The Polyamorous Misanthrope

“I’m in a mid-life crisis, I guess.  The passion is out of my life and I’m looking for something more.   My wife doesn’t understand me.”

Any polyamorous person on a dating site is almost sure to get a message like this from time to time.  No, it’s not exclusive to men.  Women do a serious version of it, too.  So get off your high horse.

But male or female, if you’ve been in a long-term relationship that’s gotten blah, you might find  yourself saying, “Oh, it would be so much better if I had a partner that understood me.”

While I’m not saying that your relationship problem isn’t that you’re misunderstood, do you really think something so commonplace and cliché is really because partners of decades don’t understand each other?  Really?  After decades together.

You people aren’t paying attention, are you?

And you know what?  That’s rather the point.  Now, you know ole Mama Java.  She’ll never advise you to try to get someone else to behave the way you want to fix your problem.  But honestly, this kind of intimacy problem is a genuine big deal.  More than that, it’s often pretty tragic.

I want to offer a possible solution, and it’s a good one.  If you’re feeling like your partner doesn’t understand you, do something a little counterintuitive:

Put all your energy into understanding your partner.

Now, I’m not suggesting long, drawn-out conversations where you’re prying like a parent with a non-communitive teenager.  It doesn’t work then and it certainly isn’t going to work isn’t going to work in an adult relationship.  When I say put your energy into understanding your partner, it means understanding the lack of communication, too.  Sometimes, it can be as easy as, “Baby, we haven’t been talking much.  Is there a reason you’d like to tell me about?” and find a floodgate opens.  Sometimes, it’s a courting process.

Don’t confuse “understanding your partner” with “getting the information you need to have a good lever with your partner”.  Understanding means exactly that.  If you don’t love and care about and want to know your partner down into his bones, my dear, you have a far worse problem that your partner not understanding you.  Got that?

If you think this is sounding a bit like Stephen Covey’s Habit Five[1] of the Seven Habits o Highly Effective People, there’s a lot to that.  If you’re having trouble connecting, if you’re having a hard time communicating, seeking to understand and understand deeply does two things.  The first thing it does is give you a clearer grokking of the issues involved.  It is never a bad idea to seek to understand a partner deeply.  Prying and being invasive is something else entirely.  If you’re seeking to truly understand, you’ll avoid being invasive because you’re developing the empathy and compassion to understand how your partner is feeling.

The second thing that seeking to understand does is build trust.  ‘Member how you were all upset and had your kickers in a bunch because your partner didn’t understand you?  We all want to be loved and understood by our partners.  You partner(s) want you to understand them, too!  It’s much easier to make that connection with someone you have seen demonstrate on a consistent basis that s/he wants to understand you!

Remember to take it slow.  If you’ve gotten to the “My wife doesn’t understand me” phase, your relationship has been sliding for a long time.  This isn’t something you can gloss over for a couple of months and expect everything to be all lovey-dovey and dandy.  It’s going to take time and patience.  Me?  I think good intimate relationships are worth it.

This won’t solve every single relationship problem you have.  Sorry, there’s no shortcuts.  But this is a fantastic first step to repair and expand relationships.

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[1] Seek first to understand, then to be understood.

I’ve been seeing more than the usual amount of discussion about jealousy on various poly boards lately, so I figure this might be a little topical to people.   I have pulled out of the air the Definitive[1] Five-Point List of Ways to Fuck Up Handling Jealousy.  I am sharing this because I am wise and all knowing about polyamory and I will deign to share my knowledge with you, puny mortal.[2]

1. Blame your partner

“Hey, I wouldn’t be feeling jealous if my partner were doing things right, right?  If only she weren’t making me feel insecure, everything would be dandy!”

Making your partner responsible for your feelings is a sure way to mess up a relationship.  There is a significant difference in, “I don’t like X behavior” and “You’re making me feel jealous.”  If you don’t grok this difference down in your bones, learning about emotional boundaries is a really productive thing you can do for yourself and your relationships.   It is not unusual for jealousy to be about personal insecurity.

As Franklin Veaux once commented, “Just because I feel bad doesn’t mean you did something wrong.”  Don’t assume that your feelings prove anything but that you’re feeling something.

2. Blame the partner’s partner

“If only my partner’s partner would not make me feel insecure, I wouldn’t be so uncomfortable, right?”  (See a pattern?)

Again, feeling bad on your part doesn’t necessarily mean malfeasance on the other person’s part.  People aren’t saints, but assumptions don’t help.

3. Blame yourself

“If only I were more secure/better looking/better in bed/more evolved I wouldn’t feel so upset.”

Feelings might be uncomfortable sometimes, but they’re not necessarily because you did something bad, either.  Jealousy isn’t always about personal insecurity.  Sometimes there really is, no kidding, a problem among the partners.

I break with some of the more New Age polyamorous writers, in that I do not feel that jealousy is always some sort of weird emotional aberration of the spiritually unevolved.   It can and often is a personal security issue, but sometimes partners do take us for granted, or are not giving us what we all agreed upon.  It’s okay to talk about that.

4. Lie about it

“What’s the matter, honey?”

“Oh, nothing.”

Don’t do this.  In a good relationship, it’s okay to say, “Actually, I’m feeling kinda jealous right now.  I want to: examine this by myself and get back to you/talk with you about how I’m feeling/have a backrub so I can relax.”

Notice this isn’t making your partner responsible for how you feel.  But it is communicating.  I mean, you want an accurate picture of what your partner is thinking and feeling, right?  What makes you think your partner is any different?  When people love each other, they do care how the other feels even if it’s hardly healthy to take responsibility for it.

5. Ignore it

Like physical pain, emotional pain is a sign that something needs attention.   There are dozens of reasons why you might be feeling jealous – some of them internal, some to do with externals.  Unless and until you sit down and examine them with an open mind and without preconceptions, you can’t know.  But if you don’t take a good look at what you’re feeling and why, it is going to fester and infect your relationships.

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[1] Not really.  It’s the number that came to me off the top of my head.  I’m sure my Faithful Readers could come up with more.

[2] <grinning at one of my Guest Columnists> I should be ashamed of myself.  But I’m not.

Mama Java is lounging on the beach right now.  Well, okay RIGHT NOW, I’m probably getting sunscreen on squirming little children, collecting beach chairs and making sure everyone has their towels, but I am at the beach this week.  Here’s a column from Rain Hannah.  Enjoy!

It can be easy, when you’ve been doing this poly thing for a while, to get complacent and fool yourself into thinking you’ve got it nailed. I guarandamntee you that you don’t have it nailed. Not a one of us does.

I’d like to get “Mind the Gap” tattooed on my forehead so that the next time I start feeling all like Saint Griselda, Patient Patroness Of Good Poly, I remember that I’m about to fall onto the third rail and get roasted with my own hubris.

You see… there will be times in any relationship, mono or poly, where the shit hits the fan. Where, because of work, conflicts, new relationships or ghost spiders from Mars, things may not be as harmonious as you would like. Perhaps, in that event, you assure yourself that things will get better when the ghost spiders from Mars have been removed from the equation. That if you are just patient and deal with it bravely, it will all be okay in the morning and everything will get back to “normal.”

Allow me to venture a few thoughts, to elaborate upon the theme of patience. It is fine to be patient. It is good to be patient. It is noble, wonderful, kind, gentle and all manner of good things. It is important, in life, to acknowledge that shit happens (constantly), and behave like an adult when it does. Sometimes it isn’t all about you and you just need to sit on your hands for a while until things get sorted, because other people really need your patience and good sense to win out or things won’t work.  Here is where it gets tricky: you have to be on your guard about letting patience turn into something less healthy. Ask yourself… “Why am I doing this?”

Seriously. Ask yourself. Take a little extra time to examine your motives. That, ultimately, is the point of this wee essay.

I fell into this pitfall recently. Shit happened, like it does, and my partners needed some space to work things out. I, wanting them to be okay, happily gave them the space and time that they needed.  I was patient. I behaved like an adult. I was being Generous to my partners and here is the rub. I realized later that I wasn’t really being generous. I was being selfish as all get out.   I, very temporarily, stuck my needs on the back burner, because other people’s needs were more pressing. Let me say up front, that was okay. What wasn’t okay was the extent to which I took it or why I was doing it. What wasn’t okay – and I didn’t figure this out until later – was that somehow, deep down, I thought that there would be some kind of a reward in it for me. Some emotional reward, a special cookie, something I hadn’t really asked for but felt I’d earned with my patience and self-sacrifice.

Hey does that last line sound familiar? Oh my GOD it totally does!  It was the whole Brave Little Toaster thing, only in the short term, looking very different, and there was no bad guy!  That attitude? That was not so grown up. It was not so generous or patient. It was… I don’t know what it was, but absolutely the opposite of what I was aiming for.  That attitude stinks.

“They got special cookies,” my subconscious said. “That means I get equal special cookies because I’ve been so patient and good. I’ve been Super Nice and a Good Poly Partner and now I am going to be rewarded with extra love and attention!”

Yeah, not so much with that.

I was rewarded with plenty of loving appreciation, but I did not get the special cookies I wanted. My cookie jar pretty much stayed about the same. There was no magical sparkle pony moment with ice cream and a parade, either. When these things failed to materialize, I might have behaved badly. I was resentful and angry because I didn’t get what I thought I deserved, in return for being so awesome.

The glitch in my mental scenario was easy to identify once I sat down and thought about it. My partners did not agree to give me special cookies in return for being so awesome. That was not part of the arrangement we made. That was something I filled in by myself, an expectation I penciled into the margins after they’d signed off.  I got actively pissed off at my partners because they’d taken me up on what I’d freely offered and then I didn’t even get a cookie.

It gets worse.  I used the situation to justify acting like some saintly, long suffering martyr. I got off on feeling really sorry for myself. I caught myself behaving in ways that were subtly guaranteed to make my partners feel guilty for taking me up on my offer in the first place.  That was when I realized that I had my head up my ass and needed to remove it, stat.

It would be easy for me to wallow in shame about all this, but I’m considering it to be another level of a lesson I will probably spend the rest of my life learning.  I’m grateful for the opportunity. Embarrassed, sure. Publicly so, if this gets published[1]. But I think it is important enough to risk that.

It isn’t always the big things. It isn’t always the long term things, the huge life issues. Sometimes it is the simple things, the small things, that trip us up and make us act in ways that are not so cool. Our partners take us at our word, and so it is important to make sure that our word and the agreements that we make are coming from an honest place, not from a place of unspoken expectation. Sometimes our motivations aren’t as altruistic as we think they are and sometimes everyone isn’t on board the cookie train because they didn’t know there was an agreement. Getting that stuff straight is important. Patience in the face of overwhelming trouble is good. Knowing why you are being patient and being upfront with yourself and your loves about what (if anything) you expect in return is better.  It’s okay to ask for something in return. But you gotta ask.

Mind the gap, kids. It’s there.

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[1] Editor’s note:  It did.  You masochist, you!

Patient Griselda, or, Minding the Gap

© 2010, Rain Hannah

Used by permission

Rainy Hannah is a polyamorous woman living in Southern California with way too much yarn, too many cats, a couple of kids, and a Very Good Dog. She has been there, done that.

I need advice.

My girl and I began exploring the “lifestyle” about 2 years ago.  At some point mid way, I discovered that I was having nervousness block my performance, in my opinion because many encounters seemed rushed.  I talked with my partner about doing solo dates, and she was very much against it.  So I let go of it.

Meanwhile, my partner gets involved (solo) with a popular social club, and from her explanation it has really helped her in areas of being social, something she had been struggling with.  She attended a larger event, held at a campground, and calls me to say she drank too much, and had been offered a spot to spend the night.  She was approached by a male member of the group sexually, somehow he gets the opportunity to explain to her the group is full of swingers, and apparently sparks fly between the two of them.  She asks me if she could have my blessing to have sex with him, and I agree to it.

I attend their next event to meet this gentleman, nice guy, apparently the woman seem to love him, and all of the sudden I start noticing that he and my girl are doing things like hugging/light kissing/and at one point hand-holding.  That night she tells me they are going to sneak out into the woods, and tell her to have fun.  After several hours they got back, and my mind had started getting restless.

Somehow I overlooked the fact this person had the potential of being a very frequent potential dating partner for her, so the next day I kindly explained how I felt to her, and that turned very nasty very fast, and she began threatening to end the relationship, but we reach some sort of simple agreement to lay it to rest until we are clear enough to deal with it in the future.  Now I have not ever had a solo playmate, and I am not sure that it’s in my genes to be able to eventually achieve this.

I am starting to feel anxiety from this situation, I fear it’s going to spin out of control, will be left with over-exaggerated tokens of affection from her, and much less of her time, while feeling inadequate because I don’t believe I have what it takes to even find someone who would be interested in doing the same with me.  I tried explaining this to her, but the results we the same.  She feels I should have no problems what so ever, but I am just not in that space right now, and confusion had taken over in this relationship.

Thanks for reading, any advice or comments are greatly appreciated.

Shouldn’t have a problem, huh?  Well, maybe it’d be better all around for everyone if you didn’t, but let’s accept for the moment that you do. Problems can be solved, so this is hardly a hopeless situation, but don’t let “should” get in the way for now.  Don’t let anyone tell you how you should feel either.

It does sound like you’re feeling pretty insecure about your own attractiveness.  That sucks.  It’s beyond the scope of a single blog post to give you really useful, solid advice about how to overcome insecurity about oneself or one’s attractiveness, but I will give you a tiny, minor piece of advice that might be useful:

Be yourself just as hard as you can.

As a unique human being, what you really have to bring to the table in terms of a relationship is the unique human being that you are.  Be that to the hilt.

You did not give a lot of detail about the conversation between the two of you “getting nasty fast” and your girlfriend threatening to leave the relationship, so unfortunately I can’t give much clear advice about that.   I can think of a dozen reasons why it might have, but without more facts on hand, I can only give you some general advice.

• Always tell the truth about how you feel
• Don’t put up with emotional blackmail
• Never agree to what you don’t want, but understand that sometimes these things can be dealbreakers.  Ideally, it’s best to accept that outright.
• You are allowed your feelings, but clinging to insecurity isn’t really helpful.  If you feel insecure, work on that. (You might want to start with Franklin Veaux’s excellent article Becoming Secure.)
• You don’t have to accept inequitable agreements.
• Be your own primary.

I really do think that in your specific case, working on valuing yourself is really the key log that’ll unblock a lot of problems.

Good Luck.  I bet you’ll do great.

Let’s talk about relationship conversations for a moment.  When you’re polyamorous, you’re going to have them more often just because you have more of them[1].  There are different conversations you will often want to have and they’re used for different purposes.  I’ve chosen a basic breakdown of three, just because lists are easy and popular on blogs.  Snigger as it suits you.

1. Checking In

The checking in conversation, while usually the shortest, is the most important in any relationship.  I find it analogous to doing the dishes immediately after a meal when nothing’s crusty and it’s easy to clean up.

These conversations tend to be under five minutes, and tend to be along the lines of:  I love you.  How are things going with you.  Do you think there’s anything serious we need to talk about?  Nope? Did I tell you that I’ll be out next weekend?  Oh, I put it on the calendar. Good.  *hugs/kisses*

They’re so important because they keep you in touch with your partner without making a heavy deal of the situation.  They seem light and trivial – perhaps hardly worthy of attention.  Nothing could be further from the truth!  If you take these conversations seriously and to heart, you’re building a lot of trust and intimacy within the relationship.  Your partners will rely on that gentle flow of information, and will often be more likely to offer you the same opportunities.

2. The Hour-Long Conversation

Sometimes long conversations need to happen.  Maybe you’ve neglected checking in often.  Maybe something really complex has just come up in your life.   That happens and is a standard part of life.

You should have a very clear idea what you want to talk about, and leave lots of listening time when you have these.  You’ll notice I put a time limit of an hour.  It’s not that I think a stopwatch is important.  I do think a limited time is important.  If you’re finding that you’re not sticking to the subject and rambling a lot, it might be you’re thinking aloud rather than having a conversation.  Thinking aloud is okay, but it’s important to be clear about what you’re doing.

You can’t go far wrong if you read and take On Civilized Discourse to heart!

3. The All-Nighter

With this one, be afraid.  Be very afraid.  We’ve all stayed up into the wee, small hours talking.  When it’s a bottle of vodka, and a political or philosophical discussion, it can be a lot of fun.  If it’s the third time this year for a Serious Relationship Discussion and the snow hasn’t even melted yet, maybe there’s a big problem in the relationship.

While I’d hesitate to issue a blanket condemnation of all-nighters, approach them with caution, fear and trembling.  Plenty of people just aren’t at their best when they’re sleep deprived, and agreements made then might be hard to take seriously[2] in the cold light of day.

The place for these discussions are rare and sparing.  Certainly and long and deep conversation can be transformative, but if they’re happening frequent, ain’t no transformation happening.  I can’t encourage going with options one and two most often.

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[1] Though as a complete aside, I find it weird that friends rarely “talk about their relationships” while lovers do.  Isn’t that odd?

[2] Sleep dep is an incredibly useful technique to encourage conformity.   See the prayer schedule for the stricter monasteries, interrogation techniques, and the sleep schedule of your average boot in Basic Training.

A New Reader Asks:

I have been seeing a guy,living and working with him for about 4 months. He introduced me to the idea of polyamory. I had honestly never heard of it, but the more I learned the more I wanted of it. Secretly I had been bisexual and interested in women for some time, and finally I met a guy that wasn’t just interested in having a threesome, not jealous of my relationships with my girl friends, but promoted it. I was in awe. Now suddenly something has changed. Since finding this love inside of me, I have felt insanely happy, giving, loving, and learning more about plolyamory and yoga each day. We run a yoga center with two of my old roommates (how i met him), doing massage, etc.

The thing is this, we have had some good times with girls we’ve met, and some good times with friends of mine, and it all goes cool. About 2 weeks before he met me he was seeing another girl, and then me and we are on a much deeper level with one another, and see eye to eye on many things. Not that it really matters, this guy loves everyone and I know thats the way it should be. The thing is, this girl wants nothing to do with me. She isn’t interested in group sex and it really makes me feel left out and alone when she is around. He has agreed to not be with her alone, but this girl won’t even hug me for a picture. What to do? When she’s around he completely drops me, doesn’t even pay attention to me at all, rarely talks to me. It’s like I’m put on the back burner. When I ask why I’m being treated as if I don’t exist, or I’m just the back up babe, he tells me it’s my fault for not involving myself, but I try…I just know this girl doesn’t want anything. He has told me int he past that she says, lets get alone and we’ll do anything you want together. I mean, what the hell!! I live with him, can she not respect that and try to include me? This morning we were all in bed together and he asked how we both slept, we both said fine. Then they started talking to eachother in spanish, I’m in Panama if I didn’t mention that and am still trying to learn spanish. They continued for a very long time and the next thing I knew, I realized no one was talking to me at all. Instead of trying to butt in their conversation and be rude, I just got up and left. I find myself crying and unhappy and I just feel like I want out. I don’t know how to handle myself,but how can this be? I believe all that he has taught me, yet he seems to act like a different person when she is around. He says she needs more attention than me because I’m stronger, yet I am the one here crying. Please help Goddess of Java, give me some helpful advice.

Okay, first of all, just because you’re poly doesn’t necessarily mean that all loves will sleep with all other loves. The woman you’re discussing doesn’t owe you physical contact just because she’s sleeping with your boyfriend. If the girl isn’t into group sex, she isn’t. Not every polyamorous person is, I assure you.  I wouldn’t be very pleased with anyone who felt I owed them hugs and would be pretty unlikely to have much incentive to cultivate their acquaintance, much less a friendship.

Since you’re trying to learn the language, I don’t think it’s inappropriate to ask for the occasional translation when you don’t understand it when they’re speaking Spanish.  Since you live in a Spanish-speaking country, I can’t imagine they’d be foolish enough to think they were speaking in a private code in front of you (which would be pretty rude).   Learning a language is pretty intense, but if they’re bilingual, they know that.   It might be that they think they’re including you and don’t realize how much you’re feeling confused and left out.

I do sometimes discuss letters with partners, and mentioned this one to The Prince.   He frowned and said that the idea that your boyfriend has tried to turn this around and put it all on you doesn’t have him feeling very confident about how well the two of you are communicating.

He’s right, as it happens.  Relationship problems just aren’t on one person, any more than wonderful relationship interactions are.   While it’s certainly possible you’re holding yourself aloof (and God knows that North Americans can seem damn emotionally reserved in the face of some Latin American cultures), it is also possible there’s an expectation that you should be “convenient”.

I suspect that there’s some cross-purposes are going on here, and something that might help is to think clearly about what it is that you want.  I don’t mean the band-aids that you think will make you feel better (i.e. your boyfriend never being alone with another woman), but what it is you really want.  Maybe it’s more focus when you’re together.  Maybe it’s clearer communication.  Maybe it’s a backrub.  (Hey, wants aren’t always complex!)  But do think hard.  Because in good relationships, you’re totally responsible for figuring out what it is what you want, and then communicating that.

Here’s the scary part.  Sometimes, when you ask, you don’t get a “yes”.   Getting a no sucks.   The thing is, sometimes it’s something you can suck up, and sometimes it’s something you can’t.

Sane polyamory is damned near impossible without a certain degree of not only self-knowledge, but a deep understanding of what’s acceptable to you and what is not.

Probably the best thing for you at this point is to find a way to think uninterrupted about what it is you really want out of life and a relationship so that you can ask for that.  What are your dreams?  Your goals?  Things you love to have happen?  What are your dealbreakers?  When you know all of that, you’ll be in a better position to know where you want to go with this.

Good luck!

Polyamory is about love and intimacy, right?  So poly people are the lovingest, mostest intimate cuddlemuffins out there.  If you find someone wants to keep the slightest bit of themselves to themselves, they’re not really poly.  People that need space cannot possibly be polyamorous.  They’re sneaky monsters with an agenda to torture the poor loving cuddlemuffins.

Okay, I can’t go on with this without laughing so hard I burn my sinuses with hot coffee.

Love certainly does have an intimate component.  You’re not going to be able to have a loving relationship without a strong degree of intimate communication and interaction.  Cranky misanthrope I might be, but even I know you can’t love in a box.  It’s a two-way street, and you really do have to open yourself up to give and receive love.  But sometimes you’ll object to a behavior only to hear, “But I thought we were poly!”

The problem comes in when people confuse loving intimacy with stomping on personal boundaries.   Intimacy is closeness, but look out for some warning signs that say that what you’re experiencing is a boundary violation rather than intimacy:

• Emotional Blackmail

Emotional blackmail is use of negative emotions, especially guilt, to control behavior.

You probably won’t notice it the first time you experience it.

You’ll be approached, possibly hesitantly, and your love will say that something you did or didn’t do hurt.  You’ll feel bad and try to correct your behavior.  Now, ya know, in good relationships, sometimes you do screw up.  It happens!  You get called on it, and will get an explanation about how to avoid it in the future.  That’s not emotional blackmail.  That’s human.  Don’t chalk every single time someone doesn’t like your behavior up to emotional blackmail.  We’re none of us perfect.

It’ll be the second or third time within a relatively short period when you notice that it’s emotional blackmail.  You’ll experience strong attempts to make you feel guilty.  They might even work, if you don’t have a clear vision of good boundaries in place.

Luckily, you are in control of this.  Take the time to make sure you have a good sense of what you’re okay with, how you want to behave and the person you want to be.  When you’re solid and grounded in yourself and your own sense of who you want to be, it’s a lot harder to use guilt to manipulate you.

• Creeping Concessions

You know old canard that if you put a frog in a pan of cool water, then gradually heat it, the frog will not notice when the temperature rises to a dangerous degree and will boil to death?

While the literal story is false, the moral of the story has a point.  You can agree to one small concession, right?  That’s okay.  Now if that small concession is treated as a precedent rather than a single exception,[1] someone who is ignoring boundaries is likely to ask for another oh, so small concession that’ll become a precedent, until you’ve found you conceded way the devil more than you ever intended.

You can’t blame this one on the other person, though.  You’re responsible for your own boundaries.  You’re in control of this one.  If you give a concession, be clear whether it’s a precedent or a one-time deal!  You’re responsible for communicating your intention, so you can handle this pretty easily when you get into the habit.

• Confusing intimacy with intrusiveness

Intimacy is voluntary.  Intrusiveness involves a demand, sometimes combined with emotional blackmail.  You get to decide what you’re okay with sharing or not.  The other person doesn’t.  Sure certain sorts of info can be dealbreakers,[2] but the person who owns the info is the person who gets to make the final call on this.

Do you get frequent calls at work?  Do you find when you are not in the person’s physical presence that you get contacted more than you want?  If you’re on vacation, are you called more often than you’d like, interrupting your free time[3]?

If you object to these things, do you get a tearful reproach about love and poly?  Remember, even poly people are allowed to set boundaries about how they want to spend their time.

• Attempts to tell you how you are allowed to live

If you’re poly, ever had a new love tell you that you needed to change how you associate with an old love?  Big time boundary violation.   There are many others to choose from, but keep in mind that just because you have a romantic relationship with someone doesn’t mean you’re allowed to tell them what to do[4].

Good relationships require good boundaries, no matter what the relationship form.   Far from separating loves from each other, a respect for a person’s individuality and free choice is a wonderful way to promote loving relationships –even with yourself.   You’ll find that a careful respect of the other person’s free choice causes you to treasure the unique individuality of that person, allowing for even greater opportunities for love.

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[1] But you agreed you had to bow to the North in respect for our relationship before you got in bed with your other partner, last time!

[2] Not wishing to share STD history leaps to mind.

[3] Notice the “more than you want to” caveat.  You wanna spend your life on the phone with a love who isn’t physically present, enjoy.  Free choice and all.  This is about what you WANT.

[4] As an aside and slightly off topic, I’ve often found it amusing and confusing that sleeping with someone is perceived in our culture as granting the other person rights over you.  You see it in sitcoms, where once a girl is sleeping with her love, she gets to “straighten him out” and reorder his life.  The plot usually presents this as a good thing.  I think it stinks.

Not too long ago, I was in the living room working idly on some material.   The Prince was in his room on a teleconference with a client.  Our son was wandering through the house as he often does, waving a blue-painted wooden sword and speaking dialog that will be turned into his latest movie.

He wandered into The Prince’s room already speaking to him.  The Prince, who was otherwise engaged, said, “I’m on a teleconference right now.  Could we talk later?”

Muscle Boy apologized and The Prince said, “Don’t sweat it.  You didn’t know.”

So, how does this relate to poly?

Well, it’s not poly-specific, but it’s a great relationship tool.  It’s a great example of good, respectful communication on both sides.   Muscle Boy often goes into his father’s room to speak to him, so the expectation that he could just start talking had already been set up.  But, when he learned he was wrong, he apologized.  Fortunately, he got an understanding response that made that apology an easy and natural thing to do.  There are plenty of households where a the busy person would speak sharply,  “Can’t you see I’m on the phone?” or worse.   It’s easy to do in the heat of the moment, especially if we’re concentrating on something else involving business or money.

But it’s also easy to do in the heat of the moment when our tender and vulnerable emotions are engaged.  I think all of us have been irritated when someone close to us has not automagically known to perform an action, avoid a subject, bring up a subject or whatever.  We often want to be interacted with without exerting ourselves, or making ourselves vulnerable by asking for what we want or how we want to be treated.  Worse, romantic literature praises the lover who instinctively knows what and how to give.  Pick up any woman’s romance you can lay hands on, and you’ll not find one with a partner who asks directly for anything.

Looking at it, it’s a terrible way to treat someone you love.   People can’t read minds.¹ Sure, sometimes we get lucky and guess right. That’s cool and it’s fun to get a neat surprise from a love who does. I’m not running that down. But while delighting in the surprise, for goodness sake don’t punish it when someone gets it wrong.

Here are some keys to good, respectful communication:

• In the future, I would like it if you would…

This is one of the first and best ways to ask for something, especially on the heels of inadvertently getting something you didn’t want.  You can’t “shoulda” anything.  The past is done and you can’t change it.  If you preface your request as something in the future, you’re letting go of the past and looking to the possibilities of the future.

• If you’re willing, I’d like it if you would…

I admit this one looks wimpy as hell in print. Here’s the funny part. It’s not. Respecting freedom of choice is an amazingly powerful act of love and respect. While I’ve been told “no” in the face of it, I do not get bad behavior or disrespect back when I do so.

I often re-iterate that there’s little about poly that’s really all that polyamory specific. The reason it’s not is because communication, respect and relationships all have basic principles that are not rooted in romance. Rooted in love? Sure. I’ll buy that. When you hold on to the deep love and respect that you have for the people in your life, you’ll find you’ll be behaving in ways that really promote deep bonds and intimacy. It works for family members and community as well as lovers, so it’s something you can practice almost constantly.

And the payoffs in your romantic relationships are amazing. So keep practicing, mah little poly chillun.  Mama Java wants you to be happy.

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¹Yeah, I know, there are some special snowflakes who claim they can. Unless they have a track record of great, long-term, harmonious relationships, and most I know who claim this do not, I’m disinclined to believe them.

I’m a big fan of the online strip Questionable Content.

One of the more recent strips has a couple of characters have a discussion about sex and relationships that I found interesting.

For those poor souls who have not yet had the opportunity to become fans, the two characters are friends with benefits.  The male… well, he sleeps around a lot but has never made any real bones about it to the female character.  For the record, yes, Sven is a big jerk if he isn’t up front before he gets involved about his desires and his expectations.  He’s always been clear with Faye.

But I wanna focus on Faye a minute.  She wants something — to know that she’s the only one Sven is gonna be sleeping with.  Does anyone think this is a good way to go about it?  Even though (in the context of the story), Faye saying, “I’d like us to be exclusive even if it’s not ‘serious,’” would be about as likely to get a “Yes” as Dick Cheney would be likely to apologize for lying to the citizens of the US about weapons of mass destruction Iraq, she’s still allowed to ask for what she wants.

She’s also allowed to set boundaries.  It would even be okay to say, “I’m comfortable sleeping with you as friends, but if and when you have another partner, I’m not going to want to sleep with you any more.”  It wouldn’t be attempting to tell Sven what he could or couldn’t do, but would be setting a boundary that’s important to her.  In fact, it’s relevant information that might effect Sven’s choices.

Obviously, neither of these characters are great at communication.  Learn from their bad example!

My wife and I have been looking for a long time to find a person or couple we could date.  Not too long ago, we did start going out with a couple.  The problem is, while I like them, I don’t like them in *that* way.  What do I do?  My wife is really excited and I don’t want to disappoint her.  Also, the couple are nice people.  I’d really like being friends with them, but I’m just not interested otherwise?

Yow, rough situation.

First off, you’re gonna tell the truth, right?  You don’t have to be mean about it, but you really do want to be honest here.  You said you like these people, so you can certainly say that.  But explaining that you really aren’t interested romantically is the honest thing to do.

But I’ll go even further.  It’s ultimately the kindest thing to do as well.  I know it doesn’t feel great to disappoint people you like or love.   I don’t blame you for finding it difficult or painful.  Thing is, if you did get involved with these people when you weren’t into it, it’s only going to get worse.  Imagine people getting attached and then finding that no, you were just humoring everyone all along.  Talk about painful!

One thing you might want to consider, in having this talk, is whether or not dating as a unit is really working out for you and your wife.  Maybe it would work out that if she’s quite interested in the couple that she could date them.  You don’t specify whether or not you have a “date as a unit” agreement or not but the way your letter reads sort of implies it.  If it is, maybe renegotiation would be in order here.  If I’m wrong, there’s no problem.  She’s free to date ‘em and you’re all good from being honest about how you were feeling.

Ultimately, being straight about what you’re thinking or feeling will work out better for everyone.

Good luck!

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