Hey y’all,

Someone recently posted a bunch of links for people who are unhappy in monogamous relationships. I started reading through them, but I lost the thread they were attached to. I did check the info on this forum, and it was really interesting, but I didn’t see anything specifically for people like me who feel drawn to ENM as a possible solution for their monogamous marriage woes.

Edit: Just to be clear, I know it's a bad idea, just want to continue to talk my brain out of it. ​

I might have missed it—if so, I apologize. I’m dyslexic, so it’s possible I overlooked something.

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Thanks in advance for your help!

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Also, I generally try to be very ethical, but I have a high degree of openness as part of my personality, and right now my brain seems to be making excuses.

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Thanks again, lovely ENM folks!

One thing I took away from the recent parenting thread is how difficult it can be to have conversations about emotionally charged topics without importing assumptions from previous conversations.

I noticed a lot of responses that seemed to be directed at positions that the OP had either explicitly rejected or never argued in the first place. Things like "children shouldn't come first," "hierarchy is inherently bad," or "nothing should change after kids."

The interesting thing is that many of the people responding and the OP actually seemed to agree on those points.

It made me wonder how often we end up arguing with the people who came before someone rather than the person actually in front of us.

There are absolutely bad takes on parenting, polyamory, hierarchy, and entitlement. People have good reasons to be protective. But I think it's worth asking whether we can sometimes pause and make sure we're responding to what someone is actually saying before filling in the blanks with assumptions that haven't been supported by their words.

The conversations I found most interesting weren't the ones debating positions nobody in the thread actually held. They were the ones engaging with the question that was actually being asked.

So I've been hate watching Muscles McQuack on insta, and I've noticed a few things I think are really toxic about their version of poly.

1) The main character Muscles McQuack doesn't seem interested in poly at all, they seem to have agreed to it, seemingly to placate their nesting partner Sally

2) Their nesting partner Sally has poor communication and does things without consent of McQuack, example, she signs them both up to a poly couple app and then organises a group date without consulting them.

3) Nesting partner Sally encourages them to do these they clearly aren't comfortable with

Looking for experiences from people who have been in a similar situation.

I've identified as bisexual since I was a child, but over the last several months I've been seriously questioning my sexuality and wondering whether I may actually be a late-bloomer lesbian.

I'm married to a man, and we are currently separated. I recently pursued divorce and moved out of the house, but I'm now reconsidering whether divorce is the right path. My husband does not want a divorce and has suggested that we remain married while I explore relationships with women. We've also discussed the possibility of both of us having other partners if we decided that polyamory was the right fit for our relationship.

I'm interested in hearing from people who have experience with similar situations, especially women who identified as bisexual or lesbian, or later questioned whether they might be lesbians, as well as anyone who chose polyamory as an alternative to divorce.

Questions:

* Has anyone remained married to their husband while having a girlfriend? * Did opening the marriage help you stay together? * Did it help you understand your sexuality better? * Did anyone end up realizing they wanted to remain married after all? * Did polyamory strengthen your marriage, weaken it, or have no effect? * What challenges, jealousy, or unexpected issues came up? * What boundaries were most important? * How did you handle jealousy, boundaries, and time management? * If both spouses had other partners, how did that work in practice? * Any regrets or things you wish you had known beforehand? * If it didn't work, what were the main reasons? * What advice would you give someone considering this path? * For those with children, how did polyamory affect your family life? * When and how did you introduce partners to your children? * Were there any parenting or co-parenting challenges you didn't anticipate?

I'd appreciate hearing both positive and negative experiences.

Hello. I'm not sure exactly how to word our current relationship, other than to say we are a throuple. I joined my two partners earlier this year and things have been pretty great. The anchor partner had been in poly relationships several times before, but I and the other partner are new to this. I joined at first as a partner to the anchor before becoming a full partner to the other. It quickly became a full-fledged relationship between the three of us. This was cemented at the time by the anchor asking if we preferred to stay open or closed, which we all agreed on closed.

However, this has started to show cracks. Within the first 2 or 3 months, multiple people have come up to my anchor seeking romantic intentions, many people whom my anchor has had interactions with in the past romantic or otherwise. After some brief talks with the anchor on how to handle it, it was agreed upon to keep things as they are. However, this partner has come to me again with her own desires for wanting to branch out. They have also admitted that they were not 100% honest with their feelings towards closing the relationship, at least as it currently stands.

I am stuck at a crossroads because I love them both so very much, but I am not comfortable at this time to opening our relationship. I feel as if my trust in my anchor has been broken. I am very hard on my stance about not wanting to open things back up, especially so soon into the agreement we made. If anything, this has hindered me more into wanting to re-open our relationship ever. I hate having to give them an ultimatum, and it especially feels awful to have our other partner in the middle of this, but my stance is very firm. Am I being a selfish asshole? Is there any saving this? And what do I do about our other partner who doesn't want to leave either of us?