Complicating my relationship with poly is that negotiating nonmonogamy is a second generation thing for me, and not done well. My dad is non-monogamous; my mom monogamous. They did monogamy because it was assumed— only my dad did not. There were affairs— emotional and otherwise— and he always left a sufficient trail to be discovered.
Once, he left us on a family vacation before the days of cell phones, camping, so we really had no phone either, to spend time with another woman.
My mom knew exactly what was going on, and in her pain, we entered into a situation that was unsafe for all of us, deadly even, and she was not together enough to guard against. Two of us survived, by sheer coincidence, highly traumatized. One did not.
We could not reach my dad for nearly 24 hours to let him know we had lost a family member.
He then entered into a 30 year
relationship and eventual marriage with the woman he was with during the accident and death, who was jealous, and could not handle my relationship with him. Artificial barriers to me seeing him were set up, a lot. They were non-monogamous— at least, my dad was, during it. It was again, known. I don’t know about my stepmom.
I recreated so much of this in my poly life. It’s notable that I freed myself from the poly relationship that was the most retraumatizing within months or even weeks of my stepmother’s death—- or was freed.
My stepmother and meta fit the same role in my life, with jealousy, sabotage, and even both of them making a veiled death threat, that I didn’t quite believe, but was scary enough to take seriously. (With my meta, it made their house the only place in the world to give me panic attacks.)
So, what I originally listed as traumatizing in poly— all could be not only found in monogamy, but is all recreations of my childhood. Causing painful emotional flashbacks (poly hell)— and as a bonus, threats on life, if only implied.
Here is an unedited list, before I made the connection, of what felt traumatic:
Lack of support during an emergency for easily solved reasons. (All that needed doing was communication with a partner.)
Having to fight and argue for basic good treatment
Being asked to subdue obvious and genuine needs of my own for wants, disguised as needs, or lack of skills/function on a third party’s account.
Having it assumed it was okay to ask me to overgive, or bear the brunt of any compromise necessary with only cursory attention to fairness paid
Betrayal in the form of acting like my needs and wants did not exist in the presence of another partner— even though if a situation was made clear to the other partner, they would have accommodated graciously and felt good about it. Or backing out of a promise much needed and expected of any decent person in the circumstance because of a summons home— without even trying to negotiate or explain with the other person, and not bring open to negotiation with me. (Minutes before she had said she would stay as long as I needed; checked a text, and said she would be leaving early, because partner had asked her to- meta was sick, but had 4 other adults at home and had deferred when asked before if partner should stay home; I was needing aftercare we had negotiated, with meta getting it was needed, and to top it off, had been as sick or sicker and alone all week prior. And we were supposedly “equal”.) Both of these were not just betrayal- but betrayal that the other person could not have continued through had they received it. So, sabotage. Under the excuse of another relationship.
Being strung along.
Someone limiting themselves with me to artificially create or prop up a structure that was not healthy or right.
———-
Skills I developed through going through this really boiled down to learning to value myself and what I needed and learning to end relationships that had good reason for me feeling bad.
I think the trauma was inevitable— without giving further identifying details, the accident swung me full into horrific PTSD, and I had already had a childhood ripe for C-PTSD.
The retraumatization/healing pattern was in a way, the healthiest choice I had available. I was too much of a mess for a relationship without mental health concerns to be even, and I was with morally conscious people who were capable of adjusting (some) and who tried their best, but through lack of skills and experience, started at a very poor place for treating other significant others well— mainly because there are so few conscious role models for poly and the culture is filled with couple centrism.
I outgrew the original patterns— thanks in large part to my partners encouraging my speaking up for my needs — and kept on going. I wish my partners could have also kept growing, and we could have kept together, but I think while I might have started more damaged (had just exited an abusove marriage a few years ago, plus past trauma) I also had more potential for recovery.
I grieve to see my last partner, especially, still stuck in her own trauma, but am really glad she is taking care of it and making progress.
I don’t think I’ll ever go back to that particular set of people, while they are together. I never got reassurance that betrayal was out of the vocabulary. In fact, I got evidence to the contrary. And I’m fairly close to mental health that really works and relationships that really work, based on several I had while also with my original girlfriend, and there would have to be a lot of mental health growth to make us compatible.
And— while I can do poly and do mono, I think poly is too big a lifestyle adjustment to just do it because someone I’m interested in is doing it.
It has strikes against it for me.
Unfortunately I could lose my jobs if I uncloset.
There is lack of support, and lack of role models in healthy-for-all-poly in our state. And I rely heavily on role models to develop behavior. Our state is largely hierarchical in its support structures in a way that dismisses the new people’s needs, though I have found (and dated) several examples to the contrary.
And one thing I’ve found is that I’m not quite ready to be the change here. I feel I have done my share, and SO appreiciate the role models here on this site but I really need a healthy live community, and at the moment, need to join one, not found one. (I’m looking outside dating for this community at the moment, because of much lower stakes.). I think our state’s poly/kink community has a lot of health to it—- but while I’m kinkier than average, because of the trauma potential, and it being a new situation and therefore ripe for me getting into something bad for me, it can’t be a large part of my life.
So that’s my story.
I’m certainly a part of my own dysfunctional circumstances.
I at least got to grow through them with poly— and it was very much the personal growth of poly that appealed to me.
But... I’m kind of ready to take a break from the AFOG’s. Or, I’m sure I will still grow, but time to do so solo - or do so in more conventional circumstances where I’m not QUITE so responsible for forging a pattern of what healthy behavior looks like on my own.