I find most married/cohabitating poly people can't find balance in their multiple relationships.
I find most married/cohabitating non-poly people can't find balance in their single relationships. I wouldn't hold poly relationships to a higher standard.
The excuse of well we have history, responsibilities, etc are usual thrown out as an excuse. How are you supposed to build a bond in your other relationship if they are not given the importance of the other.
This feels like putting the cart before the horse. You build the bond
first,
then you share the history/responsibilities/etc as they happen, THEN the relationship has gained a certain level of importance. You don't assign a level of importance and then shove stuff at it until it "fits".
Who in their right kind wants to be treated as less than.[?]
Umm...someone who is comfortable not being "more than" (or "equal to")? I have friends that I am closer to than others - does this mean that there is no point in being friends with someone who doesn't consider me their "best" (or "co-best") friend? I feel that I am happier appreciating what people bring to my life and not lamenting what they can't.
Being poly to me gives me the freedom to appreciate people at whatever level they intersect my life and not be confined by how relationships "should" go. I have secondary relationships that have lasted longer (by decades) than my "co-primary" relationship with Dude...because that is what they are (and where they are likely to remain). My relationships with women have, historically, all been destined to be "secondary" type relationships (in that they have been with bisexual women with male primaries - as am I). Does this mean that they have no value? NO! (Although I have been told that this means that I am "not really bisexual" - which I find amusing.)
.... I married nate because I found him suitable as a life partner. Now if I started dating Joe, we might have fun and I might care about him but that doesnt mean that he automatically is going to be someone that i would consider as a life partner.... there were plenty of people along that way that I had fun with but would never consider to be more than that to me. Of course you have to date people to discover if you feel that way for someone. If I'm open to that level of a commitment doesnt mean that someone is going to get it just because they are dating me. Co-primary status isn't something I would just give anyone.
Agree. Just because I am willing to allow relationships to proceed to the "co-primary" status doesn't mean that every relationship MUST automagically start there.
I touched on this in my post
here about what commitment in poly means to me.
How do people think primaries happen, anyway? ... I don't mind jumping in...but with most people? I'd want some time to date before making that kind of commitment.
I agree with this - although my history might indicate otherwise. I don't really date, both of my boys went from friendly fucking to cohabitation to LTR. (I've "jumped in" twice - it's worked out all both times.)
That said, there is a really big difference between BEING secondary (for a time) and being TOLD that I could only EVER be secondary. I'm ok with our relationship being secondary while that is its natural shape, but at some point it's natural shape may be different than this.
This is the difference between using hierarchical terms "proscriptively" (i.e. you can only ever be secondary) vs. "descriptively" (i.e. I have less investment in this relationship currently but lets see where it goes - and it is ok if it stays here, grows, fades, or waxes and wanes).
******
No matter how long Dude and I are together, I will always have been with MrS longer. That is an objective fact. MrS knew me through times and transitions that Dude will only know as stories (realizing that I was bisexual, my first experiences with women, my first failed pregnancy, etc). The longer Dude and I are together the more of these experiences will involve him (my second failed pregnancy, my first experience as a metamour, etc.)
Fact is, I learned from my experiences in my relationship with MrS (how to trust, how to feel love, how to be in a relationship) and Dude benefits in that I am more open to relationship/emotional stuff than I was 20+ years ago. So he doesn't need to "break down the walls" that MrS did.
It is unfair to expect Dude to understand all the nuances about me that MrS does - when MrS has two decades of experiences to draw on. It is also unfair to expect me and MrS to put OUR relationship on some kind of "hold" so that Dude can catch up and be "equal". Each relationship needs to stand and flourish on its own merits - not in comparison to the other.
JaneQ