[box]Gandhi said that if you want to change the world, you have to be the change you want to see. To that end, Rayne brings you No Stupid (Kink) Questions, a series of questions asked by novice kinksters around the web. If you have a question for Rayne, leave it in comments, or email it to rayne@insatiabledesire.com[/box]
Here’s episode 8: But… but… It’s mine!
Question 9:
Isn’t “polyamory” just another word for cheating?
Well…
I guess that depends on how you look at it.
What do you mean?
Always with the questions, this one.
What polyamory is:
Polyamory is an agreed upon arrangement between partners that allows for including other people in the relationship in some way.
For example, ages ago, I gave M permission to sleep with, form a relationship with, be friends with whoever he wants. I didn’t put any restrictions on that. I found myself wishing I had a couple times, cause the chicks he usually ended up being interested in were just really not a good fit for me, but until recently, neither of us was really interested in backtracking, and for a long time, that’s how we viewed things like changing our minds.
Yeah… we have issues.
Sometimes, one partner prefers to remain monogamous, while the other does their thing. Some feel one night stands, and blind dates, and other one shot deals are the only safe way to go about it without causing hurt feelings, or even catching feelings. Some have full on relationships with their other partners. Some swing with other couples. Some are all in a relationship with each other. Some aren’t. Some live together. Some have no intention of living together. Some have relationship hierarchies. Either in the dominant/submissive sense, or primary and secondary relationships. Some don’t.
There are all sorts of polyamorous relationships. The main thing they have in common (or the ones that work, anyway), is honesty. And honesty is the reason most people don’t see it as cheating.
What polyamory isn’t:
It’s not sleeping with someone behind your partner’s back. It’s not coercing your partner into a threesome. It’s not having an orgy with a bunch of strangers one drunken night at an after party… though sometimes it is. It’s not stepping outside the marriage/relationship/what have you because you’re not getting your needs met at home.
No amount of added relationships (which also add stress) is going to help a bad relationship. Matter of fact, I’m gonna go out on a limb, here, and say that added relationships will probably do more harm than good. I mean, consider the resentment that may or may not be prevalent if it turns out you get along better with your secondary partner than your first, and here you haven’t even attempted to fix the problem with the first before adding the second. I’d be one pissed off woman, and hell hath no fury like a woman scorned. Even a slave.
But what if I still feel like it’s cheating?
My turn. What do you mean?
Well… What if I’m not comfortable with my partner having other partners? What if I still feel like polyamory is being unfaithful?
Well, no one said you had to be poly to be kinky. If your current partner’s interested, and you’re not, stand firm. If they don’t (can’t? won’t?) honor your wishes, find someone who will.
But… What if I don’t want to find someone else?
…
You do realize you can be quite frustrating, right? I mean, I can’t be the only person who’s told you that.
If you don’t want to find someone else, then I guess you need to figure out how to handle being in a poly relationship.
Really, though, I’ve found that the ones that work aren’t what you’d think. There’s no bickering among partners about time spent with each other, because they all work hard to be sure no one feels left out. There’s not much jealousy, because no one gets anything everyone else doesn’t get. Sleeping arrangements depend entirely on who they are, and how they’re linked.
I think we can all agree that, when you really dissect the emotions, the most hurtful part of cheating is that it’s dishonest. Of course, there are some questions about what drove your partner to it, and you always worry a bit that you just weren’t good enough. But what hurts the most is that they didn’t trust you enough to tell you they wanted to see other people.
People in polyamorous relationships sometimes believe that one person is never enough.
M and me? We just know that sometimes, there’s gonna be a girl one of us really likes and wants to be with. Maybe just sexually. Maybe a relationship. Maybe as his slave. Whatever the case, we’ve decided to give it a shot when she comes around. And hopefully, it’ll all work out for the best.
Have a great new year, y’all!
Sarahbear
Have I told you lately that I adore your level-headed, middle-of-the-road take on things? Because I do. It is not often that I find articles that explain the ins and outs of non-traditional life choices (like poly) without including digs at the people who choose traditional choices (like monogamy). I believe it comes from being truly happy with the choices you’ve made for your life, otherwise you’d feel the need to put other people’s choices down in the process.
Rayne
I’m sure that’s part of it.
But I used to be the bitch on the kink forum screaming about “one true way” and “if you’re not doing it my way, you’re not doing it” and…
One day, I went back and read my blog from the beginning, and realized I was just like all the people I was bitching about. And I decided I didn’t like who that was. So I changed it. I’m not perfect, but I’m definitely more accepting than I used to be.
Besides… Differences of opinion breed progress. And we can always use a bit of progress.
Ava Darke
I can’t tweet this because it would bring back up some painful memories for a few people…but I do wish those people could take your advice from the last section. I cheated over the summer, although we didn’t get very far before we were caught. But if our spouses could have accepted a relationship between us…I think all four of us could have been much happier. I never wanted to cheat…it just sort of happened. But there’s no easy way to deal with it when, after many happy years of marriage, one spouse wakes up and realizes they want to explore polyamory. If the other isn’t into it…one person is going to be hurt either way. There’s little sympathy for a spouse who wants someone else and can’t have them, but you can’t choose who you have feelings for.
Sarahbear
I beg to differ. Well, mostly. Cheating is not polyamory, it’s disrespectful and deceitful to your partner. It’s making a decision by yourself that will have a massive impact on your marriage/partnership and it’s selfish.
Rayne mentioned in the article that you had to be honest and talk about everything and that all has to happen before the trust is breached. You don’t get to test out poly and then go expect your partner to just go along with it. There is a right and wrong way to go about it. Talking first and setting up boundaries, testing it out together and talking all along the way to see where you both are comfortable and happy. If you’re not happy then you have to decide what you truly want, your marriage and your husband to be happy or to explore other relationships. Both of you do deserve happiness, but not at the expense of the other person’s.
I also have to completely, 100% disagree with the cop-out excuse that you can not help who you love and have feelings for. You can. You allow yourself to spend enough time with someone and you nurture that relationship, you develop feelings for them. As a married person you owe it to your partner to recognize those situations and avoid them (unless you’ve arranged to have an open relationship). Things don’t just happen. You don’t go from ‘just friends’ to having an affair in a day. You build a relationship and you make conscious decisions to cheat. I speak from experience as both the cheater and the cheated on, so I’m not condemning you or trying to pick a fight. It’s taken a year+ of introspection and talking to get back to where I’m at in my marriage and accept responsibility for the choices I (we) made that got us where we were when our affairs happened.
Ava Darke
I’d typed up a long, eloquent reply…but I forgot to answer the math problem, so I lost the entire comment.
The short version is that I know that cheating is not the same as polyamory. I do accept the responsibility for the deceitfulness that came from assuming we had permission once we’d told our spouses we had feelings for each other instead of seeking explicit permission to pursue our short-lived relationship. Both of our spouses had entertained thoughts of polyamory in the past, but they changed their minds when it came down to a reality they didn’t choose. (History: My husband and his wife had had an emotional affair years ago, one I only learned about recently.) But I do wish we’d been able to have a real, open relationship without the lying and the guilt. I’d never intended to start an extramarital relationship, no matter how I felt about him. I ended up confessing after we actually kissed, and that’s when everything exploded.
I have a post I’m waiting for EC to publish that talks about the complete change in my world view since all of this happened. I was nervous about having my husband read it, but he did, and he said it was nothing he didn’t know already. He knows how I feel – I’ve always been honest about my feelings. I know it hurts him, and he knows I’m hurting, too. But we love each other too damn much to let this destroy our marriage. I just wish we could’ve had a happy resolution for everyone.
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