Into The Deep End

Oh ... did she say disparaging things about you on FL? I can understand why that would trouble you.
 
It's possible the things said about me on FL were an attempt to create a dominant persona. At least, that's what I've decided to tell myself. That, or fictions made to blow off stress. Either way.

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The GF and I both had changes in our schedules today that let us meet up for dinner, along with a very old friend of hers. Said friend has known her over half her life, they have no secrets, BFFs forever type thing. I was possibly more stressed over this than I was about meeting the husband. But long story short, she liked me... and also could tell we were making each other happy just by being there. So I've got her stamp of approval, which was pretty much a requirement.

I've got something else, but I've tried typing it out a half-dozen times and it's not coming out right. I'll give it another shot tomorrow, perhaps. It's... at the same time it's nothing unexpected yet something strangely unexpected. I know, but that's the best way to describe it. Hopefully I can do better tomorrow.
 
Well blog on! I'm curious to see your next entry.

Congratulations on the good meetup with the BFF.
 
So, a couple things.

First, the advantage to living your life online is that you get to meet all types. I've got friends who are poly, kink, trans, whatever, you name it, I probably know at least a few people who qualify for the label. One thing I never understood about my poly friends is that calendars and scheduling always seemed to be an inside joke to them.

I get it now.

Our schedules both happened to open up for a bit tonight, and I hopped a quick twenty-minute drive (which I did in fifteen) to meet up with her and her friend at a diner. Just a chance to sit next to her, hold her hand, talk about stuff... yeah, I get it now. When the schedules don't seem to want to work out, you take every bit you can get. When they open up two nights in a row, it's a minor miracle.

But this also leads me to problem #1. First, Good Thing #1: She is comfortable enough with me that she'll read her texts where I can see her phone. This is one of those "Maybe I'm Just Weird" things, but after coming from a marriage where both sides were raised to never share phones, this was... it was touching. A sign of trust. I don't even know if it was intentional on her part or not, but it says to me that I'm trusted. And, since I was raised not to read over people's shoulders like a rude little snoop, I turn my eyes elsewhere...

... but not before they get a glance at a message where she talks about meeting for dinner and wishing there was enough time to get laid. And a response about teasing her.

Every muscle in my body tenses up. I couldn't've read that right. Or I didn't see enough to get the context. We've been open with each other; she's never mentioned someone else; half of my brain starts thinking of the worst-case scenarios -- I'm being played, used, whatever. The other half starts thinking of better reasons -- it's talking about her husband, or I must've misread it. Either way, I have this huge debate with myself in the span of about two full minutes, and eventually end on "Fuck it. It's her life. If it matters, ask her about it in private. But face it, odds are it was someone she met before you, and you knew going into this how things were. You love her, you deal with it, 'cause it's how you feel that's the problem."

... and then a minute or so after she's talking about how she had been telling her sister about her dinner date with her boyfriend on Monday and her sister was joking about getting laid, and I realize... she's talking about me. Our dinner date, which I blogged about last night. I just had a moment of total panic and possible jealousy... over myself.

I think it's time to accept that my marriage may have left me with self-esteem and trust issues, and if I want this relationship to work, I'm going to need to work on overcoming them. Not just coping with them; overcoming them.

Because that's the thing I was having trouble putting into words the other night. I've at and thought about it and slept on it and... I'm in love. Which totally fucks over my "Stay single until the divorce is done, spend some time by myself, figure out who I am and what I'm doing, then maybe start dating again" plan. But it's a bit more than that.

See, I've got this friend. Known him since second grade. We've had our differences, but we've been friends for damn near three decades. I've helped him smuggle vodka out of high school; he's helped me with bills after college; that sort of thing. He was a little skeptical when I told him I'd fallen for a poly woman. I gave him the car analogy I typed in my first post (second? Somewhere up there.) His response was: "Yeah, but what happens when you want to buy the car, and can't?" I said something about burning bridges when I get to them.

At this point... I'm pretty sure, if neither of us were married, I'd buy the car in a heartbeat and worry about payments later.

This scares the shit out of me on several levels. Not just the "Am I gonna mess up her marriage" level, but on the "Am I even ready for a relationship this serious" level, the "How can I date someone when I can't afford to fix my friggin' house" level, the "God, it's not fair, I need her with me right now" level...

There's days I wonder if I'm emotionally mature enough to even be an adult yet. Which, technically, I've been an adult for over half my life. I just... feel like I should be better ready for this than I really am.
 
Re:
"I think it's time to accept that my marriage may have left me with self-esteem and trust issues, and if I want this relationship to work, I'm going to need to work on overcoming them. Not just coping with them; overcoming them."

Amen ...

Polyamory tends to be complex and most people who are new to it find it to be a little overwhelming at first. To be polyamorous, you kind of need to develop a whole new way of looking at things.

Re:
"Yeah, but what happens when you want to buy the car, and can't?"

Ah, but who says the car was ever bought in the first place? What if no one "owns" the car? What if the car has a mind of its own, and a will of its own? What if the car wants to choose which (and how many) drivers it shares itself with? Can you live with that?
 
Maybe not a 100% new way of looking at things... but it certainly requires looking at definitions and redefining some, and looking at things previously held to be true and deciding how true they are. I don't know if I can love more than one person. But I'm able to accept the fact that she can, and I'm lucky to be one of them.

Ah, but who says the car was ever bought in the first place? What if no one "owns" the car? What if the car has a mind of its own, and a will of its own? What if the car wants to choose which (and how many) drivers it shares itself with? Can you live with that?

I never said it was a perfect metaphor. I guess I'm perfectly willing to be with the car as long as she wants me to ride he-- hold on, the metaphor's going someplace bad. As long as I can be insi-- no, wait. Um. I'll be there if her tank needs fil-- uh-uh. Um. Hrm. Yeah, the car metaphor is a bad one. But was the best I could come up with at the time.

And two months ago, I probably would be surprised to hear myself say this, but... yeah. I can live with that.
 
In a quick update, I am learning to understand Polyspeak. The phrase "My husband has a date this weekend" translates to "There is a good chance we'll get to spend some extra time together this weekend."

... I don't think I've ever rooted for someone else's date to last a long, long time before.
 
Heh, compersion with a twist.
 
On paper, tonight was just an ordinary date. Went out to a bar to watch a band, came back, watched a movie... well, watched part of a movie, missed the rest of it... And I find myself very sad once again that the subject of sleepovers is still being hashed out. Although that may quickly change; apparently her husband's date went very well. In the sense that right about the time we were getting dressed, so were they. I'm told that their date resembled our first date in a way; they had been texting for quite a while before deciding that yes, they wanted to meet to see if there was more to it... and the answer was "Not just a yes, but hell yes." So it's possible that there's going to be a bit more understanding there now that he's in the same sort of situation and knows what it feels like. I'm holding out hope that maybe next weekend will be the weekend.

And if not... as much as I'd love to wake up beside her, if it's something he's uncomfortable with, I can wait. But as I sat there next to the woman I've fallen in love with as she texts her husband about his date, I realize... polyamory is like quantum physics. I -think- I know what's going on. But I'm probably wrong. In a way, it doesn't matter, because I know the results. But if I keep learning, maybe I'll understand someday.

Don't know how much more I'll post here. I started this blog-forum-post-thing because... I felt lost, I was confused, I needed advice, I was worried about things. I... don't feel that way anymore. For now, it's just... the rightest thing in the world. The most open and caring relationship I think I've ever had, with someone who is... in almost every way, as close to the perfect woman as I will probably ever find.
 
That's starting to sound like a happy ending. :)
 
God, I hope it's not an ending. But I think it's the end of near-daily updates and stream-of-conciousness stuff. I have reached a place where I wish my meta the best in his relationships; where my stbx-wife has chosen to reunite with an old boyfriend and they're discussing possibly living together once the divorce is final... or possibly buying the house from me; where I'm going to have two stbx-inlaws moving into the basement to help them get back on their feet, 'cause transitioning is a royal pain in the ass; and where my girlfriend and I can both appreciate a fine-looking female drummer and laugh about it afterwards.

In other words, I am in a very strange place, and I am okay with that... which is also strange, and therefor, okay.

I might write more here eventually... I'm sure I'll hit some situation where my brain just implodes and I've got no clue what to do or how to process something... but for now? For now, I'm good. And I'd like to thank everyone who posted or PMed with advice; it was a huge help.
 
Well, I'm not sure if my brain imploded or not, but it seems like the situation should be recorded for posterity. Or whatnot.

I saw her kiss him for the first time tonight. Not, like, full-on-makeout kiss, but more than just a simple peck on the lips. And I felt... nothing. Not a single bit of the jealousy or rage or awkwardness I was expecting to feel. Just... it happened. It was expected. It didn't stay in my head, it didn't float in my mind when I kissed her later, it was just... a thing.

Granted, a few minutes earlier, he showed off his new giant-bar nipple piercings and talked about how it didn't hurt because his girlfriend bites harder than that... and it's possible my brain just turned itself off and hadn't rebooted in time to process anything.

Regardless, I'm going to count it as a win, a triumph of open-mindedness over upbringing. Sadly, our schedules don't allow us to get together until after the weekend, which will be the longest we've gone without seeing each other since this started. Gonna be a long friggin' week.
 
Re:
"I'm going to count it as a win, a triumph of open-mindedness over upbringing."

I'll drink to that.
 
Girlfriend and husband talked.

Sleepovers have been approved on both sides.

I admit, I squee'd like a teenaged fangirl watching her 'ship made canon.

... okay, so, I'm a giant friggin' nerd. I'm also happy. Now I just need to wait until schedules clear up.
 
Billy, I have to say reading your blog is giving me a lot of insight into how S2 might be feeling and coping with our relationship. He isn't monogamous (he hasn't quite sorted whether he's polyamorous or just not into exclusive relationships/exclusive sex partners), but still, he's walked smack into a situation where he's dating a married woman with whom things have to be coordinated around home and family, especially kids, and since he just ended a 14-year monogamous marriage, I'm sure there's some culture shock going on for him.
 
Yay for sleepovers! :D
 
So... life has decided to remain interesting on several fronts. The number of people living in the house has increased by two, as my soon-to-be-ex-brother-in-law and his daughter have moved in to the basement. The gets a mention on this blog because he is one of the reasons I'm more... open-minded than I used to be. He started transitioning a couple years ago, and recently his eldest son became his eldest daughter. Some members of the family haven't taken this well, which is why they need a place to live; personally, I don't care. They're good people.

Besides... reminding me to be open-minded probably got me into my current situation, so I kinda owe them.

Anyway. So the entire week involved cleaning and moving and whatnot, and somewhere in there, schedules combined and we had our first sleepover... and earlier in the day, I lose my mattress. See, the STBXwife has been sleeping in the guest room on the mattress borrowed from the brother-in-law. When Brother-in-law moved to basement, he took the mattress down there with him. So the one I've been sleeping on got moved to the guest room, since it was the wife's, bought with her first paycheck after we moved into our apartment over eleven years ago. Which meant we had... um... a nest of blankets and pillows. Not the most comfortable arrangement, but she was okay with it for a first sleepover.

Well, napover. Maybe three hours of sleep total. I don't know if it's because the NRE hasn't worn off, I don't know if it's because I'm truly, madly, deeply in love with this woman, I don't know if it's just because I haven't slept next to someone in six months... but those short bursts of sleep were some of the best sleep I've ever had. Sleeping next to her was the best part of the night. Even better than the sex. And I'm not the 'bragging fratbro' kind of guy, but... that's saying a hell of a lot right there. It's like saying something is better than fifty-year scotch, or sweeter than pure sugar. I'm going to remember this night, for multiple reasons, until the day I die.

And then she had to leave. Partially because she was wide awake and I was somewhat failing at adjusting to a multiple-nap schedule instead of a full night's sleep, partially because she had to go get coffee to save the rest of her household. And I'm trying not to freak out, because since then... nothing. No 'got home safe', no jokes, no response when I mentioned something I'd heard about a game she was interested in. I'm telling myself, it's nothing, she may have just gotten home and fallen asleep, or misplaced her phone, or even just turned it off to spend time with her husband so he doesn't feel like I'm replacing him (Which is apparently a possible issue, even tho he has two girlfriends... I thought I was getting a grip on psychology until this whole poly thing came along...) (EDIT: Turns out she fell asleep. Her sleep schedule continues to baffle me.)

I'm finding it interesting how the two sides of my life are changing. On the one hand, the STBXwife and family. Her family is great, even the uncles who volunteered to kill me for her if she wanted. She said no, as far as I know. But last night, she was... oddly jealous. And somewhat passive-aggressive. "I know you weren't making out with her, 'cause you're a horrible kisser. You're like a labrador, she wouldn't want that." And this morning when I had a text asking if I was up, I forgot to check who it was from before saying "Yeah, but its lonely without you here," which caused another mini shitstorm. I can't blame her -too- much as she's hormonal and it's her boyfriend weekend with his kids so she's kind of... in pain and alone and just lashing out.

On the other side, I am apparently being added to diagrams of the polycule drawn up by people I had (until about 4am this morning) never met. And for that matter, within half an hour of meeting me, they were asking if I was going to go to any of the meetups. So there's... I'm not sure. Acceptance, but it's something different than that. But it feels more like a family that the family I married into does. I've always liked being accepted. Happens rarely. I... am not normally social with strangers, but someone Id' never met wanted to hug me based solely on what they'd heard about me... I'm in a very weird place for me.

I've reached the point where this relationship... I think it's strong, I think it's going to last a long time, as long as I don't let my guard down and mess something up. But now... it's like this whole other step. You date anyone, you meet their friends. But this is... I don't know if it's because I'm naturally antisocial and don't let that many people get close to me, or if it's because poly groups tend to be closer even when there's no direct connection between them, but it's more like meeting her family. Friends, if you don't mesh well, doesn't matter as much. Family... family is far more important.

I have this sinking feeling I'm going to fall in love with this strange new-age family, only to realize that I -really- can't do poly and then have something happen to sever the one link I have with them. Stupid, no-basis-in-reality sinking feeling. I've been getting more of those this past month; it may be time to reconsider a depression med. 'cause I know that she's the best thing in my life, that this is... yeah, the best relationship I've ever had, and I don't my brain messing it up.

I seem to ramble when I don't get much sleep. Ah, well.
 
I have this sinking feeling I'm going to fall in love with this strange new-age family, only to realize that I -really- can't do poly and then have something happen to sever the one link I have with them. Stupid, no-basis-in-reality sinking feeling. I've been getting more of those this past month; it may be time to reconsider a depression med. 'cause I know that she's the best thing in my life, that this is... yeah, the best relationship I've ever had, and I don't my brain messing it up.

I seem to ramble when I don't get much sleep. Ah, well.

Boy, do I hear this. The sleep issue, and the faith in your partner and yourself issue sound so familiar right now.
 
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