I was bullied as a child and felt sexually invisible in high school and feel wounds from that are still fresh in some ways. I see a lot of people who speak for the poly community who found relationships easy from the very beginning and that makes me feel not so welcome and has made me kind of hesitant to join in forums like this but my therapist told me I'd get more understanding from identified polyamorists so here I am.
I cohabitated with my spouse for a few years and have been married for more than 20 years. We slept together for quite a few months before we had sex for the first time and felt the sexual part of our relationship was not so passionate as the one I had with my previous girlfriend. Not long after my son was born (now college age) our libidos went in very different directions and the lack of sex and the quality became a major stress. I had a career crisis a bit less than a decade ago that had me start SSRIs, when that happened the sex dried up almost completely and I wasn't motivated enough to complain about it.
About a year ago my doc said I should try stopping the SSRIs and in the next few months I experienced an awakening. I cleaned up years of junk that had accumulated around the house, lost about 22 pounds without trying, and the conflicts about sex really came to the fore. I read the book The Art of Seduction by Robert Greene and it hit me like a lightning bolt and that got me reading a lot about love, relationships and seduction and such. Well my wife was not just consenting with this but she assisted me in my schemes and both she and me son noticed I was a lot happier and easy to live with when this was happening.
Not too long ago we made a discovery about my wife that made it really clear that the bulk of the difficulties were on her side and that maybe she could do years of therapy, take time off from all the things in life that she really loves, and maybe respond occasionally if I could choke back feeling resentful and deprived in the meantime enough not to push her away. She would have to do all this for something she doesn't care about herself and just to please me. On the other hand I have like 20 or 30 hours a week I can devote to new relationships and a tremendous amount of desire, energy and willingness to work hard.
Mainstream people really would have a hard time getting it but we both believe I can be a better husband if I succeed at becoming polyamorous. In terms of being committed and companionate our relationship is strong. The serial monogamy route seems like a certain disaster (should she be alone because she can't respond? if i break this relationship can I really believe the next one will last? breaking up would make it easier for me to explain myself to mainstream people and might open some doors but it would also mean more stress and difficulty as opposed to being supported in my growth and healing by the family I love.)
One some level I'm afraid "you can't teach an old dog new tricks" but in the last six months I have probably done about 1/4 of the studying on the way to a master's degree. I can talk a really good game on relationships. From my book learning I am really certain it's possible to have a love affair like the ones aristocrats had in the 18th century and I know that could be a lot of fun for both of us. Yet the book learning isn't the same thing as making it happen. I'm going to keep doing it because it's a way of relating to the world that is good at even though I'm starting to think and my therapist is starting to think it could be getting in the way. I'd see a one night stand as an improvement over the status quo but I've got some picture of what is possible with new relationship energy and I really want to make something awesome happen for somebody.
I cohabitated with my spouse for a few years and have been married for more than 20 years. We slept together for quite a few months before we had sex for the first time and felt the sexual part of our relationship was not so passionate as the one I had with my previous girlfriend. Not long after my son was born (now college age) our libidos went in very different directions and the lack of sex and the quality became a major stress. I had a career crisis a bit less than a decade ago that had me start SSRIs, when that happened the sex dried up almost completely and I wasn't motivated enough to complain about it.
About a year ago my doc said I should try stopping the SSRIs and in the next few months I experienced an awakening. I cleaned up years of junk that had accumulated around the house, lost about 22 pounds without trying, and the conflicts about sex really came to the fore. I read the book The Art of Seduction by Robert Greene and it hit me like a lightning bolt and that got me reading a lot about love, relationships and seduction and such. Well my wife was not just consenting with this but she assisted me in my schemes and both she and me son noticed I was a lot happier and easy to live with when this was happening.
Not too long ago we made a discovery about my wife that made it really clear that the bulk of the difficulties were on her side and that maybe she could do years of therapy, take time off from all the things in life that she really loves, and maybe respond occasionally if I could choke back feeling resentful and deprived in the meantime enough not to push her away. She would have to do all this for something she doesn't care about herself and just to please me. On the other hand I have like 20 or 30 hours a week I can devote to new relationships and a tremendous amount of desire, energy and willingness to work hard.
Mainstream people really would have a hard time getting it but we both believe I can be a better husband if I succeed at becoming polyamorous. In terms of being committed and companionate our relationship is strong. The serial monogamy route seems like a certain disaster (should she be alone because she can't respond? if i break this relationship can I really believe the next one will last? breaking up would make it easier for me to explain myself to mainstream people and might open some doors but it would also mean more stress and difficulty as opposed to being supported in my growth and healing by the family I love.)
One some level I'm afraid "you can't teach an old dog new tricks" but in the last six months I have probably done about 1/4 of the studying on the way to a master's degree. I can talk a really good game on relationships. From my book learning I am really certain it's possible to have a love affair like the ones aristocrats had in the 18th century and I know that could be a lot of fun for both of us. Yet the book learning isn't the same thing as making it happen. I'm going to keep doing it because it's a way of relating to the world that is good at even though I'm starting to think and my therapist is starting to think it could be getting in the way. I'd see a one night stand as an improvement over the status quo but I've got some picture of what is possible with new relationship energy and I really want to make something awesome happen for somebody.
