Polyamory

[Traumwandlerin]

You will have to live with people going against you. My peer group is really liberal, but even there some just couldn't understand and thought of it as wrong. Also at some point you need to confront your family with this cocept, this can lead to problem, too. I've married the father of my child (now in divorce). This was really a big discussion for everyone. My other partner felt really bad, cause I can only marry one, and i married the other one.

The parents of my husband thought I was cheating and he didn't care. The parents of my other partner thought I I'm just using my partner for fun and he should break up with me and getting himself a "fulltime-girlfrieng with a chance to marry her someday". All those things can make such a relationship complicated in the long run. Add kids in this mix (I was planning to have another kid with my other partner, but do guess every kid will be automatically legally also the kid of my husband and it's not easy to change this). And then, how will those family-mix live together.

Real life is hard on polys. There are just so many laws here in Germany, where inequality can't be changed, not everyone would be allowed to visit me in hospital for example. Only my relatives and my husband, what about additional partners? Not possible, not even if I would set up a will.

I hope it's a bit more on the easy side with you Just one advise, be really careful if you want to integrate another person, test this person carefully and be really sure he or she won't poison your relationship from within to get one of you just for him/herself.

[Lost_Demise]

I disagree with it. You can only be truly fully deeply with one person at a time in my opinion. At the same time if it makes people happy to have those kinds of relations I will not keep them from doing so. If they ask for it then if they all look happy and seem happy together I will offer my blessings.

[Saker Witch]

Before he met me, my husband was in a polyamorous relationship. He admits now that he only agreed to it because he wanted to get the woman away from her husband, and she wanted to try polyamory. He did manage to come between them and they divorced. So he didn't exactly go into it with the "right" attitude. Being a man, his take on polyamory is that it is disingenuous because yes, men DO want to have many sex partners, but polyamory is in the guise of "loving" them all. Men don't have to love someone to have sex with them. For women, I think, the love aspect is much more important.

[Lost_Demise]

Saker Witch not all men are like that. Say a lot, say many, but don't say all. I'm male, gay or not I am a man. I am also married though and have a sexual fear. Sex is something that I am rarely in the mood for. Also there are many women who find it easy to have sex and not be in love with the man to do it. It depends on the person - not the gender.

[Traumwandlerin]

I'm with Lost_Demise on this one, it's really the person, not the gender. The men in my relationships were very loving, one actually had just me as a sexual partner and was happy with me having several others.

But I know what you were talking about Saker Witch, only in my case it was a woman who played the role of the "divorcer".

[flowersofthelady]

Im glad its working out for you too!

I also lived in a poly-relationship for 2 years. We ended it when i became pregnant too however it never went smoothly my husband an i had already been married for a few years and we are still together. it wasnt the relationship that was a problem it was one of the people in it. similar to your story Traumwandlerin part of me thinks she never loved me and just went along with it to try to "steal" my husband. we all supposedly loved eachother, we really loved her and she had so much emotional baggage that she ended up emotionally torturing us. but when you love someone you try to help them as we did but in the end it got us nowhere. it took me ages to get over her and i still have nightmares 4 years on. if it wasnt for the children we may have tried something like it again but we couldnt risk them being exposed to such an emotional nutcase so we are staying happily monogamous.

[Jadis]

I really wouldn't want to deal with another women in a realtionship. Actually I doubt I would want to deal with the issues of another person in the dynamic reguardless of gender. I'm a solitary person and I really enjoy my alone time.

Knowing that I'm one end of the spectrum I can intuitivly accept there is an opposite end of the spectrum. Many cultures have practiced the more common polygyny and the less common polyandry. The only time I ever personally find the practice 'disgusting' is when it involves minors or non consenting adults.

[Ashkotewagosh]

i understand that many people "think" that men are only in these kind of relationships for the sex but i disagree because its me matt and ryan and we are all happy. I can tell when people are trying to bullshit me and use me (ive been there many times) but these two are real and i love them and they love me. i couldnt have anything better than what i have right now.

[Asch]

Not to quibble but anthropologically speaking Polyamory is when a female has multiple male spouses http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polyandry, polygyny is when a a male has multiple female spouses http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polygyny and polygamy refers to plural marriages as a whole http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polygamy, many of the terms are used interchangeably by laymen.

Most of the western world practices serial monogamy. That is long lasting relationships that may or may not entail marriage and children but usually end and are followed by a new monogamous relationship.

I minored in social anthropology .

[Ashkotewagosh]

are you directing that at me because i am female lol and i have two male spouses

[Asch]

Nope,just clarifying.

[Traumwandlerin]

Uhm, Asch, you shoud read before linking

Polyandry: One women with different male partners
Polygyny: One man with differen women
Polygamy: Multiple marriages, often focus only on the male with many women aspect
Polyamory: More than two poeple involved in a love-based relationship

[Lost_Demise]

Those word definitions are very interesting to know. o.o

[Kitty]

fresh from a sociology exam here - lol
looking at some of the comments on the first way if you look at primitave communism there was multiple partnerships - probably to reproduce but for comfort and stuff as well so I really don't see how it can be considered disgusting
I'm in an open relationship with my boyfriend, and while it's not the same as polymorous, it works for us due to his travelling a lot.
Even at my age there are a lot of people who have accepted that they're in love with more than one person, and admittedly it's dificult in the case of your partners not understanding or not liking it but if everyone involved is happy then there's really no problem as far as I see it
xx

[Robert L]

Never heard of this, without the religious angle that is.
Does that mean a woman can have more then one husband?