Here’s my situation. I have been married for almost 14 years. My wife and I have been polyamorous for three years now. We were in a triad with a single bi-sexual woman for two of those years. As usual, it was tumultuous. The ladies never really got along for more than a few days. Eventually, the triad dissolved. Well, our ex and I would like to get back together. The problem is that I cannot deal with both my wife’s strong emotions and mine’s. I want to be authentic to what’s in my heart but I don’t know if I have the emotional fortitude to navigate the situation. How do I mitigate my feelings for our ex? Is it possible to forget about someone that you still love? What do I do when pursuing a love is damaging to my marriage? It always ends up in a fight. My wife says that she actually hates our ex and she can’t understand why I can’t leave her alone. Any advice?
Can you dissolve feelings of love?
- Thread starter KMS619
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dingedheart
Well-known member
Are you sure you had a 2 yr triad when the women only got along for a couple of days. Sounds like your hinge with a relationship with 2 women.
To answer your question no I don't think you can dissolve feeling of love. You'll just mourn the loss. Just hope it doesn't get you too depressed or too resentful...and last yrs and yrs.
To answer your question no I don't think you can dissolve feeling of love. You'll just mourn the loss. Just hope it doesn't get you too depressed or too resentful...and last yrs and yrs.
It sounds like it was a forced triad.
Why did you and your wife decide to "date" the same woman, if the 2 women didn't get along? Many people new to poly do, thinking they will avoid jealousy, but actually triads usually do just the opposite.
Perhaps your wife has veto power? So you agreed if it didn't work as a triad, you had to break it off with your gf. That's too bad.
If you want to start seeing her again independently, that might work. For you and gf. It could take your wife longer to feel comfortable with you seeing a woman she doesn't like. It sounds like you two need to read a lot and negotiate dating independently. I recommend the More Than Two website and book, as well as the book Opening Up.
Also you can do a tag search for "triad" and "unicorn" here to see the do's and don't's around triads.
Why did you and your wife decide to "date" the same woman, if the 2 women didn't get along? Many people new to poly do, thinking they will avoid jealousy, but actually triads usually do just the opposite.
Perhaps your wife has veto power? So you agreed if it didn't work as a triad, you had to break it off with your gf. That's too bad.
If you want to start seeing her again independently, that might work. For you and gf. It could take your wife longer to feel comfortable with you seeing a woman she doesn't like. It sounds like you two need to read a lot and negotiate dating independently. I recommend the More Than Two website and book, as well as the book Opening Up.
Also you can do a tag search for "triad" and "unicorn" here to see the do's and don't's around triads.
I am sorry you struggle.
You were in a rough sounding triad and it folded. Now you and the ex want to try again, this time as a "V" model. Wife hates this ex and she can’t understand why you can’t leave her alone.
Well... why can't you? Are you able to articulate it?
When was the break up? Was it recent and still fresh?
If so? People need time to heal before starting a new thing. After some time passes, you could ask wife if she could be ok in a V model with you as the hinge and the ex as the other V-arm person.
Break up feelings stink, and feel yucky. But don't just leap into a V with the ex to avoid feeling yucky from the break up. If waiting for a time is better for all? You wait.
In the meanwhile, what stops you from saying something like...
If you each need extra support and the spouse is too close to the situation to provide it, could you be willing to see counseling? Talk to a friend or relative? Basically comfort in and kvetch out?
What exactly is in your heart? You do not actually say.
If the goal is mitigation? You don't have to forget. You have to let time pass. Without interaction, the love will fade further down into memory. Then it doesn't feel so strong and angsty.
Is that the goal?
You could stop pursuing at this time because that behavior is currently damaging your marraige. You cannot do both at the same time. You could take a time out to assess.
You sit and reflect and you choose what you want to be doing. Become firm of purpose:
You are in charge of your behaviors. You choose what behaviors you want to be doing at this time and in future.
So again... what is in your heart?
Galagirl
You were in a rough sounding triad and it folded. Now you and the ex want to try again, this time as a "V" model. Wife hates this ex and she can’t understand why you can’t leave her alone.
Well... why can't you? Are you able to articulate it?
When was the break up? Was it recent and still fresh?
If so? People need time to heal before starting a new thing. After some time passes, you could ask wife if she could be ok in a V model with you as the hinge and the ex as the other V-arm person.
Break up feelings stink, and feel yucky. But don't just leap into a V with the ex to avoid feeling yucky from the break up. If waiting for a time is better for all? You wait.
In the meanwhile, what stops you from saying something like...
"Wife, we broke up the triad. We are both in a healing process here. I still have loving feelings for ex. I am not going to express those feelings to you because they are triggery for you. You need to do your healing without extra triggers and I want to respect that.
I need you to respect that my healing process is from a different POV than yours. You have hateful feelings for ex. I would appreciate you not expressing them to me because they are triggery to me. I need to do my healing without extra triggers too.
I am willing to give you the space you need to heal. Could you be willing to do that for me?"
I need you to respect that my healing process is from a different POV than yours. You have hateful feelings for ex. I would appreciate you not expressing them to me because they are triggery to me. I need to do my healing without extra triggers too.
I am willing to give you the space you need to heal. Could you be willing to do that for me?"
If you each need extra support and the spouse is too close to the situation to provide it, could you be willing to see counseling? Talk to a friend or relative? Basically comfort in and kvetch out?
What exactly is in your heart? You do not actually say.
If the goal is mitigation? You don't have to forget. You have to let time pass. Without interaction, the love will fade further down into memory. Then it doesn't feel so strong and angsty.
Is that the goal?
You could stop pursuing at this time because that behavior is currently damaging your marraige. You cannot do both at the same time. You could take a time out to assess.
You sit and reflect and you choose what you want to be doing. Become firm of purpose:
- You choose to stop interactions with the ex temporarily until the break up angst / strong emotions fade down. When all 3 players have had enough time to recuperate from the triad bad experience and are calmer, you could ask wife and ex if they are willing to reconsider a new V model with you as the hinge.
- You choose to stop interactions with the ex permanently and let the love for ex fade down. You choose to keep participating in the marriage with wife.
- You choose to stop participating in the marriage with wife and disband it. You choose to pursue the ex.
- You could choose to let both the ex and wife go. Be on your own for a while.
You are in charge of your behaviors. You choose what behaviors you want to be doing at this time and in future.
So again... what is in your heart?
Galagirl
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Spork
Active member
I'm only going to address one thing, the question that you asked...there is more, and others have given good input on that.
Can you "dissolve" love?
I think so, yes. Not like flipping a switch, and maybe not in a total and absolute way, but over time, if you decide firmly with yourself to not see someone anymore for good reasons, your intense feelings will fade, I think. You'll still have memories but their power over you will diminish.
Sometimes events can occur that accelerate this. I had strong feelings for someone, and then we went on a trip together and he acted like a total asshole, and at that point my feelings for him had been cooling off anyways, and that just put the clincher on it. Like I would not mind being friendly to him if he showed up back in my life, but I won't be putting any energy into it, nor resources into anything he might need. The "feelings"...well, that is over. By a long shot.
Had feelings for another one, that really tugged at my heart for a long while, a good...I'd say 8 months after the last time I saw him, I started to get a bit of closure on that. What helped? Well, I found out something about how he treats people in general, that helped me to understand him and why it went the way it went. New information that clarified things about his character. It made it easier to just let it go, finally. Also? I fell in love with a partner, and that explosion of NRE for another person helps to fade out the urgency for a previous one.
Both of those people, I had said to them that I loved them, and at the time I really meant it. They get a little sliver of my heart to keep forever, but it becomes a sort of archival thing with no immediacy and no importance, eventually.
So yes, it's possible to "dissolve" or at least seriously mellow and fade and gradually mostly forget, the intensity of feeling for someone. But it can take time. Just like anything, like mourning a loss, or quitting an addiction.
Can you "dissolve" love?
I think so, yes. Not like flipping a switch, and maybe not in a total and absolute way, but over time, if you decide firmly with yourself to not see someone anymore for good reasons, your intense feelings will fade, I think. You'll still have memories but their power over you will diminish.
Sometimes events can occur that accelerate this. I had strong feelings for someone, and then we went on a trip together and he acted like a total asshole, and at that point my feelings for him had been cooling off anyways, and that just put the clincher on it. Like I would not mind being friendly to him if he showed up back in my life, but I won't be putting any energy into it, nor resources into anything he might need. The "feelings"...well, that is over. By a long shot.
Had feelings for another one, that really tugged at my heart for a long while, a good...I'd say 8 months after the last time I saw him, I started to get a bit of closure on that. What helped? Well, I found out something about how he treats people in general, that helped me to understand him and why it went the way it went. New information that clarified things about his character. It made it easier to just let it go, finally. Also? I fell in love with a partner, and that explosion of NRE for another person helps to fade out the urgency for a previous one.
Both of those people, I had said to them that I loved them, and at the time I really meant it. They get a little sliver of my heart to keep forever, but it becomes a sort of archival thing with no immediacy and no importance, eventually.
So yes, it's possible to "dissolve" or at least seriously mellow and fade and gradually mostly forget, the intensity of feeling for someone. But it can take time. Just like anything, like mourning a loss, or quitting an addiction.
vinsanity0
Active member
Spork, it sounds like your feelings diminished because you found out bad things about the people. I don't think that's the same as dissolving love for someone because your wife doesn't like them.
Spork
Active member
Those events definitely had an impact, in those situations.
But time apart, I think, can absolutely also diminish the urgent feelings of a love relationship. Regardless though, it isn't simply flipping a switch. Even those instances I had where I learned negative information about those people, it only HELPED me get over them...I was already struggling along on the road to doing so, it just made it easier and less painful. Time, I think, is the key.
As I mentioned, there is a lot more to THIS specific situation. I didn't want to get into all that. With the wife and everything. Because others already had done.
Mainly I'd question, so it's right for the wife, for him to break it off with the gf and get over here...but is it right for HIM? I don't know.
So I purposefully set aside that, and just addressed if it were possible.
vinsanity0
Active member
I agree that immediate urgency will fade over time. For me, it never really goes away though, unless they were shitty to me.
I think there are different types of people on that. Lot of people will say love fades with time. I'm not in love with my first bf anymore, although I'd be glad to see him. But I've got a friend telling me none of his loves has fades one bit, ever. He basically has to learn to pretend around his exes.
I also know a lady who can basically stop paying attention to a friendship and her feelings for the person don't diminish a bit. She can pick up a conversation as she left it after years. That doesn't work for me - I need regular contact to keep the same level of trust and relating, and I conned love with that, so that with no contact basically I stop caring.
Spork
Active member
I think you're right.
I have often said, because I define "love" very broadly, that once I love someone, I never stop loving them. It's not a gift I take back. But that is only true in the sense that I define love VERY broadly.
The part I figured the OP was asking about was the part that HURTS. The "mourning the love I miss" part. Now, maybe it's because everyone that I was ever feeling big love feelings for, was shitty to me sooner or later...but eventually in time, those big feelings faded. I no longer felt stuff like hurt or longing, thinking of them. I have the fond memories, and I'd say they have a place in my heart. And I consider it a loving place.
But I think like the grief process when I lost my dear friend (the one who actually died)...for the first three months, I felt a physical pain in my chest or belly, more or less all the time. Like I'd been punched. I was distant, not right. Then I got past that, and still I had a lot of thoughts of "what if"...what if I'd called or been there that night, what bargain could I strike with the universe to have him back, what if I could find and speak to his spirit now and tell him how everything has changed and nothing is right since he left... It's a process. And finally, you accept it. And get on with life.
I had, especially with the guy I had to find out stuff about how he treats people...I had a couple weeks of lying curled up around my phone crying. I had months of rationalizing his behavior and scripting everything out and overthinking it all. I had months of anger, because I wanted to be able to say he didn't matter to me, but he did. I wanted to not miss him, but I did. And eventually...around the same time, I found out the information I did, and I fell in love with Zen...eventually I got over it for reals and moved on.
But I still wish him well. And I remember what loving him felt like. And he has a little place in my heart anyhow. In my very broad strokes definition of love, well, I still love him sort of. But I'm not feeling anything intense or painful or big, if I think of him.
Hi KMS619,
During your triad, did the single bisexual woman live with you (and your wife)? If so, maybe you could start up a V with her living someplace separate. You could go date her from time to time at her place; maybe eventually you could do some overnights at her place. If, that is, your wife is willing to accept that. If not, then you'll have to break up with your wife, the other woman, or both.
Is it possible to forget about someone that you still love? No, not per se, you'll always remember that person. But you can adapt to life without that person in it. Does that make sense?
I hope this post helps a little.
Sincerely,
Kevin T.
During your triad, did the single bisexual woman live with you (and your wife)? If so, maybe you could start up a V with her living someplace separate. You could go date her from time to time at her place; maybe eventually you could do some overnights at her place. If, that is, your wife is willing to accept that. If not, then you'll have to break up with your wife, the other woman, or both.
Is it possible to forget about someone that you still love? No, not per se, you'll always remember that person. But you can adapt to life without that person in it. Does that make sense?
I hope this post helps a little.
Sincerely,
Kevin T.