I'm here to vent because I'm caught between a rock and a hard place. I've touched on these issues in another forum, but this is another dimension to my situation.
I was never really poly... I started dating an older man, D, last year, who openly told me that he was married and had just started going on dates because his wife had decided to open the relationship. They were each others' first everything, had married young, and had a daughter three years ago. She was in the BDSM community, and wanted to open the marriage so she could advance in a relationship with one specific man. So for the first time since high school, D found himself looking for a girlfriend. He wasn't really interested in it at all. He only started the whole process to make things seem "fair" and he wanted to give her what she wanted.
Skip forward a year later, and he and I are extremely close. I have a busy life, so it usually mostly works out that I don't have a ton of time to spend with him. We see each other 2 nights a week (one overnight). The rest of the time he's busy being an incredibly committed husband and father. Meanwhile our relationship has flourished. I've never felt this kind of love for another person. So at the same time, since I'm not naturally poly, and I'm relatively young, it is painful sometimes to think that I can't really have him all the way. But mostly I'm ok with dealing with these feelings. He's made it clear that I'm staying no matter what and that I'm a crucial part of his life now.
Recently things have been a little rocky. I've always felt like his wife is jealous of our closeness, and tries in some small ways to make me still feel "secondary". We have to always ask for her approval every time we see each other, etc. I also just found out that they made the decision to have another child recently without discussing it with me or S's partner, and S is already pregnant. I have struggled with this a lot emotionally for reasons that are hard even for me to understand.
I've always wondered a little bit... especially when I'm having a dark time emotionally with this and have what D and I call our "bad thoughts"... why they are together. They don't seem physically close. Their personalities are wildly different. And, at the beginning of this whole thing, she really did hurt him by confessing that she wanted to see someone else (let me make clear again, that neither D nor I started out poly so this didn't come naturally to us). At my worst I find myself thinking that I'm so much better than she is. They don't fight and get along fairly well, but there is just nothing there. I mostly kept these feelings to myself and didn't act on them because I thought there was something I wasn't seeing and I didn't want to interfere if D's and my relationship was still flourishing.
When D told me about the pregnancy, he confessed something else. That what he has discovered with me is something he never had with her. That he is sure that he loves me more, and only married her originally because she was the first person who came along. These confessions are dangerous, but a small part of me still liked hearing them. I know that's wrong. I don't know what to do.
After discussing it later, he said that family comes first, and she is his family. Obviously he had still decided to move forward with having another child with her, because "that was always the plan". But part of me feels like this is not the way poly is supposed to be. Sometimes it seems like they are just friendly roommates raising children, and I am the addition for him that makes it worth it because I provide the romantic connection he's discovered he does need. I guess this can work if everyone is happy with it, but now I find myself really hoping for the alternate universe where things could maybe be different. But I know he's too much of a standup guy to let that happen. He basically told me that he wouldn't want his daughter (and the one on the way) to be raised in a divorced family. Nevermind the fact that they would still be surrounded by a world of love from so many people... his mind is fully made up.
Looking for any kind of advice or any similar experiences. Right now I see myself moving forward preserving things basically as they are. We will all work on communication, I'll be there for his current daughter and future child even though the idea of being part of a complete family is sometimes hard, and keep thinking about maybe having a family of my own with him someday (which we have talked about a lot). I'll do my best to be friendly with my metamour. It's complicated, but maybe it will work out. I'm just wondering if I'm a bad person for having these ideas sometimes.
I was never really poly... I started dating an older man, D, last year, who openly told me that he was married and had just started going on dates because his wife had decided to open the relationship. They were each others' first everything, had married young, and had a daughter three years ago. She was in the BDSM community, and wanted to open the marriage so she could advance in a relationship with one specific man. So for the first time since high school, D found himself looking for a girlfriend. He wasn't really interested in it at all. He only started the whole process to make things seem "fair" and he wanted to give her what she wanted.
Skip forward a year later, and he and I are extremely close. I have a busy life, so it usually mostly works out that I don't have a ton of time to spend with him. We see each other 2 nights a week (one overnight). The rest of the time he's busy being an incredibly committed husband and father. Meanwhile our relationship has flourished. I've never felt this kind of love for another person. So at the same time, since I'm not naturally poly, and I'm relatively young, it is painful sometimes to think that I can't really have him all the way. But mostly I'm ok with dealing with these feelings. He's made it clear that I'm staying no matter what and that I'm a crucial part of his life now.
Recently things have been a little rocky. I've always felt like his wife is jealous of our closeness, and tries in some small ways to make me still feel "secondary". We have to always ask for her approval every time we see each other, etc. I also just found out that they made the decision to have another child recently without discussing it with me or S's partner, and S is already pregnant. I have struggled with this a lot emotionally for reasons that are hard even for me to understand.
I've always wondered a little bit... especially when I'm having a dark time emotionally with this and have what D and I call our "bad thoughts"... why they are together. They don't seem physically close. Their personalities are wildly different. And, at the beginning of this whole thing, she really did hurt him by confessing that she wanted to see someone else (let me make clear again, that neither D nor I started out poly so this didn't come naturally to us). At my worst I find myself thinking that I'm so much better than she is. They don't fight and get along fairly well, but there is just nothing there. I mostly kept these feelings to myself and didn't act on them because I thought there was something I wasn't seeing and I didn't want to interfere if D's and my relationship was still flourishing.
When D told me about the pregnancy, he confessed something else. That what he has discovered with me is something he never had with her. That he is sure that he loves me more, and only married her originally because she was the first person who came along. These confessions are dangerous, but a small part of me still liked hearing them. I know that's wrong. I don't know what to do.
After discussing it later, he said that family comes first, and she is his family. Obviously he had still decided to move forward with having another child with her, because "that was always the plan". But part of me feels like this is not the way poly is supposed to be. Sometimes it seems like they are just friendly roommates raising children, and I am the addition for him that makes it worth it because I provide the romantic connection he's discovered he does need. I guess this can work if everyone is happy with it, but now I find myself really hoping for the alternate universe where things could maybe be different. But I know he's too much of a standup guy to let that happen. He basically told me that he wouldn't want his daughter (and the one on the way) to be raised in a divorced family. Nevermind the fact that they would still be surrounded by a world of love from so many people... his mind is fully made up.
Looking for any kind of advice or any similar experiences. Right now I see myself moving forward preserving things basically as they are. We will all work on communication, I'll be there for his current daughter and future child even though the idea of being part of a complete family is sometimes hard, and keep thinking about maybe having a family of my own with him someday (which we have talked about a lot). I'll do my best to be friendly with my metamour. It's complicated, but maybe it will work out. I'm just wondering if I'm a bad person for having these ideas sometimes.