question for all: easier with one than the other?

mekodesu

New member
Evening/morning and salutations

so i was just talking with one of my partners (or whatever we are at the moment) and i had a few realizations in the conversation. when this all started i was better friends (best) with one (BG) than the other (B whom i was talking to) in fact i really barely knew her and she is the wife of my best friend.

my relationship with bg is completely different than with b, how we interact with each other and so forth.. our friendship has been easier and i guess some aspects of that relationship as well because of our already existing friendship and connecting on that level. so that in turn means the majority of my relationship with b has been not only building the relationship but establishing the friendship, which i wish had occurred when i first met them.

so some of what has been on my mind alot with this break we are on is my relationship with B and how it has at times been strained, we fight more we disagree more ect, ect (and in alot of ways we are very similar). i told her tonight i think one of the reasons for this is that we both are trying to hard instead of things being natural anymore.

She has brought things up that have bothered her to me before and i have heard them and tried but failed to act on them in a way that was felt to be adequate to rectify them (meaning more strain of course)

so the question is (and this may be more for secondary’s than primaries but all opinions welcome) has anyone else had this experience where they mesh amazingly with one but the other isnt as easy. And primaries have you felt third wheel at times with your secondary and other partner because of their relationship and/or that when the issue is brought up the solution is never quite completed?

also how did you handle that situation was it cut loss and run or try and work it through it.
 
so the question is (and this may be more for secondary’s than primaries but all opinions welcome) has anyone else had this experience where they mesh amazingly with one but the other isnt as easy. And primaries have you felt third wheel at times with your secondary and other partner because of their relationship and/or that when the issue is brought up the solution is never quite completed?

also how did you handle that situation was it cut loss and run or try and work it through it.
yes, I have meshed better for different reasons to one over the others. My husband, PN is poly. Sometimes I talk about concepts with him expecting him to not get it, or argue a different point with me or throw up his arms and agree to disagree only to find that he knows exactly what I am talking about... whereas Mono doesn't get it. On the other hand, there is a lot that Mono does and understands lots that PN doesn't.

We used secondary/primary descriptions at one point and still do where it comes to responsibility to our child/property/family matters... but that is it. I think feeling a third wheel has nothing to do with secondary/primary relationships. A third wheel is a third wheel. A secondary partner shouldn't have to feel they should hold back or a primary step up in such cases. It is what it is and dealing with it without the confusion of labels makes more sense to me than confusing issues with descriptions such as primary and secondary. We were all equals in times where there is a struggle... and now we are just all equal... all individuals and all an entity unto ourselves.

PN sometimes is a bit of a third wheel I think in that he is an introvert who stays quiet sometimes and is in his own head. Mono is far more gregarious and can steel the spot light from PN. I think PN used to get frustrated with this, but like everything, there is usually a reason for frustration of this sort. Turned out he wasn't taking responsibility for his social life, keeping up with friends, finding new one, and taking on his presence at social gatherings. He holds his own when he engages to do so. It had nothing to do with his status in my life and everything to do with himself.

Mono tends to shrink in situations where he feels PN is not being represented as my husband. He takes a back seat to uphold our marriage and put it on a higher pedestal. BARF! I hate that shit. :p No one to me has a rank. And certainly no one should be anything but themselves as far as I am concerned. I realize he is concerned and being respectful, but its the motive behind it. He is in the military though. He says he does better with a rank. I keep telling him that if that is what he wants then I am his chief and he has to cut that shit out :p:D ya, it doesn't always work. He is really being himself it seems.
 
b brought it up to me after it was mentioned from her friend tonight that first impression was that there was an obvious connection with bg and i but it didnt seem like it was there with b and i (or as stong) this is a person i had just met at the time and didnt know how she would think of things or what not so there i did hold back some yes.

the other time this was mentioned was by another friend who has known them both longer than i have. apparently the question was only asked of B and not of bg (this was this summer) this caused b to try even harder to prover her wrong (there is that trying to hard thing again) they were both however very worried about what she would think

at one point we did decide that the labels were rather useless because we didnt see it that way, but with the pregnancy that has changed. (i mentioned that i had felt rather secondary over something to get the response well you are and it wasnta a joke)

i think that these labels work at the beginning maybe but thing cant be thought of like that in the relationship because it efects everyone involved, and that a form of equal standing should be established especially if its something that all parties want to continue and maintain.
 
meko, I am glad you started this thread because I am a bit confused about your relationship with B.

You consider yourselves a triad? 3 equal partners, all primaries? Or you're in a love/sexual relationship with BG and are merely friends/metamours with B, a V configuration?

If you're in love and sexual with BG, but just trying to be friends with B because she is lovers with BG, many people find it isn't necessary to be just as close with the one you are in love with, as it is to be loving or even friendly with her lover. There is certainly no need to have 3way sex if you're not attracted to her.

Especially now, you're apart from BG. There really is no reason to be best buds with B if you are quite different people and disagree on many issues in life. Sure, it's important to be civil and polite, but there doesn't need to be an intensity of love and caring if you're not feeling it. You certainly don't need to force the issue.
 
Of *course* a person involved with a couple will usually feel a stronger connection with one member than the other. I mean, what two friends do you have that you felt exactly the same way about from the beginning? What two loves in your life developed in exactly the same way at exactly the same time? It *can* work out such that things are roughly equal, and I do believe that sometimes a person can feel NRE for a couple as much as for the individuals within it, but I think this is the exception rather than the rule.

Trying to force it is a very bad idea, feeling pressured tends to push people apart rather than bring them closer. Let it be what it is. If you have a strong connection with one partner and not the other, maybe what you have is a vee and not a triad. And that's ok. I honestly feel like the third/secondary/person-coming-in-from-the-outside had some responsibility but in the end it HAS to be up to the members of the preexisting couple to make sure that neither of them is feeling slighted or like a third wheel or whatever by the new relationship. If the natural shape of your relationship is more like a vee than a triad, or if it's not an equilateral triad, then maybe you should do more separate dates as twosomes and just hang together more casually as friends when it's all three of you rather than feeling like all three partners have to be together all the time with one of them just feeling unnecessary.

Forget what your friends think. Just tell them "Yes, we each have different relationships that look different because we're different people, that doesn't mean we don't all care about each other."

Getting together with my gf and her husband was a huge learning experience. Going into things, I had the misconception that it would make more sense for me to be dating both of them if I was going to be dating one of them. That would have been a huge mistake, because Eric wasn't ready to engage emotionally with me the way Gia was. Expecting each relationship to work the same way would have resulted in unhappiness all around.
 
Magdlyn we consider ourselves a triad and i love them both very much, when our adventure began bg and i already had a well established good friendship and i communicated with her more, wehn i originally met them a few years back i only got to meet B for a very short amount of time and we really didnt start talking more until a couple years later which happened to be about the same time we started our relationship.

the friendship in both cases is important to me because i feel that it is also very important in any relationship to have a freindship basis with it, i have always believed that if you are going to spend your life with someone (if it comes to that) that person or persons should be not only your lover but your best friend(s) and in any relaitonship you should be able to consider your lover a friend.
 
. I mean, what two friends do you have that you felt exactly the same way about from the beginning? What two loves in your life developed in exactly the same way at exactly the same time?

i completely agree, no relationship is not going to be the exact same jsut as no relationship is going to be the exact same, it would be so very weird for me if it was because they are two different people and thats what i love about them.

. you should do more separate dates as twosomes and just hang together more casually as friends when it's all three of you.

i actually did suggest seperate dates with each of them after this issue was raised last year, in my opinion that actually worked well. when we are out together all three we are out as friends, this is in part to the professional life aspect for them

. Forget what your friends think. Just tell them "Yes, we each have different relationships that look different because we're different people, that doesn't mean we don't all care about each other.".

this is EXACTLY what i think, when its their relationship and life they can have a say. the only time an opinion will matter is if it could have negative impact on my professional life or on one of theirs (thus discretion in public)

while B and i have similarities i am very different than both of them, in some life experiences and especially in some of my thinking. in a way i think its my very funtastic punk rock self (and old skewl punk not this new crap they try calling punk. i have always been an individual and not cared of what others think if i know its not important because no one shapes me BUT me!)
 
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