Polyamory, page 12
Of course, familial love doesn’t necessarily come easily. Most parents tell me they love their children uniquely but not one more than another. Some tell me they are challenged by one particular child and have difficulty loving them. In that situation, they have to do something internal to continue to show up in that relationship in accordance with their values or what it means to them to be a good parent. Many tell me they feel resentful of their children or one child. Again, they have to challenge themselves to do something internally to manage those feelings and figure out how to parent well, or well enough, while still figuring out how to take good care of themselves and attend to their own dreams and desires.
But, even when it is challenging to love our children or balance their needs with our own, our cultural expectation is not that we look for ways to get rid of some of the children. Instead, we are encouraged to find ways to manage feelings, attend to our own interests and self-care, and get support from family and community.
Obviously, the way we love our children is not the same as the way we love our romantic partners. But I do think that this exercise can teach us something meaningful about love and exclusivity. In the family setting, we expect that our love will expand as each new child enters the family. What this shows us is that love is not necessarily a limited commodity. In the right circumstances, love can expand, or multiply, rather than be limited or divided. When it is challenging, much depends on what we believe about family, love, and expansion, and how we want to show up in our lives.
What polyamorous people do is apply these same ideas to romantic love. They argue that, just as it’s possible to love more than one child deeply and wholeheartedly, it’s possible to love more than one partner deeply and wholeheartedly. Additionally, they invite their feelings of love for their partners to expand further as a direct result of the unique relationships they are in. The polyamorous community coined the term compersion, which describes a feeling of well-being, joy, or pleasure that is derived from having a partner experience pleasure with someone else. This is a new term to express some of the experience of the expansion of love that becomes possible when more than two people are involved; it is the opposite of jealousy.
In our current culture, monogamy is the relational ideal and standard. In that context, it is a common fear that romantic love is, indeed, a limited commodity. Many people fear that if their partner had another lover, it would detract from their intimacy or connection in some very real and frightening ways, potentially leading to comparison—being found lacking and then being left. But does it really have to be that way? If love can expand for multiple children, why must it divide for multiple romantic partners?
Imagine what it would be like if we lived in a culture in which polyamory was the norm and monogamy the exception. In that culture, people would assume that, when you fall in love with someone new, you don’t love your current partner any less. You wouldn’t ever be expected to choose between the two, and both relationships would be considered valid, important, and meaningful. More partners would mean more love, not love subdivided.
Imagining that may feel like a stretch. Nonetheless, I’d like to ask you to consider this question: Would there be a benefit to living in a culture in which it’s totally normative for love to multiply, rather than having to compare and ultimately choose? For example, might it save some perfectly viable relationships that fall prey to serial monogamy or the pressure to choose just one?
I posed this question to a group of fellow therapists and got some interesting, thoughtful responses. One pointed out that a “love expands” attitude might make separations and divorces easier, because it would be easier to acknowledge that even when you decide to separate from someone, you don’t automatically stop loving them. Acceptance of this fact might make it easier to maintain a loving relationship with a former partner, rather than having to put up a wall to prevent your new partner from feeling jealous.
Another therapist noted that it could reduce jealousy in general if we understood and accepted that a single person isn’t going to meet all your needs. It would open up the idea that having multiple needs met by multiple people is normal and not worth the energy expenditure of jealousy, which feels akin to crisis.
In the same vein, it could make it easier to handle the completely normal and expectable differences that all partners experience, because it would take the pressure off our partners to meet all our needs. It could make us feel more fulfilled and less resentful or disillusioned when one partner inevitably isn’t everything we could ever hope for in every circumstance.
Finally, another therapist said that it would feel nice to live in a culture with the attitude that love is abundant, rather than scarce; if we believed that there was enough love for everyone, maybe there would be less loneliness and isolation.
This is the most basic premise of polyamory: Love is not a limited commodity that you have to compete for. It’s something that human beings have the ability to create from scratch. It can expand to embrace all the people in our lives, and loving more people means we have more love to give. Moreover, we have the ability to create our own emotional state; by feeling love, and dwelling on the feeling, it is possible to make it expand, feel it more, and spread it to areas where the feeling might not previously have been as strong as you would like. This is a mindfulness practice you can learn, repeat, and get better at.
This doesn’t mean that everything in polyamorous relationships is always sunshine and roses. Even when it’s possible to love more than one, it can sometimes be complicated and uncomfortable. Even when a person believes in the expansion of love, they might experience difficult emotions like envy and jealousy. This is true even in the culturally normative situation of love expanding within a family: Adding more children to the mix can be a little fraught, and finding a new balance doesn’t always come easily.
Also, time and money are somewhat more limited commodities, even if love isn’t; deciding how to apportion limited resources between multiple partners is a common source of challenge and growth in polyamorous relationships.
Monogamy, as a belief system and relational construct, seeks to solve the potential issues of emotional discomfort and time constraint by limiting our romantic relationships to a single person. For many, that’s a perfectly good solution, but it’s not the only possible solution. It also creates other issues of its own: infidelity and serial monogamy, for example.
ONE PERSON FOR EVERYTHING?
No one person can be everything to anyone. This basic idea is fairly well accepted in our culture, and many communities and subcultures espouse the importance of multiple supports and connections. Consider the benefits a couple might experience from having other friends: Neither partner has to give up a major interest or hobby just because their partner doesn’t share their interest, and neither of them have to participate in something they don’t particularly enjoy.
In the culture of monogamy, however, sex and romance aren’t handled that way. People may be completely comfortable with accepting that no one can share all their partner’s hobbies or opinions but feel completely differently about the idea that no one can fulfill all their partner’s sexual desires or match all of their kinks. In fact, many people feel uncomfortable when their current partner has a close friendship with someone else, particularly if their gender suggests romance is possible. Similarly, connections with exes may be discouraged, even though they already proved to their own satisfaction that the relationship with the ex wasn’t workable. Monogamy, as most people currently practice it, asks us to find one person who fulfills all our sexual and romantic needs, and stick with them exclusively, for decades. We might find other people to connect with around other interests, but for romance, we’re expected to choose just one. And if another comes along, we are expected to choose.
In the world of polyamory, on the other hand, sex and romance are regarded much like other areas of interest. Partners connect around common interests and romance alike, and experience increased flexibility, independence, and connection as a result. This can feel a little alienating or abstract to imagine, so I’d like to guide you in another brief thought exercise.
Imagine that you’re in a relationship with a wonderful person. You’re compatible in a million ways, and you support and respect one another through thick and thin. But there’s just one little thing: You’re not particularly sexually compatible.
If you’re monogamous, sexual incompatibility might become a big problem. You can’t seek out another sexual partner without violating your relationship commitments. You have a few options, none of them particularly appealing: You could end the relationship, you could commit infidelity, or you could choose to suck it up and live without that sexual fulfillment.
For a nonmonogamous person, however, this doesn’t necessarily create a problem. That’s because they can outsource the sex part, just like how, in a monogamous relationship, you can outsource the person who will get completely involved in that weird or boring hobby that you adore and your partner has no interest in. It’s perfectly possible for a polyamorous person to preserve the relationship without committing infidelity or relinquishing the possibility of sexual fulfillment.
This, to me, is one of the biggest reasons that polyamory makes sense. It presents a viable alternative to both serial monogamy and infidelity, both of which create significant distress in people’s lives and make regular appearances in the therapy room. In fact, I’ve found that polyamory, when done well, can lead to more stable relationships than monogamy, in that it doesn’t depend on deception or making choices out of step with the natural evolution of relationships. It acknowledges that no one relationship will fulfill every aspect of a person’s sexual and romantic selves, and allows an outlet for exploration without destabilizing long-term partnerships. In that vein, I’d like to share this story, which illustrates the beauty of a relationship founded on a recognition of the truth that no one person can be everything to anyone:
I grew up in a very conservative religious family and culture, and came out as lesbian relatively late—in my mid-30s—and through much struggle concerning what that meant for my faith and my relationships with family.
I was taken aback when the second woman I ever dated started right off—the first time we even had coffee together, after meeting on the dance floor at a club—saying, “I assume you’re monogamous and want to get married; most lesbians do. Well, I’m not and I don’t, so I don’t see this working out as a relationship, but I think we could be friends.” I found it insulting that she would make assumptions about me. I’m not sure what I said, but it was probably something like, “I don’t know whether I’m monogamous or not!”
When I started to come out as a lesbian, in the 1990s, my entire world-view changed in big ways; I didn’t have an established set of assumptions about how things would go. I mean, I was already doing something radical and inconceivable to my parents and my childhood church, so why should anyone assume I’d be conventional in other ways?
Currently, I think of myself not as monogamous or polyamorous, but simply as committed to my partner/spouse for life. Beyond that, if I wanted a label, I’d choose autonomous or independent. My sense of being a separate self is very important to me, no matter how close I am to my partner. I’ve always needed a significant amount of time and space to myself, and I avidly pursue creative work, emotionally intimate friendships, and involvement in social justice activism and a faith community. I just don’t happen to be interested in pursuing another sexual relationship. I’ve always found it disturbing to hear about relationships in which each person is expected to be everything to the other and meet all of that person’s needs. I think those are likely to be unhealthy relationships, actually. I’m glad that my spouse (who, by the way, is polyamorous) has always been supportive of my—you could even call them “other”—relationships with writing, church, and close friends, and I’d feel trapped if that were not the case.
POLYAMORY IN A WORLD OF DIVORCE, SERIAL MONOGAMY, AND INFIDELITY
Here’s another foundational idea in the cultural construct of polyamory: Maybe human beings are not actually built for monogamy. As you can imagine, this is quite a controversial topic. There are more and less extreme versions of this argument. Some believe that monogamy runs counter to the essential nature of human beings, while others argue that some people may not be naturally compatible with monogamy.
Here is one way to look at it: Human beings have two aspects or urges to balance. On one hand, we want a deep, close, connected, lasting pair-bond, as well as emotional security and no fear of a breakup or any big surprises. On the other hand, we want the shiny, heart-fluttering experience of a new love, which feels exciting in part because it is a little uncertain.
In the culture of monogamous relationships, people are supposed to choose between these two options. The cultural ideal is that (after some early experimentation, perhaps) we ultimately embrace the pair-bond and forego the excitement of new love. But there is an alternative that might come about intentionally or totally accidentally. We could find ourselves having feelings for someone new. In the culture of monogamy, according to which we can only have one relationship at a time, embracing the new love would mean sacrificing the long-term pair-bond.
As therapists, we know that divorce, serial monogamy, and infidelity are rampant in our culture. Is it possible that this is because many people struggle to balance their desire for a deep, lasting pair-bond with their desire for the thrills that come with a new, exciting, fresh relationship?
Imagine that you’re in this situation. You can’t bring yourself to give up the close, long-term pair bond, but you also want to have that shiny new experience of a fresh love. What options do you have? You don’t want to break up, so you can’t go the serial monogamy route. You have no culturally approved option.
In this scenario, a lot of people end up going the route of infidelity, as an attempt to hold on to their long-term relationship while also getting that new-love experience. As therapists, we have a unique front-row seat to the harm caused by romantic and sexual deception. It’s certainly not a good option if you want to proceed ethically, avoid harming the people you care about, save money on therapy, or preserve your original relationship.
Imagine now that you are a person who thinks you are not really prepared to give up the possibility of having, at some point in the future, a brand-new, sparkling, full-on experience of new love. But imagine you are also clear that you are a person who wants to make a commitment, settle down, and be a good and reliable partner and spouse. You don’t want to cheat, lie, and deceive. You want to live up to your promises. What do you do then?
INFIDELITY: THE BEST ARGUMENT FOR POLYAMORY
Infidelity has two components: (1) developing and acting in some manner on romantic or sexual feelings outside of your dyadic relationship agreements, and (2) keeping it secret, and/or actively lying about it. When I’m working with couples in the aftermath of infidelity, it often seems to me that the lies and deception cut even deeper than the extradyadic romance and sex. In fact, many clients tell me so. I’ll bet you have had the same experience.
My clients often tell me something like this: “It stings that my partner developed feelings for someone else, but I think I could get over that. It’s the betrayal that cuts deepest. I keep going over it in my mind, trying to figure out when they were together, and wondering how I missed it. What was I doing while they were together? Cooking dinner? Picking up the kids? How could my partner look right into my face and lie? I feel so stupid. How can I ever trust them again? I knew something was up, and I asked and asked, and eventually actually confronted my partner, and they denied it, over and over again. How could they choose that other person over me, so blatantly, and in such a hurtful and destructive way? This was my one safest person in the world. How have we come to this?”
In the aftermath of infidelity, partners feel betrayed, taken advantage of, stupid, ashamed, angry, furious, and disillusioned. The partner may have confessed the infidelity, revealed the infidelity when directly asked, or lied repeatedly and then been caught in some manner. The lies may have been direct or indirect. They may have called their partner crazy for even thinking they would cheat. There is a lot of variation, and some scenarios are more difficult to recover from. Yet, many couples recover from the betrayal and successfully rebuild their relationships. I find it fascinating that many people can recover from infidelity but not tolerate the idea of polyamory.
Imagine what it would be like for you or your partner to bring the conversation about romantic and sexual feelings for someone else out into the open. What would that sound like? “Honey, I met someone at the office, and I have to admit, I have a little crush.” Could you do it? How about if your partner brought it up? Could you hear it? Could you get curious? Could you remember that the alternative could very easily be deception?
If a person is in a situation in which they are really having strong feelings for someone other than their spouse, they have a choice to make. They could get a grip, make a decision not to act on it, and follow through with integrity by remaining monogamous. Or they could push the boundaries of agreements, incrementally or all at once, and either edge toward infidelity or dive right into the deep end with full-blown deception.
Polyamory offers a third path: Why not have a real conversation about it?
TRANSPARENCY AND FIDELITY
Let’s return to that hypothetical conversation about a crush at work. Without a doubt, that is likely to be a difficult conversation for many people to have. Here’s the thing: I know a lot of polyamorous people for whom this conversation doesn’t even reach a 2 on a scale of 1 to 10 for stressfulness. Amazing, huh?
