I'm new to the concept, and would love to see if I could get such a relationship to work myself, so I'd like to know what kind of failures you had, so I can learn from them. Only if you care to share, of course.
Good luck in finding the right woman.
ARod,
We first tried in 2002. We had a friend of six years. Everything seemed to click between us. She was divorced. She was open to a relationship. We started seeing each other. Over a period of about three months, she slowly started moving from Triad to V and eventually said she couldn't handle the idea of sharing someone she loved. She also started to try to pull Ben away from Bex. Ben put his foot down and said it wasn't going to happen and she bailed.
We waited about five years to heal the pain and then started looking again. About the time we started discovering some possible interest points, Bex got pregnant--and we didn't want to go through two major life changes at the same time, so we stopped looking.
After the baby was about a year old, we started looking again (a year and a half ago). We met someone who seemed like a great fit--but then ran into some serious questions about her integrity. She had all the right answers, but we were still nervous. Her answers seemed almost "too good". Then she ran into difficulty with her family, they threatened us with legal battles, had her committed for 96 hour watch--all because of poly views.
We backed away from each other, she found someone else as an FWB, and yet posted online about how much she wanted to join our family. There were some hurt feelings on her part and ours, too.
Two months ago, Ben and she got together and started to talk about trying again. She said she would, that she would put her other relationship on "just friends" status and try. After seven weeks, we discovered that she was lying the whole time. Not only didn't she put the relationship on hold, but actually *started* a committed relationship *the very next day*. (We found an email from her that told him "I love you" for the first time and where she asked him to marry her.)
When Ben confronted her about it, she started to deny it, then he pointed it out and she admitted to everything, apologized, said she would really put it on hold and give us a solid six-month "trial connection". Two days later, she was waffling again.
A fwe weeks ago, she had asked us to help her discover if she had any outstanding warrants (we have some good connections) and the information came back just after all this happenend. We discovered that a lot of those "too good to be true" answers were just that. She has been lying to us from the start.
(As an example, she claimed that she was divorced, then discovered she was still married and claimed it was a complete surprise--but we found that not only was she fully divorced, she actually *remarried* the same guy the year before she met us and had made NO ATTEMPT AT ALL to dissolve the second marriage. We're very particular that we don't get involved with those who are married. It's a matter of honor for us--and she knew that from the start.)
Long story short (too late!), we just keep uncovering lie after lie after lie after lie. And we don't believe you can establish a loving, trusting relationship on a bed of lies.
This is really the short version and so much has been left out. Feel free (anyone!) to ask questions, give advice, etc.
And for the record, we're not interested in flings, short-term stuff, quick hops into bed or just sexual experiences--we're looking for a life-long love, a woman who wants to join our marriage and our lives until we pass into the next life.