Ask Lemmy

I was involved in a nonconsensual, clandestine polyamorous relationship once. It sucked, broke my fucking heart.

I tried (long distance) dating a poly dude in a situation where he had a long term live-in boyfriend and got me and a trans girl to start dating him around the same time. He wanted a polycule to work out and it seemed plausible-ish for a few months, but the communication was atrocious. Everyone liked the central poly dude and I tried getting along with the other two, but it was clear they were just interested in the main dude. Turned into a mega jealousy situation between all of us which blew up horribly and spectacularly.

In a good monogamous relationship now, but I wouldn’t even try a poly thing again. It requires a lot of communication, moving parts, and if someone is slightly less than truthful it’s probably doomed to fail lol.

I worked with a married couple many years back. Then they had a kid. So they split their shifts since daycare costs to damn much for 2 Perkins cooks. So they very little of each other. So they went to an open relationship model because "needs". One of the male managers known for hitting in and fucking all waitresses (because he controlled their schedule...) took the opportunity to start plowing her too. The husband... Thought he had game and thought he could get someone at work. He couldn't. So that had to be a fun dynamic. The husband and wife's manager working side by side with both of them and the manager was having a baby with one of his other conquests that also work there. Their marriage quickly fell apart and people's opinion of her and the manager and the husband took a leap off a cliff. Before all of that they were a very happy couple and great friends to be with. Afterwards they were all insufferable and the child pays for all this.

Knew another couple, married, with for kids. They moved to a open relationship model... Probably for plethora of reasons, Part of me believes that she misses her early twenties party girl that she used to be. Turns out being in mid-30s and having four kids and being married really limits the type of guys that you get. Her former husband moved on with life. And she now has a fifth kid with someone that was a temp boyfriend.

I know of two couples that dabble in it to some extent. One as far as I know is unicorn-hunting, because their rules for it suggest a 3rd member genuinely capturing someone's heart would lead to relationship implosion of epic proportions, and I suspect that couple isn't mature or stable enough to be doing what they're doing without leaving people open for hurt. Not that I have any say in it, lol. But I feel sorry for any thirds that interact with them thinking there's even a chance of them being an equal partner.

The other couple has much better communication skills, and claim they're poly, but as far as I can tell from the outside "poly" has happened as an attempt to save the marriage. Maybe they'll make it work, but I've watched them make some dumb mistakes, and the wife has jealous behaviors when women interact with the husband and a history of bending to his needs before her own so I think even if she says they're poly she might have talked herself into it as a way to attend to him.

I think healthy poly is possible--but it requires extremely mature individuals with exceptional communication skills, and that's rare even in monogamous couples.

I've been in like, 3 or 4 of them so far. I can really see the value in a poly relationship but I find it, that it's incredibly challenging to maintain much less establish one. All of the ones I've been in, was where the individual wanting or orchestrating the poly relationship, was just a flat out cheater who wanted more than they can handle. My limit is no more than 2 other partners. The people I kept finding myself with, practically wanted like several partners too many and it just complicated things.

I'm open to being in a good one but I really don't know nor would I know anything or anyone that'd want a good stable poly relationship.

Genuine question. Shouldn't there be love between you and her boyfriend for it to be polyamory ? otherwise isn't it just polygamy ?