NRE vs jealousy

Shaya

New member
I've been wondering about the way in which NRE and jealousy interact in an established relationship when a new third is added. For simplicity's sake, let's keep the discussion to a V configuration.

In the original pair, jealousy may develop in the one who did not start a new relationship, whilst NRE may develop in the one who did. Jealousy and NRE are both strong emotions that may lead to conflict between the original couple. I imagine jealousy pulling one person one way, whilst NRE pulls the other in the opposite direction on issues in which the couple are conflicted upon. Examples of issues may include boundaries, division of quality time, timing of family outings, etc. Over time, I imagine the conflict can show deep differences in philosophy and be interpreted as incompatibility in the original couple, leading to a separation or breakup.

There are few resources in the monogamous world on how to manage jealousy or NRE-type emotions.
  • Jealousy in monogamy: I tried to summarise my thoughts on how jealousy impacts and is handled by monogamous relationships in post 2 here.
  • NRE in monogamy: Monogamy divides NRE-type emotions into wanted and unwanted, with the wanted subtype called "falling in love" and promoted in a billion pop songs, whilst the unwanted subtype classified as limerence or lust. Wanted or unwanted usually seems to be based on whether one is already in an established relationship and I otherwise see only small differences between "falling in love", "limerence", "infatuation" or "lust".

Polyamory promotes a whole host of resources on understanding and managing jealousy. Although jealousy is typically thought of as being an unwanted emotion that needs to be managed, some people have pointed out that jealousy can serve as a healthy warning trigger to a situation with inherent danger (posts 5 onwards). NRE on the other hand is in some ways the opposite - it tends to be thought of as a positive emotion to be experienced, though there are certainly ways in which it can impact an existing relationship negatively. The difference however, is that I don't see nearly as much on how to manage the negative impact of NRE, though I suspect the concept of polyamoryville to be a humerous attempt to explore this. There is also an article on poly hell that peripherally explores the issue but I feel the article falls a little flat.

I see jealousy and NRE as heightened emotional states that exert a cognitive bias (clarification at post 27) on our logical thinking . As jealousy and NRE fade, we can sometimes reflect back and wish we had acted differently had our thinking be less cloudy at the time. We often say not to make any major decisions whilst in the throes of NRE or jealousy, and I see this advice as the practical application of recognising that heightened emotions can play tricks with our logic.

In summary, both NRE and jealousy can impact our relationships in positive and negative ways. NRE is generally thought of as a positive emotion to experience whilst jealousy is generally thought of as negative emotion to contain. However, we also recognise that NRE can have a destructive aspect to existing relationships and jealousy can be useful when it serves as an early warning system. The destructive aspects of jealousy seem to be relatively well studied in polyamory, but I feel that the negative aspects of NRE are less well explored.

I would like this thread to be mainly about NRE. Thoughts that focus on just jealousy could be posted over in a jealousy thread perhaps?

In replying to this thread, I was hoping experienced polyamorists could share the following:
  1. Resources that explore the positive and negative aspects of NRE. Please don't post resources that only explore this with one paragraph. I'm looking for something more engaging.
  2. Resources on how to manage NRE.
  3. Resources that contrast the pull and push fight in a relationship due to NRE and jealousy.
  4. A philosophical debate of why polyamory articles seem to focus more on containing jealousy but less so on NRE, especially since unchecked NRE can be the driving force behind jealousy?
  5. Finally, given how much "air time" jealousy receives, if your answer is merely about jealousy, please post it over here instead. This thread is primarily about managing the negative aspects of NRE and to contrast NRE with jealousy.

Thank you guys, for helping me to understand more in my ongoing exploration of polyamory. Look forward to hearing your opinions and reading your suggested resources.
 
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NRE is a rather new term in the English language, especially when compared to the word jealousy which has a long and established history. More questions get asked about jealousy than questions about NRE. Though I do think NRE gets talked about often enough on this forum.

Wikipedia has a somewhat brief article on NRE, with references and external links at the end. Stewart Zhahai wrote an article on NRE in 2001, and if you read all the way through it there is some material on handling the negatives of NRE.

By googling "new relationship energy," I found some other articles. You'll have to be the judge as to their merit ...

That's all I have for now.
 
I think there is really only two pitfalls with NRE. One is neglecting existing partners. The other is making emotional decisions. I don't think I've ever read anything about NRE that hasn't mentioned that. One thing I haven't noticed is any mention of how to use NRE constructively in an existing relationship.

OTOH, jealousy is nothing but destructive, in my opinion.
 
Hey Vinsanity, you said
One thing I haven't noticed is any mention of how to use NRE constructively in an existing relationship.
I've seen a few people say that when they see a new partner and get all sexually charged, they sometimes come home and the sex with the original partner can be fantastic. NRE could be seen as a welcome emotion to all parties involved in this case.

You also said:
jealousy is nothing but destructive, in my opinion.
I agree that jealousy by and large is destructive, but there are rare cases when it serves as an early warning system, it seems. Links were given above in the opening post.
 
OTOH, jealousy is nothing but destructive, in my opinion.

I agree if and only if we separate out the feeling of envy from the feeling of jealousy, where jealousy is more "I want that instead of the person who has it" and envy is "I want that too", without taking it away from anyone. Envy can be a damn good pointer at things that are missing from your relationship. Jealousy though, is definitely destructive.
 
I think jealousy and insecurity often get confused. I'd see jealousy as a more proactive grudging someone else what I'd like to have. For example being jealous of partner going out on date with their other lovers. Insecurity is less about the other partner and more about how the partner in NRE is treating you, leading you to doubt your value in their eyes and fear losing it.

So I basically see the difference as 1. Whether it is about competing with someone for partner's attention or fighting to retain own perceived value in relationship. and 2. Whether it is reactive or not. Insecurity will always be reactive - even if it is to something perceived and not real. While jealousy could stem from insecurity, but it could be something else altogether - for example need for control or possessiveness. This person is mine and I am jealous of anyone they pay attention to.

I am making that distinction because I am usually not a jealous person and when I was blindsided and hurt very badly by Spexy's actions during NRE, I was very horrendously insecure - my whole self was being dismissed almost like an afterthought. I had invested my time and social connections and woven this man into my family life in front of extended family, was known to his family as the woman he wanted to marry. He was on legal documents as my son's guardian if something happened to me, and he was just saying we were over like we meant nothing? shutting me out, lying on whim? I suffered horrendously. I lost 10 kg over the next month or two, was not able to eat, sleep, work....

But I was mostly fine on the front of jealousy all through. Even through the worst of the heartbreak, my issue never was the other woman, but how he was treating me. In the initial time, when things seemed to go well between the two of them, I was even able to feel unhesitating compersion - even to the point "well, I'm glad at least that is working. At least you aren't throwing us away for absolutely nothing". Which was a good thing and bad thing. Good, because it didn't add more toxic stuff to an already bad situation. Bad because the relationship lasted less than a week - 3-4days and it would have been way easier if it were jealousy because it would have ended with the relationship. It took us months to address my insecurities, and the broken trust.
 
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I'd see jealousy as a more proactive grudging someone else what I'd like to have. For example being jealous of partner going out on date with their other lovers.
I'd call wanting something someone else has "envy", not "jealousy".

Envy: I'd like some cake, but someone else is eating the last piece. I wanna eat cake too!!! (A comparison of what I have and what you have, based on an actual lack of cake).

Jealousy: I don't care how much is left, if you take a piece of cake then it might all be gone before I get there with a plate. That means you can't have any cake. (An attempt to avoid an unwanted outcome, based on fear of a lack of cake).
 
I meant jealousy. Not "I'd like my partner to pay me attention too" but "I'd like my partner to pay only me attention"

I don't really think anyone is magnanimous enough when coping with partner's NRE that they are envious. They are straight out jealous. They see their partner paying attention to someone and they want that attention to be theirs. For politeness sake or after applying a good dose of reasonableness or logic many may *say* me too, but my belief is that they feel abandoned and basically want their partner back.
 
I see jealousy as a symptom of insecurity. I also see the need for control as a symptom of insecurity. So if a person is feeling jealous or they need control, they are not handling their insecurities well.

So how does NRE affect one's insecurity? Well, in the case of a couple opening up for the first time, one's natural conclusion may be that their partner will leave them. They are programmed to think in terms of monogamy. It is very hard to think of it in terms of poly until you have been through it at least once. This is why communication is essential before taking any steps toward poly. You don't have that communication when a partner has an affair, then announces they are poly. It is only natural for their partner to feel insecure.

This leads us to the partner who is in the throes of NRE. They need to recognize it. They need to be mindful of their other partner(s). They can't work out their partner's insecurity for them, but they can work with them.

The main problem that arises with NRE is that it amplifies any problems one may be having with another partner. This is why poly won't fix a bad marriage.
 
I meant jealousy. Not "I'd like my partner to pay me attention too" but "I'd like my partner to pay only me attention"
I see. I'd read "grudging someone else what I'd like to have" as relating to the "going out on a date" bit (envious of what my partner has because I want to go out on a date with a lover too), not the "with someone other than me" bit (jealous of his date using up the limited resource that is my partner, thereby depriving me of what's mine).
 
So how does NRE affect one's insecurity? Well, in the case of a couple opening up for the first time, one's natural conclusion may be that their partner will leave them. They are programmed to think in terms of monogamy.

Also some people handle NRE better than others. Insecurity is natural if your partner suddenly goes off the deep end, starts trivializing your relationship or outright expressing that it should end because he is dazzled with a new one. Or if there are lies and other dishonesty in order to bypass crucial debate.

I am not jealous by nature at all, but I went through a nightmare of insecurity when Spexy got into NRE with someone else. Their relationship lasted for less than a week. I continued receiving first a direct break off that he regretted the next morning, then a constant web of lies of concealment and evasion and trickle truth trauma for months after. I discovered that he had shared some very dismissive and humiliating opinions which weren't even true about me to the woman to describe how much he was attracted to her. The NRE was gone. The woman was gone, but the way he handled it left me losing 10kg in the next month or to and horribly anxious episodes if he so much as breathed wrong for ages after.

We are good now. NRE blew up a lot of issues he had around communication as well, magnifying everything.

The information overload being mostly to describe that you don't have to have a jealous or insecure reaction to your partner's NRE for it to devastate you for no reason. I went from "You found someone. You look so happy!" to "What do you mean we are over" in a span of a couple of sentences. Without that deliberate brutalization, I'd likely have remained happy about him finding someone.
 
I don't really think anyone is magnanimous enough when coping with partner's NRE that they are envious. They are straight out jealous. They see their partner paying attention to someone and they want that attention to be theirs. For politeness sake or after applying a good dose of reasonableness or logic many may *say* me too, but my belief is that they feel abandoned and basically want their partner back.

Actually, no. If I am in a good place with my partner, where I feel confident in his attraction to and caring for me, I enjoy seeing him in NRE because it makes him happy. I *don't* feel abandoned. But he doesn't tend to go waaaay off the deep end in the way I've seen happen in a lot of stories here on the forum.
 
Maybe, Anamikanon and icesong, what you're both saying fits into a match-mismatch model of love in a relationship. I have wondered for a while now if we feel most comfortable in a relationship when we love someone with the same intensity that we feel they love us back with. A mismatch of love in this theory could be a source of discomfort to us.

Applied to your individual cases, this theory might explain part of anamikanon's discomfort when her lover experienced NRE because anamikanon felt an increased love disparity. Icesong's comfort on the other hand might be due in part to a restoration in a perceived disparity.

Not really seeking to poke at individual people's relationships, with apologies if I've done this with an appalling lack of consideration of all the other factors involved in the situation, but rather, trying to see if a match-mismatch model of relationship dynamics can be partially responsible for why people are sometimes comfortable with and sometimes uncomfortable with a partner's NRE. Feeling that one of our partners has NRE with someone new whilst we already have NRE with someone else could be comforting because it balances a disparity whilst having someone fall out of love with you and chase a new shiny may create a love disparity and could generate significant discomfort.
 
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Shaya, I think that's relevant but not _quite_ it, in my case. I would phrase it more that there's a requisite amount of time and attention I need to feel loved, and without it I don't. If I am still receiving that attention despite NRE for someone else, then I can be happy / feel compersion. If I'm not, then I feel abandoned.

It's _close_ to the match/mismatch thing you mention, but not _quite_ it. For instance, I don't _know_ (although I'm pretty sure) whether my feelings and Artist's feelings are equal. But when he is with me he makes me feel loved, and _that's_ the relevant data point.
 
I agree with icesong. I'm the same. If my needs are met in the relationship, then I'm more likely to feel compersion and less likely to feel insecure. I'm not typically a jealous person...I can be envious (want a cool thing like the cool thing you have) but not jealous (want THE cool thing that you have.) I think in the case of mismatched desire, those relationships usually will fizzle out or explode. To have a healthy, functioning relationship, both parties need to have similar levels of investment. So, absolutely, someone who is more invested in the relationship will be much more likely to feel insecure, fearful, and jealous when their partner who is less invested, is crazy in NRE for someone else.

Blue & I were both similarly invested in our relationship...but he did have more desire for Azure than me last fall, and it was obvious in his actions. I did feel some jealousy towards Azure. It wasn't something that I was use to and I absolutely did not like it. On the plus side, it got me back into therapy and back into regularly practicing the healthier habits that keep me emotionally balanced and healthy. For that, I am thankful.

Prior to Azure, I'd had moments of insecurity...those lessened with practice. For example, in the very beginning of our relationship, having not been in an open relationship before, I felt some fear and insecurity when he'd go on a date with a new person. I did not give into those fears, instead I examined them, and wished him fun on the date anyway. By last fall/the beginning of the end, I consistently felt happy for him when he had a date and only felt brief twinges of anxiety when the date was with someone new (that was huge for me as I do have a diagnosed anxiety disorder.) With Azure, there were several things that happened to increase my fear/anxiety and create jealousy: I was working a lot and away on business....Blue's long weekends with Azure did not coincide with my schedule so we were suddenly seeing significantly less of each other and having many less overnights (and despite being an LDR, they were having more overnights than we were despite me being local.) My needs for time and touch were not being met. His behavior also changed. In the past, he'd always been very open about his other relationships...Azure wanted a DADT type relationship and that flowed over into our relationship in that he suddenly became more tight lipped...and where in the past he'd text or call on weekends he was away, suddenly we had minimal to no contact for days at a time... I was accustomed to daily contact and seeing each other nearly every day (that was the combo of NRE and the DADT, she specifically told him she did not want him texting/calling me when he was with her.) He displayed a clear preference for time with her, even sometimes preferring phone time with her over physical time with me. All of that increased my anxiety, triggered my insecurities, and I felt jealous for the first time in our relationship. Suddenly, much of our time together was consumed by my fears, anxieties, and jealousy, which just increased the distance between us. In that case, the jealousy was very clearly a combination of me not getting my needs met, my insecurities and fears, his hinge skills, his getting carried away with the NRE, and the incompatibility in how we relate. She was a game changer. Ironically, they are no longer together because she wanted a mono relationship and that's just not something he can/will do. His NRE burnt really hot with her, but it also burnt out faster. He & I are still close friends (after taking some time apart.) We've discussed last fall, he's made amends, and I think we both have learned valuable lessons about ourselves and how we relate in relationships. It was a painful lesson for me, but one that I'm extremely grateful for having learned.
 
Shaya, I wasn't jealous. At all. His relationship with the woman was initially something that made me happy, then something that worried me because of his changed behavior with me after being with her. I never had a problem with whatever his relationship was with her in that sense. Didn't give a damn whether they had sex or not, kissed or not, how much time they spent together, etc (I was in another city anyway) - whatever the typical issues with jealousy are.

Later I found some of her behavior with Spexy to be controlling and abusive at which point I blew a fuse. But there was no "love disparity" or whatever scene going on in my head. I was fine hearing about her or not. I was happy if Spexy liked her. He'd even chatted with me all the way to a date with her and I was fine. In fact, I remember while in the middle of the heartbreak of the trouble between us, I clearly told Spexy that I hoped he was finding joy with her, because otherwise he had created this massive mess for no real achievement. And this is a point when I thought we were over. I wasn't sleeping, eating, anything. I was just spacing out and thinking or crying or working endlessly to distract myself. Still didn't feel jealousy. Probably not how my mind operates.

My problem was strictly with how I was treated by Spexy.
 
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Am I the only one whose NRE sort of bleeds over into my other relationships? I mean, my happiness tends to make for happier relationships all around. The only time it becomes a problem is if a partner starts over-thinking it. Then it gets into "oh he seems very happy...but the happiness is because of her, not me." The only thing I had to work on was not oversharing, which is hard for me because I like sharing.
 
Am I the only one whose NRE sort of bleeds over into my other relationships?

You're definitely not alone. I'm like that too, and I've had several partners who have been similar. My NRE has bled over to my other relationships and I've gotten to enjoy my partner's happiness with someone else affecting mine and the shared partner's relationship positively.
 
Am I the only one whose NRE sort of bleeds over into my other relationships? I mean, my happiness tends to make for happier relationships all around. The only time it becomes a problem is if a partner starts over-thinking it. Then it gets into "oh he seems very happy...but the happiness is because of her, not me." The only thing I had to work on was not oversharing, which is hard for me because I like sharing.

Definitely not. That happened with some of Blue's other relationships. And, from the hinge side, that happened with my relationship with Snow...and kind of with the fwb I had for awhile...though that was more in the sense that it just ramped me up sexually and that bled over...
 
Thanks icesong, Anamikanon and pinkpig. The match-mismatch theory on one's comfort in a relationship seemed nice on paper but looks like it doesn't quite get it right in real life for you guys. I might start a spin off thread on it just to explore my curiosity on this issue a little more.

Back to jealousy and NRE. My wife and I had almost always agreed on everything before poly came along. Then suddenly, our decisions and logic no longer seemed to mesh. NRE seemed to direct my wife's decisions on any given issue in one direction whilst jealousy directed mine to the opposite conclusion. For example, before opening up to poly, if I found a fault in the third person, I'd say to my wife it was evidence of immoral behaviour and that he was a cad, with my comments flavoured by jealousy. She'd reply, he's not immoral, his decisions are internally consistent with a different moral compass and a different worldview, based on so many other life experiences. She'd say we could learn so much from him, with her comments flavoured by NRE. There's a lot you can dissect from this example, but i use it to illustrate an example of NRE and jealousy pulling in opposite directions.

What do you guys think about NRE and jealousy pulling in opposite directions? Is the way I've phrased it a good analogy or is there a different way you would explain the same phenomenon?
 
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