Apologies in advance for the wall of text. This is a bit of an involved story, but I suck at editing. Thanks in advance for reading the whole thing.

54M here. My long-standing marriage split up in 2019, for several reasons; one of the main reasons was the fact that the majority of our marriage was largely sexless. I decided at that time that I was not interested in another long-term monogamous relationship, nor one that did not include a sexual component. I’ve managed to have a few relationships since then, of varying lengths and levels of commitment.

Back in July I matched with a woman on Tinder. She identified as ENM and was kink-curious, like me. We hit it off right away. Had our first date a few days later, which culminated in some great sex. We spent a lot of the summer together, doing various things (simple hangouts, traditional dates, straight-up hookups, sleepovers). Along the way I sort of caught feelings a little bit, but I never pushed for anything beyond what we had in the moment. We both decided to just let things develop and see where they led.

A couple of weeks ago we had a discussion about where we were. She told me that she was really interested in looking for someone who could be more of a primary partner, but that we were not currently a good fit for that role. (I’m involved in some activities that limit my availability for weeks at a time, and I have adult children who live at home with me.) We haven’t seen much of each other since that talk, but we’ve chatted nearly every day. She’s currently dating someone who is also looking for a primary partner, and I’ve been supportive of her in this.

This past weekend she had a friend down for the weekend. He was supposed to come visit back in August but had to reschedule. After he left she and I talked. She had been hoping for some good sex but when the time came they ended up just snuggling and chatting. She told me she thought that they were probably just going to end up platonic snuggle buddies. She then surprised me by telling me that she also envisioned us as platonic snuggle buddies, and she wanted to deescalate the relationship. She said she likes thinking that sex could be on the table, but she’s not really feeling the desire for it.

It’s already been difficult adjusting to seeing her less; the thought that when I did see her the option of sex is foreclosed is really jarring. She’s a little surprised, and perhaps hurt, that I could view the loss of sex as a dealbreaker in our relationship. I’ve noted that even if she’s searching for a primary partner, she need not foreclose intimate relations with other partners; that’s sort of what ENM is about, no? She points out that intimate relationships come in all shapes and sizes, and not all of them include sex. Which is true, but ours most certainly did, and I’m surprised that she’s surprised I would be wary of continuing a relationship that’s effectively been cut in half.

I really like this woman, and I don’t like the idea of losing her from my life, but I honestly don’t know how to handle this change in my relationship, or even if I should. How do I spend time with her, wanting to touch her, kiss her, fuck her, knowing that I can’t?

I’m relatively new to the idea of ENM, so I put it out to those who have more experience for advice and perspective. Thanks again.

TLDR: Partner wishes to maintain a relationship with me, but without sex. I view sex as integral to our relationship. Should I make this adjustment? If so, how?

geteilt von: https://slrpnk.net/post/2665683

A while ago I noticed a problem in my polyamorous social circles, namely that some of the guys just are not doing that well, in terms of finding partners, dating, and generally succeeding at nonmonogamy. In particular, the guys who are new to nonmonogamy seem to make a lot of blunders. Sometimes these are spectacular and result in those guys giving up and going back to monogamy, but other times they seem to take the form of a steady failure to date, or a quickly cycling through relationships. Of course, there are plenty of men who take well to nonmonogamy (myself included), espcially those who have been doing it for a long time. That said, longevity is no guarantee of success – some of the frustrated guys at my recent class on this subject had been polyamorous for over a decade but could still not get their groove on. My hope with the discussions below is that they will help other guys hopscotch past a lot of the conceptual traps that hold us back.

Archived Version

I'm in the market for books that normalize poly parenting. I have the Red Stroller for normalizing different family types (eg. single parent, gay, interracial).

My child's other parent (separated) is very conservative and my family is too. I'm not trying to "push" poly, but prepare my kid mentally/emotionally if people say shit about me. I still have several years before I would need to come out.

I called some people I'm seeing partners, but got scolded by a friend because I guess partner means a relationship that's more "serious". My friend suggested calling them lovers.

I'm emotionally involved with all my people and I care about them. I just get an ick from labels and relationship ladders (abusive family).

I'm looking for a word that's unassuming, but clearly says "I'm not single" so I can easily be honest with monogamous people.

Any suggestions? Lover sounds a little too much like cheating.

non youtube link

I posted this because I liked the open nature of the video, that it includes opinions from different perspectives and because I enjoy Mainely Mandys content.

My personal take: I see no reason to police someones queer identity, so if someone says they are queer then they are queer to me.

Hi all,

I've been through a rough year. I've had to rebuild myself from ground up and now that I'm back and looking at what comes next, I'm feeling scared and uncertain. I could really use some kind words or to hear about the experiences of someone else who's gone through the same. I'd even welcome advice, if you feel like there's something I should know.

Here's a bit about me.

In the spring of last year, I was a husband and a dad 5 years into a fairly typical marriage. We had recently experienced a miscarriage and her mom had recently moved in with us due to a brain injury. Things were stressful.

My wife re-connected with an ex who lives far away and was at that time going through a divorce. They ended up engaging in long distance cheating. She told me that thing got out of hand and she assured me that she was putting an end to that, but she also made it clear that she dropping him as a friend wasn't an option. A few weeks later, she asked if we could talk about opening up our marriage.

I initially said no. I had a previous disastrous experience with adding people to a relationship. Based on that, I was of the opinion that on paper polyamory was a great idea (no one person can be 100% of what someone else needs) but in practice it's messy and incredibly difficult and that we weren't starting from a strong enough position to take on that emotional load. She agreed. And then a couple of weeks later brought it up again.

I was fully aware of the signs here. My options were: 1. End the relationship or 2: Keep the relationship closed and find out about her cheating at some point in the future or 3: Open up the relationship even though I felt uncertain about it. I took the third option. I hoped that with my experience from the past that I might be able to build this into a successful poly relationship. I didn't thinking highly of our odds, but if we ended up succeeding I would be happy with the result. Regardless, things were going to change. All I could do was hope for the best.

We did our best. Looking back on it now, it's laughable that we thought we had prepared enough, but we did the best we could at the time. I had decided I'd wait several months before I started being open to new relationships, to provide as much stability as I could at home. She went off to spend several days with him. On the day she left, she said "I won't let anything harm you or our relationship. If things get too difficult, let me know and I'll end things with him or at least take a break". Four very difficult weeks later, she told me that she wasn't going to keep working on our relationship and that we were over as a couple.

I've spent the last year recovering from that rejection and emotional turmoil. I took a major hit to my confidence and it took a very long time to get that back and feel like myself again. My ex-wife and I managed to maintain a strong co-parent relationship throughout. I have massive respect for her as a mother and she feels the same about me as a dad. We both want to spend every day with our child and would rather deal with the complexity of us living together than make things simple and live separately.

Now I'm living with my ex and our child and thinking about what comes next. I don't have to consider my next relationship from a ENM context, but I strongly identify with what I see as the core principles of ENM and I'd be happy to be in a relationship with someone who is identifies as poly. I'm not planning on living away from my child (and therefore my ex) any time soon; that kind of non-traditional lifestyle might be unacceptable by a large number of potential partners out there. So it seems like I'd be more likely to find an understanding person in the poly/ENM community.

But I have concerns. The poly community around me must be small compared to the general population. I have no idea how to effectively integrate into that community (I've been to some munches, which have been a lot of fun, but even at poly/ENM specific events there seems to be a focus on kink). I'm not as young as I used to be. I'm concerned that choosing a lifestyle that gives me the most time with my child is also going to prevent me from finding someone to build a meaningful relationship with. And if that's the case, so be it, I wouldn't change my decision.

I'm just looking for some words of support. I've learned recently how important it is to have a community instead of just one person that you rely on, so I'm reaching out to see what's here.

Hello everyone. I recently learned there are a handful of people in my community who engage in non-barriered intercourse by default (sex with multiple partners without condoms).

I try to keep to only one non-barriered partner, to minimize any STI spread that may occur. Though testing is important, there are risks that 1. A test may be wrong, and 2. An infection can be introduced and spread after a successful clean test.

Also, my partner has a history of getting BV if her non-barriered partner(s) have other non-barriered partners. So, we keep it to only one non-barriered partner (for intercourse).

Any thoughts on this? Is it ethical to have more than one? Is it sustainable to only have one?

Hello ♥️

I hope lots of you know that this Saturday is the first somewhat organised day of visibility for Non-Monogamy in all of its forms (see link)

My ‘cule and I are off to a picnic in my city; what’re you all doing? 😊

What are your ways of finding the poly people in your local area? Do you have a community and meetups?

feeling 'trapped' in monogamy.
so i've(20m) have been in this wonderful relationship with A(20f) for about a year now, and as I disclosed from the begginging that I was looking for a open/poly relationship, she knew it from the very start and we agreed to that. Fast forward a couple of months and we close down the relationship because she doesnt feel secure enough, which was also a completely valid request. After we opened it back up she went on a date with someone, made out and then proceeded to tell me that this is not something she wants to go look around for, after that we closed the relationship again. Since then neither her nor me have been on any dates and any discussion even hinting towards the topic elicits an we should try it at a different stage of our relationship when we are more secure. This makes me feel trapped and controlled, especially since she knew about me wanting a non-exclusive relationship from the start. Any advice?

I personally found The Ethical Slut to be one of the best and most influential books I've read, especially for the way it de-stigmatizes sex. What are your favorite polyamory books?

I currently have two partners, a nesting partner and one who lives 3 hours away who used to be my domme and who might be again, who knows.

You may have already read this article, or possibly read the book (or website) but a lot of people don't realize the regret that the authors had after publishing this book.

There are a lot of things I fucked up in More Than Two. I recently wrote about how hard it is for me to even look at the book, and how it’s going to be awhile before I can really dig in to what I think the problems with it are.

First, let's start with the dictionary definition of polyamory: the practice of engaging in multiple romantic (and typically sexual) relationships, with the consent of all the people involved.

Here's a reasonably well thought out article on Polyamory from Psychology Today: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/basics/polyamory

I've been polyamorous since 1999, have been legally married twice during that time, raised four kids in a polyamorous household. Let's chat!