A little help please...

[DestinyWaits]

You know, it was hard for me to think of a title for this because well, I have no idea what to call this thread, all I know is that I was wondering if anyone else has ever had this experience and if so how did you handle it.....


With our last partner, a woman my husband and I loved very dearly, we were always trying to put things on an equal level with everyone. What I mean by this is that we wanted her to feel that she was an equal part of our relationship, ie, getting her opinion on decisions, inclusion is day to day activities and so on. All this was made more difficult by the fact that she wanted to live on her own to put on the outter appearance of being "normal" for her seriously religious mother but at the same time wanted to be an avid part of our relationship. We took all steps that we could think of to take to let her know she was an equal with us, or more importantly with me, as a sister wife should be but she was insistant that she was and would remain the "third" person. We wanted her to be an equal but she couldn't get past the fact that we had been a married couple for years before she came along. I think this is part of the reason our relationship didn't last which is very upsetting because she was the one we thought would be with us forever and the one we loved dearly.

Do any of you know what can be done to help make someone understand that though we are married we do have enough love to include them and love them as an equal? Can this be done?

[vandalin]

It sounds to me as though she wanted to be with you guys, but not as a "married triad". It also sounds like she may have felt she was intruding on you and your husbands relationship. Perhaps she wasn't ready to be an "equal". She seems to have wanted to keep her life separate. She obviously has an outside influence or at least an outside pressure to still be or pretend to be someone she is not (mother).

I'm not sure if my input can be of any help, since it might seem like I'm just repeating what you said, but sometimes a change of syntax can put a new perspective on a problem. Time and communication are about the only thing I can suggest. Ask her what she wants for the relationship, what her ideal would be, what part she sees herslf in.

[Quath]

It is hard to overcome the social conditioning we are taught as we grow up. So all you can do is to try to work to get people to re-evaluate the things they were taught growing up and see if they can accept new ideas like triads.

You could also try the classic approach of trying to get someone to read some Heinlein books.

[DestinyWaits]

In all honesty I understand what you both have said and thankfully my husband knew who Heinlin (sp) was because I didn't and so now I will have to read some of those books myself...as if my library wasn't big enough already!!! hehe! I do plan on talking to her again about it all and seeing if maybe since we have been apart for a few months if maybe we can see where we went wrong and try to work together to fix the problems. Thanks to you both.

[foxflame88]

I don't have any advice, but wanted to offer encouragement. Good luck!

[Mark1npt]

Destiny.....Quath and Vandalin present good views on this subject. Another I may offer is that, things may not always be what they appear to be. I hate to question everyone's motive, but perhaps she was not the person you and your husband thought she was or were in love with? Maybe the living alone was a convenient excuse to not totally immerse herself in the lifestyle? Maybe she was still finding herself, questioning herself and her ingrained upbringing and not ready to commit to the life forever. People get cold feet all the time and we've all been in relationships where 1 person valued the relationship more deeply than the other. People walk all the time, for various reasons. Keep trying, you two may yet find the right person to share the rest of your lives with.

[DestinyWaits]

Mark I believe you are right on this one, the two of us have thought the same thing since she kept refusing to move in with us even though it had been almost a year. I know her family are important to her but need she have said "Mom, Dad, I'm moving in with this couple because we are all in a relationship" or could she have just said something like "mom, dad, I'm moving in with these friends of mine to help out since I'm a single mother of 2 and they are great with the kids" these are things we have wondered and I hope you are right, we do want this and hope that somewhere out there there is the other piece of us that we are searching for.

[Nadine]

no advice, obviously.. but I'm hoping you guys can all come to a decision and I hope it's a good one

[Mark1npt]

Destiny....I think maybe the kicker was she had two kids....she probably didn't or couldn't come to grips with how to deal with this sitaution and her kids. I know it's made it immensely easier for us three with all our kids grown and headed off to college. It just removes a huge hurdle.

[XYZ123]

Originally Posted by Mark1npt

Destiny....I think maybe the kicker was she had two kids....she probably didn't or couldn't come to grips with how to deal with this sitaution and her kids. I know it's made it immensely easier for us three with all our kids grown and headed off to college. It just removes a huge hurdle.

He has a point. I'm on the other end. I'm married with a young child and another on the way. While my husband and I did have one V poly relationship, with me at the center, it was incredibly hard for me to enter into it and to balance that out with being a mother and having a family that would never understand. P was the person we thought was right for us, but P was also a very special person whom we had been friends with for years and long before our son was born. Even now I don't know if I can ever go forward in another poly relationship and not feel I'm somehow "messing up" the lives of my children. It's upbringing and society in part. But it's also my difficulty in letting go of my whole white picket fence dream life I grew up wanting.
Whatever happens, I wish you all the best. Maybe she'll come to terms and maybe she won't. Either way, I hope you all find what you are looking for.