sev's Labels and Sexuality

Bisexuality: when gender is a different kind of factor

Feminism: the empowerment of women is good for everyone

Fetish: reclaiming sensuality

Kink: what it is that some of us do

Polyamory: multiple responsible committed loves

Queer: more than just politics

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I believe that the world and I have a lot to offer each other. Nonmonogamy is a way for me to fill my life with wonderful people, drawing the lines where I feel they belong in my life. It's about communication, about being honest about my feelings, and about spending my time with people who make me happy -- with the full knowledge and consent of all my partners.

Having multiple relationships can sometimes be difficult due to time constraints. In other words, time spent with one lover is time not spent with another. However, the same does not apply to emotion. Love shared in one relationship is a positive experience which fills me with loving energy which benefits my other relationships.

• Things I've learned about Expanding Poly Relationships
• Some ways I find myself Defining Primary
• My thoughts on Poly and Swinging
• Musings on Bisexuality, Polyamory, Jealousy, Activism
• Adding a third to an existing couple
• Resources for monogamous people in Mixed Monogamous-Polyamarous Relationships

Negotiation and boundaries

Polyamory, for me, isn't all sweetness-and-light about "free love." With so few real role models for structuring relationships, I've found that a polyamarous lifestyle requires far more purposeful, thought-out discussions and boundaries than a monogamous one. If you're building a lifestyle like this, I strongly recommend the alt.polyamory FAQ, the How to f**k up supplement, and I'd like to add my own words about limits:

Go ahead, set limits. I'm a bit hard-line about this issue, since my spine is only recently grown and I'm still a bit irritated at myself for allowing myself to be trampled so much for so long. I've decided that it's a lot better for me to be demanding and then have to make concessions than it was to be conciliatory and hope that I'm given what I need.

The quick, easy answer is for anyone to move only as fast as everyone's comfortable with, and for all of you to communicate enough so that problems can be identified and dealt with before they get more difficult. There's plenty of modifications you can make to this route, though -- and there's lots of room on the spectrum between full speed ahead & a cold halt while one person isn't ready yet (sometimes for years on end, IME).

Make sure your limits are heard. Be willing to compromise, and make sure your lovers are willing to compromise for you, too. There's nothing wrong if your needs are different than someone else's needs -- "I could do it if I was in your place" or "Somebody else did that just fine" isn't a reasonable answer to "That doesn't work for me." Don't wait for somebody else to figure out what they're comfortable with while your needs get trampled. In my experience, if you wait, you will have gotten the people in your life "trained" to expect you to put their needs first. The sooner you start stating your needs, the sooner people in your life will get used to the idea that they need to not only hear what you say, but to take what you say into consideration.

It's scary to say, "I can't do *that* for you unless you do *this* for me," and stick with it. But stick with it. Most likely, once you get it through someone's head that you're serious, you'll come to a compromise that's not perfect for anyone, but that doesn't severly trample on anyone's comfort level, either. If there's something someone needs that you can't provide, well, zie can ask another lover. A worst-case scenario of the relationship ending because zie reufses to have a relationship without something you can't provide does have a significant silver lining -- better that you find out sooner than later.

Setting boundaries is definitely scary and difficult and in my life, generated some painful responses from people who were shocked that their sweet little doormat stood up and finally asked for something. However, in the end, it resulted in my life being filled to the brim with people who were willing to work with me to make sure I get what I need -- some are friends and lovers who now see me in a new light; some are new friends and lovers who filled the gaps left when some of my former acquaintences couldn't deal with this "new me".

The literal meaning of polyamory is many loves. Cambridge's Bisexual Resource Center further defines it as a generic term for non-monogamy, with a heavy emphasis on honesty and responsibility in their pamphlet entitled Responsible Non-monogamy This pamphlet gives a good introduction to the ideas behind non-monogamy. It lives on the homepage of The Open Hearts Project. More information can be found on the alt.polyamory home page.