Need Advice or Suggestions

qtrhorse89

New member
So I am currently in my first poly relationship with a guy who has two other girl friends. I am not his live-in and I'm content with this. We have been seeing each other for about a year now. I have dependent personality disorder and for the most part have been keeping it under control. Here lately it has gotten out of my control and I am going back to therapy to work on this. Several of the problems I'm about to touch on are probably largely being induced by this disorder but I was wondering if given the situation you all might have some suggestions in the meant time.

I have been with my partner for over a year, I am very happy with where we are at. I do not live with him and I don't want to live with him. He seems content with his live in gf and that is fine with me. The three of us that he sees are close and we spend time together. I don't usually get jealous of them or vice versa. One of the girls and myself were talking and the subject of love came up. I had talked to my partner about this before. I do feel my version of love for him aka an intense affection and concern for the well being of another. To me this is love it has different forms like romantic, familial, friendly etc but you get the picture. He seems to reject the word love based on its many definitions and basically said he cared for me but didn't want to use it. I let this go, I tell him I love him and don't expect anything back. Well then I find out that he been telling his other partners that he loves them but not me. I was hurt and didn't understand. The dpd kicked in and I basically had a gigantic melt down. He tried to explain it that he didn't feel the love for me that involved wanting to live with him or experiencing and intense pheremonal rush of sexual desire etc. That I was an intimate partner, a lover that he enjoyed seeing and spending time with and cared about deeply but that his definition of love doesn't fit. I just don't understand. I feel inadequate, like I've done something horribly wrong and that there is something wrong with me to not deserve this. I don't understand how that his is only version of the word love that it is a requirement for him to want to cohabitate with a person before they are loved? When he tries to explain his emotions to me it seems like my definition of the word love. So I don't know how to reconcile this. It seems like we are arguing more over semantics than actual feelings but I don't know how to cope with his wording. Maybe it is the way I was raised or I'm still thinking like a monogomous person, but I want that from him. Like I said I don't want to live with him, and our levels of emotional connection seem to be similar enough but I am confused as to what is going on. Has anybody else ever experienced something like this or can maybe shed some light on this? Is there some secret poly rule that I'm just not understanding...

Thanks for any help you can provide.
 
Tough place to be.

Hi qtrhorse. That sounds like a really tough place to be in. It sounds like up until you knew that he was using that particular term of endearment with his other partners, that you were okay with not hearing those other words. It also sounds like now that you know that, you're finding it really hard to not compare, or want the same thing for your own relationship. I'm also hearing that his honesty is hurting you; even though he's speaking his truth, you want him to recognize that there is some kind of love there, and you are literally melting down from the stress of it.

Whenever I find myself in a situation where I really, really want something that I don't have, I ask myself a couple of questions. One: Is it important? Two: Is it urgent? This helps me balance myself out when I'm feeling panicky or overwhelmed (although I don't always win that battle LOL!)

Using this tool, from an outside perspective I would say that YES, this is important, but that NO it is not urgent. When you take that time constraint off, and stop creating a need to have this worked out right now, I am guessing that you'll feel a lot calmer. I'm not saying that it's not an issue at all; your feelings are really, really important and you have a right to happiness. I'm only suggesting that pressuring an immediate response out of the situation is going to create a lot of stress for you, and removing that might give you the time and space to feel clearer about what you'd like to do

Hugs - keep using these boards and communicating about what is happening for you. Getting clear inside of yourself is the best possible solution to any problem in your life, and creating an on-line space to help you do that is important.
 
This seems like a pretty straightforward problem that could happen in any relationship, mono or poly. You're in love with him. He's not in love with you. You can either choose to live with that or move on. With poly, you get the added option of living with it AND moving on... in other words, staying lovers but finding a second bf who WILL say I love you back.

Why not go that route?
 
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