Comments on: more on marriage

By: Uma

Uma — Sun, 07 Oct 2007 15:13:48 +0000

I have been happily (well most of the time!) married for 28 years, but I have always had outside relationships, usually with friends common to both me and my husband, always with someone Scott approved of, because it just wouldn’t work otherwise. I never thought of myself as poly, but I guess I was/am. I am now settled into one outside relationship with a wonderful partner who loves me, my kids and my husband. I’m older now and this relationship is what I need, this one other strong partner, not multiple others as I used to need.

You need to tend to your own needs, Jane, and from what you wrote, I’d say that you are doing just that. I also like reserving the right to have new experiences that change your outlook! I think I’ll do the same! ;)

By: happygirl

happygirl — Sun, 30 Sep 2007 00:31:56 +0000

Enjoyed the post as well. It is a different level of understanding to get to the point of knowing what works for you. I am in the process of learning that one person is not someone’s “enough” but that is not a reason for me to be in a ‘poly’ relationship. It just means working on the relationship and knowing what you need your friends to fill in.

By: Heather

Heather — Fri, 28 Sep 2007 20:35:59 +0000

Girl, I am always so happy when you just brave it and fully speak your own truth. Makes me all, “Yeah, THAT’S my friend.”

Love you much, as always.

By: Rae

Rae — Thu, 27 Sep 2007 22:33:42 +0000

Oh, Dear Jane, Remember those conversations we had a few months back about you blogging about poly/mono relationships and your hesitance? And now here you are, blogging your heart out and I’m sitting here literally taking notes! I very rarely grab my journal while reading blogs but that’s just what I did now. Several of your statements are going to be fueling my own free-writing exercises for weeks to come! I think the power of your experience & your writing is your ability to convey something that is very personal, acknowledge that your perceptions may not apply to any one else, but still give every one else a starting point to assess themselves and figure what does apply.

It’s ironic how even the most subversive of lifestyles can revert, fall into, become the same quotidian experience if one isn’t careful. This applies to sexual/romantic relationships but also work, hobbies, child rearing, politics. If we aren’t actively invested in our thoughts, our actions, our processes, then anything can become habitual, stunting, and ineffective.

The sentence that struck me deeply, as I navigate several endings and possibilities of new beginnings, was “I reserve the right to have new experiences that change my outlook in other ways.” I think I’m going to print that on a stack of cards and silently hand them to people when they say, “But you’ve changed!” or “Why do you so desperately want to move from a place you were happily living for the past 4 years?” or “How can you leave him after all you’ve been together? What is different now?” Nothing’s different except the fact that, for one reason or another, I am different.

By: d'gou

d'gou — Thu, 27 Sep 2007 18:40:19 +0000

I agree with Peter, I think people can find a way to make meaning, or to avoid communication, regardless of whether they are single, monogomous, or poly, or whereever in between… Facing yourself and doing the hard work is what matters, whatever vehicle helps along the way.

By: Susan

Susan — Thu, 27 Sep 2007 17:08:59 +0000

This is a really astute and thoughtful post. I really empathize with the part about having avoided this discussion in the past because you didn’t want to be seen as not supporting your friends. I look forward to the day when we can all identify as poly or not without it devolving into a binary debate about which relationship style is right.

You might like “The Meaning of Wife”, by Anne Kingston. It is a funny and thoughtful look at monogamous marriage, and how it does/doesn’t jive with contemporary women’s lives.

By: Peter Throckmorton

Peter Throckmorton — Thu, 27 Sep 2007 16:13:15 +0000

One of the unpleasant things about people who are self-centric about their relationship model is the “more evolved than thou” moral high ground they climb up on. What you are saying is the real stuff - any model of relationship takes hard work.

My kid sister has been hard-wired monogamous her entire life. I’ve been hard-wired poly/slut/etc for my entire life. We’ve both put in hard work on our individual lives and neither is “better” than the other, “more evolved” than the other, or any such self congratulation.