partner's only concern any more. I think that's improving with generations as men are raised to expect to do more with children, but I know too many men who never really thought about the impact kids would have on their lives, until they had them.

 

[Bramblethorn]

That made me laugh. Once upon a time, I was at a party with many poly bisexual friends, and someone started drawing a diagram of who was going out with whom. Which made a long line. After a couple hours and remarkably little 'can we call that a relationship or are they just fucking?', we ended up with a long line of names like a hydrocarbon molecule, with about 30 names on it. And a couple extra polymerisation cross-links and a blobby bit.

...now I want to write a polycule drama story where all the characters have names like Di and Ethyl so their relationship configuration sounds like a real IUPAC molecule.

Edit: hmm, if I can name one of the characters for a Roman god, "Di, Ethyl, Mercury" would be the ultimate in toxic relationships.