The Best Life Yet

I have a friend that got pregnant with her 3rd while she had an IUD since it failed. Decided for a 4th (since the 3rd was a 7 year age gap from the first 2) and ended up pregnant with twins and had to get a bigger vehicle so that 3 car seats would fit side by side. Yikes!

Anyway, regarding the kids... It's definitely common for people to change their minds. And I know people who don't like kids but like their own for sure.

I have never wanted kids but even have felt the occasional feel where I'm like "but am I going to regret not having kids later in life when I'm older?!" And then I realize that feeling a few feels about whether I'll regret it later doesn't change the fact that I have no desire to give up the social life I have now, the freedom to make whatever adult plans I want now. I don't want to feel obligated to interact with other kids or parents on play dates, or spend a shit-load of my hard earned money raising kids, etc. Basically, I know that the investment (money, time, emotional, etc) is still more than I want to give, regardless of what occasional feels I might have.

Not trying to convince you not to have kids. It's definitely a very personal decision and plenty of people change their minds with no regrets. But I think it's smart that you're sitting with it and just really thinking on it.

As for Oona, just from what you've written about her in your blog I'm not actually shocked that she blew up at you. But I'm glad to hear that asserting your boundaries feels like it's working and will hopefully stop future conversations about the topic.

I also agree that you don't need to have a period of being single. I used to think that. I had a friend who went from being in a long term abusive relationship and immediately started dating someone else afterwards, and I worried that she felt the need to date so soon and that she was just afraid to be alone and independent. But that person is now her husband and he's amazing and they are amazing together and she's happy. And when I thought those thoughts, it was because I had been single during plenty of times when my friends weren't (not sure if I was single at that time or not). But I felt like being single for periods had helped shape who I was and helped me be super independent. The reality is that I've ALWAYS been super independent and still am even with having multiple partners now. So I agree that if you're the type of person that tends to change your mind about things.... that's probably just WHO YOU ARE. Single or partnered, that isn't going to suddenly cause you to make up your mind and become set in your ways.

Like you said though, someone is always going to judge you no matter what you decide. Ultimately what matters is whether you think you're doing what's best for you, while minimizing any possible negative impacts to those around you. And that is something you're definitely aware of and really pay attention to!

I hate the whole "you need to be single" thing. It just isn't true. And I hate far more than that, the notion that what worked a treat for one person, has just GOT to be The Right Answer (tm) for anyone and everyone.

Good for Oona that being single a while helped her figure her shit out.

You aren't Oona, and Oona ain't you.

I had plenty of folks tell me I needed to be single after my marriage ended. And boy-howdy, the hell I got for going the other direction into a quad plus satellite Sadist thing. But in a way, the things that were useful about being single, are exactly what I was getting from being solo poly...I was not committing to anything too serious, too fast, I was learning how to be independent and what my own little bill of rights in relationships needed to be. But at the same time, I needed my partners, as kind of a support group. I needed people to push back against the part of me that believed that a bad, abusive relationship was the best I deserved. To tell me I wasn't crazy when he gaslighted me. To help me see the good in myself. No amount of solitary navel gazing was gonna get me where I needed to go, and there's a chance I might have ended up back with him if I'd tried to be truly alone.

So no, I do NOT think that time alone and single is always needful, sometimes it really is not.

And Oona crossed a line where her need to be right was more important than her true caring of you, when she told you that she knew better who you are than you yourself do. It's just not cool to do what she is doing. It's fine to give your friend some advice, but trying to shake their confidence in their own choices with this "I know you better than you know yourself" business...no. People have to live their own lives. If I gave a friend advice and they pushed back and I knew they didn't want to hear it and weren't going to make use of it, I'd let it fall like a pebble in a pond...if it's useful one day, it'll still be there. If I'm wrong and it's not useful, then fine. My ego has got no place in my friend's life. And I really think Oona's mixed her ego up in all this too much. At least it sounds that way.

*hugs* I don't know what to tell ya about kids. I didn't want any. Shit happened, and I wound up with two. There were times...years, even...where they've been the most precious thing in my whole reality. I've lived for them, and they've taught me things about love that I might never have otherwise known. But...they have been heinously expensive, my body never recovered from having them even though I'm considered pretty hot for a mother of two, and I struggle with some sexual self-esteem stuff because of the effects of childbirth, some of which I didn't know would happen... And then there are all the unique challenges each age bracket brings. Now my ex is turning my sons away from me, and there are times they break my heart. I kind of just want them to go away, and then I hate myself for wanting that. Being a parent is stupid hard. Seriously.

So...I don't know. I hope you can find a way to make a choice in that regard, and be at peace with it, one way or the other.

I'm glad to hear that you're feeling better, and your conversations lately have gone well (for the most part). I don't think you're crazy at all. The things you're feeling and going through DO make sense. I also hope that the boundary with Oona improves your guys' relationship. Boundaries can be hard to set and sometimes hard to keep, but they have saved more than one of my relationships. I hope you have a lovely mini break!

My life couldn't be less like yours if I tried, but I empathize about the kid situation. You never know when you might decide to have one. Just don't think OHMIGOD, I NEED TO FIGURE THIS OUT NOW. Don't put that kind of pressure on yourself.

I love my kids. I would have found a way to be happy if, in an alternate universe, I had never had them (does that sound bad? Oh well). Can you just let things coast for a little bit without worrying about any major decisions? Honestly, your life seems so exhausting!

I think it would have been pretty awkward and disrespectful to return to Hannah and say that his wife has now allowed the relationship to continue under the original terms and expect her to be back on board, regardless of what she said. I'd be worried that you'll change your mind again and I'd have to either end the new marriage I just signed up for or dump the new partner... again. It's true that most relationships don't end up lifelong and that is probably the case for Rider and Hannah but it was you who put a stick in their wheel and ultimately changed things between them by giving the ultimatum that you did. I suspect Rider, for whatever reason, tends not to let you know the consequences of your actions when they impact on other people, including him, so you don't feel bad but as you have now seen yourself, he has been harbouring feelings around your actions then and how quickly you ploughed into a new relationship and wanted to shed any restrictions that actually, you originally put in place to ensure some form of exclusivity in your marriage.

SEASONEDpolyAgain said:

I think it would have been pretty awkward and disrespectful to return to Hannah and say that his wife has now allowed the relationship to continue under the original terms and expect her to be back on board, regardless of what she said.

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I mean, it's not exactly like that. It's not like I have been sitting there weighing the pros and cons of them being together and condescendingly decided to "allow the relationship to continue." A relationship is not a tap that some master hand turns on or off. The entire situation changed (in about a dozen different ways), and Rider and I are each free (under the agreements between the two of us) to date whomever we please. If he were to return to her, it would be his choice of expression of that freedom. As it happens, he has his own reasons for not wanting to go back to her, number one being that he feels guilty about kind of ghosting their friendship at some more recent point, so he's not going to choose that option. I don't believe he's lying to me about that to make me feel better.

From hearing him talk about it, it's less that he misses Hannah in particular, and more that he misses having Some Person to fill the role that Hannah was filling in his life. To me, that sounds like he's better off finding someone for whom he can have genuine excitement. He's been going to lots of poly events, so I'm hopeful for him!

I'm trying to carve out a few moments from work right now to update on my weekend. Work is sooooo busy still! I did manage to get caught up on everything before I left for my three-day weekend, but having taken a day off, of course I am buried again. I'll give the semi-abbreviated version . . .

The haunted ship thing was all right. On one hand, the amount of effort obviously put into it was impressive. On the other hand, I think I was expecting something a bit different somehow. We still had fun, though!

Staying on the ship, however, was AWESOME! Dustin had gotten us a really nice room—what would have been first class when the historic ship was operational. It had porthole windows that you could put your arm out, and which had a city skyline view. It was obviously very vintage inside.

We did drinks in the room, then the haunted ship, then dinner, then sex, then explored the upper decks of the ship in the dark. Then we wanted a glass of wine but everything on the ship was closed, so we took a taxi into town and had a drink at a bar before returning. When we got back, Dustin wanted to take a bath, so we both climbed into the tub, cuddling up with him behind me, and we both fell asleep! We woke and hauled our pruney selves out of the tub about an hour later.

Checkout wasn't till noon, and we woke around 10:30, so we had plenty of time in the morning to roll around having sex and enjoying the ambience. I got to peep at Dustin's butt as he poked his head out the porthole to look for seagulls.

After we checked out, we spent a bit of time wandering around the ship in the daylight. There was a lot of cool stuff to see. Then we were hungry, and Dustin wanted something very specific: an ocean view, breakfast food, and mimosas. On a weekend day, that wouldn't have seemed like a tall order, but I wasn't sure there would be a place doing past-noon mimosa brunch on a weekday.

Luckily, Yelp seemed to suggest that there was ONE such place—on the grounds of a nearby art museum. So we went over there, and holy shit, it was PERFECT. There was a huge old tree outside, and a patio with seaside views, and vintage buildings, and the drinks were made with fresh-squeezed juices, and they served breakfast food till three!

Dustin and I eyeballed the menu. My eye always goes straight to the chilaquiles, but it's basically breakfast nachos, so I usually try to be "good" and not order them. But when Dustin suggested that we get them and split them, I could not say no. They were probably the best ones I've ever had!

After breakfast, I had a mind to check out a seafood market local to the area we were in. Legend suggested that they actually might have blue crab, which, being an East-Coaster by birth, I missed terribly. The market was really great! They had all these tanks with different kinds of living fish and crustaceans . . . including the fabled blue crab! I bought half a dozen—far fewer than I would have if I'd been back East, but it would have to do for the situation at hand.

Dustin and I stopped at Target and the grocery store to get some veggies and a pot to steam the crabs in. When we got back to his place, he put on my Siouxsie list on Spotify and the World Series on the TV, as I prepared the meal. The combination of Siouxsie, baseball, and the scent of crabs in the air made me feel so much like I was transported back to my youth—all were elements of my adolescence. I felt so peaceful and contented.

After dinner and cleanup, Dustin and I had a brief sexual interlude, interrupted by the sound of fireworks on his block for some reason. We clothed ourselves and wandered outside to find out what the noise was. Just then, Derek got home, so we finished watching the game with him instead of resuming our activities.

The rest of the night was a super-quiet TV night. We watched some shows, snacked probably too much, drank probably too much, traded foot rubs, and had, overall, a really good night . . . right up until the end.

Around 2:30 a.m., Dustin got texts from a couple of his bandmates: Pete and also the drummer. They were trying to lure him out for Friday-night shenanigans. He rolled his eyes and said he'd much rather be with me. They sent a video of Ayuki doing something goofy. Things continued normally for a little longer, but then, still cuddled up to me on the couch, Dustin suddenly asked me a question.

"So it's really OK if I want to see other people?"

"Sure," I said. "As long as you're honest with me about it."

I hadn't realized he had wandered off into the surly side of drunk and was setting me a trap. Suddenly it all came tumbling out of him in a torrent. He hadn't wanted me to say yes. He'd wanted me to be jealous and possessive of him and tell him no. I explained that sometimes I *DID* feel jealous and possessive of him, but I wasn't going to let that stand in the way of him doing what he wanted to do with the people he wanted to do it with. I told him that it wouldn't be very fair of me to insist that things be closed on his end when I still had Rider, now would it? He conceded the point, but kept sulking.

I asked him where this had come from. Had it been incited by the texts from his friends, somehow? He said no. Because, I explained, to me, it seemed to have come from out of absolutely nowhere. I hadn't said or done anything related to the question.

"It wasn't out of nowhere," he insisted. "It's always in there somewhere. Sometimes it just comes out." He said he feels like he can't trust me, and then a few breaths later, he said he wishes I would just lie to him—tell him I want him to be with only me, and I with only him, even if it was just a lie.

I explained to him that, first of all, I wouldn't lie to him, not even for his convenience. And secondly, which was it? Did he want to be able to trust me, or did he want to be lied to? Having it both ways was impossible—didn't he see that? I sighed and got up and started getting ready for bed.

He came into the bedroom, apologetic, and said he just has a hard time with it all sometimes. He said he doesn't understand how I could love him as much as I say I do and still be OK with him being with other people—how could I be so OK with risking our connection by letting him connect to other people, when he'd told me there was danger in it? If it had value to me, how could I risk it? I was so tired at this point, and half-drunk, that I couldn't string my thoughts together logically. I told him we could talk more in the morning, and I went to sleep.

We woke up late in the day. He immediately started cuddling me and kissing on me, and I asked him how much of the previous night he remembered.

"Do you remember the last episode of the show?" I asked. He seemed to mostly remember only the second to last one. I reminded him of what happened in the last one, and he vaguely remembered after prompting. "Do you remember picking a fight with me right before we went to sleep?" He said he kind of did, but only barely. So I recounted it to him.

He was very apologetic for picking the fight, but he admitted that it was something that boggled him. I told him that it's not that I want him to be with other people. It's that I want him to do what makes him happy—what he wants to do. And if that's be with other people, then that's what it is; it wouldn't be fair of me to restrict him from that. And if that's be with only me, because he feels that there's a danger to our connection otherwise, then be with only me. But don't rake me over the coals for giving him options. And I'm certainly not going to lie to him. He seemed satisfied with that answer in a way that he hadn't been the night before.

We kissed and made up and then had crazily mind-blowing sex. I actually had an orgasm from missionary, which never happens to me. Seriously, it has happened only once in my life before, and that was in 2011. I have no idea what kind of voodoo sex magic Dustin has going on, but he gives me more orgasms via more methods and in more positions than anyone I've ever known—some combination of fit and technique and chemistry, I guess.

I made breakfast, we ate, we took a nap, and then he took me home. Rider was still at his Day of the Dead celebration event, but he came home shortly after me. We vegged out for about an hour, then changed into our costumes and headed to Perry's Halloween party. The set we played was one of our best ever. The house was decorated very cool. Oona was there and stuff seemed blessedly normal between us, in a good way. Rider and I were both tired and hungry for more than party-grazing, so we left after about five hours, stopped at the grocery store, and I made us a midnight snack. We had PIV for the first time in a while and then went to sleep.

(continued . . . )

( . . . continued from previous)

Rider woke up feeling sick. He'd been sick on Thursday but thought he kicked it on Friday, but it came back Sunday morning with a vengeance. We had a concert to attend Sunday night, so until it was time to go, we just laid around eating food and watching TV, trying to get him recovered. I watched the same episodes that I'd watched with Dustin. I think I am just going to have to resign myself to doing that sometimes. I want both of them to have the real Relationship Experience, and I guess that means watching some stuff twice. I didn't mind, though. I actually ended up catching more stuff the second go-round.

Eventually it was time to go to the concert. The concert was GREAT! Rider and I had some wonderful conversation while waiting for the band to go on. But he started to feel sick again as the show was wrapping up. We stopped at the store and I got stuff to make a small dinner. We ate that and watched some more TV and then went to bed. I keep telling Rider he needs to slow down a bit or he's going to take even longer to get over this thing, but slowing down is not something that comes naturally to him. He's still thinking of going out to the street fair tomorrow for Halloween. I've informed him that I'll be lazily waiting for trick-or-treaters outside the apartment gate, haha. He's welcome to join if he feels like it.

Tonight's a Dustin night. I got my Dustin schedule for the week, and he doesn't have to work this weekend, so he wants to do an overnight in the desert in one of his buddy's trailers. I was into the idea but a) wasn't sure how Rider would feel about it and b) I've been broke since giving Dustin the cash for my new amp. Dustin told me he'd be willing to actually give me his amp that I currently borrow sometimes and give me the cash back, which is SUPER generous of him.

Rider said he didn't mind, since I'd still be gone only the one night, but he did express a bit of jealousy that I get to go do stuff with Dustin all the time. He said he wanted to have adventures with me too. I felt like I actually DO go on adventures with him a lot, so I looked back over my calendar.

"We just did a Halloween party, a birthday party, a conference hotel night, hiking in the mountains, a beach adventure day, a border-crossing adventure, a downtown adventure, and TWO concerts this month. And a festival the weekend before this month started. I’m not sure how much more adventure we could pack into a month! If you feel like we don’t adventure, I humbly request that you reconsider."

He laughed and said I had a fair point. He said maybe it's that none of that stuff is a "romantic getaway" like I seem to have with Dustin. I told him I'm more than happy to go do that kind of stuff with him, too, but the difference is that Dustin comes up with the ideas for AND pays for most of this stuff. Every single out-of-town jaunt I've gone on or have planned in the future with Dustin is his idea. And he's paid for every hotel room and the gas and most of my meals. It's not like it's me coming up with this stuff for one relationship and not the other. I'm the broke, passive one. If Rider wants to come up with a location for a romantic getaway and spring for the hotel, I'm not gonna say no!

He thought about it and said that's fair. I told him if he comes up with an idea, I'll help him nail down a date that will work. He seemed happy about that. It seems that each of them has a hard time not envying what the other one gets.

Dustin envies that Rider gets to live with me and call our shared space "home." He envies that I'm legally married to Rider, which means that option is not on the table for him, no matter how entangled our lives may get. He envies really any time I get to spend with Rider that I could otherwise be spending with him.

Rider envies Dustin being the "shiny new thing" and how Dustin always seems to have funds and ideas to whisk me off to this place or that. He envies the NRE-sex that I'm surely having with Dustin, because he remembers what that was like with me. And he envies really any time I get to spend with Dustin that I could otherwise be spending with him.

I dunno. There's not much I can do about any of that. I can't give either of them ALL of my time. I'm not gonna divorce Rider because my being married makes Dustin uncomfortable. I can't take the new-thing shine off of Dustin to make Rider happy—only time can do that. So everyone's just going to have to learn how to live with it all. Or not, and walk away.

Last night was blissful. Dustin and I went to the Japanese market and got stuff to make homemade sushi and miso soup. We even made wasabi from powder. I'm so proud of the results that I wanted to share a picture. It's a spicy tuna roll, a scallop roll, and a roll with both! The miso soup was the best I've ever tasted. We used organic dashi miso. Dustin also insisted on getting the gamut of Japanese booze too, so we had a beer, a hot sake, a cold sake, and a plum wine. We made way too much food and had to pawn some off on Derek when he got back from his martial arts class.

It was so much fun preparing dinner. Dustin put the classical radio station on Spotify—the one I often listen to when I have left-brain tasks to do at work and cannot handle lyrics. It felt so adult and romantic and fancy to be side by side in the kitchen, slicing and stirring, pausing to kiss or sip wine, while classical music played in the background. One of the things that I absolutely love about hanging out with Dustin is that we both love culinary explorations. I have always loved cooking, but I'm usually in the kitchen alone. Once in a great while, I've been able to enlist someone to chop or grate in a sous chef capacity, but I've never before had a partner who was just as enthusiastic as I am about fresh, healthy ingredients and delicious, delicate preparations. He has no qualms about doing stuff like driving out of the way to go to that one store that reliably has fresh dill, etc.

After dinner and cleanup, we had naked cuddle time, which predictably turned into sexy time, which unpredictably turned into anal time. Something I'd said had put the idea in Dustin's head, and he was very excited about it. It was pretty good timing, actually, as last week I had a bit of a butt problem going on, so I was hoping he wouldn't request that, but this week it was all cleared up. I'm still not 100% good at it, really, but I am still growing to like it. I've discovered that I really don't like fingers in there much, at least not so far—too bony!—so the warming up process is more like just sliding and gradual poking, haha. But once it's in there I'm usually OK. Other than maybe a bit of paranoia about a mess. It's been so far, so good in that regard, though.

After sexytime and a shower, it was somehow already 10:30. We decided to watch a show, then eat more miso soup and watch another episode. We lamented being out of ice cream. I guess it's time to decide on the next flavor and get busy on it soon! As we cuddled on the couch, I was internally marveling at how often Dustin says the exact thing that I'm thinking. I don't think it's like psychic or anything—I just think that we think a lot alike on a lot of topics, and, given the same cues and timing, our minds respond in the same way.

We realized just before going to sleep that we'd forgotten to move my car out of the danger zone for street sweeping, so I set an alarm for extra early. When it went off, Dustin bade me stay in bed while he went to move it for me, since "[he gets] to sleep in anyway." That man is always going out of his way for me, I swear.

In poly-related news, the boys have been totally making nice to each other lately. When Rider got sick the other day, Dustin said to wish him a speedy recovery on his behalf. Rider passed along his thanks in return. And Dustin and I were talking about transport options for the desert, and Dustin said that if I could take the car I share with Rider, Dustin would leave his for Rider to use.

In poly-related not-news-but-thoughts . . .

I've been becoming hyper-aware of a transition problem lately, and it feels complex, so I am going to explore it here. So what I mean by "a transition problem" is that I am finding it difficult to switch gears from one guy to the other. When I've been home for a few days and I then re-encounter Dustin, there's a moment where, instead of the joyous reunions I'd been accustomed to, I feel like he is slightly alien to me, and it takes me a little period of time to get back into the groove with him, where kissing him feels "right" again.

And it's the same thing but even worse on the Rider side. When I've been off with Dustin for a few days, transitioning back to Rider feels weird and dull and flat, with it taking a period of time to where cuddling with him and kissing him feels good and normal again. But it's a longer period of readjustment back to Rider—sometimes more than a day, even.

On both sides, I feel weird and guilty about it, like if they knew that something was off, and that it had to do with the transition, they'd be unhappy and maybe even resentful. I actually mentioned it to Rider, but I'm reluctant to do so to Dustin because I don't want to add more fuel to his "this situation is so fucked up" attitude that occasionally surfaces.

It's also weird because . . . and I'm not sure if I can explain this right . . . I feel like to truly connect to each of them, in the moment that I'm with them, I kind of have to energetically disconnect from the other one. Otherwise the other one is kind of standing at the forefront of my heart, blocking my connection to the first one. I have no idea if that makes any sense at all. The EXTRA weird part is that, from afar, each seems to actually notice when it happens, like they can feel me cutting the cord for the moment, and it pains them. They'll like send me needy-ish texts and want to be reassured right around the time I manage to effectively make the shift to the other one.

It's like sometimes I feel like my love is like a lighthouse—one strong beam that is sweeping the landscape and can only fall full-blast on any given place at once, though it does move around.

With the serious talks and emphasis on reconnection that Rider and I have been doing, I really have felt more connected to him than in some time . . . but only when I'm with him, and only when I've effectively made the transition. But here's the really fucked up part: I kinda feel almost like I'm cheating on Dustin when I do transition. Even though I'm not—everyone knows about everything. And here's the other really fucked up part: when I transition back to Dustin, I feel like I'm betraying Rider in some way. Not cheating, but . . . fucking him over somehow.

I dunno how to properly explain it. There's a nuance there that is hard to put into words. Like the act of disconnecting from the one to connect to the other is a slight against the one not present, and like I'm wrong in some way for doing it. Like I don't know anymore how to hold them both in my heart at once. I feel like I used to know—at the beginning, my love for Dustin felt like it was multiplying my love for Rider. Like I was finally capable of "doing poly right" and giving Rider what he wanted and, oh my god, wasn't it amazing to have these two sweet, beautiful, gentle, attentive creatures as my lovers. But lately, I don't feel that way. Lately I feel like I have to perpetually dislodge one in favor of the other, then repeat the process. It feels kinda poly-not-poly.

It is very strange, the different stages that this has all has gone through and that it continues to go through as we (on Thursday) enter the beginning of Month Five of Dustin. I wonder if this lighthouse sensation is one that will pass . . . ?

Reverie said:

I dunno how to properly explain it. There's a nuance there that is hard to put into words. Like the act of disconnecting from the one to connect to the other is a slight against the one not present, and like I'm wrong in some way for doing it.

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I've felt this when transitioning as well as been on the Dustin/Rider side of it and I think you explained it quite well. I also don't think it's at all wrong but rather a natural, latent quality that arises from love being a neurochemical state. The love you feel for each of your guys is coming from a rather different frame of mind so as you go back and forth between them, the shift is rather jarring.

The other times I've felt these shifts have been coming out of intense experiences with psychedelics or melt-my-face-off mdma parties with friends, after something traumatic happens, or when I have to come back to town after spending more than a few days seeing nobody to almost nobody while working in the woods or backpacking. I found the first few times were disconcerting as I felt myself longing for the experience before the transition, and often a little depressed. With relationship transitions, I'd also feel guilt, like I was cheating the partner in front of me out of something, like somehow I wasn't being true to them.

However, as it happened more I began to accept it as a natural aftereffect of the events that were driving it. With the exception of trauma, all of them were experiences that found me very focused on the present as they brought me immense joy and satisfaction, While the trauma wasn't joyous by any means, it had the same power to ring my bell and force me to stay very much in the moment. I also found that the more I accepted it as my body's natural reaction to the transition, the faster the transition happened. This may be a poor analogy but it always reminded me of wearing a new pair of heavy leather boots for work- at first they were difficult to even put on, were super awkward to hike in but as I wore them more, they eventually came to feel comfortable and almost like an extension of my foot.

As far as being the person on the other side of this transition, it's also a weird state. The first few times I really experienced it with Lemon I felt intense anxiety at being the non-nre guy, replaced, ashamed, and a host of other unpleasant feelings. It also pushed me to do a lot of soul searching, work on being a better communicator, and to work on developing a much greater emotional intelligence. It wasn't easy and I often handled it poorly but now more than 5 years later I'm happy it wasn't easy because it really kicked me in the ass, forced me to confront those wormy scripts that lodged in my brain when I was a kid and, because I didn't like how I handled the situation, it provided enormous impetus to grow. Now the only part that is still a bit weird, mainly because I'm not sure how it happens, is the situation you describe where you make the shift and the partner in the distance seems to instantly know it. I've been several states away in the backcountry out of cell service but still felt the shift. It feels almost like a light on the dashboard turning on when it happens. Other than that though, now the transitions seem really natural. If we've been apart for a long time (over a month) it can feel a little strange to share space with someone again but I think that's fairly typical when going from living solo to having a nesting partner.

From here, as a disconnected person looking in from the internet, what you're going through seems not wrong but natural and rather logical. I also don't think you're slighting either of them though I get why it feels that way. However, from what you've described they're both struggling to understand, process and even deal with some of the scary unpleasant emotions that they're both having which makes me think they would both probably feel a bit of a slight because that's easier to feel upset at someone else than to say to you "So that's not easy for me to hear but thanks for sharing, I had no idea transitioning was so rough for you, is there anything I can do be supportive?" or saying to themselves "Wow, this situation I've agreed to be in is unpleasant for me, but part of loving her right now is being in this situation so maybe I should examine why that I feel this way and work on my end of things." In addition to processing all your emotions, from what you've written you're also extremely cognizant and empathetic to what they're both going through rather than resenting them for struggling with it so I wonder why they aren't able to do the same for you? It seems to me like they often both expect you to change what you're feeling and doing rather than work through their own stuff which seems a bit unfair to you given that they both agreed to be in this situation.

Refusnik said:

I've felt this when transitioning as well as been on the Dustin/Rider side of it and I think you explained it quite well. I also don't think it's at all wrong but rather a natural, latent quality that arises from love being a neurochemical state.
...
From here, as a disconnected person looking in from the internet, what you're going through seems not wrong but natural and rather logical. I also don't think you're slighting either of them though I get why it feels that way.

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Thanks for this. It is helpful to know that I am not alone in having experienced something like this, and also to know that my description of it made sense to someone.

Refusnik said:

Now the only part that is still a bit weird, mainly because I'm not sure how it happens, is the situation you describe where you make the shift and the partner in the distance seems to instantly know it. I've been several states away in the backcountry out of cell service but still felt the shift. It feels almost like a light on the dashboard turning on when it happens. Other than that though, now the transitions seem really natural.

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RIGHT?! How is that even possible? But it totally seems to happen, more than could be attributed to coincidence. Maybe it's just that the two people are both so in sync that they both drop the connection at once, and the person who doesn't immediately reconnect to someone else feels loneliness instead after the drop...

Refusnik said:

However, from what you've described they're both struggling to understand, process and even deal with some of the scary unpleasant emotions that they're both having which makes me think they would both probably feel a bit of a slight because that's easier to feel upset at someone else than to say to you "So that's not easy for me to hear but thanks for sharing, I had no idea transitioning was so rough for you, is there anything I can do be supportive?" or saying to themselves "Wow, this situation I've agreed to be in is unpleasant for me, but part of loving her right now is being in this situation so maybe I should examine why that I feel this way and work on my end of things." In addition to processing all your emotions, from what you've written you're also extremely cognizant and empathetic to what they're both going through rather than resenting them for struggling with it so I wonder why they aren't able to do the same for you? It seems to me like they often both expect you to change what you're feeling and doing rather than work through their own stuff which seems a bit unfair to you given that they both agreed to be in this situation.

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Rider's actually been really good about it since I've explained it to him, so there's that. I think, to some degree, he's also just happy that the full reconnection is happening at all, delay be damned, because he told me that for a while, it was hard for him to even feel a connection at all through my bubble of NRE for Dustin. *I* still felt a connection to *him*—if somewhat muted—but I think it was hard for him to see past the obvious fact that I was constantly carrying Dustin in my mind.

As for Dustin . . . I am trying to be very gentle and understanding of him and his struggles because he is so very new to even the idea of poly. We've got only four full months under our belts at this point. When I look back to the beginning of this blog and all the silly mistakes Rider and I made in the beginning, it really puts things in perspective for me of how good Dustin is actually doing.

A few months in, I was running around like a kid in a candy store basically trying to fuck anything half-decent-looking that moved, just to get some balance because Rider had another girlfriend. Rider was NRE-blinded by me and making erroneous assumptions about his other girlfriend wanting to be something more like solo-poly than co-primary. His other girlfriend was insisting on a DADT that basically made Rider's life hell, and when they segued out of DADT, she started basically flying off the handle at any mention of me.

So Dustin, who sends Rider well-wishes, offers to let Rider borrow his car, sometimes expresses his icky emotions in unpleasant ways but never tries to change me or my situation, and is fine with hanging out with me and Rider as long as it's a group/party situation . . . I don't think he's doing TOO bad, in the grand scheme. Sure, he's got a ways to go, and he doesn't always handle things in the best manner (especially when alcohol is involved), but I try not to be too hard on him.

In short, I think they're both doing all right. Perhaps part of it is that I tend to choose my words carefully and not disclose every feeling that passes through me, but I don't feel unduly pressured to change how I feel.

Last night was mostly uneventful. I sat outside and waited for trick-or-treaters, wearing my animal hat to be festive. Rider decided at the last minute that he wasn't recovered enough to go to the street festival, so he eventually joined me. We sat there for about two hours but got only five kids, so we gave up and went inside. I blame the World Series.

While waiting for kids, I'd been hungry and unwisely eaten four pieces of candy and like 1/3 of a bag of Gardetto's snack mix. That stuff is so tasty, but it always makes me feel like shit after I eat it. I should know better, but sometimes I do it anyway. And I was hungry. I make poor decisions sometimes when I am hungry.

Rider wanted to go for tacos when we got back in the house, so we did. I started to feel absolutely terrible as we pulled up to the taco place—oddly cold with hot flashes, tingly and kind of bruised all over, and weak. I ate my tacos and drank some water but felt no better. I supposed I just needed to let the junk food wear off, so when we went home, I huddled under a blanket and played on my phone for a while.

Eventually, I felt a bit better. Rider and I traded rubs and then cuddled up and both fell asleep. Mind you, it was only about 9:30! We'd intended to watch some TV, but didn't even get that far. I slept hard and had what I think were jealousy nightmares about Dustin—odd! That's the first time that ever happened.

I woke, alone on the couch, confused and with the lights still on and my contacts still in. I didn't remember Rider trying to rouse me to come to bed with him. I checked my phone and it was nearly 1:30! I also had a text from Dustin around 10:00 saying he was heading home and his phone was almost out of battery. He'd wanted to talk before bed, so I felt bad that I'd fallen asleep. I texted him an apology and got up to join Rider in bed.

I walked into the bedroom and thoroughly startled a masturbating Rider who was watching porn at very low volume on the bedroom TV. Whoops! I guess that's why he hadn't tried to rouse me.

I apologized and offered to go back onto the couch, but he said not to worry as long as I didn't mind him finishing next to me. Of course I didn't. In fact, it's something we used to just have as part of our sex repertoire—he'd mostly touch himself and I'd sometimes slightly lend a hand. We haven't done that in a long while, though.

When he was finished, we went to sleep. I got a total of about 11 hours between the two sleeps, so I guess I needed it!

The main topic on my mind today is desire. I have no idea how to sustain desire for a person past NRE. I warn each maybe-longterm partner, but each partner thinks that their cock will be the magic bullet that will kill the problem. And they have reason to think so, because my desire for sex in NRE is legendary, my passion relentless, my obsession unquenchable, and, to make matters worse, my NRE lasts juuuust long enough that it begins to appear that maybe they were right, before it all comes tumbling down.

Rider tries to pin the problem on my NRE with Dustin, but he forgets that we were already grappling with this issue in mid-2016. He forgets that he complained on our honeymoon that we were not having enough sex for what a honeymoon should contain.

Dustin doesn't believe me when I warn him. "Why you gotta make negative predictions about the future? Let's just keep it alive and see what happens! I think this can last forever! Keep thinking like that and of course things go wrong—focus on the positive."

My love for people doesn't die with the fade of NRE. I still care for them. I still think they are beautiful and attractive and remember all the good that I saw in them. I still value and respect them and it matters to me what happens to them. I still want to nurture them and help them. And I even still remember what it was like to be alight with passion for them. But do I crave them? Desire them? Lust after them? Nope. Not so far, anyway.

As fatal as it would be to my relationship with Rider, I almost want to believe that I just "haven't found the right person(s) yet" who could keep the desire alive; that maybe it's just a symptom of the relationship having "run its course"; that it is anything but inevitable with anyone. I can't believe that, though. I have no evidence in favor and too much to the contrary.

Perhaps I will make a thread about this...

ETA: I did make a thread here.

Yesterday was my "adulting" day. I planned to get my oil changed, deep-clean my apartment, and look into refinancing my credit card debt to 0% cards. I managed to get the first two done, at least, before it got too late.

Right after work, I was famished, so I needed to stop and get a snack before dealing with the car. Dustin had offered to meet me for happy hour since I needed food anyway, so I spent an hour with him at the taco place I go to near work.

On the way back to our cars, in the dark, he stopped me on the sidewalk under a tree and kissed me, and I just . . . I continue to be in complete awe of how kissing him feels—like every cell in my body is hyper-aware of where and how any part of him is touching me. It's kind of hard to explain, but a lot of times while kissing someone, I either can get too much up in my head, or just allow myself to get swept away on a wave of general passion where I'm not having a particular focus. But, kissing him, it's like our mouths are communicating back and forth in an actual language, complete with grammar, vocabulary, meaning, and musicality. The world around us vanished—the streetlights, the tree, the sidewalk.

We both drew back, breathless, and looked at each other, and I said, "What is this?"

"You're the best kisser in the world!" he said. But I don't think I am. I think it's just us.

We started walking again, and when I saw our cars, the reality dawned on me that I had to get in mine, separately, to go do the thing (oil change) that was the reason I even got to be with him briefly in the first place. I am very unused to seeing him for such a short time, and even more unused to parting at our two cars and going separate ways.

"I made you a Spotify playlist," he said.

"I'll listen to it on the way home."

The oil change passed uneventfully. When I got home, I gave Rider a big hug and a kiss. He'd stopped at the store for me like I'd asked and had already started doing a bit of cleaning.

I basically tore the apartment apart, pulling everything out of corners to sweep out the bunny hairs, windexing sliding mirror doors, and dusting places high and low. Rider helped for a little while, then petered out. I think dirt is invisible to him. He'll cursorily go over the surfaces in the kitchen and bathroom because he knows that's part of "cleaning," but he never cleans them all the way, and he doesn't seem to notice the dirt and clutter that remains. It's very strange. But he did help. And he did laundry!

Nearly four hours later, I fixed us a meal and flopped down next to him, dusty and sweaty, and we watched a show. Because I'd gotten so much sleep the night before, I was lenient about bedtime. We went to bed around 1:00.

Linked to the whole desire thing I'd posted here, he and I had had a conversation about the things that he wants more of sexually. He says he wants to do more things that actually get me off. Which is exactly the thing I don't really care about right now—I'm happy to get him off, but want not much of anything for myself. But, because I knew it would make him happy, I told him he could go down on me. And he did, and it was good. I always have fun once we get started. And then I got him off and we went to sleep.

Overall, it was a very productive day. I always feel so much better when the apartment is clean. I wish we could afford a cleaning lady once a week, because it gets so messy when I'm around only half the time.

This evening, Dustin is picking me up from work and we're going shopping for snacks for our trip. Then we might just stay home and be lazy or something. I'm still in major recovery mode from the madness of October.

Tomorrow I'm supposed to have a chastity date with Rider. And then Saturday, Dustin is coming to pick me up. He'll leave his car for Rider, and we'll drive out to the desert in my car. He's gotten us some molly, and we're staying in a trailer on his buddy's art ranch. I LOVE THE DESERT! We're just staying the one night and will be back in town late Sunday evening. He doesn't have to do his honky-tonk the next few Sundays because he gave the gig to a friend for a while. Dude is in town for only a while and needs the cash.

(continued . . . )

( . . . continued from previous)

It occurs to me that I haven't spent a lot of time in this blog lately talking about what people other than myself are up to.

Rider has been busily going to poly meetups and making new friends there and other places. He has so many new friends, most of whom I have not met, that I have trouble keeping track of them by name. There's one dude friend he's made from a poly meetup who hosts weekly jam sessions on Fridays. Rider is super excited about this because it fills a hole that he'd had since leaving FL—the potluck jam sessions that Al used to have each week.

There's a thing where there's a girl that Rider's new dude friend has been kissing on at the meetups, and she's been trying to hang out with Rider, and he assumed just as a friend because she likes his friend. But I guess the other night she started "shamelessly flirting" (Rider's words) with Rider over text. So he's trying to feel that out. He said he does like her, but he doesn't want to step on his friend's toes. I find the whole thing a bit odd—that Rider didn't seem to be interested in her till she expressed interest but now he is, and that she'd be trying to go after two dudes who are new friends at the same time, and that Rider would be maybe into it. But I don't know what the dynamic of that meetup group is, since I haven't been to a meeting. Maybe it's always just a total free-for-all. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

That chick that Rider is super into—the colored hair one—has canceled on him like twice now. He's confessed a crush on her. I'm not sure what's happening there. Seems like she's either super, super busy, or maybe not super interested.

I'm happy for Rider that he has this swiftly burgeoning social life, but I get a little exhausted just hearing about it. He has two poly meetups and two meeting-friends-for-drinks scheduled for next week already. All I have on the books is a tagalong to work with Val on her plant stuff Saturday morning because I want to learn things.

Rider and I joke about my "JOMO" (joy of missing out) as opposed to his "FOMO." I am truthfully content if I just get to spend sufficient time with my boys, get to see platonic friends every couple weeks, and get some solo time. The times that I try to keep up with Rider, I always end up burning myself out.

Oona is still going through tough times. Toby has been out of work for over a year now since the show he used to work on ended. He briefly had a new job but was displaced from it for nepotism. She is feeling the strain of being a single breadwinner in a relationship that she feels also dissatisfied with in other ways. She complains often about being unmarried at 40, despite not knowing whether she'd even want to marry Toby if he asked.

She hates "being the last woman standing" among her friends, in terms of never having been married, and she romanticizes my ill-fated young marriage to Moss by saying "at least got to be a pretty, young bride who will always have pictures of my day." I only shake my head in puzzlement, because, to me, it wasn't about the pictures or the day. It was about me and Moss, and though we are still friends, our relationship didn't work out, twice.

Oona is a study in contradictions sometimes. In the same breath, she will criticize me for jumping into things too fast, then lament why marriage never happened for her. If my decisions are so foolish, why does it sound like she regrets not making them? She will castigate me for my "fear of being alone" [which isn't even a thing] while staying in an unhappy relationship because she, admittedly, is afraid it will be years before she finds a partner again. When we were young, she, four years older, always seemed so worldly and poised and wise compared to my clumsy-puppy naiveté. But the older we get, the less sense she makes to me and the more she seems to resent our differences in person and views.

Mel is still off doing the family thing with Tina and her two daughters about an hour outside of town. He seems happy. Their relationship was a tumultuous thing for a long time, with him being unsure he could handle having the stepfather role thrust upon him just because he fell in love with a woman who has kids. But he seems to have taken to it in the past year. They even brought the kids to Oona's birthday party.

Perry is still . . . Perry. He's still casually seeing the same girl but calling himself "single." He's still a barrel of fun and a great bandmate. He's stopped rolling his eyes about me and Dustin, finally, at least to my face. He recently went vegan, which is interesting, as he used to be as cheeseburger a fellow as ever existed.

I've been kind of burned out on my social circle lately, which is probably why I hadn't updated on those guys in a while. Part of it is probably the gossip mill as reported by Oona recently. But part of it is that I've just been feeling myself segueing into a chill homebody phase. And part of it is that I've really been enjoying the more "family" vibe I get hanging out with either Rider and the pets, and especially with Dustin, Derek, and Eve.

I'm actually really looking forward to seeing my own family in less than three weeks. I'll be taking the red-eye Monday night and spending Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday with my family. Rider will be joining me on Wednesday. He and I will probably go out Friday night to see Jake at the bar. And then Rider is flying out Saturday morning, and I'm driving up the three hours to Dustin's hometown to hang with him and his family. Meet the parents, lol. I am super, super, super excited to see my mom, sister, brother, and nephews. My mom is going through a breakup and is having a tough time, so it'll be good to give her a big hug. And I'm looking forward to cooking with my mom and sister. And I am nervous but excited to meet Dustin's parents, sister, niece and nephews.

Plus, I feel like being around a bunch of little kids and a pregnant woman will also help aid me in my recent motherhood question. My sister is pregnant, both of my nephews and one of Dustin's nephews are two, and Dustin's other nephew is still an infant. (He also has a niece, but she's 18. She was born when Dustin's sister was still in high school, and he kind of helped raise her.)

But, yeah, not sure what's with this shift in me about feeling more family-oriented. Maybe it's the time of year . . . all I know is that it will be damned good to be home for the Thanksgiving holiday!

I think that Oona is very prone to projection. Read your paragraph about how contradictory she seems, like accusing you of being afraid to be alone, but acting like she is afraid to be alone, that is classic projection. Right along with the whole "you should be single a while, it worked for me once" thing. I would guess that right now, she is wishing she had the fairytale happily ever after in a *le sigh* kind of sad way, wishing she could get out of an unhappy relationship, but afraid to be alone. Her inner voice she doesn't want to listen to, is telling her stuff, but since it's going against what she has rationalized for her situation, and since it runs right into the brick wall of her own fears, it's just a lot easier to beam it your way.

But I don't know her well enough to do more than guess. You can maybe consider it and you'll be better able to know if there is anything to that guess, or not. But it's pretty typical humany stuff.

I wonder if the homebodying is a seasonal thing, too. I've been feeling more homebodyish lately. Where before I'd take any excuse to go out, now I'm looking for any reason I can stay in. I don't want to do much. But I think in my case, it's also partly a money thing. Every day I can spend nothing at all, I feel good. With the holidays approaching and other things leaning on my budget, I even want to avoid wasting gas by going anywhere, if I can.

Spork said:

I think that Oona is very prone to projection.

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Y'know. Dustin has said the same exact thing. He said that anytime anyone gives emphatic negative-tinged advice that you didn't ask for, it's because they're projecting and it's something they should be telling themselves instead.

I just had a little blast from the past. Rider and I were vaguely discussing how NYE might work, and I was suddenly hit all at once by memories of our first holiday season together.

How first he had ditched me for our Xmas plans, just weeks before the date, to appease Claire, after I'd already refrained from buying tickets to see my family because we'd made plans. And then, only a couple weeks later, he'd tried to turn our NYE trip to Sam's into a sex romp with Kelly, after selling me for over a year on how much I'd love Sam's annual NYE party weekend, and I had to explain in a panic why that would be upsetting to me.

I'm not still mad about that stuff, but, looking back through the lens of the more assertive person I am today, I am not sure how in the actual fuck I kept dating him. I'm pretty sure present-me would dump someone for that shit in a heartbeat. Maybe they'd get a mulligan for the first thing, but the second thing like that in such quick succession would be a bed-shitter for sure.

Funny how time changes us. 2014 me used to put up with far more shit from partners than 2017 me could even dream of.

Last night with Dustin was pretty good. He picked me up from work and we went to Trader Joe's. As we got there, the clouds were really crazy and it was getting kind of close to sunset, so he wanted to go up to the roof level of the parking garage and look around. Turns out you can see all the way to downtown from the roof, and once the sun dropped behind the oddly stark cloud line and we could see it, downtown and everything else lit up in sort of this orange blaze. It was really neat. It was cold up there, though, so we didn't stick around all the way till the sun set. Here's a picture of Dustin in the warm light, looking dubious at being photographed, and with his hair blowing around in the wind.

We got a bunch of food for our trip this weekend: brie and sesame-wheat crackers, kettle chips and cottage cheese (which I like to eat together—habit handed down to me by my parents), blueberries and strawberries (which I sliced the strawberries and tossed together), tofu and tempeh (which I cubed and marinated), edamame (which I tossed with some fleur de sel and a couple drops of sesame oil), and broccoli and asparagus (which I blanched and added fleur de sel to).

I also made a delicious dinner of chickpeas, mushrooms, red bell pepper, onion, spinach, and fresh dill, with garlic, herbes de provence, and goat cheese. And a worker at TJs had recommended a bottle of wine to us that was only $10 but holy shit was it good! I think I might go back and get more before they sell out.

Over dinner, Dustin and I discussed our shared love of cheese. We talked stinky cheeses and cheese crystals and how sometimes each of us will opt to get a cheese plate as dinner instead of an entrée. He said he can never get anyone to eat all the cheeses with him. And then the topic turned to dessert wine. He'd mentioned in passing on one of our early dates that he liked port, but we'd not discussed it at length. Turns out we both love tawny port, and I was showing him my favorite one and explaining that I haven't had it in years. He also told me that there was a white dessert wine that he didn't know what it was but he'd loved it, and I think we narrowed down that it was probably a Sauternes.

I worked in the service industry for most of the time from the ages of 21–31 (while I was in college and part of grad school), and it really imparted a love of fancy and delicious things that I usually cannot afford by myself. Moss used to indulge my "one fancy dinner per year" on my birthday, during which I'd do the whole multiple courses and paired drinks with each course thing: a martini with olives before the meal, an appetizer with bubbly, a white then a red during the main course, and then port with dessert or cheese. If I wasn't walking sideways by the end of that, sometimes I'd finish with a scotch, a bourbon, or coffee with Frangelico.

Food is really the only area that I care about getting fancy. I don't go in much for fancy possessions like clothes, shoes, furniture, vehicle, accessories, or jewelry. I never mind doing travel or vacations on a shoestring budget. I'm not high-maintenance about stuff like hairdos and nails. And I'm more a fan of spooky ramshackle buildings with some grit and character on them than places that are polished, new or renovated, and manicured.

But food and drink, though. Definitely my splurge area.

Dustin and I decided that our next real date will be a cheese date. Some weekend day, we'll go to the cheese shop kinda close to where I live, get a selection of cheese and a nice bottle of port, and go have a picnic in the huge park nearby. I AM SO DOWN.

Other than the food prep, last night was pretty lazy. We had fantastic sex (Dustin said it was one of the best orgasms of his life), watched a show, had a couple of cocktails, and lay around on the couch trading rubs and chatting.

(continued . . . )

( . . . continued from previous)

At some point, Dustin was talking about something he likes to do in the spring, and he said, "If we're still together when spring rolls around . . . " and I just felt a profound sadness. It led us to talking more about the whole situation and the bottom line is that right now he just can't see himself happy in a poly situation long term. He said he's not putting anything in stone—no one knows what will actually happen and maybe yet he will change his mind—but he is pretty sure that eventually wants to fully commit to one person and have that in return.

He wants to have a family and give someone his all and focus on the teamwork of building that with someone, and he doesn't believe it's possible to do that with multiple relationships.

"People do it . . ." I said.

"Think about how busy you are right now," he said. "Think about how much attention and energy is required to raise kids. I look at my sister with her two little ones, and it's barely-controlled chaos at all times. You tell me you sometimes feel like you're neglecting your pets being home just over half the time. Can you really picture it working for someone to split their attention like that?" he asked.

"I guess most of the situations where it works end up being more like communal living situations," I replied.

And, thinking about it, I realized that even if (by some stroke of magic) he himself could be cool with it all, and he did find someone to do all that with (who was cool with poly, and cool with me), I'd basically have to be part of that household to be anything more than a loose satellite secondary. And that isn't going to happen. Well, damn. That's a lot of very unlikely "ifs" leading up to an unsatisfying outcome even if the "ifs" all came true.

He told me (again, as he's said it before) that before he met me, he'd actually kind of given up on those things that he wanted. He figured he'd just be single for the rest of his life, living in the moment day to day, probably dying young but being pretty OK with it since he's lived enough life already in 40 years that he feels like it's four times more than most people get in their entire life.

He said that relationships never seemed worth it because he didn't care about the people enough to make the sometimes-necessary sacrifices—he didn't like how the dynamic always seemed to devolve into him fucking up and the other person never forgiving or forgetting, holding it over his head for always. He'd always wanted a family someday, but "someday" never came soon enough for his past partners, and since it still hadn't come by 40 and he felt as jaded as he did then about relationships, he'd resigned himself to the idea that it probably never would.

And then he met me, and I'm "not like other chicks." I'm cool and open-minded and forgive and don't hold grudges and I ground him without trying to cage him. We like so very many of the same things and have so much fun together. We have fantastic, sweet, dirty sex. He said I'm perfect, excepting "my situation." And if I exist, well, that has awakened a hope in him that maybe other people like that do, too . . . people who are not already married. Maybe all is not lost. He said he kind of doubts it—if it took him 40 years to meet someone as cool as me, maybe he won't get to meet another one. But he's not quite so jaded anymore, so he's open to it happening if it does.

He also said that he'd be into doing all that stuff with me, if my situation changes, but that he's not going to push me into doing anything. He wants me to do what is right for me, whatever that is.

He was curious about what I thought that might be though. "Do you really see yourself wanting or needing two relationships?" he asked.

"Well, it's complicated," I explained. "I'm actually finding the situation itself to be kind of a pain in the ass. I thought this would be the easy role to be in, but instead, it's very difficult. If I had it to totally do over from scratch, I probably would not choose this. But I don't regret being with you. I know you exist now, and I love you. And I love Rider too. I can't un-know or un-love you guys. But I agree that the situation itself sucks. I wish I could split myself into two complete humans and live out both lives separately instead of having to juggle and balance all the time. I'm not very good at it. I was definitely happier in some regards when I had only the one relationship to handle."

And it's true. I don't regret being with Dustin. I'm not trying to up and "quit poly" again—to do so would be some kind of great sacrifice on one side or the other. And I definitely would not ask Rider to mostly close again, even though he currently is not dating anyone in particular. I want him to have his freedom. But if I had a totally clean start, with no one to sacrifice and nothing at stake? I don't think I'd pick being poly again.

Which is not to say that I exactly regret it. I've learned a shit-ton about communication and honesty and jealousy and emotional depth and boundaries and my own issues and the human condition and people's desires. I've learned more about safer sex and possible risks. I've gotten a chance to experiment with all kinds of dating and people and kink and stuff that I never would have if I'd just stuck to serial monogamy my entire life—I'd nearly always been in some kind of serious or at least serious-ish relationship, so checking casual stuff out has been at the very least informative. And all of this stuff has taught me a lot about what does and does not work for me in partnerships and about what my own needs, wants, good and bad habits, limitations, prickly areas, and fears are. As with going to a Ph.D. program and deciding to leave with the terminal M.A. instead of dissertating, if I hadn't tried it, I would have always wondered if I'd been missing out on something. So I don't regret it.

But it hasn't delivered on the things that I was hoping it would. One of my biggest hopes was that sexual variety would stoke my libido for long-term partners. That hasn't happened. Another huge hope was that my relationships would never have to end, because if I wasn't getting a need met, I could just sort of outsource it. That hasn't been the case, either. Incompatibility is incompatibility, and there is not unlimited time to keep maintaining less-compatible relationships while perpetually adding new ones. And a huge reason was because I was often tempted to cheat in monogamy, and poly (depending on one's agreements) kind of negated that. And then there was sort of a vague inkling I'd had at the beginning about thinking it fun to live in some kind of large poly household, but I actually think I'm too introverted to make that fly, and, anyway, after doing a bunch of reading here, most of those seem to be rather inherently unstable.

As it turns out, there may be no solution for the libido thing in poly that couldn't potentially be solved in monogamy, if variety isn't truly the key. As it turns out, poly relationships lead to MORE breakups than monogamous ones, just because there are more of them to possibly end. As it turns out, I actually trust myself not to cheat now that I've worked on my inner self, better identified my values, and shored up my integrity.

Aside from the things I've learned, which cannot be taken away from me now that I know them, literally the only benefit poly has for me right now is that it is the only way I can hang on to the two people that I love. It's making it possible for me and Rider to stay together despite a sex-drive incompatibility, and it's making it possible for me and Dustin to stay together despite the fact that I'm married to someone else.

I honestly thought that the only reason poly was rough for me was because I struggled with jealousy and control issues, and once I let go of those and had someone else to date, it'd be fine. But it's really not. It's just as hard but in different ways. Live and learn, I guess.

If Rider broke up with me tomorrow, I think I'd prefer to be mono or mono-ish with Dustin. This despite the fact that Dustin has said out loud, "What if the only reason I want you so much is because I can't have you all to myself?" I'd just put that to the test, I guess, and let the chips fall where they may.

If Dustin broke up with me tomorrow, I think I would choose not to date, despite Rider's continuing to date, focusing my attention instead on hobbies and on figuring out my answer to the kid question.

If they both broke up with me tomorrow, I think I'd prefer not to date for a while, live with roommates, focus on hobbies and figuring out the answer to the kid question, and then find a mono or mono-ish situation.

But I don't think that I would willingly get into this particular situation again, where I feel like I never have quite enough time or energy or me to go around.

I wish I could split myself into two complete humans and live out both lives separately instead of having to juggle and balance all the time. I'm not very good at it. I was definitely happier in some regards when I had only the one relationship to handle.

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This is exactly how I feel. I love both my guys, I am happy in both relationships... But being apart from both of them so much is awful. Honestly I think it's much harder for me than either of them. I don't really want a poly relationship as much as two mono relationships if that makes any sense. Hingeing is fucking hard.