Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm in an open marriage. I've been doing this for twenty years. I don't relate to this. I accept that at some point my kids may find out but I'm trying a lot harder to avoid it. To the extent that it doesn't occur to anyone that I might be doing this because I'm a mother, great. I'm not asking for wider cultural validation, I'm not proselytizing, I just want to be left alone.

Hate to break it to you, but your kids will find out and probably already know unless they’re toddlers. It’s not a matter of if, it’s a question of when and how. I’m the kid, my sister and I always knew and it messed both of us up emotionally.

When I was in grad school thirty years ago, a few of my classmates talked about their parents' open marriages. So it's always been around.
And yeah, they were all pretty miserable about it.

I know a couple that got into this stuff and it didn’t pan out well. The guy got divorced and remarried someone who was all about swinging/polyamory and being the hot thing in the room. His kid, though, did not like the situation and turned on them. He did not take on the lifestyle himself— my sense is he was rebooted by his parent’s behavior. I’m guessing having all of these people walking in and out of his life was too much. In fact, based on the story, his own marriage lasted a lot longer than dad’s. I do believe you can truly love more than one person, but maybe in sone cases, there’s quite a bit of narcissism at the core of it all.

*revolted by the behavior

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm in an open marriage. I've been doing this for twenty years. I don't relate to this. I accept that at some point my kids may find out but I'm trying a lot harder to avoid it. To the extent that it doesn't occur to anyone that I might be doing this because I'm a mother, great. I'm not asking for wider cultural validation, I'm not proselytizing, I just want to be left alone.

Hate to break it to you, but your kids will find out and probably already know unless they’re toddlers. It’s not a matter of if, it’s a question of when and how. I’m the kid, my sister and I always knew and it messed both of us up emotionally.

When I was in grad school thirty years ago, a few of my classmates talked about their parents' open marriages. So it's always been around.
And yeah, they were all pretty miserable about it.

Anonymous wrote:Post divorce, I've tried variations on ENM a few times. I've been very honest. Some of the women have not been. In all cases, everyone seemed to care a lot about the multiple partners. The affection was genuine. The respect was genuine. The attraction was genuine.

Unfortunately, it's a very unstable situation in my experience. Jealous feelings emerge. Someone ends up getting priority. Someone else ends up getting neglected. I was the neglectful one in one situation. I was the neglected one in another. I broke up with the one who neglected me, and she was genuinely devastated when I broke up with her, but she never considered breaking up with the other guys (one of whom was long distance and didn't know that there were other guys in the picture).

Anonymous wrote:Look at how the Sister Wives reality show played out to see how true long term polyamory works. The husband and his first three wives claimed they had a happy and equitable partnership. Once the husband found his fourth wife, he fell madly in love with her and said she was his 'person'. He moved in with her exclusively and tried to legally divorce a different wife so wife 4 could be the legal wife. The other 3 wives had to work, while wife 4 didn't. Once he found someone he truly bonded to, the other relationships were neglected to the point that wives 1-3 all eventually left him. He's still with wife 4 and has no plans to seek another woman. When it comes to relationships, I truly believe humans can only emotionally bond with one person at a time.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm in an open marriage. I've been doing this for twenty years. I don't relate to this. I accept that at some point my kids may find out but I'm trying a lot harder to avoid it. To the extent that it doesn't occur to anyone that I might be doing this because I'm a mother, great. I'm not asking for wider cultural validation, I'm not proselytizing, I just want to be left alone.

Hate to break it to you, but your kids will find out and probably already know unless they’re toddlers. It’s not a matter of if, it’s a question of when and how. I’m the kid, my sister and I always knew and it messed both of us up emotionally.

Anonymous wrote:She's an 8th grade english teacher? I wonder what her students and their parents thought when this story dropped.

Anonymous wrote:There was this great one season reality show on showtime about polyamory that showed multiple long-term polyamorous marriages.

Every relationship had a hidden dynamic of 2 people prioritizing themselves over the third or fourth person. Typically the third had a history of trauma or would be much younger than the others in the group. There was always a subtle competition between the longer term members and newer additions to the polycule.

There would always be one partner being left out of something at any given time, and they would be visibly distressed. The 'processing' conversations they would have afterwards with the other partners were the relationship equivalent of being called into a meeting with HR. A lot of gaslighting, crying, and minimizing issues veiled in therapyspeak. The underlying problem would never be truly addressed or solved.

When the throuples would finish crying, they'd go back to talking about how enlightened and liberating their relationships were. It seemed like a really exhausting way to live.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Or you're doing the marital equivalent of snorting fentanyl for the thrills.

This^. You are free to do it but don't try to defend or preach how beneficial it is. You may like it now, may feel different in 5 years.

Anonymous wrote:

Or you're doing the marital equivalent of snorting fentanyl for the thrills.