I'm having a tough time making some relationship decisions, and I was hoping you might be able to offer some perspective. I think part of why I'm having a tough time is my relative lack of experience with the situation I'm in, and I don't want that to lead to me making an unnecessarily hurtful decision.
Bottom line, I don't know if the relationship I'm in can be fixed. If it can't be fixed, I don't know how to make it work well enough so we can live with it. And if I can't live with it, I don't know how to break up with everyone without breaking their hearts.
I'm a middle aged, middle class woman. I've been married to a man for 20 years; we have two kids, age 11 and 12. We've had our problems in the past, most notably a history of chronic depression on my part. His response to that left a lot to be desired. I lived despite an almost total lack of support from him, largely because of my best friend, who has been able over the years to offer me the support and love I needed when I wasn't able to return it or even appreciate it. I literally owe her my life, several times over.
She spent about two years after her divorce, which I held her virtual hand through, exploring her sexuality and having a grand old time for the first time in her life. I held her virtual hand through a lot of those learning experiences, too. She now identifies as bi and poly, and is really happy: her kids are doing well, she's on good terms with her ex and they coparent beautifully and I'm really happy for her.
She got involved with a couple, and introduced me to the male partner of their triad, thinking we'd like to know each other. I fell in love. So did he. So my husband and I opened our relationship, and I started seeing this guy. She was a little upset when he and I started having sex, and after a couple months admitted it was because a) she wanted to have sex with me, which she had always denied and b) she was jealous that he had successfully eradicated my depression in a way she had never been able to.
From the beginning I worried that he and I being romantically and sexually involved might strain both the friendship, and/or their triad, which had only been together for 6 months and is a long distance relationship (my friend lives on the other coast, the rest of us live in the same city).
Upshot being, she enjoys sex with women, and now she was admitting she wanted to enjoy it with me. My boyfriend likes threesomes, (we'd done several with various girls he brought around) and I love her, so we started sexting, and the next time she was in she and he and I all spent the day together.
Because of time constraints and the third person in their triad not enjoying spending time with me, that was the only time we spent together. I guess I should be grateful, because normally I wouldn't get to see her at all; they always have a packed schedule of things to do and people to see when she's in, and I don't fit in with their circle of friends. We continued to sext and carry on long distance. My boyfriend and I continued our semiregular interactions
Not long after that, I decided to accept a full time position. It was and is a financial necessity, and an emotional one. My husband, with the unwitting support of his girlfriend who is physically and psychologically *exactly* like his mother and sisters, is defaulting back to some really negative behaviour patterns toward me and the kids.
So knowing I had a rough eight weeks ahead of me, with working double shifts and trying to construct an exit strategy from an increasingly untenable situation which involved separating our finances and moving to a new apt, I told my boyfriend and my best friend that I wasn't going to be very available, and would need to walk back from getting together with them the next time she was in. I thought I'd get some support, but instead I got a lot of anger and recrimination for canceling my plans with them on short notice. My boyfriend walked back from that pretty quickly and said he'd be glad to help however he could. And then he started a new relationship. It took my best friend a while longer, but she apologized and explained why she reacted the way she did- my withdrawal triggered her fears that my depression was returning- and we forgave each other.
I remember one night I had to leave the apartment and lock myself in the car to get away from my husband. The same night, my boyfriend couldn't return my texts because he was comforting the woman he had started a new relationship with, because her drug user ex was sending her skanky texts.
I had to return something to his house not long after that, and his live in girlfriend was home- normally they make sure she's not there if I'm coming by- and she asked me how I was doing. I broke down
She offered to let me sleep there but I've got my pride and I despise drama and I didn't want to disrupt things to where the kids would notice (I hide most of the conflict from them) so I pulled myself together and said that while I appreciated it I really just needed to learn to deal. Honestly, I was ashamed that my boyfriend had been sharing the details of what I told him. Since she doesn't want to know me, I don't think he should have been telling her teh details of my personal life.
So, fast forward to now. With my boyfriend being unavailable, and my best friend less available, and my husband being not someone I want to be with, I'm really lonely plus I'm not getting laid. I don't want to disrupt his new relationship (or his old ones) by being around them when I'm feeling so bad and struggling to deal with so much negativity. So I thought I'd check out Tinder. I've never been on Tinder, my boyfriend was an active user when we started seeing each other and had encouraged me to check it out.
I asked him if he'd feel ok about me hooking up with a few guys on tinder. Since my boyfriend was an active tinder user when we met, and he and I have quite enjoyably threesomed a number of people (some just once, some on a semi regular basis, one being the girl he started a new relationship with) I figured we were on the same page regarding casual sex and just needed to work out the details.
He said that if I had any sexual contact with another man, it would bring the physical aspect of our relationship to a screeching halt. I was gobsmacked that he would feel this way. He said that the women he and I had sex with were ok because he only picked out women he intended to have long term relationships with, and only picked out women he was sure the rest of his partners would enjoy having as part of a poly family.
Well, yeah... except for all the ones you didn't keep, dude Some weren't a good fit. Hell, based on the evidence of how everybody spends their time, *I* am not a good fit.
So he is partnered with four other women, and having unprotected sex with all of them, then having unprotected sex with me, but won't so much as kiss me again if I have sexual contact with another man. We didn't even get to the part of the discussion where he said under what circumstances he'd be comfortable with it- no unbarriered sex, no penetrative sex, no genital contact at all, whatever. He wasn't having any of it. He said it would be different if I wanted to find a guy to bring around for him to meet, to make sure he and his partners would like him. If my goal were to add a guy to the closed poly group, then maybe he'd consider it.
I'm just at a loss. I wasn't asked if I wanted to be in a closed group, or even an open one; two of the people in this group I've only met once, another has been over the course of a year consistently unwilling to interact with me. I get he wants to build a poly family, but I don't think this is what that looks like.
I approached my best friend and she said (as she usually does if there is conflict between me and him) that she needed to remain neutral. Neutral means she is completely uncommunicative and doesn't respond to my texts or emails.
When I told him I was angry and needed to step away so I could cool off before we continued the discussion he said I was so inept it was abusive to him and my best friend, that I needed to quit using them as transference rods to get my cortisol hit to self medicate for my depression, and several other things that seemed equally angry and unkind. Even if it's true, *especially* if it's true,
I would think that merited being supportive and compassionate. I have to assume he's hurt or angry and lashing out.Then he followed up with an email that we proposed all be a closed fluid bonded group with q2month testing and if any of us had so much as skin to skin contact with someone outside the group- either accidentally or on purpose- we would be immediately kicked out, would have to immediately be retested and not readmitted until the tests came back clean.
So....
I'm just at a loss. I feel inadequate, and like I just don't know how to do this and I'm hurting the people that I love. I know I brought a lot of this on myself with bad communication habits, not sticking up for myself and tolerating behaviour that I shouldn't have. I'll own that. But I don't know how to set us right. What can I do to make this better?I know this is insanely long and complicated, and unlikely to even get read. So if you did make it this far, thanks. I appreciate it.
Poly And Seeking Some Insight On Novel Issues
Read the whole thing. You're welcome.
First and foremost: I hope you and your husband, in the midst of all this chaos, are still managing to find the time to feed, mind, hear, hug, and just generally be there for your kids. Mom and dad can get divorced, and mom and dad can date other people, but mom and dad have parental responsibilities. I'm gonna give you and your soon-to-be-ex-husband the benefit of the doubt and assume your kids haven't been left to fend for themselves, PASSIONS, while dad is off with his new girlfriend and mom is negotiating the terms of her surrender with her "poly" boyfriend. I'm gonna assume that your complicated romantic relationship(s) and your husband's new girlfriend aren't consuming all your free/waking/parenting time.
Okay...
You despise drama, PASSIONS? Great: then dump your controlling boyfriend, tell your old friend you want to be friends again (just friends, not friends-with-benefits-who-share-a-controlling-boyfriend), and get your ass on Tinder and date other guys — remembering, of course, to give your kids the time, attention, and support they need during what is surely a difficult time for them too. Don't worry about breaking the hearts of your old friend and your time-share/shitty boyfriend: people get dumped every day, people go into polyamory knowing it means higher-than-average dumpings, and people can and do get over being dumped.
And, again, what you describe above is less "polyamorous relationship" and more "drama-generating, misery-inducing Rube Goldberg contraption." And one set of rules for him and another set of rules for you? Um, that's bullshit — unless that kind of power imbalance/exchange turns you on, PASSIONS, which it doesn't seem to. So, yeah, it's time to pull the plug. DTMFAs all around.
Finally...
Someone—someone other than me (I'm swamped right now)—needs to write something about straight men who say they want polyamory when what they really want is a harem. Not all straight poly guys are like this, of course, but I get letters on the regular from women whose supposedly poly boyfriends/husbands can sleep with/collect as many women as they like but the women aren't allowed to touch other men — and, in some cases, they're only allowed to touch other women in the presence of their boyfriends. Seems to me that there's some old-school/Old-Testament patriarchal shit out there being passed off as hip-and-liberated polyamory.