A Polyvirgin Story

wantsacracker

New member
Yes, I'm a polyvirgin who wishes I had had the bandwidth for poly years ago...

Here's my story:

Once upon a time, there was a girl who was met a very special boy. They developed a friendship and sexship. They lived in different counties but thank God for public transportation! They were 14 and 15. Now they are over 40 and still intimately connected emotionally, though not sexually or frequently in touch.

Between 14 and 40, the girl fell for another -- the love of her life -- only to discover that they wanted different things. She wanted a family with shared childrearing. He wanted to hire a nanny. Their relationship ended. She was heartbroken and took solace in dating.

She met another man who set off fireworks when he touched her. Within a month of meeting, she became pregnant. She decided to have the baby. The baby daddy proposed. They married and had a family. They were monogamous.

In life after giving birth, she suggested that the baby daddy take on a lover. She was "touched out" and didn't want to deprive her husband of meeting his sexual needs. He never took the offer seriously. Meanwhile, she dreamt of her former love of her life and was still emotionally occupied with him, even if they did not have contact. The ex love of her life haunted her heart.

She did her best to build a fence around her heart to keep the ex out. She sensed the baby daddy did not feel comfortable with her being friends with the ex. She honored her commitment to her husband.

Years later, the ex reaches out to her for some professional support and the haunting of her heart begins again...or maybe it never left...

Polyamory becomes a recurrent thought for her -- a question -- could this be a possibility? Is it possible to have a primary relationship with her husband and be a hinge in a vee with the ex? Or is this waaaay too complicated for a polyvirgin? The ex may or may not be interested in anything but a professional relationship. Also, he has married. But she cannot help but wonder if the request for professional support is an excuse to stay somehow connected...?

The husband is very traditional monogamous, raised Catholic, probably chose to marry out of a deep sense of responsibility as much as any other reason. He is also sensitive and broaching the subject of polyamory would be delicate and difficult terrain to travel well...

I can only think about my regret -- that I hadn't considered polyamory earlier in life -- as a way to remain true, open and honest about my feelings for the relationships in my life.

All 3 of the men I mention hold a special place in my heart. Different reasons, different seasons, but it is occurring to me that the only reason I have only one actively in my life is cultural convention. And, I suppose, convenience.

I guess I am trying to figure out the risk-benefit of starting the polyamory conversation...and, how to begin...?

Husband is the primary without question. Priority for family and reality of the needs of family dictate that. Ex was always best to spend time with once a week, even when he was the one and only. My ideal world would have both of these men current and active in my life, the ex being secondary. The long-life love would be very occasionally in my life. But, I would like to have more conversation/email/texting with all of them concurrently and not feel I was being a bad person for caring deeply for all of them...

It may not be possible in my life, with all the other parameters, but I'm considering it...

Thanks in advance for any input.
 
Welcome to the forums. I like that your're visualizing your ideal world. It really helps to know what you want out of polyamory. The next step is actually trying to get it accomplished in the real world.

How would you visualize broaching this subject with hubby? Would you just have a heart-to-heart, or would you maybe mention the possibility while watching some poly/open scenes on TV or a movie?

What are you prepared to do with ex if you never broach the subject with hubby? Will you do some legwork first to determine ex's wife's feelings on the subject? How will you feel out the ex to determine his true intentions?

Sorry for all the questions, but your post intrigued me.
 
Sounds very familiar.
My advice-just dont jump the gun and act on anything.
Start the topic without personal examples or anticdotes. Maybe start with something about Will Smith and Jaeda Pinkett (happy open marriage) or some other big name whose out as happily married and poly. I know there was a singer who came out poly... I can't remember her name. I think her husband was an author.....
 
How would you visualize broaching this subject with hubby? Would you just have a heart-to-heart, or would you maybe mention the possibility while watching some poly/open scenes on TV or a movie?

What are you prepared to do with ex if you never broach the subject with hubby? Will you do some legwork first to determine ex's wife's feelings on the subject? How will you feel out the ex to determine his true intentions?

Interesting questions, LearninginTN, thanks, too, for the welcome :)

Thinking about speaking from the heart is interesting as many communication challenges exist between hubby and myself. The irony is that with my long-life friend/love, I feel I could say anything...

I have spoken with hubby about how marriage can feel like a box, in the context of his parents' 42 year long marriage since they were teens. I spoke with empathy towards the parent with the desire to divorce but also asking is there another option that they could agree on.

In some ways, I am recognizing for myself that I need to be better friends with my hubby so that we can communicate as friends. Monogamy in my experience has always included elements of possession and jealousy. This may also be why I never had a relationship last more than two years prior to having kids!

As for the ex -- I prize honesty and integrity, so I haven't even spoken about my feelings with him. It makes no sense in the context of my knowing that until I could have a conversation with my hubby about it, there's no action I could take anyway with my ex. Just bringing up with my hubby the professional connection made my hubby immediately stop the conversation. There's more communication that needs to happen before I can open up lines of open-hearted communication with the ex, sadly.

Maybe this is why polyamory is most interesting to me these days -- why can't I have these feelings and be open about them? There is this idea I have internalized about emotional infidelity...and so I have kept the feelings that are not for my husband stuffed inside and have avoided that part of me. It makes me sad to feel like people who are important to me cannot be close to me except for dark, quiet corners of my mind.

It seems life is bigger than that. Love is bigger.

Thanks for getting me to think more on this!

Appreciate it.
 
Sounds very familiar.
My advice-just dont jump the gun and act on anything.
Start the topic without personal examples or anticdotes. Maybe start with something about Will Smith and Jaeda Pinkett (happy open marriage) or some other big name whose out as happily married and poly. I know there was a singer who came out poly... I can't remember her name. I think her husband was an author.....

Thanks, LovingRadiance, for mentioning Will and Jada -- I didn't know they were open! That's what happens when you are a mom to homeschooled kids -- little connection to the larger world! An interesting and non-threatening way to discuss polyamory to start...

And, curious -- what do you mean by saying "sounds very familiar"? Will I find stories here like mine? Where? I'd love to read more...
 
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I home school also and no tv. ;) I understand the mental isolation from the "real" world lol!

I met my husband when I was 13. But then he disappearred for 10 yrs.
I met my bf when I was 18. We became best friends asap. Lovers off and on.

I married my husband when I was 25- still best friends with GG, still loved him but tried doing "marriage by the books". I failed that. Had an affair with GG.

Husbband and I decided to try to work it out. In 2009 I told him I am inherently poly (didnt know the term before that, but prior to marriage my life was always very poly in style).

I deeply love my exgirlfriend (from when I was 19) and remain in friendly contact (she is NOT poly).
I love my exboyfriend (last partner before I married) and we are in frequent contact. In fact he's coming over this weekend to help my husband with tiling our bathroom. :)
 
Husband and I decided to try to work it out. In 2009 I told him I am inherently poly (didnt know the term before that, but prior to marriage my life was always very poly in style).

(edit)

I love my exboyfriend (last partner before I married) and we are in frequent contact. In fact he's coming over this weekend to help my husband with tiling our bathroom. :)

How would you describe a poly style life? I was a serial monogamist before marriage, but if I had had an open enough mind about polyamory, I might have been able to sustain multiple relationships...instead, I ended one before starting another...

Love that your loves are able to be friends :)
 
When I was in 1st-3rd grade, there were two boys I was sure I would grow up to marry (not one after another-both at the same time).
Then we moved.
4-6th grade there were again, 2 boys.
In high school there were two-one is the father of my first child, the other helped raise her until he moved out of state 2 years later.

While dating my girlfriend at 18, while she was a professed lesbian, we both were very attached to GG (my current bf). The three of us seriously discussed and planned to move together when she left for college and raise my daughter as a family together.

The last partner I had before Maca reappeared in my life, we had an open relationship. Our relationship started when he and his best friend pursued me. We weren't a triad or even a v. But we had numerous 3-somes together and we were all friends.

While I was raised in a very religious household (church 3 times a week, parents were the youth leaders blah blah blah)-
I never believed in the idea that love was finite. I always believed (in large part due to my religious upbringing) that love was something we were meant to share with everyone. I found it confusing even as a young child that we were "supposed to love everyone with the love of Christ" & "husbands should love their wives as Christ loved the church" & there were these specified limits and boundaries that we then should "forsake all others" and only love our spouse. It seemed an obvious conflict to me.

I spent years struggling with that. While dating my last partner before marriage, who was also Christian, I spent hours upon hours in deep discussion with him on the topic. He happened to agree that it was a conflict. During that relationship we began researching history and specifically the history of the Bible, various translations etc.
We concluded that it was a pointed and probably intentional subterfuge of reality. We concluded that love IS meant to be shared and that in sharing it, it grows. But, that doing so requires a loss of control and because people fear the unknown, we create imaginary rules to give us a sense of safety (false though it may be) and THAT is what all that structure of monogamy is actually about-false control and false security.

ANYWAY! That fell through when I married Maca-because he was so entrenched in insecurity and abandonment issues, I felt it my job to try to patiently help him heal... EPIC FAIL. Monogamy wasn't realistic for me and he was unwilling to consider that there was any healing he needed to do. His insecurity and abandonment issues fit perfectly into society's conditioning for controlling monogamy.
It blew up in my face (and his).
 
We concluded that love IS meant to be shared and that in sharing it, it grows. But, that doing so requires a loss of control and because people fear the unknown, we create imaginary rules to give us a sense of safety (false though it may be) and THAT is what all that structure of monogamy is actually about-false control and false security.

ANYWAY! That fell through when I married Maca-because he was so entrenched in insecurity and abandonment issues, I felt it my job to try to patiently help him heal... EPIC FAIL. Monogamy wasn't realistic for me and he was unwilling to consider that there was any healing he needed to do. His insecurity and abandonment issues fit perfectly into society's conditioning for controlling monogamy.
It blew up in my face (and his).

Thanks, LovingRadiance, for sharing your story!

I'm sorry things did not work out with Maca, but glad that you figured out the roots of the reasons why.

Your story makes me wonder about the roots of human insecurity...?

Maybe we all get imprinted with fear of abandonment by society and it takes being able to let go of fear and to really embrace the fullness and bigness of love and every person's ability to love so that we can embrace others without controlling behavior and insecurity.

Your story is helping me look at my own insecurity and fear. Perhaps that's the place to start with for me on my path exploring polyamory :)

Thanks for your sharing!

Warmly,
Wantsacracker
 
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