Challenges of Being Poly and Married

So you all know now that i spend alot of time online reading lots articles now today i want to share this with you i found it on Fetlife by a member Harley, who wrote it to express her challenges but as i was reading through it i kept thinking thats how i feel… so here it is as a poly husband i agree.

I’ve been wanting to write this writing for a long time (and planned to write it yesterday until I was dealing with the fake photog). When Mr J and I first got into the scene we were not married, but in a 10 year relationship – in fact, our anniversary of dating (July 27th) was about a month after we were in the scene. We also weren’t really planning on polyamory at that point. But after being in the scene, learning about it, and realizing we both wanted more from our kinky lives (I mentioned this in my last post on non-monogamy), we started to explore non-monogamy and polyamory.

But being married and trying to find meaningful partnerships is hard. I mean it is always hard, but marriage makes polyamory even more complicated than being single (yes you can be polyamorous and single) or being in a less rigid partnership. I want to find meaningful romantic partnerships outside of my husband: a boyfriend, girlfriend, lover, etc., but have been dealing with some of the issues that will follow.

One of the biggest problems I’ve found is any external partners will always be second. I use this example of if Mr J and another partner were both in a car accident at the exact same time and taken to different hospitals, I’d be at Mr J’s side. Unlike people in non-hierarchial poly, I have a primary partner. From the secondary’s perspective, this can be difficult to accept and difficult to want to put themselves in that position. Why would I want to be second all the time? Well, in the extreme case that I have to choose, then yes, the secondary would be, but that doesn’t mean that I wouldn’t value a secondary partner in the way that they seek or deserve.

Another issue is the perception that because I am married, that I am not looking for long-term relationships (or short-term relationships with more depth). False. That’s exactly what I have been looking for though obviously not with everyone that I want to play with. I’ve had men (I say men here because I haven’t had other genders tell me this) tell me “well, a lot of guys know they won’t have to get close to you/you won’t get close to me because you are married.” False again.That is a monogamous mindset that does not fit in polyamory!!! People have a lot of trouble when getting into non-monogamy, putting aside the monogamous presumptions. Edit – one of these presumptions being that all relationships need to eventually end in marriage, which makes being with someone that IS already married difficult. This is why I’ve had to make very clear the distinction between playing in public and private and between where I want a FWB/play partner or want something more.

I’ve also found that people assume married folks will be more jealous of each others secondary/external partners or they feel guilty for taking one of us away from the other. The fact is as long as each of our needs are being met, we both feel compersion for each other. You won’t be taking me away from Mr J and if you love Mr J, you won’t be taking him away from me. I mean do you spend 24/7 with your partners??

But there are also problems on my end with finding poly partners. I will have the knowledge, assuming Mr J and I stay together until we die, which is currently my plan, that every poly partner will probably leave me at some point to pursue their own primary relationship, if they don’t already have one, or move to another state/country for a job, etc. etc. Unless we have a poly triangle (and even those present issues), live together or share things the way my husband and I share things, there is really nothing keeping that person from moving on to bigger and better things. That is hard for me to accept and it is always in the back of my mind. That coupled with my previous relationships that were getting pretty serious then dissolved, it makes it difficult for me to want to get close to people now.

The times when I have seen married folks find poly partners most successfully is when they meet other married folks or those in LTRs themselves. That way it is a secondary-secondary partnership and they are already in the same boat as the married couple. There is much less strife, from what I have seen.

Full link to the article to view https://fetlife.com/users/1605769/posts/1828646

Jon the nudist

Jon the nudist

Well, my name is Jon the Owner of You Only Wetter a 37-year-old, Poly practicing, Dom with two great kids. I am a happy busy internet geek with a love of all things Google and I love spending time sitting on the sofa watching the latest Dr. Who, Mythbusters or a movie. I am a nudist mostly at home but do like to go down to the beach and bare all or go for a little walk around some hidden woodland really would like to do the whole nudist holiday :)

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Challenges of Being Poly and Married

by Jon the nudist time to read: 6 min
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