Gentle Reader,

Polyamory.

Hmm... I've been wanting to write on this for a bit. It's a hard target to hit because the definition changes from day to day (just as I change from day to day). And that's one of the strengths of it - it changes and adapts. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

At its most basic form, polyamory is having loving relationships with more than one person. It can be as simple as sleeping around with multiple people, or as complex as having full-blown "primary" relationships" with more than one person. Everyone who considers themselves polyamorous (and many who simply do it without calling it that) does it differently. A common model, because this does involve people of all sexual orientations, is a married couple who will have relationships "on the side" or who will have an "open relationship." The classic open relationship is a big theme in polyamory.

The aspects of polyamory that include multiple romantic/emotional relationships are the ones that appeal most to me. Like a parent with more than one child, just because there is more than one does not diminish the love felt for each individual child. Similarly I don't think there is a limit to love. To time, to physical ability, yes - those are major limiting factors. To the emotional commitment, no.

So to me, polyamory means that I am not limited to a single emotional relationship into which I have to pour the entirety of my emotional needs and into which I subsume my identity. Part of this is, I'm sure, a reaction to almost six years of very stressful monogamy in which I was the main emotional crutch for an emotionally unstable person. But because I do not limit myself to a single relationship I find that I am better able to concentrate on those aspects of a relationship that do exist with each individual; instead of making someone fit some pre-conceived notion of what I "need" in a relationship, I see what they have to offer and what I can offer them.

"Offer them" because relationships have to be two way. I expect my partners to have their own life (another reaction to The Ex), but within that I will offer them as much as I can. The need and boundaries set up between myself and others will not always be the same - one person may be quite comfortable hearing greater details about my other partners where another may not want to know any details past that I was out with someone else. That's for the two of us to negotiate. You have to talk a lot in these relationships about what the comfort levels of the various parties are, and make sure you work things out such as are comfortable for all involved.

Which means that honesty is a must. Period. Polyamory does not work without honest dialog. It may not always be comfortable, but I feel very, very strongly that I have to be honest with my partners and that I keep them informed of where I am (emotionally and otherwise) to the extent of their comfort level. To do otherwise isn't fair to them, isn't fair to my other partners, and isn't fair to myself. It's the quickest way to destroy a relationship (and quite possibly more than one).

So that's where I am at the moment. This definition can and probably will change as I progress through life. How boring if I never changed. ;-) I don't necessarily rule out monogamy for the rest of my life (I try not to rule things out entirely because, like the Prince Albert piercing I swore I'd never get, they have a habit of coming back to, er, bite me), but it's not for me right now. It's not who I am at the moment. I prefer to believe this is something I will continue to practice for some time to come.

Moose *&^)

This page last updated 2000-07-05, slight tweaks 2003-03-13

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