Intro to Polyamory Blog

So, here I am.

I'm mid-thirties, female, and "discovered" Polyamory in 2001.

It wasn't until some time in 2002 that my husband and I moved forward into 'active poly' from 'theoretical poly'. I re-united with a former boyfriend in March 2002 or so, and my husband escalated a friendship more towards "lover" state in September of that same year.

Neither of these first relationships really worked out. My husband broke up with his girlfriend about 6 months later because there wasn't enough intensity for what he was looking for in a secondary, and while the guy who was my 'boyfriend' is still around in my life and still wants to be with me, I feel that I need something different.

My husband has since gone out with and broken up with another secondary girlfriend since breaking up with the first, and I've re-united (somewhat) with a long-distance lover and found a supportive friend who was interested in being my 'secondary' but isn't the right one for that transition, for me.

I've been with Husband for 9 years now, and we made our transition into ethical non-monogamy 4 years into the relationship. It wasn't an easy transition for many reasons, but like the transition from employee-mindset to employer-mindset, I know it's a good thing we worked through, even though our relationship now is looking more Secondary than Primary.

Husband and I are splitting up in a Primary sense. We had the pivitol conversation nearly three weeks ago and since then have only progressed further down the break-up path. Folks around us hoped we'd figure it out and stay together, but figuring it out is making us lean more towards splitting up, the more we talk about it.

I guess there's no going back from this one. I guess I'm happy about that, but I also know I'm sad and frightened and ... feeling a little abandoned. But, truthfully, the balance of our relationship was always skewed, we got & stayed together for the wrong reasons and now we're just no longer willing to live in a state of unhappiness.

One thing that OF COURSE has been mentioned is the whole "poly" part of us breaking up. Folks who are aware of our poly relationship but who participate in monogamous (but not necessarily fidelious, if that's a word - meaning, they've cheated but didn't get caught) relationships have made comments about how polyamory probably played into the destruction of our relationship. My return comment is that when Monogamous relationships break up, monogamy is not blamed, so I'm not going to accept in any way that Polyamory is to blame here. In fact, I think polyamory kept us together for longer than we would have had we subscribed to the "only one for me" theory.

At any rate, this is my blog about Polyamory in general, my Poly thoughts in the world, and a more personal side, the break-up of a primary relationship and the re-discovery of love and the future in an ethical non-monogamy sense.

Notes are welcome, but abusive flames will be removed and disregarded for the most part. This blog is about love - self love, love for others, love for life. Feel the love, but know I am not a threat to you if you wish to contain your capacity for it.

If you have questions, they're welcome however. Even 'hard questions' which are meant to make me really think about what I'm doing or thinking are just fine. This lifestyle of mine is not 'standard', I know, but as I read somewhere:

"Normal is a word we use to describe someone we don't know very well" - Anonymous