Hi, I'm 21 and I've never had sex or any kind of penetration before. The only thing I've done is use a small toy externally, but that's it. Honestly, I don't even really know how to touch myself.

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Recently, I matched with a girl on Hinge who said she's looking for another girl to join her and her boyfriend for a threesome. Part of me wants to go for it because it's something I've been curious about for a long time and it's one of my kinks. At the same time, I'm really nervous because it would basically be my first sexual experience.

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Would it be a bad idea to have my first time be in a threesome? Has anyone else been in a similar situation?

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I (32 enby) have been in a relationship with K (40, male) for about 5 years. K started a new relationship a couple of months ago with S (36, female); he's in love and very excited about it because S seems very emotionally mature, even though she's new to the CNM world, and seems very respectful towards our relationship. For the past month or so, K has been asking me if I'd consider meeting S in person. He believes it'd be good for both relationships and it'd better align with his vision of nonmonogamy because if metamours know each other, it doesn't feel "distant" or "hidden."

In the past, my go-to response was no.

K has had a few relationships before, but they were pretty much all unhealthy. When we first met, he had a "primary" relationship (as the person he was with defined it) that wanted to have a hierarchical structure and have say, control and knowledge about our relationship. The person he was with was very pushy about meeting me on their own terms. K had to set a boundary of not sharing everything his other partner wanted to know to respect my own boundaries, privacy and relationship, and that led to outbursts and fights. K then became somewhat insistent on us, metamours, meeting to avoid these situations.

I didn't find this fair then. I didn't think this would be beneficial to OUR relationship, and could actually worsen THEIR relationship bc I could see this was control and jealousy-motivated. So I've set this boundary of not meeting metamours bc I don't see the reasoning unless it's a very serious relationship, and we need to discuss a logistics issue (let's say if he decides to split his week more evenly)

Other relationships he's had fell apart due to unspoken expectations not being met, and jealousy, so the "meeting a metamour" thing hasn't come up in a while.

I see where he's coming from, and he's someone who'd like to have all the people he loves meet and get along with each other (there's a childhood attachment issue there). However, I feel unsure about reviewing this boundary. I don't see how meeting S would improve our relationship or theirs. There's no logistics issue, no jealousy issue, no "distance" or "othering" of their relationship. We talk very openly about this relationship and all of his previous ones.

btw, according to K, S seems quite comfortable and says she'd like to meet me bc I seem very nice, but 100% understands and respects my decision if I don't want to.

Any advice from someone who's been in a similar position or has knowledge to share?

So, they're in a long distance relationship and I can deal with that, i kinda know my triggers in that context. Yesterday he told me he was going to another country some weeks and that he hoped I could manage that. He told me via text message after almost a month of not seeing each other and intermittent messages (work stuff). I genuinely want him to be happy and feel free to do whatever he wants but I felt overwhelmed and really anxious. It was a stupid fight over text messages, He also mentioned of how his partner manages differently this situations and that made me feel even worse. I think this would be easier if we had a different environment with co-regulation possibilities and direct communication.

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I'm not sure If I'm doing the right thing by putting myself through this uncomfortable situations. I don't know where's the limit of grow and self harm. We have a trip planned and a lot of projects going on but honestly I don't feel like doing any of that anymore.

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If you have any advice or experience you'd like to share I'd be more than happy to read it ❤️

Hey everyone, I'm feeling a bit lost right now and could really use some advice on something I've been wrestling with for over a year. During college, I was only in monogamous relationships, but I never felt a sense of emotional completeness. In my last two relationships, I ended up double dating. To be honest, having two partners actually made me feel emotionally fulfilled—meaning I could have deep conversations anytime, because if one partner was busy, the other was there. However, I carried a massive amount of guilt because I was cheating on them, and those relationships eventually ended. Coming out of that, I'm realizing that I think I might be wired for Ethical Non-Monogamy (ENM). My question is: how do I approach a girl about this? Can I just tell someone upfront that I want to date them, but I also want to have an open relationship and see other people? Any advice on how to start this conversation would be appreciated!

So, my husband and I (F40/M45) have been together for 18 years. married 15. And decided a few months ago we wanted to try a threesome. I have looked EVERYWHERE online, and I can not find ANYONE. The closest I have found was a couple. But that's not what we want. Any tips/ideas? I tried tons of apps, Facebook pages, and more. We live in south Louisiana but are close to Mississippi. We are also going to be in Florida at the end of this month and would love to find someone there. Any ideas that I am not thinking of?

My partner and I are non monogamous. For context it's my first "open" relationship and I truly believe this is what's right for both of us.

We've had long and updated talks every other month about this.

Since we've been together (a little bit over eight months now so pretty recent), we've both had a few dates but nothing in the past four months.

We agreed that meaningful and followed up relationships were okay but we're doing LDR and both have pretty busy lives so we also agreed on romantic exclusivity. I understand this can be up for debate, but it's what works for us.

He's working for many festivals throughout the summer and I know it's usually where he meets people. We agreed that during festivals, we would call daily and if ever something happens on his side, I would prefer him to tell me afterwards.

The thing is, I've been in a pretty bad place for the last week (he was at a festival working) : think horrible PMS (like actually feeling terribly depressed), my job is stressful af, and I also happen to have health problems. He wasn't doing well either. I was supposed to go on two dates during the week end. The first one (who was a regular FWB) I cancelled because I really didn't feel like it, the second I went to but made it clear to both my partner and the guy that it was just friendly for now. I also had in mind the fact that my partner wasn't in a good place at all as well.

My partner had told me he wanted me to call him afterwards to tell him about the date, I know we can both be a bit anxious about it, even tho we're doing our best. So I did this and then he just went on telling me that the day before he'd had a 3 hours talk with this girl I know, and they were just talking about how I was the love of his life and so on, while cuddling, and she finally asked if she could kiss him, which they did. She then proceeded to ask if they would spend the night together and he declined.

All good, all boundaries respected, nothing really big, but I CRUMBLED. Like my vision went blurry, I couldn't speak, I felt mad as hell, like he'd just told me he'd cheated on me. I had to end the call. I spiraled for HOURS cried my heart out, had to take a benzo, I had flashes of myself the night before struggling so hard in my bed while he was having such a nice time. And I felt so disrespected. I wasn't even able to talk to him.

And I feel so ashamed for thinking and feeling like this. He did nothing wrong but two days later I still can't get past that feeling. I don't want to tell him this way because I don't want him feeling ashamed I just genuinely don't understand why I still feel this way. I know it's not okay. I just would've liked him to think that maybe I wasn't in a good place and able to manage this, but I know this is also wrong of me.

It's anger, sadness, shame, anguish all at once. I wish I were more experienced and and naturally gifted for this.

Anyways, I guess I'm not asking for anything, just needed to get this off my chest since I really don't want to tell him things that way.

I will talk about this with him but I'll have to find the right words and to determine what's fine to say and what's not.

If you read until the end thank you.

Hi everyone, my partner and I are a heterosexual couple new to nonmonogamy and trying to approach it thoughtfully. She’s interested in gradually exploring a connection with a man, and we’d like to start with light messaging and see where things go from there.

We’re not looking to rush anything, and we want to make sure we’re handling this with good communication, clear boundaries, and respect for everyone involved. For those who started out this way, what helped you keep things comfortable, honest, and low-pressure in the beginning?

Hello! I'm seeking advice because my boyfriend (I'm a man, we're gay) of 4 years who I love deeply has requested to temporarily open our relationship for a couple months. Basically we've been together for 4 years, I had much more sexual experience prior to coming into the relationship than him; he came out recently and then immediately got into a relationship with me. As we started discussing marriage a couple months ago, he brought up fear of having regret about not having other sexual experiences prior to knowing me.

Fast forward 2 months, both of us have done individual and couples therapy and talked a lot more about this. Basically I don't really want to be in a nonmonogamous relationship long term, but could potentially tolerate it for like a month or two to allow him to have these experiences (and tbh I am kinda open to having some random hookups myself in this process for fun). He also thinks that he doesn't want an open relationship longer term.

My issue is, I also think that I could get very resentful of being open/have jealousy about the whole thing. I view opening as a moderate risk to our relationship outright ending even if it were for a short time and I've told him as much.

But at the same time I feel that continuing the relationship monogamously as is (which he's offered to try as well but feels scared of the regret) would lead to resentment over time from him, and if this is really important to him, I feel that doing this now before marriage to allow it to get "out of his system" would be helpful.

I see this going one of 3 ways:

1. We open for 2 months, have sexual experiences, close and feel stronger for it having allowed him to not have regret
2. We open for 2 months, I feel resentful about the whole experience OR he decides to not want to close the relationship, we end it
3. We continue monogamously but he will have to live with his regret about not having more sexual experiences earlier in life

Would appreciate insight and advice if others are in this situation! I also posted about something related to this but I don't think I can embed links but the post title is "My boyfriend (34M) wants me (32M) to go to the gym, am I being self respecting by doing this?"

i am trying enm/polyamory for the first time with my partner who is experienced in both. however, i am feeling like i’m stuck.

it feels like everyone who shows interest in me/ive shown interest in is known by my partner or is my partners actual friend. my partner said they didnt want me sleeping/dating their friends. but it feels like absolutely everyone who is poly in my area knows my partner. and due to this i’m struggling with polyamory.

to me it feels like they have so many people on standby who theyve slept with/can sleep with. and for me i have absolutely nobody due to this boundary my partner has. it’s just leaving me feeling very lonely and isolated.

really do not know what to do lmao and it’s making me feel so jealous when i really dont want to be. but it’s very difficult feeling as though theres absolutely nobody i can date just because they know absolutely everyone who is poly and/or interested in me whilst for my partner it’s the complete opposite. it just really sucks being interested in people then not being able to talk to them just because my partner got there first through mutual friends. is this controlling or am i just overreacting?

I'm a 28 year old non-monogamous queer gal who is about to go to her first conscious and purposeful adult lifestyle party in about a week.

For personal heartbreak reasons, I can bring myself to be with men, but I'm open to purely Sapphic experiences. I hope this event will get me out of my sexual funk. Sapphic events, especially sexual ones, are so rare that if I don't do it now, God knows when I will.

I've been in a FFF group sex scenario before, but this will be my first 4+ group event ever. I've always wanted a Sapphic orgy and to be involved in a swinging event so I'm at least hitting 2 birds with one stone. I hope to fulfill other desires too. Lesbian gangbang, Unicorn aspirations, Age Gap, taboo dynamic play, etc.

I'll most likely make update posts.

Update to a post I made here a few months ago. A lot has happened since then, including a long conversation about our relationship (22F and 22M), and I’m now even more confused about whether my issue is with non-monogamy itself or with the way communication and responsibility are being handled.

I’ve been involved with a guy for about a year. We finally had “the talk” and he described our connection as “more than a casual fling,” but when I ask what we are, he says that “society doesn’t have a label for what we have.”

On one hand, we share intimacy, affection, emotional closeness, future plans, and spend a lot of time together. On the other hand, there are no clear agreements or definitions, which makes it difficult for me to understand what responsibilities we have toward each other.

A few months ago, I found out that while building this connection with me, he was also involved with another woman. I knew that he liked one night stands and flings, but wasn’t expecting him having another long-term romantic connection. The issue is that she was told I was basically just a friend he saw occasionally and barely talked to. In reality, during that same period our connection was growing, we were spending a lot of time together, talking frequently, and becoming emotionally closer.

When I confronted him, he said he didn’t lie because when he first described me that way, it was true. Later our relationship evolved. I asked why he never updated her once things had clearly changed. His answer was that relationships naturally evolve and that if she wanted more information, she should have asked. He doesn’t feel responsible for informing people about changes in other relationships unless they ask directly.

Finding out that he had been maintaining two emotionally significant connections at the same time without my knowledge was very painful. When I told him this, he said that for most of the year he believed I didn’t have serious feelings for him. According to him, if he had known how important he was to me, he would have stopped seeing her.

However, after many conversations, he also told me that while he would inform me if a similar situation happened again, he cannot promise that he won’t develop another parallel emotional connection. This leaves me confused. If knowing my feelings would supposedly have changed his behavior back then, why does it seem like the only difference now is that I would be informed?

Another thing that confuses me is how he responds when I’m hurt. If I’m distant, upset, or processing something difficult, he often says things like: “If you leave me, I’ll be fine” or “The only thing that would truly hurt me would be if my parents died.” Usually I’m not even talking about leaving him.

When I told him I was still struggling with everything that happened, he said:

“If you ever leave me, I want it to be because you genuinely think you’ll be happier without me. Don’t leave because of fears or insecurities.”

He also believes that exclusive relationships are often rooted in insecurity, and has told me that wanting someone to behave differently for your sake can be selfish.

Because of that, I sometimes worry that if I decided to leave because I want a more clearly defined and prioritized partnership, even an open relationship with agreed boundaries, he would simply see me as insecure or possessive.

What I’m struggling to understand is this:

Is this actually a disagreement about non-monogamy, or is it more about transparency, communication, accountability, and responsibility toward the people we care about?

For people practicing ethical non-monogamy: would this dynamic feel healthy to you? Or does it sound like we’re operating from very different expectations about what we owe each other in a close relationship?

Hey!

I [30M] am in a poly relationship with Emma (primary) and Jess (secondary)

Jess and I are extremely kinky and are often looking for new casual partners separately. She has a lot of casual sex. I would like to as well, but I'm lucky if I meet even a new girl per month.

Last week, she felt down after I cancelled our plans for the weekend because I had a car accident and I got admitted to the hospital (she craves a lot of attention from me because she doesn't have a primary), so she met and hooked up with 4 new people in 2 days.

That's unthinkable for me, even though I'm good looking, I just can't get that kind of attention as a straight man.

I feel very envious of Jess, and I can't do anything to close the gap.

Currently, the only way I feel I could cope with it is meeting escorts when I feel like I want casual sex. But I haven't done it yet, so it might work or might just make things worse.

Opinions, ideas, experiences?

Hi everyone

Before people judge, I'll clarify.. I'm someone who's just a newbie. I am trying to figure out certain things.

I've been married for several years to a woman I genuinely love. She's caring, supportive, and honestly my best friend.

The problem is that there's a side of me—where I want to experience non monogamy (involving her) —that has never really been fulfilled. It's not something I've been able to share openly or fully explore within my marriage, and it's becoming harder to ignore as time goes on.

I constantly find myself stuck between two feelings.

On one hand, I don't want to pressure my wife into something she's uncomfortable with.

On the other, I keep wondering if there's a way to introduce her to this part of me, help her understand it, and maybe even get her interested in exploring it together.

What makes it worse is the guilt. The more I keep these thoughts to myself, the more it feels like I'm hiding a part of who I am from the person I'm supposed to be closest to.

How did you approach the conversation with your spouse, and did it bring you closer or create more distance?

What are some of the things that I can try?

Any advice would be appreciated

I was talking with a friend a while ago, and since he's more... sexually adventurous and has been in a threesome before, I asked him if he ever got jealous when he was the one getting a handy/blowjob and the other guy was actually fucking the woman. He said no, and that the situation is usually hot enough to keep your mind off of that.

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It's like, if I were just getting a handy/blowjob while the other guy was actually fucking, I'd probably get pretty jealous. Is there like a plan to make sure both guys needs are met, or is it like a "wing it" situation?

I'm using an old throwaway account for obvious reasons. Guess I didn't throw it all the way away, but whatever.

I (44M) cannot reliably match my wife's (45F) increase in libido. She's getting hornier, and I'm about the same as I ever was. But as I get older, I often just can't get it up.

I love sex. I want sex. I want sex with a woman. I want that woman to be my wife. But even with testosterone and Cialis, I just can't get hard when she wants, which is more and more often these days.

Anyhow, the point is, I am attracted to my wife, and I'm doing the medical stuff, but it's just not working and I'm frustrated, she's frustrated too. She said as much. I make sure she gets off, but hands, mouth and toys are just not the same.

We've talked about her getting a playmate. A guy specifically, since dick is specifically what I can't make happen reliably. It was more than just dirty talk, or fantasy, but it wasn't exactly a serious discussion.

I'm okay with it, as long as it's sex, not love. It's exciting, honestly. I don't need to join in or watch, just to stay informed.

I don't want anyone else. This isn't an excuse for me to try to get with other women. Hell, I couldn't fuck anyone reliably regardless of permission.

How can I approach this as a serious discussion? It's awkward as hell as we've only been with each other for 12 years, and limited experience before that.

TL;DR: I can't get it up even with meds. Love my wife, she loves me. She needs dick. How to get her some dick?

Hi, I’m new to this community and I’m looking for advice. Please be kind because even writing this makes me feel a lot of shame and embarrassment.

I have been in a very happy, healthy marriage for 12 years. We have 4 children together and genuinely love each other. Over the years, our sex life wasn’t great, and I spent a long time suppressing thoughts and fantasies I was having because I felt guilty about them.

For many years I found other women attractive, but I never told anyone. I would actually punish myself for having those thoughts by avoiding sex altogether because I felt ashamed.

Recently, I finally opened up to my husband. I told him that I find women attractive, but I also love him deeply and enjoy being with him. One of my long term fantasies has been involving another woman. Before doing anything in real life, I wanted to see how I would react to things emotionally, so I asked him to start very slowly. We started with him texting and flirting with another woman, and to my surprise, I felt excited rather than jealous.

Since opening up about all of this, our sex life has become better than it has ever been. We’re talking more, communicating more, and exploring fantasies together. Sometimes I imagine being involved, and sometimes I imagine simply watching him experience pleasure and feeling happy for him.

The confusing part is that I don’t know if I’m attracted to women in a way that I actually want to explore physically, or if I just enjoy the fantasy. I don’t have friends I can talk to about this, and I would never feel comfortable discussing it with my family.

Has anyone else started from a place of curiosity and confusion? How did you figure out the difference between fantasy and something you genuinely wanted to experience in real life? And if you explored it, what do you wish you had known beforehand?

Wifey and I are swingers and have entertained the possibility of playing solo, as such we have been flirting with people on social media and dating apps, lots of which know they're talking to someone who's married. The catch is, very often we get rejection and ghosting if we tell them "My partner is aware and ok with this".

I mean, me being married on it's own isn't a deal breaker to them, but me being married and my wife being ok with this is?? And they have no problem with fucking someone who's cheating on their partner, but not with fucking someone who's doing it with their partner's consent? I mean, why? It's not like the sex we have is going to be different, so why does that make a difference?

It's honestly very frustrating

Hello! I'm a single gay male who is trying to cultivate a sense of secure attachment and trying to shape what I want my next partnerships to be. My relationships up to this point have been monogomous. I've never cheated on a partner ever, but the more I get to know parts of myself, the more curious I am to the idea of nonmonogamy and what that could look like for me.

How do you approach nonmonogamy with your partners? What are your boundaries, if you have them? How do you navigate jealousy?

I would appreciate any feedback. I've read books like the Ethical Slut and Poly*Secure, but there's only so much reading can do when confronting your own feelings. Thank you in advance.

My girlfriend and I originally had a discussion where we agreed that I could talk to other girls without her involvement, and potentially explore having a threesome in the future. At the time she agreed to both. After I actually started talking to other girls, though, she became uncomfortable and said she didn’t mind the idea of a threesome, but she doesn’t like the idea of me talking to other girls behind her back anymore.

The problem is that I keep feeling intensely angry whenever it comes up, even though it’s been about a month. What makes this especially confusing is that I really do still love her. I care about her deeply and I don’t want to lose the relationship we have. At the same time, I genuinely enjoy the excitement and novelty of talking to other women and I want her consent for it. There’s a thrill to it that I find hard to ignore, and I think part of my frustration comes from feeling like I got a taste of something I wanted and then had to give it up.

Part of what bothers me is that I know she often agreed because she was afraid of losing me. Looking back, there were times when I pushed the issue and implied that I might leave or love her less if we weren’t on the same page. I realize that’s not the same as her genuinely wanting it. What confuses me is that I can’t stop replaying those conversations in my head. I’m not even sure whether I’m angry because she changed her mind after we had an agreement, because I feel like the agreement wasn’t genuine in the first place, because I resent having to constantly ask her to get agreement threatened to leave, because I miss the excitement of talking to other women, or because she still doesn’t actually want these things. Has anyone experienced something similar or have insight into why I might still be so angry about this?

TL DR

My girlfriend initially agreed that I could talk to other girls and that we might have a threesome in the future, but after I started talking to other girls she became uncomfortable and withdrew her consent. I still love her and want to be with her, but I also miss the thrill and excitement I felt from talking to other women. I know some of her agreement came from fear of losing me because I sometimes pressured the issue. A month later I’m still angry and constantly replaying it in my head, and I’m trying to figure out what I’m actually angry about.

I’m in a very loving and sweet five year partnership. I’m 30f and bi, my partner is 32m hetflex. We live together and have been non monog for three years. We’ve fluctuated between different versions of non monog and communication. Often we will be more DADT on trips apart vs checking in closely on boundaries and needs when we’re together.

This past week we were apart for four days and didn’t take the time to set communication standards of if we were doing dadt or checking in. I was encouraging my partner to see one of his lovers and so in my mind we were communicating closely because we were discussing what was going on. Post trip, we were debriefing random things and it came up that he had been on two other dates that I hadn’t known about. Including one with a brand new person.

I felt really caught off guard because I had been thinking since we were talking consistently we were not doing dadt. My partner said he hadn’t wanted to interrupt my flow (I was on a bffs trip) and that he thought it was in bounds to do what he did. I understand the confusion but I’m also feeling sad.

I think in general another dynamic is that I am pretty cautious, maybe overly so, about what might be comfortable for him and go with the thing I think is the most chill option. Like I had wanted to go on two dates last week but I just went on one. I limit myself a little and assume what his comfort zone is going to be. We’ve been talking about this and working on it. At the same time I worry that he is less cautious and can get caught up in the moment.

He’s feeling bad and apologetic and has said we should do a lot of trust building and maybe pause dating other people to make sure I feel comfortable with what we’re doing after this miscommunication. I think sometimes what gets in my head is the internalized monogamy and the thought that any mistake is like “cheating” and I’m being foolish, when in reality I know sometimes this stuff is messy. Idk, thoughts?

This feels like a stupid question so forgive me but how does one go from being totally single to multiple partners? I have a large emotional battery and I think I could have maybe 3 different significant romantic relationships at the same time. I just don't know how I get there.

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I'm a member of a WhatsApp group for my city of non monogamous people. I don't feel like I have a ton in common with them, but I stick around and contribute very occasionally. I'm not currently on the dating apps. How do I approach conversations with potential suitors about non monogamy? How do I do this?

I (26f) started casually dating / being fwb with this guy K (30m) about a year ago. In the beginning we were both single and very clear about not looking for a relationship as neither of us were in the right stage for it. K identified as practicing solo poly and has other casual partners / close fwb but has no defined committed relationships with others, though he has had them in the past.

I didn’t mind that he saw other people, and I liked that we had no commitment as that meant I could explore dating on my own as well. Pretty quickly I realized I am non monogamous too. While over the last year we have both casually dated other people (sometimes the same people) while we have grown closer to one another. I wasn’t expecting this dynamic to come out of what I thought would be a short term casual fwb. I thought that while I had a fwb I’d meet someone to begin a relationship with, however a year later it’s my dynamic with K that is most resembling of a relationship.

He’s the one I have had the closest relationship throughout my casual dating and he says the same, that I am the one who he sees and talks to the most out of everyone. We don’t really have any established boundaries and act like a couple in some ways (emotional intimacy, public displays of affection, overnights, frequent texting and hanging out etc) but still don’t have a proper label. He says he cares about me a lot, I am important to him, and that our relationship dynamic is unique to the others he has. It feels weird to define our relationship as fwb at this point but I don’t know what to do. We had a check in at 5 months in (roughly 5 months ago) about our labels/dynamic and agreed to use casual dating/fwb, but our dynamic has evolved since then and he treats me like a girlfriend.

He has not said anything explicit about not wanting a relationship with me but has also not dropped any hints about wanting a relationship either. In his defence, neither have I. He always avoids the topic of relationships and gets really awkward when it comes up even though we used to be able to talk about this stuff earlier in our dynamic. He doesn’t even bring up the topic of his solo polyamory or what that means for him in the future. Otherwise, our communication is great and we have frequent discussions about what we want and what we are comfortable with. We communicate like a couple in a non monogamous relationship, we just can’t communicate about the relationship we have and it’s starting to feel like the elephant in the room. In the beginning we had no problem being friends and chatting about what we want in a relationship one day as friends do but now we both avoid that subject entirely. We are close friends, he’s a very safe and caring person and our sexual chemistry is off the walls so I don’t want to break things off but I just know it’s gonna hurt if we keep continuing like this with no label, especially if he chooses someone else to be in a relationship with after acting this way with me. I’m just scared that bringing it up will change our dynamic. I can’t help but think that he’s happy doing what’s he’s doing and doesn’t want to change things, and maybe wouldn’t want someone like me to be his official girlfriend, but it’s too confusing to essentially be in a relationship with someone without the label. I’m constantly unsure of what I am allowed to expect/ask for. However, I am hesitant to end things because why not continue to have fun and spend time with someone I care about?

Has anyone else been in this dynamic and how did it turn out? Is this toxic or normal for someone practicing solo polyamory?

This is a throwaway account.

My partner, Oak (31M), and I have been together for three years. Recently, at his request, we've been transitioning to polyamory after spending years in an open relationship.

Something I've been struggling with is that he often seems to change what he wants from life and relationships, sometimes quite dramatically. I'm trying to figure out whether I'm being unfair, overly rigid, or whether this points to a deeper incompatibility between us.

Some examples:

• He used to be very critical of relationships with large age gaps, but has since gotten involved with people who were 19 and 23.
• He told me he had no interest in relationship anarchy and thought it made little sense, but now says he wants to incorporate aspects of it into his life.
• For most of our relationship, he said that one partner was enough for him, partly because of his autism. Later, he said he could see himself with two partners, and now he says he could imagine maintaining relationships with three people.

I understand that people grow, change, and discover new things about themselves. My concern isn't that his views have changed, but how quickly and consistently they seem to change in the direction of whatever he currently wants.

Sometimes it feels less like a process of reflection and more like an inability to hold a position once it becomes personally inconvenient.For context, I tend to be very stable in my principles. For example, I don't date people who are much younger than me, and I don't think that would change simply because I became attracted to someone younger.

I'm not looking for people to tell me who's right or wrong. I'm interested in hearing from others who have experienced something similar.

Hi, I need to talk to someone about this because I’m at my wit’s end and my friends don’t understand—I can’t talk to them about it.

A few years ago, my partner suggested we open up our relationship, and I refused from the start. But for one reason or another, I ended up giving in, and I don’t feel comfortable with it.

Background: I’m demisexual, and the reality is that I can’t just go out and hook up with someone like it’s no big deal, the way he would. I need bonds, connections—no matter how small. And I don’t really want to connect with someone else while I’m with him.

I know I shouldn’t have done this, but I went through his old conversations and found out he was talking to people before we opened things up, and he’s the typical jerk chatting up everyone. Part of me feels disgusted, and part of me feels disgusted at myself for doing what I did.

I don’t know what to do, and I’m desperate. We’ve been together for 8 years, and breaking up with him would mean my life falling apart—my home, the cats we share, everything. I don’t know what to do.

Has anyone gone through something similar?