So, I feel like my husband is my life partner. I love him & I don't see myself ever being without him. We've been together 17 years. Married for 12. BF & I are also in love. Best friends apart from being best friends with our spouses as well as being lovers & partners. We had long conversations while spending the weekend together talking about where our relationship started 6 months ago & how we would like it to continue. The love & passion I feel for BF is very different to me than the love I have for hubby & BF feels the same way about his relationship with his wife. It could just be the NRE but for now it feels right. We've both struggled trying to explain to others & our spouses that what we feel for each in no way detracts from our marriages & in no way do we compare one another to our spouses. In fact, having an outside relationship has enhanced our marriages. I'm wondering if other poly folks also find this to be the case?
Different types of love?
- Thread starter Dustytx
- Start date
Inyourendo
New member
I felt that way when in NRE with my boyfriend. I had this huge disconnect from husband and felt like we were just not on the same wavelength anymore. Eventually things went back to normal again, if anything I feel more of a romantic connection with my husband and more of a friendship connection to my boyfriend. I love both deeply but it's a different kind of love for each
Hubby and I definitely have a closer bond with me having other partners. It's partly because he isn't the only person in my life, which means he gets a break from listening to me and supporting me when I'm having a hard time. That might sound like he's harsh, but he isn't; he doesn't like long conversations with anyone, and my mental health issues can be a pretty big load for one person to help me carry sometimes.
I'm also happier when I have another partner, and that happiness carries over into my marriage. When I'm happier, so is Hubby.
It helps that he also gets somewhat turned on by knowing that another man wants me and fucks me, but Hubby's the one I come home to.
Establishing the open marriage we started with, and fine tuning it into our current arrangement in which I have polyamorous relationships and he sticks with only me as a partner, hugely improved our communication with each other as well, because I insisted on having possibly more discussions than we needed to have to set out boundaries and agreements. With the open marriage model, both of us wanted to keep the marriage the top priority, especially for Alt and Country's sakes. I don't do hierarchical poly, so I wouldn't say my marriage takes MORE priority than my other relationship, but it's still important to me and to Hubby that the marriage be not only functional, but good and happy. In order to make that happen, especially at the beginning, we *had* to communicate about boundaries and expectations, and that was something we'd never done even though we'd been together nearly three years by that point.
So yeah, I would say my being polyamorous and having other partners has definitely benefited my marriage. Sometimes Hubby puts on his asshole hat (that's his phrasing, not mine) and things get rough for a while, but we're now able to eventually talk it out and make changes, something that we rarely successfully managed before the open marriage.
One thing I make clear to Hubby and to any other partner I have is that I don't consider anyone *more* important. They're important in different ways and bring different benefits to my life. Hearing that helped Hubby wrap his head around the whole thing and not worry as much that I might leave him for someone else. Maybe telling your husband something similar would help him?
I'm also happier when I have another partner, and that happiness carries over into my marriage. When I'm happier, so is Hubby.
It helps that he also gets somewhat turned on by knowing that another man wants me and fucks me, but Hubby's the one I come home to.
Establishing the open marriage we started with, and fine tuning it into our current arrangement in which I have polyamorous relationships and he sticks with only me as a partner, hugely improved our communication with each other as well, because I insisted on having possibly more discussions than we needed to have to set out boundaries and agreements. With the open marriage model, both of us wanted to keep the marriage the top priority, especially for Alt and Country's sakes. I don't do hierarchical poly, so I wouldn't say my marriage takes MORE priority than my other relationship, but it's still important to me and to Hubby that the marriage be not only functional, but good and happy. In order to make that happen, especially at the beginning, we *had* to communicate about boundaries and expectations, and that was something we'd never done even though we'd been together nearly three years by that point.
So yeah, I would say my being polyamorous and having other partners has definitely benefited my marriage. Sometimes Hubby puts on his asshole hat (that's his phrasing, not mine) and things get rough for a while, but we're now able to eventually talk it out and make changes, something that we rarely successfully managed before the open marriage.
One thing I make clear to Hubby and to any other partner I have is that I don't consider anyone *more* important. They're important in different ways and bring different benefits to my life. Hearing that helped Hubby wrap his head around the whole thing and not worry as much that I might leave him for someone else. Maybe telling your husband something similar would help him?
I literally just had this conversation with my husband about my boyfriend, and it ended up with me comparing them to kitchen appliances.
A stove and a fridge are cornerstones in a kitchen, but you can't replace one with the other.
A2Poly
New member
So very perfect.
Hi Dustytx,
Every person is unique and individual, so I expect the love between any two people to be unique. That is, the love between "Person A and Person B" will always differ from the love between "Person A and Person C." This doesn't mean Person A loves B more than C, it just means she loves B differently than C.
Having said that, NRE definitely affects the nature of love any two people have for each other. And, I have heard of RRE (Renewed Relationship Energy) which is where NRE (in the newer relationship) spills over into the older relationship.
Regards,
Kevin T.
Every person is unique and individual, so I expect the love between any two people to be unique. That is, the love between "Person A and Person B" will always differ from the love between "Person A and Person C." This doesn't mean Person A loves B more than C, it just means she loves B differently than C.
Having said that, NRE definitely affects the nature of love any two people have for each other. And, I have heard of RRE (Renewed Relationship Energy) which is where NRE (in the newer relationship) spills over into the older relationship.
Regards,
Kevin T.
I love this too!
When I had two partners, I felt the same way. I loved both of them enormously. They were both deeply important to me - but like that, like different appliances.
Ah, man, if I'd read this when I was still with both of them...I think they'd both have had a good laugh too. Jon and Rachel both love cooking, so the idea of comparing the two...they'd probably have a playful argument about who was the stove and who was the fridge and then eventually say that it should be the stove and the sink, because then they'd both be warm and needed.