Polyamory (from Greek πολύ poly, "many, several", and Latin amor, "love") is the practice of, or desire for, intimate relationships with more than one partner, with the knowledge of all partners. It has been described as "consensual, ethical, and responsible non-monogamy.
I italicized some words there for a reason. If you are fucking and/or dating someone behind your partner's back, that isn't polyamory. That's you being a cheating shit.
I am in a polyamorous relationship with the 2 women who have become the loves of my life, Trisha and Michelle. I met Trisha at a job selling computers years ago. We started seeing each other casually, and it wasn't long before we made it a formal relationship and moved in together as a family of 4 (she has 2 daughters, who I love as much as if they were my own, from a previous relationship) in 2012. While we always had an open relationship, neither of us really met anyone we got serious with for quite a while. I met Michelle 4 days into starting graduate school for our Master's degrees in counseling psychology in 2015 (we are both mental health professionals now). She actually asked me to come smoke with her between classes. I had quit before then, but went with her anyway. She saw me texting Trisha. It was obvious enough to her that I was texting a romantic partner, so she asked if we were monogamous. The answer being no, we went out on a couple dates and casual encounters, which quickly became dates and casual encounters for all 3 of us. The casual thing seems to be the default for all of us. We're shamelessly slutty like that. It went on that way for about a year before the 3 of us made the well thought out decision to make it a more formal relationship and live our lives together.
Communication and boundaries are key in any relationship, and that much more so as the number of people increases. We didn't get serious about our relationship on a whim. If you open up a relationship or want to bring someone else into a relationship, it requires conversations and boundary setting. What people want varies. It may be casual sex with other people only, it may be one partner having a serious relationship with someone else, more than 2 partners in a closed group (not seeing anyone outside the group), an open group like us (though we're introverted and aren't actively looking for anything beyond what we currently have, so it's mostly theoretical), etc. If you jump into it without communicating and coming up with something that works for everyone involved, and working through any unexpected feelings that come up, it's probably going to start to become unhealthy fairly quickly and wind up failing to work out.
My family and friends, those of my partners', and the girls' father have always been fine with it. I think everyone just expects lifelong weirdos like us to do unconventional shit. Other people respond to the knowledge of poly relationships in a variety of ways. I've had someone say it's "pimp." No honey. Pimping is a type of profession. I'm not profiting from this, although the triple income situation comes in handy when it comes to bills. A lot of people assume we're kinky. We are, which I could and might make an entire blog entry about in the future, but not all poly people are kinky, and not all monogamous people are vanilla. Some wonder, why be in a relationship at all if not monogamous? Why do anything? Because it makes us happy and we help each other grow as people. Some sort of exoticize it. It isn't very exotic in our case. We're like any other family, working jobs, helping the girls with homework when they need it, having dinner together, taking care of pets and the house, laughing together, etc. The only difference from most families is there are 3 moms. Reactions from the general public are minimal. People see a small group of women together, assume heterosexuality, and think we're friends. Most people aren't very imaginative, with the occasional exception of some pervy man creep seeing us showing affection and wanting a free show or to get in on it. Really, men. How many times have you harassed women on the street and actually got some ass? If common decency is really so foreign to you, maybe just give up for practical reasons? For that reason, and to minimize dealing with people's biases and stupid questions in general, we have to be somewhat careful where we show a lot of affection.
Our relationship isn't just 3 people together. We also have one on one relationships with each other, though that's the bulk of it. Michelle and I have things we do together. Same with Michelle and Trisha, and Trisha and I. We also make time just for ourselves. Like I said before, we're introverts. Of course, feelings of jealousy can come up, but that will happen sooner or later in any relationship. Communicating about feelings and respecting boundaries make all the difference. You have to talk. Mind games and vaguebooking don't do anyone any good. Polyamory isn't for the passive aggressive. It isn't healthy in a monogamous relationship, either. Trisha, Michelle, and I pretty much have our boundaries and communication down. We've been together. We feel what a lot of poly people call compersion, which is basically the opposite of jealousy. For instance when I see pleasure being shared between my partners, it brings me joy, not anger or anxiety.
Polyamory isn't for everyone, and that's fine. Monogamy is perfectly valid, but just because something is popular, doesn't mean it's the only valid way of doing things. What I described in this post is just our particular relationship. It isn't meant to be an instruction manual, though some basics, like communication and boundaries, are important however you want to manage your relationship.
If you're curious about or considering consensual non-monogamy or polyamory, these books are good for newcomers to learn more about it:
Opening Up: A Guide to Creating and Sustaining Open Relationships
The Ethical Slut: A Practical Guide to Polyamory, Open Relationships & Other Adventures
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