That’s what’s on this week’s episode of Non-Monogamy Help.

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Podcast Transcript

For background context I'm a 55 yo man who has been married to a 52 yo woman for 2 years and I knew my partner identified as polyam before we married (we had been in a relationship for 6 years already, and she was in a relationship with my best friend for almost all of that time).

So our story started, as I suspect many do, when my then gf of 5 months invited a long-term male friend of mine to have threesomes with us. He lives in a different country, so we only see him about a week a year. I had only been in monogamous relationships until then and had never heard of polyam, although I had heard of people being open or swinging.

It quickly became apparent that they had a more intense emotional connection than I had with my gf (she confirmed this herself). I felt jealous when they started asking to have sex separately from me, and when I explained that wasn't the dynamic I wanted, I was told "but there are 4 relationships here: a&b, b&c, c&a, a&b&c). We're polyamorous".

This was a bolt from the blue to me, as I only believed there was a&b, and a&b&c . I hadn't signed up to her having a separate relationship with him. I was only interested in the group sex dynamic. However, to avoid losing either or both of my long term friend (I'd known him decades) or gf I went along with it, but it's never sat easily with me and it's caused many many arguments between my now wife and I.

Over the years they've pushed the boundary further and further away from the original 3-way thing into a series of separate dyads, first insisting that they sleep together while I'm in another room, then arranging time together where I was specifically not invited.

Last year we went on holiday together, and they decided (I felt I couldn't say no) that they wanted to hang out together for the afternoon, and made it clear that I wasn’t invited. This wasn't so they could be intimate (I've always said they should take time out for that).

No, this was just to 'hang out'. Seeing as we were already hanging out as all three of us, and apparently very happily, this felt very exclusionary, and simply rude. Frankly it ruined the holiday for me. This year they're planning a week-long holiday without me. And it's killing me.

While I'm comfortable with the concept of poly, this just doesn't seem equitable, for several reasons: I spend most of the year with my wife (as I said, he lives a considerable distance away) where intimacy, affectionate touch, and sex don't feature very often between my wife and I, yet when I see her with him, she becomes a different person: very sexual (once if not twice or more a day), constantly snuggling and cuddling him, being really affectionate.

This is really killing my self esteem, and I feel like I'm the 'comfy pair of slippers' in this relationship and he's the fun and exciting one.

I've raised the obvious disparity numerous times to try and see if we can improve the connection between us, but this often leads to massively destructive arguments, which just pushes us further apart. But I know that addressing the disparity in connection, and improving communication are critical if I'm too so feeling so left out.

This has been going on for years. When she asked me to marry her, I took that to mean that I'd be her primary partner (I know hierarchy isn't always seen as ethical, but I know that's what I need in a relationship).

I feel like they are hell-bent on getting all their needs met, even knowing that doing so is going way beyond a place where I feel comfortable. Whenever I ask if we can discuss this and negotiate a dynamic where everyone compromises a bit so that everyone feels comfy, I get told I'm being controlling. But from my perspective, this feels like they're coercing me to accept a dynamic I never agreed to, and never wanted.

Basically my question is this: does any of this sound ethical? Is is wrong to seek compromise, or am I fundamentally wrong here?

I'm reaching the point where either something changes, or I walk away for the got off my emotional and mental wellbeing.

Response

There is so much about your question that I relate to. I haven't really had this problem because I've been in polyam relationships and negotiated that and wanted that from the start. So it's not necessarily the exact same thing, but that feeling of being the comfy pair of slippers—I talked a lot about this in the podcast I Could Never—if you've never heard about it, I talk a lot about that feeling in my podcast episode, which might be helpful for you—but that feeling really sucks. That really sucks.

So I just want to say, first and foremost, that I'm really sorry that you're going through that, because that is such a painful and horrible feeling. And I know what that feels like, and I'm really, really sorry that you're going through that.

Forcing someone to be polyamorous

This is not ethical. No, there's nothing ethical about this situation. When you date someone and they say they're polyamorous, that doesn't inherently mean that the relationship that you're entering with them is a polyamorous relationship.

And I really feel like if they're polyamorous—I mean, this is the thing. Being polyamorous doesn't necessarily mean you have to pass a course or get a license or something to operate. And unfortunately, I wish that I could say that if they're polyamorous, they should fucking know better, but really that's not the case, unfortunately.

But I would say that if somebody knows well enough to know to call themselves polyamorous, it is still going to slightly surprise me that they don't know well enough to negotiate the aspects of relationships before entering into them.

And I mean, it's not really clear from your letter—because you said that she was your girlfriend for five months, and then she kind of invited a long-term male friend to have threesomes with you guys. And that's fine. That's fun. You sound—I don't think you're necessarily polyamorous, but you sound potentially open to other things, which is fine.

But at no point—you said that she identified as polyam before you married. But at what point did she identify as polyam? Did she identify as polyamorous before you met? Did you go into this relationship with any discussion about polyamory, or did she invite someone to have threesomes with you, and you thought it was kind of like a swingy thing? That's fine. Yeah, there could have been a little bit more discussion about this.

But then, as you said, all of a sudden they're asking to have sex separately, and then they're like, "Oh, it's because we're polyamorous." No, that is not how the situation goes.

Polyamory requires consent

It's fine if she later on figured out that this was the relationship structure that she would prefer. And it's also fine if, even if they're not polyamorous, there are open situations with open relationships where people are allowed to sleep with other people without it being a group sex dynamic, without that being a problem. But that was not discussed. None of this was discussed with anybody. It was just sort of like, "Well," and they're asking—this is another reason why I really hate asking for permission.

This is a complete embodiment of when asking for permission goes wrong, because the whole thing about asking for permission is that if you agree to a polyamorous relationship from the start, you agree to a relationship where your partner doesn't spend the vast majority of their time with you, where they're free to have other connections and romantic relationships. So you've already consented to that.

The reason why they're asking for permission is because you haven't consented to that. And I think that there's an aspect of them that knows it, and this is more than a little gaslighty.

I don't know the exact way it was done to you, so I can't—and obviously, I'm getting one side of it, so I can't fully judge—but to just be like, "Oh yeah, we're polyamorous." No, there was no discussion of that. You did not agree to that. You literally said "I had not signed up for this."

And then you basically have a choice between losing your partner and somebody that is your friend. And I don't know what the group sex dynamic was. I don't know if you considered him to be a sexual partner of yours, maybe not. But you lose two connections with this. So you're being strong-armed into the situation, and that's not fair.

There could have been some sort of a discussion. Agreeing to polyamory is a different situation than—if you had been in an open relationship and she simply just wanted to sleep with him on her own time, and that had been adequately discussed with you, that's fine. You could have potentially agreed to that also.

You didn't fucking consent to being his boyfriend. He is your friend. And I'm not saying that—there's different types of connections in a polycule, everyone doesn't have to be dating. But to say, "There's four relationships here, A and B, B and C"—what the fuck? No, you didn't—yeah, you're friends with him. It doesn't seem like, from the way you wrote this letter, that you have sex with him. Maybe you do, I don't know. But you know what I mean, there's not a relationship between you and him.

And to say that to you as if—did you go out on dates with him? Doesn't sound like you did. So to be like, "Oh, but there are four relationships here"—that is so fucking gaslighty. That is not the truth. It is not the truth, point blank.

And I'm sorry, but you don't get told who you're in a relationship with. That's something that you decide yourself, and that's absolutely unacceptable.

This was a group sex, sort of three-way thing, and then they were like—and again, like I said, if she had just simply asked to sleep with him on her own, and you had been asked about that, you might have had your reservations, but it sounds like you might have been okay with it. But this wasn't what was presented to you.

And on top of that, what breaks my fucking heart about your letter is that—I say polyamory is not an excuse to find multiple semi-sustaining relationships until you reach a level of permissible stasis. That's not what it's about.

And so you are also in this relationship not getting what you need. Yeah, nobody's required to kiss anybody or be intimate with anybody at all, period. But you are not getting the basic forms of intimacy in a relationship that most people, polyamorous or not, would probably expect.

And that's the thing that kind of breaks my heart about this situation. If your wife were loving and caring and intimate and affectionate and sexual with you, I don't think that you would be that bothered by all this. But you're basically being shown a glaring disparity in your relationship, and you're trying to address it, and every time you address it, you get told "you're being controlling."

You're not being controlling. This is absolutely unethical. This is totally, massively unfair.

And I'm not saying this is a tit-for-tat situation, and this isn't a situation where you're attempting to be like, "Oh, you've kissed him two times. Now you have to kiss me two times." It's not like that, but it's going to be very hard for you to be a witness as well.

And I wonder if, before this person came on the scene, was your girlfriend loving? Did this change when this new person—when did the dynamic between the two of you die away? Yeah, you spend most of the year with her, and that's fine, but your relationship between each other—has she shown any effort to improve it? Have you brought that up in and of itself, without the connection to the other person? Does she address it? Does she pretend like it doesn't exist? Is there a reason for it?

I mean, if there's something going on with her—it's very easy to get excited over new people, especially people you don't see all the time. There's a certain sparkly thing about new people, and that's not necessarily your fault. And even if she does feel that buzzy excitement about a person that she doesn't see that often—absence makes the heart grow fonder—it's not necessarily your fault, but that's no excuse to completely and utterly ignore your relationship.

And this has been going on for years, and that really breaks my heart.

Basic needs in relationships

I mean, to answer your question, no, none of this sounds ethical. None of this sounds okay.

She's not required to pay attention to you. She's not required to hug and cuddle you and stuff. But that's not a weird thing to expect or want, and it's also not something that if you're not getting that—even if there wasn't this other guy in the picture, to be honest with you, even if she just wasn't seeing anybody else, but there was no intimacy or affection—that's the whole point of most relationships.

Yeah, there are relationships where there's no sex in them, and people are fine. And there are ways that people can be intimate without being physically intimate. But if that's something that's important to you, that's valid, and that's fine. And even if this other person wasn't in the picture, if you were stuck in a monogamous commitment with somebody who was not willing to show you any kind of affectionate touch or intimacy, I think it's perfectly valid for you to be like, "This isn't what I signed up for. That's not what I want out of a relationship."

It's not even about him. Yeah, there's a whole bit of fucked-upness going on. But also, the relationship between the two of you—there's nothing happening there.

Maybe you thought, when she asked you to marry her, that you'd be her primary partner. And I think you hoped that would come with the intimacy and affection that would generally come with marriage. And if it didn't, then what the hell, man?

Hierarchy—yeah, it's not always ethical, but this is the classic case of when on the outside it may look like hierarchy, but it's certainly not what's happening on the inside. Absolutely not.

I mean, I think you should trust your own feelings. You say that you feel like they're hell-bent on getting their needs met. And you're trying. You are asking. You're not asking for them to—it'd be one thing if you were like, "I want you to break up with him. I want you to never see him again." You're not even asking for that. You're saying, "Can we discuss this? Can we negotiate something where maybe you compromise a little bit, but everyone feels comfortable?" And they're like, "No, you're being controlling."

What the hell? I'm gobsmacked, to be honest with you. I can't—this is outrageous.

The three C's

And the thing about other adults—and I've said this before, it's from Matthias Barker, who says a lot of things that I think are great. Don't agree with him on everything, but says a lot of things that I think are great. And one of them is the three C's, in terms of what you can do about another grown adult's behavior.

Consent

The three C's: one, you can consent. You consent to the behaviour, accept that it's part of what the situation is. And when you consent to the behaviour, I don't mean pretend to consent and bear a grudge—and I don't think you've borne a grudge actually, which is honestly super fucking grown-up of you. I'm surprised if you don't have a grudge, considering the situation.

But the consent isn't really there. You're agreeing to the situation under duress. You're not agreeing to it because you actually want it. You're not accepting this. It's not acceptable for you. But that's what consent really means.

Confront

There is confront. Confront means what you've done—confront the situation, ask for it to change. And that's an important step, because there are some times where some people expect people to read their minds, or they don't explicitly ask for what they want. And you have done that. It seems like you have explicitly asked for what you want.

And I might consider suggesting couples therapy. But the thing about couples therapy is that it can actually be really damaging. I would suggest you read "Why Does He Do That?" by Lundy Bancroft. Very much suggest you read that book. I'm not saying necessarily that your partner is being abusive, because I don't know enough about this dynamic, but that book is really, really eye-opening.

Because in that book, there's also ways to help people who are in difficult relationships. And one of the things that Lundy Bancroft talks about is about how couples therapy can actually be worse for—couples therapy works on the premise that both of the people in that couple are wanting to improve the relationship and are acting in good faith, basically. And in an abusive dynamic, it's not in good faith. And so sometimes the therapy, when they're going to typical couples therapy, can reinforce the problematic behaviours.

So I don't think I would recommend that, because the fact that you're asking for what you want, you're making it clear, and—it's hard again, I don't know the fullness of this situation, I'm getting one side of it—but it feels very gaslighty. Just being like, "We're polyamorous" or "You're being controlling"—this doesn't feel like a situation that would benefit from couples therapy, to be honest.

You have tried confronting the situation, and you could try seeing if you can find a couples therapist that also deals with difficult dynamics, and maybe can recognize that. But I think that you've done pretty much all you can to confront the situation.

Cut

And so the only thing that's left is cut—cut yourself out of the situation, because you cannot control another grown adult's behaviour. You really can't.

And from my perspective, from what I can read about the situation, it does not seem like you're being controlling. It doesn't really seem like polyamory is necessarily what you want. But there could have been dynamics about this that could have been negotiated. You clearly don't want it, and somebody just bulldozing over you—it's not really okay.

This isn't what you want. If this isn't what you want, then I think you need to stand up for yourself a little bit more in this situation and make it clear: "This is not what I want."

And you're not—in this situation, I could see why you would want to say, "Hey, you have to break up. You can sleep with other people, but not this person," because obviously this is sort of a poisoned well. But you're not even asking for that. I mean, I don't know if you're asking for that. It doesn't seem like you're asking for that. You literally said, "Negotiate a dynamic where everyone compromises a bit so that everyone feels comfortable."

So you're not even asking for that. If you'd asked for that, then I would have said, "Okay, it's fair for someone to call you controlling a little bit," but you're not even asking for that.

Compromise in polyamory

I don't know—to answer the question, no, it doesn't sound ethical. And no, you're not wrong to want a compromise. But I wonder if there is a compromise in this situation, because it doesn't seem like they're willing to give up anything.

And it's also so fucking rude, some of the shit you've described. If people want to spend time—imagine, I think one good thing to help you reframe this is: imagine if you were on vacation with some friends. If you were on vacation with two friends, and they—it's fine if they want to spend time on their own to hang out. I mean, yeah, that's fine. Generally speaking, if you go out on a vacation with two other people, you kind of want to hang out all together. That's the fucking point of going on a vacation with three people.

But if, for whatever reason, two people wanted to spend time alone, I just feel like—and I wonder how they made it clear that you weren't invited. Because it's okay. If you're all on holiday together, and they're like, "Hey, we want to do this activity. We'd like to do it just the two of us. Is that all right? Would you be okay with that? We've scheduled this other activity that you can do. Or here's some ideas of something you can do"—that's okay.

I wouldn't be—if I went—I'm thinking, I have two friends who are married, and if we all went on a holiday together, and there was some sort of romantic thing they want to do together, I mean, yeah, we're not all dating. But you know what I mean, in a friendship context, even I can understand. But if they hinted, like, "We're going to do this," and they sort of hinted that I wasn't invited, that would be annoying, even if it was just my friends, or just friends, you know. But you know what I'm saying—if there were no romantic elements involved, that'd be fucking rude. So then that'd be rude.

So there's just so many things about this. And if they want to go on holiday alone, but do you have holidays with her? Anyway, I'm going on and on, because I just feel really bad for your situation.

What you can control

I just think that this is massively unfair and totally unethical and just not fucking on, to be blunt.

Yeah, to sum up, yeah, it's unfair. Polyamory is not something that should be sprung on you. You should have had a discussion about this. Making comparisons—it's hard for you not to make comparisons between you and this other person, and the fact that your relationship with her is not even a satisfying relationship is a huge issue. And even if that guy wasn't there, even if there wasn't that whole other issue, the relationship that you have between you would be a huge issue.

And I just think you need to think about the three C's. What have you done so far? See a therapist on your own. If you're not seeing a therapist on your own—especially, it can be really, really hard for men. Men don't always have the same social connections women have, and you absolutely can find those social connections, so don't feel isolated. And I know it can be hard sometimes as well if men have kind of been socially conditioned to see it as not being cool to talk about their feelings and things like that.

If you don't have a therapist, please definitely consider seeing a therapist, because it's going to be really, really helpful for you to analys e the situation as well. I'm really glad that you wrote me about it, but I definitely think see a therapist and talk about this as well with them.

But yeah, this is not ethical. If it helps to have someone tell you that—this is not ethical. From what you've described, this is not an ethical situation, in my opinion.

So I genuinely hope that helps, and good luck.