Relationship Configurations

Emm

Stealth Mod
There often seems to be a tendency for people new to poly—and sometimes old-timers as well—to see a particular relationship shape as The One True Way To Be Poly™. This then leads to communication problems when they assume that everyone else uses the same definitions that they do.

There are others, usually newcomers, who wonder if they're really poly because they don't exactly fit the One True Poly™ model they first stumbled across and who wonder what they should call themselves instead.

In order to demonstrate the great variety that's out there (and the fact that I'm easily amused on a Saturday morning) I've drawn up a few of the more commonly referred-to configurations I've come across.

V (or Vee):
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Triad:
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Quad:
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Another type of Quad:
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N:
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W:
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Example of a Tangle:
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Feel free to add more. Perhaps when there are more examples people will stop judging everyone else on how closely they conform to their own personal idea of what One True Poly™ looks like.
 
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This is my current network out to the metamour level (I'm the purple one, double lines indicate married couples, and the dotted line is a non-romantic sexual relationship):

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(double lines indicate married couples, and the dotted line is a non-romantic sexual relationship):

Interesting. Started to do my own diagram but I'm wondering what line pattern to use for a non-sexual romantic relationship?
 
Pick a different dot or dash pattern, I guess. I just used double and dashed lines 'cause that's what sprung to mind first.
 
Never seen anyone here say a particular configuration like a triad or quad or whatever is the true way to do poly. What I have seen people say is that controlling rules and hierarchy are popular in certain configurations, like a closed triad, and these configurations are often attractive to people because they offer increased control and supervision of your partner's relationships.

But anyway, right now, neither me or my partner are seeing anyone else regularly. But I guess we are N people. We just have as many relationships as we can manage basically. Our partners will probably never meet although that isn't forbidden, just unlikely.
 
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...What I have seen people say is that controlling rules and hierarchy are popular in certain configurations, like a closed triad, and these configurations are often attractive to people because they offer increased control and supervision of your partner's relationships.

I think I've only seen you make these points with those words, with the assumption of control and supervision in some configurations and not others.

I don't think labeling lines makes much sense (a controlling line is wavy? a supervision line that's not d/s is green?). To me, poly exists in the fact of more than one line coming from a node. What happens after that is up to the participants and typically also changes with time. I'd drop the dashes and doubles for that reason, too.
 
To me, poly exists in the fact of more than one line coming from a node.

I agree. Thought about it a bit, and realised that it's not what we do, but the intensity of the connection that defines my relationships. Intensity definitely changes over time.
 
I think I've only seen you make these points with those words, with the assumption of control and supervision in some configurations and not others.

I don't think labeling lines makes much sense (a controlling line is wavy? a supervision line that's not d/s is green?). To me, poly exists in the fact of more than one line coming from a node. What happens after that is up to the participants and typically also changes with time. I'd drop the dashes and doubles for that reason, too.

So you've never seen anyone jump on people looking for a closed triad? Or are you saying I'm the only person who hunts unicorn hunters on here?
 
When did this thread become another thread about Unicorns? Can we have just one blinkin thread about configurations that is not centred around bloody Unicorns and their hunters?
 
different shapes, for fun...

What the hell, this is the shape of my life right now. Kinda between a tangle and a triad? Who the hell knows. I'm polysaturated, that's for sure.
 

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I don't know how to draw the shapes.

Currently we are a V.
But we used to be a V with one end dot having another extension to another dot..
 
I think once you add in what is considered the extended post family by KB it's a tangle.

The family is an extended w. Woodsmith to me to SB to KB to NT to SP. The tangle add on: KB and NT are dating a girl L (fully separately, not set up as a triad), L is dating a couple Umbra and Pet, Pet is dating a guy domo.
 
Woodsmith to me to SB to KB to NT to SP. The tangle add on: KB and NT are dating a girl L (fully separately, not set up as a triad), L is dating a couple Umbra and Pet, Pet is dating a guy domo.
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Close? I'm not sure how to indicate that the KB/L/NT section are all separate relationships without cloning L.
 
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Close? I'm not sure how to indicate that the KB/L/NT section are all separate relationships without cloning L.

That is perfect. And it looks like less of a mess that way.
 
Never seen anyone here say a particular configuration like a triad or quad or whatever is the true way to do poly.
You see a lot of new people who seem to think it's only poly if both halves of a couple are seeing other people at the same time, or it's only poly if everyone is involved with each of the others, or it's only poly if everyone lives together, or it's only poly if it's poly-fi, etc, so therefore their relationship—whatever it may be and however many other definitions of poly it may meet—isn't really poly.

Two recent examples are not really poly, not really mono either and Not mono but not poly, what is my poly identity? How do I "label" my relationship?

Both describe standard poly or mono/poly relationships, but because they've previously heard poly used only to describe a different configuration they don't think the label applies to them. I have no problem at all with people choosing not to label themselves poly if they don't think it fits, but in both of these cases they seem to want it to fit, it's just that the constrained definitions they're familiar with don't allow it.

Can we have just one blinkin thread about configurations that is not centred around bloody Unicorns and their hunters?
Amen.
 
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These two must have superhuman scheduling abilities. That's all I have to say about that.
 
My configuration is a W with an extra arm... \/\/\

Gralson, me, Auto, her hubby, his boyfriend, and his wife (with each pronoun referring to the previous person). AFAIK, my girlfriend's husband's boyfriend's wife doesn't have another partner, but I don't keep tabs.

Some cultures have very rich vocabularies for familial relationships, e.g. the brother of your mother has a different title than the brother of your father or the husband of your mother's sister, etc. It would be interesting to live in a culture that had something similar for poly relationships.
 
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I don't think those threads pointed to anyone saying a particular configuration is the true way. For example, the mono/poly thread was someone monogamous wondering if her being monogamous means that she couldn't be in a poly relationship. It wasn't her saying we have a closed triad and that's real poly. Same with the other one, really.

And I've changed my mind, my ideal configuration would be like SCs.
 
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