Our introduction - looking for knowledge

SnC

New member
Hello! So here's our intro....

We are a very happily married couple of more than ten years. Prior to meeting my amazing wife, I was briefly in a poly-triad. It ended for a few reasons, none drama bearing, and it was all mature and handled well. At the time, I did quite a bit of reading with the then-available (read; alt newsgroups) resources, and felt I did an ok job educating myself. But, it's been a long time. My wife and I have always been 100000% honest and _truly_ open with each other about everything, so she of course knew full well about the poly triad I had been in. She didn't like it, and maintained that the lady in question was breaking her vows with her husband, despite all three of us being completely honest and on the same page with everything. In no sense was I trying to convince my wife to get into polyamory; just educate her about my past.

Fast forward to about 5 years ago now; we got into swinging. It's been a very enjoyable time for us. I can fill in more details about how we crossed over that bridge if people are curious; trying to keep this not so wordy :)

We've always felt it would be a good thing for us to have a (male) long term play partner for my wonderful wife. This seems like an ideal situation for us. We've tried for a long time now to find such a swing partner, with some minor successes but not achieving our goal. A bit frustrating.

Fast forwarding again...and without going into details, we find ourselves considering the possibility of a poly relationship with a man whom my wife has begun having feelings for. He is comfortable with the idea of poly. There's much to learn and discuss yet, and we're approaching it as mature, caring adults.

We've hit a bit of a bump in the road though (externally sourced). When we got into swinging we talked for months about it, educated ourselves, and only after we felt we'd comfortably answered everything we could think of did we dip our toes in the pool. We're both very glad we did. But, in this case we've kind of gone about it backwards. Hitting the bump in the road made us realize that we hadn't spent a lot of time in discussion, researching, questioning, etc. So, here we are...
 
Hi. First of all, are you male? Or female? Females can have wives these days... Why does your wife need a(nother) male in her life?

2nd, your wife is her own person. I am a bit uncomfortable with your use of "we."

Are you aware being poly does not mean having 3way sex? Being poly means loving more than one. So, your wife is falling for a guy... And you want to have 3 way sex with him? Or what? Can your wife pursue a relationship with new guy without your "help," or not? Or do you both insist on "only playing together" as so many poly noobs do?
 
SnC: I think we need more information about this "bump." What's the problem? What led up to it? Is it "your" problem or "hers?" i.e. Are you experiencing jealousy? Is she feeling like she's breaking her marriage vows? Or...?

Mag: I'm confused by your response. He doesn't say anything about 3-way sex, nor does he say she "needs" a(nother) man in her life... I'm also not entirely sure it's relevant whether they're a homo or heterosexual couple.

I'm sure his wife "can" pursue relationships without his help... but helping one another is what functional married people do. He has more experience with poly, and she has none, so it's natural that she would look to her spouse for guidance.

I do agree that posting as "we," and "us" finding a partner for "her," is confusing. If your wife needs help navigating these waters, I encourage her to create her own account and share her questions. This forum is anonymous and it can be really helpful to talk things out with objective strangers.
 
Hooboy. Ok, I didn't come here to be on the defensive.

My wife and I are extremely close. We are "we", and she is a million times happy with that. It doesn't make her less of her own person. I don't control her, nor she me. We are completely honest and open with each other in every respect, madly in love with each other, utterly devoted to each other, and adore making each other happy. Neither of us is even the slightest bit uncomfortable with the use of 'we' to describe each other in our relationship.

As for being poly not meaning having threesomes; I respectfully beg to differ. We refuse to be constrained by labels. If my wife and I choose to have emotional relationships with other people, and those people are comfortable with sharing physical intimacy with one of us and the other being there as well, a label doesn't preclude that.

My wife and I are a team. We do things on our own, but we're always a team. We share things, discuss things, help each other as much as we can, revel in each other's successes and comfort each other in our failings. If either of us is to develop an emotional relationship with someone else, then 'we' need to both be comfortable with that or it is a non-starter. It's not about control, or anything the like. Free? Absolutely. We've both made the free choice to actively walk together in whatever we do, and that includes potentially moving towards having emotional relationships with people other than each other.

We're not looking for advice about the 'bump' we've hit in the road. I didn't mean to suggest we were. The 'bump' made us realize that we need to better equip ourselves for being poly if we're going to do that. We equipped ourselves very well before we got into swinging. We've gone about it backwards with poly, and we're here to correct that; to educate ourselves and gain a better understanding.

As for any 'needs'; there isn't a need. My wife and I have discussed what we think we would like our relationship(s) to be, and over time we've become more and more comfortable with the idea of being in a poly triad.

As for my wife creating an account; she doesn't want to. As we've always done, she's always in the loop and prefers that I do the typing.
 
No one was really putting you on the defensive. Frequently, new members post an intro and older members will ask for clarification, such as genders, orientation, the why's and wherefore's of certain things posted, and other specifics, just so we can have a better picture of who you are - it doesn't mean necessarily that anyone was judging, but that there was something either unclear of confusing. Details help us offer better feedback for your situation. That's all.

Additionally, the "we" issue mentioned was not a question about your relationship and your solidarity with your partner - it was more a practical thing regarding posting on the forum. Just know that it gets super confusing for readers to understand who is doing the "talking" when people come here and use "we," or do not identify who is who. It is generally not good etiquette here to create one account to represent a couple or more than one person. That is why someone usually brings it up. If your wife has no interest in joining and posting herself, please just make sure you speak in your voice and let us know specifically when it is a communication from her or from both of you. It just helps to make things clear that way.

This is from the User Guidelines:

We expect that each account represent but a single person. We understand that couples may wish to embark on a poly journey as a unit and thus want to share an account. That can make for some awkward discussions as the person posting under a username changes from post to post. We have some accounts that have been used by a couple--and those folks may continue to use those accounts as long as they make it clear which person is posting--though we want all accounts to be used by a single person.

Welcome!
 
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I'll restate what I said above; "As for my wife creating an account; she doesn't want to. As we've always done, she's always in the loop and prefers that I do the typing. " She will never log in here.

My wife and I are both rather incensed at the approach here. We didn't come here to offend, create a situation where we're on the defensive, have bureaucracy thrown at us, or have to justify that we are together. We came here looking for knowledge, and now with an innocent posting a bee's nest has apparently been poked with vigor.

And yes, people were putting us on the defensive. With the very first response to this, I had to defend that my wife is in fact her own person, and defend that we are not uncomfortable in addressing ourselves as 'we". I didn't mention anything at all about having threesomes, but then have to defend on that. Now we're finding we have to defend why we will only ever have one account; a point which was already explained but we nevertheless have to defend it anyway.

Is this the norm for this forum? Treat people like "noobs", put them on the defensive, pretty much force them to explain themselves, and quote guidelines at them?

"Welcome" indeed.
 
Hi SnC,

No, it's not the norm for this forum for newcomers to be put on the spot. That said, it can be a, well, vigorous forum at times, and it's hard to predict where/when that will happen. If you stay with the forum, you'll find that it's usually pretty easy-going.

It sounds like your wife has traveled quite a journey to get to where she is now, compared to the beginning where she "maintained that the lady in question was breaking her vows with her husband, despite all three of us being completely honest and on the same page with everything." It's encouraging that she has opened her mind in that way.

There is a lot of valuable material on this site, and a lot of good opportunities to dialog with other members and get feedback. I would encourage you to take advantage of that, even though I'd understand/respect your decision if you decided not to. You can even message me privately if you're uncomfortable interacting with the group.

With regards,
Kevin T.
 
Is this the norm for this forum? Treat people like "noobs", put them on the defensive, pretty much force them to explain themselves, and quote guidelines at them?

"Welcome" indeed.

Ummm... nobody forced you to explain anything - this is an internet message board and we are all anonymous, so how could you be forced into anything when it is your choice to post or not? People asking questions is forcing you to defend and explain yourself? You don't have to explain a darn thing if you don't want to. :confused:

AND my quoting the guidelines was a courtesy I extended to you, so that you would know how this forum is run. Why wouldn't you want to know the guidelines, anyway? I was simply sharing information to help you understand why some other folks may have responded in the way they did. I was being nice by doing that.

And I was quite sincere when I welcomed you. But fuck that! Sheesh.
 
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Welcome SnC,

Sorry you were slapped with a wet-fish, the minute you opened yourself up,....
:eek: It just seems to be the nature of the beast. Experiences get triggered,..we all do it from time to time.

Take what value you can get from the site, and to hell with the rest. :cool:
 
I just wanted to know if you were male or female, since you didnt say, and since you said your wife wants a male lover. Kinda wondered why. And wondered what the bump in the road is. Like, transitioning from swinging to poly, are you afraid of your wife falling for another guy (if you are a guy) and leaving you?

And like NYCindie said, wanted to let you know it's not etiquette here for a couple to share an account.

In other words, I just wanted a chance to get to know you better so you could gain the "knowledge" you claim to be seeking.
 
let's shrug it off and move on

My first posting.... Hi SnC. My husband and I are new to poly, too.

Sorry about all the hooplah with the back and forth of the initial postings.

How about we all start over? I'm hoping to glean some info off this thread.
 
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And yes, people were putting us on the defensive. With the very first response to this, I had to defend that my wife is in fact her own person, and defend that we are not uncomfortable in addressing ourselves as 'we". I didn't mention anything at all about having threesomes, but then have to defend on that. Now we're finding we have to defend why we will only ever have one account; a point which was already explained but we nevertheless have to defend it anyway.

There was no accusation that your wife is not own person. In fact, both responses explicitly stated that your wife is her own person. Why would you interpret that as us saying exactly the opposite??

How is this forum "forcing" you to be defensive? One person said something that could be taken as abrasive. I agree, her post made assumptions that had no basis in your words. But that's one person, and no single person speaks on behalf of the entire group. Then I responded to her comment by pointing out that you said nothing about threesomes. You seem to have ignored my attempt to help you, but that's cool, I won't take it personally.

Is it possible that you're reading our words through tinted lenses? Have you received hurtful comments about your lifestyle in the past or on non-poly-friendly forums, and you're reading those comments in between the lines of our own, when such is not intended?

You say you're not looking for help with the bump, and that you're here for knowledge and discussion. That's all we're trying to do. But if not the bump, then you haven't given us much fodder for discussion. What was your intention in posting your introduction? If just to say "hi" then that's fine, just let us know that you don't have any specific questions right now, and we'll stop wasting our time on someone who doesn't want our help.

As for my wife creating an account; she doesn't want to. As we've always done, she's always in the loop and prefers that I do the typing.

Actually, folks, I'm siding with SnC on this one. The policy refers to a different situation, wherein two people login separately to the same account and use the first-person-singular to refer to different people in different posts.

That can make for some awkward discussions as the person posting under a username changes from post to post... we want all accounts to be used by a single person.

It's now explicitly clear that the husband is always the one at the keyboard, i.e. "using" the account. He speaks on behalf of his wife by referring to her in the third-person-singular. There's no confusion.

If you're going to harp about policy, make sure you fully understand it first...
 
Sorry about that SnC. It happens sometimes that people post without realizing how their "voice" can be perceived in an environment with no tone or body language. Unfortunately we the readers can't KNOW how a writer intended something to be read in every case.

Usually miscommunications can be resolved, since I think we all do it once in a while, but unfortunately there are also those who are either unable or unwilling to take the time to try to read their words as a stranger might, who insist that the reader is "wrong" because "that's not what I meant", and therefore seem to do it more often. I think this forum is better than many, though, because most people do seem to be trying their best most of the time.

Again, sorry that was your first experience here.
 
Sorry about that SnC. It happens sometimes that people post without realizing how their "voice" can be perceived in an environment with no tone or body language. Unfortunately we the readers can't KNOW how a writer intended something to be read in every case.

Well, there are always different ways of seeing. I'm going to chalk up the bad bits in posts above to textual misunderstanding.

Responding to some other elements...

You say you're not looking for help with the bump, and that you're here for knowledge and discussion. That's all we're trying to do. But if not the bump, then you haven't given us much fodder for discussion. What was your intention in posting your introduction? If just to say "hi" then that's fine, just let us know that you don't have any specific questions right now, and we'll stop wasting our time on someone who doesn't want our help.

:) We do want help, but we don't (think) we need help with the bump. We've intentionally avoided laying out the circumstances of the 'bump' because (a) we're working through it just fine, (b) we mentioned it to provide some understanding of what brought us here; realizing we needed more education and (c) it is possible the other fellow in this equation may be reading. We're not interested in keeping things from him, but I don't know that he would be interested in us posting about him here. That's why we said in the initial posting, "externally sourced" and left it at that.

As for the intro; we were just trying to be friendly, and add our introduction here. We weren't seeking anything other than just to say 'hi, we're here, this is why, and this is how we came to this table'.

I'm glad things seem to be simmering down in this thread :)
 
Sounds good!

There're lots of great posts on this forum, and many people have been through so many problems, and navigated them publicly, that you can find something for just about any situation you should find yourselves in.

If you do have any specific questions in the future, feel free to start a new thread that addresses them specifically. That's usually the best way to get something seen from a fresh POV.
 
My first posting.... Hi SnC. My husband and I are new to poly, too.

Sorry about all the hooplah with the back and forth of the initial postings.

How about we all start over? I'm hoping to glean some info off this thread.

If it makes sense for a newbie to the forum to welcome another newbie to the forum, WELCOME! :)

Being poly is an exciting adventure! Of course, there's lots to learn and understand. Most people in western society don't grow up understanding how to participate in a non-monogamous relationship. We're Disney-programmed (as I've called it) from an early age to find the handsome prince or the fair (usually helpless <choke>) maiden and get married, living happily ever after in marital bliss because you plucked up the courage to say "I do". The formula doesn't work very well for monogamous relationships, and it's an abysmal failure for non-monogamous relationships.

The 'bump' we hit taught us that we really needed to spend some time educating ourselves, and gaining a better understanding of things so we could be better relationship partners in a poly circumstance.

We feel that we're fortunate to be coming to the poly table with five years of swinging experience; the various concerns regarding non-monogamy from a physical perspective have been answered. Emotional aspects played a part too, but not like what we're embarking on now. We hope to learn a lot here.

I don't know that we have a lot of questions just yet. We do know that there's a lot of information we don't know yet, but we're so new to it all that we don't know even the questions we'd like to ask yet. We will probably develop more questions as we read more.
 
There're lots of great posts on this forum, and many people have been through so many problems, and navigated them publicly, that you can find something for just about any situation you should find yourselves in.

As in our experience in swinging, we're reading threads posted by others regarding various circumstances and discussing it between each other. We think this does a lot to help evoke and clarify thoughts. Kinda like "Oh I would never do that!" and "Well, I think it could work if this were to be the case along with it" and "Ok, yeah that might work but what if this?" It helps foster discussion between us. We think it's a great tool.

If you do have any specific questions in the future, feel free to start a new thread that addresses them specifically. That's usually the best way to get something seen from a fresh POV.


Will do!

By the way; love your sig :) As I've said before, I don't like labels - they are for packaging, not humans.
 
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