SchrodingersCat
Active member
You have the right to be satisfied and have your needs met in your relationship. If he's not capable of that, then you deserve to be with someone who is.
There are polyamorous relationships where everyone gets their needs meet and their love reciprocated. There are also monoamorous relationships where one partner feels that their love is not returned to the same extent it's given.
Polyamorous people don't corner the market on unrequited love... It sounds like your situation is not unlike any where two people sign up for an attachment-free relationship and then one person goes and gets attached. I've been in your boyfriend's shoes before, when I wasn't dating anyone else. That is, I've been with someone where we agreed to keep it casual when we got together, and then they were hurt when they grew attached and I didn't.
What's more important? Your reputation or your happiness?
If you can't talk to your partner about how you're feeling, that's a bad sign. It's important to realize the difference between "I'm feeling ____ and I just wanted to let you know, so you can support me and help me deal with and hopefully overcome these negative feelings I'm having" and "I'm feeling ____ and I expect you to change your behaviour so I don't feel that way."
I think of "being needy" as "I need you to do this, I need you to do that" and not "I am an emotional person with strong feelings that I'd like to share with you."
Bizarre cult origins???
It's not always so formal. There are lots of people out there who have healthy polyamorous relationships without even knowing there's a word for it or that other people do it too. Dollars to donuts they don't use those "formal" terminologies.
Of those who do, most use them more as a description than a rule they have to live within. It's just done for brevity. Having words to describe things that others have already experienced just speeds up the process of communication and understanding, once you climb the learning curve of the vocabulary.
I'm still curious about these alleged cult origins..... You're not thinking of that thing in Bountiful, are you? Or Charles Manson? I assure you: polyamory has nothing to do with any of that.
There are polyamorous relationships where everyone gets their needs meet and their love reciprocated. There are also monoamorous relationships where one partner feels that their love is not returned to the same extent it's given.
Polyamorous people don't corner the market on unrequited love... It sounds like your situation is not unlike any where two people sign up for an attachment-free relationship and then one person goes and gets attached. I've been in your boyfriend's shoes before, when I wasn't dating anyone else. That is, I've been with someone where we agreed to keep it casual when we got together, and then they were hurt when they grew attached and I didn't.
I wish I could talk to him about all this! But I’m clearly the "needier" person in the arrangement and that’s not how I want to come across.
What's more important? Your reputation or your happiness?
If you can't talk to your partner about how you're feeling, that's a bad sign. It's important to realize the difference between "I'm feeling ____ and I just wanted to let you know, so you can support me and help me deal with and hopefully overcome these negative feelings I'm having" and "I'm feeling ____ and I expect you to change your behaviour so I don't feel that way."
I think of "being needy" as "I need you to do this, I need you to do that" and not "I am an emotional person with strong feelings that I'd like to share with you."
I’m much better off with all this information about poly, but to be honest, it’s also been a bit disturbing. I’m uncomfortable with how formalized everything is with its own weird terminology and not to mention bizarre cult origins. Ugh. I hate the sound of "secondaries," "primaries," "vees," "metamours," etc.?!? Ugh. I’d prefer to think of poly as simply a more complicated (and potentially more problematic) type of relationship between consenting adults. I hope I can get the notion that I’m a "secondary," instead of a friend, girlfriend, or partner, out of my head now!!!
Bizarre cult origins???
It's not always so formal. There are lots of people out there who have healthy polyamorous relationships without even knowing there's a word for it or that other people do it too. Dollars to donuts they don't use those "formal" terminologies.
Of those who do, most use them more as a description than a rule they have to live within. It's just done for brevity. Having words to describe things that others have already experienced just speeds up the process of communication and understanding, once you climb the learning curve of the vocabulary.
I'm still curious about these alleged cult origins..... You're not thinking of that thing in Bountiful, are you? Or Charles Manson? I assure you: polyamory has nothing to do with any of that.