WanderingINTJ
New member
Though I am unsure what to title this thread, I'm sure my story won't be a new or unique one. I am thoroughly glad that I found a place to express myself. My views have seemed to morph so much, and it seems there are very few people with who I can converse and receive feedback. Essentially, I feel alone. I'll let my first post be a summary then will proceed to add details later.
I'm pretty much at a point after 8 years of a monogamous marriage that I am very interested in polyamory, but my husband is not. Monogamy was nothing I really thought about until a couple of years ago. It was then it was questioned. I guess monogamy was apart of that forsaking all others, but I really never have thought to what it exactly meant. Probably because I identify on the asexual spectrum, the role of sex in my life was not important nor contemplated a lot. I've had sex with people before, but it just was umimportant and uneventful (not to say it was bad, but just the way I processed it) that it's seems I never gave a lot of thought to what I was engaging in and what it meant.
Well, after developing some feelings for a friend of 14 years (that I never was attracted to before-after discovering a asexuality, that helped to maybe explain,) I contemplated more about my feelings. I did not tell myself that I was not supposed to have feelings for someone else and didn't feel hugely guilty because they were not primarily sexual in nature, I simply said to myself, how can I manage these feelings because they can't possibly be horribly wrong. It felt very much like having affectionate and truly loving feelings for a friend.
I began doing research and came across poly. I felt I was capable of strongly emotionally connecting to more than one person. It was then I proceeded to ask my husband what he thought about being emotionally connected to multiple people. He stated that he thought this should be exclusive to a man and wife just like sex. I proceeded to tell him that I thought I was capable.
With my proposal of polyamory, came rejection from him. To him, he felt I was reacting to untreated depression and because of my mental health deficits I would not be able to be in relationship with anyone more than him. He even stated I wasn't truly asexual, because I wanted a polyamorous relationship, and needed a diagnosis. This was all about 18 months ago.
Over the course of this time, things have continued on. I continued researching and trying to connect with others that were familiar with what was going on in my head. Overall, this has been a journey just truly learning about myself and how I'm meant to live life (at least in this moment.) I relearned that I've always thought that two people exclusively providing each other's needs for life was never a realistic ideal for me. I just went into a monogamous marriage because it was the right thing to do. The best way to raise children. I really wish I would have known I wasn't by myself before marriage.
I've learned that in my life, I Live life full of changes, phases, new things, adventure and a long term monogamous marriage does not seem to fit into that. That has been very hard for me to accept. That everything else in your life is allowed to change (probably with the allowance of your spouse) but not your marriage and the vows you stated. I have come to believe, the things in any relationship are and should be open to negotiation. Not to say everyone gets what they want all the time, but there is flexibility. Unfortunately, after time, I think I have come to the decision that my husband and I should part ways. He can get what he needs out of a relationship (as he is a very passionate, sexual, affectionate person who has compromised himself a bit to accommodate my asexual ways and sometimes aromance- I was hoping him finding an additional relationship would be an answer) and me, I can get whatever out of life. We do have a daughter, so that is the most difficult part of making this decision.
Pursuing polyamory just seems like a way to additionally fully live life, discover new things, people, and places. There's definitely more about all of this that I will add. In the mean time, thank you for reading and feel free to comment.
I'm pretty much at a point after 8 years of a monogamous marriage that I am very interested in polyamory, but my husband is not. Monogamy was nothing I really thought about until a couple of years ago. It was then it was questioned. I guess monogamy was apart of that forsaking all others, but I really never have thought to what it exactly meant. Probably because I identify on the asexual spectrum, the role of sex in my life was not important nor contemplated a lot. I've had sex with people before, but it just was umimportant and uneventful (not to say it was bad, but just the way I processed it) that it's seems I never gave a lot of thought to what I was engaging in and what it meant.
Well, after developing some feelings for a friend of 14 years (that I never was attracted to before-after discovering a asexuality, that helped to maybe explain,) I contemplated more about my feelings. I did not tell myself that I was not supposed to have feelings for someone else and didn't feel hugely guilty because they were not primarily sexual in nature, I simply said to myself, how can I manage these feelings because they can't possibly be horribly wrong. It felt very much like having affectionate and truly loving feelings for a friend.
I began doing research and came across poly. I felt I was capable of strongly emotionally connecting to more than one person. It was then I proceeded to ask my husband what he thought about being emotionally connected to multiple people. He stated that he thought this should be exclusive to a man and wife just like sex. I proceeded to tell him that I thought I was capable.
With my proposal of polyamory, came rejection from him. To him, he felt I was reacting to untreated depression and because of my mental health deficits I would not be able to be in relationship with anyone more than him. He even stated I wasn't truly asexual, because I wanted a polyamorous relationship, and needed a diagnosis. This was all about 18 months ago.
Over the course of this time, things have continued on. I continued researching and trying to connect with others that were familiar with what was going on in my head. Overall, this has been a journey just truly learning about myself and how I'm meant to live life (at least in this moment.) I relearned that I've always thought that two people exclusively providing each other's needs for life was never a realistic ideal for me. I just went into a monogamous marriage because it was the right thing to do. The best way to raise children. I really wish I would have known I wasn't by myself before marriage.
I've learned that in my life, I Live life full of changes, phases, new things, adventure and a long term monogamous marriage does not seem to fit into that. That has been very hard for me to accept. That everything else in your life is allowed to change (probably with the allowance of your spouse) but not your marriage and the vows you stated. I have come to believe, the things in any relationship are and should be open to negotiation. Not to say everyone gets what they want all the time, but there is flexibility. Unfortunately, after time, I think I have come to the decision that my husband and I should part ways. He can get what he needs out of a relationship (as he is a very passionate, sexual, affectionate person who has compromised himself a bit to accommodate my asexual ways and sometimes aromance- I was hoping him finding an additional relationship would be an answer) and me, I can get whatever out of life. We do have a daughter, so that is the most difficult part of making this decision.
Pursuing polyamory just seems like a way to additionally fully live life, discover new things, people, and places. There's definitely more about all of this that I will add. In the mean time, thank you for reading and feel free to comment.
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