Krazykitty
New member
Hi All,
I have not posted much and I'm so freshly new to polyamory it's insane. My husband and I started "negotiations" last month. Neither one of us has dated or anything else, outside of our relationship, so please bear with me. I hope this makes sense.
He and I have become so close since he asked for us to become polyamorous. It's brought out many issues that lay hidden between us and has washed them away or helped to bring them out. Some of my personal hang-ups have been healed.
Just for clarity, my husband and I have been together this time for 5 years, married for 2 years, but we were "off and on," I guess you'd say, for a long time previously. We have an almost-18-year old child together. Long story.
I am dealing with a desire to get a jump on the process of polyamorous dating and find someone else right away, before he can do so. My husband saw someone, a co-worker of mine, and that caused him to ask for a non-monogamous arrangement. I don't really know the girl, but I can't help comparing myself to her (finding myself deficient in looks, femininity, and fashion sense) and then pretty much coming to the conclusion that I need to locate a secondary partner, someone who thinks I am very beautiful.
I think this strategy might help to mitigate the effects of my husband's desires and the true things he's telling me. If another person might become involved with me, who would tell me how wonderful I look, I think this would make it bearable...
Is that unethical? I can exercise, put on more make-up, etc., but I'm still an average-looking 42-year old woman, and as long as he's fantasizing about this absolutely STUNNING 26-year old creature, I feel as if I'm fading into obscurity. This can't be right.
Please, please try to be nice... I don't even know what I'm feeling half the time... All I know is my heart breaks JUST a little (I'm getting better about it) when he starts going on and on about this girl. I know he's tried to tone it down, but I can tell he's practically salivating every time he even thinks of her.
I found her picture on Facebook. She's friend of a friend. I showed my husband last night and he went a little crazy. Our usual bedtime play and teasing turned into him being like, "I want to fuck other girls!!" I was trying to be nice and trying to find "compersion" of some sort when I found her picture, and that's what happened.
This is one reason I have so much fear of a time when he might actually start seeing her. I want a safe nest I can be in when/if this happens and I don't wanna be alone!! Does this make sense to anyone?
See, my husband rarely (I think it happened once) tells me I'm beautiful and in fact, I'm not, I guess. He tells me I'm "cute" sometimes. I'm kinda average looking, and also about 16 years older than the other girl. I can't really compare to the movie-star type beauty in my co-worker. Also I am not his "type": I'm very tomboyish and he likes the primped, preened, "girly" girls quite a bit better, to look at, that is.
He and I are together because of being basically soulmates (long story, like I said.) Life could not keep us apart and our life experiences are spiritually incredibly similar. We're not together so much because he thinks I'm so beautiful. So if he can go out and be with someone more beautiful than me, it makes sense to me that I should find someone soon, whose favorite women look a lot like me. I feel that this would pre-emptively fill the gap that would appear if/when my husband is actually seeing, being friends with, or sleeping with this woman that he finds so incredibly beautiful.
I have a funny feeling that I am wrong in this circumstance. I know I need to rely on myself emotionally, but it's just too damn hard. I'm hurting so much, especially about the looks/"beauty" issue. How can I get my needs met? Is it wrong to look for someone to date or hang out with, in order to prevent or mitigate being emotionally harmed later?
Can someone help me sort things out a little better? Is anyone else dealing with the issue of not being your primary partner's physical "type" or not as good-looking as your primary's "other" partner? How have others dealt with this sort of thing, if at all?
Thanks so much for taking the time to read my rambling post. PMs are welcome.
I have not posted much and I'm so freshly new to polyamory it's insane. My husband and I started "negotiations" last month. Neither one of us has dated or anything else, outside of our relationship, so please bear with me. I hope this makes sense.
He and I have become so close since he asked for us to become polyamorous. It's brought out many issues that lay hidden between us and has washed them away or helped to bring them out. Some of my personal hang-ups have been healed.
Just for clarity, my husband and I have been together this time for 5 years, married for 2 years, but we were "off and on," I guess you'd say, for a long time previously. We have an almost-18-year old child together. Long story.
I am dealing with a desire to get a jump on the process of polyamorous dating and find someone else right away, before he can do so. My husband saw someone, a co-worker of mine, and that caused him to ask for a non-monogamous arrangement. I don't really know the girl, but I can't help comparing myself to her (finding myself deficient in looks, femininity, and fashion sense) and then pretty much coming to the conclusion that I need to locate a secondary partner, someone who thinks I am very beautiful.
I think this strategy might help to mitigate the effects of my husband's desires and the true things he's telling me. If another person might become involved with me, who would tell me how wonderful I look, I think this would make it bearable...
Is that unethical? I can exercise, put on more make-up, etc., but I'm still an average-looking 42-year old woman, and as long as he's fantasizing about this absolutely STUNNING 26-year old creature, I feel as if I'm fading into obscurity. This can't be right.
Please, please try to be nice... I don't even know what I'm feeling half the time... All I know is my heart breaks JUST a little (I'm getting better about it) when he starts going on and on about this girl. I know he's tried to tone it down, but I can tell he's practically salivating every time he even thinks of her.
I found her picture on Facebook. She's friend of a friend. I showed my husband last night and he went a little crazy. Our usual bedtime play and teasing turned into him being like, "I want to fuck other girls!!" I was trying to be nice and trying to find "compersion" of some sort when I found her picture, and that's what happened.
This is one reason I have so much fear of a time when he might actually start seeing her. I want a safe nest I can be in when/if this happens and I don't wanna be alone!! Does this make sense to anyone?
See, my husband rarely (I think it happened once) tells me I'm beautiful and in fact, I'm not, I guess. He tells me I'm "cute" sometimes. I'm kinda average looking, and also about 16 years older than the other girl. I can't really compare to the movie-star type beauty in my co-worker. Also I am not his "type": I'm very tomboyish and he likes the primped, preened, "girly" girls quite a bit better, to look at, that is.
He and I are together because of being basically soulmates (long story, like I said.) Life could not keep us apart and our life experiences are spiritually incredibly similar. We're not together so much because he thinks I'm so beautiful. So if he can go out and be with someone more beautiful than me, it makes sense to me that I should find someone soon, whose favorite women look a lot like me. I feel that this would pre-emptively fill the gap that would appear if/when my husband is actually seeing, being friends with, or sleeping with this woman that he finds so incredibly beautiful.
I have a funny feeling that I am wrong in this circumstance. I know I need to rely on myself emotionally, but it's just too damn hard. I'm hurting so much, especially about the looks/"beauty" issue. How can I get my needs met? Is it wrong to look for someone to date or hang out with, in order to prevent or mitigate being emotionally harmed later?
Can someone help me sort things out a little better? Is anyone else dealing with the issue of not being your primary partner's physical "type" or not as good-looking as your primary's "other" partner? How have others dealt with this sort of thing, if at all?
Thanks so much for taking the time to read my rambling post. PMs are welcome.