Getting Past Heartache

S

SadishWolf

New member
A bit of background: my wife and I are new to poly (a few months now). We decided to give it a try when we were approached by a friend with the offer of some casual playtime. It didn't take long before I developed feelings for our new partner and requested a more intimate relationship. We started dating and have fallen crazy deep in love. We spend a lot of time together, and talk constantly when we aren't together.

Here's where things get harder for me. She has a lot of partners (6 including me). One of them is her husband, who I am beginning to build a friendship with. He has also started dating my wife (which I totally support). As for her other partners, I am stuck in an emotional hangup. My personal opinions of them aside, it is heart-wrenching any time she is with them.

At one point she indicated she would potentially be open to poly-fi, with us and our nesting partners making up the full polycule. This was something I wanted really badly, but she has now backed out of it. She has made room for me in her life, and has even allowed me to be closer than her other non-nesting partners, but I'm just so torn apart every time I know she's with one of them.

I don't know how to move passed this awful feeling, and I don't have anyone in my life that I feel like I can talk to about this, so here I am. There's more to the story, but this covers the vital info for my issue. I just need to hear advice from people who are not invested in it. Please help me.
 
This sounds like good old-fashioned jealousy or envy. The feelings are the same and it’s completely normal. These feelings can be the most difficult thing about poly for some people, particularly those new to poly.

First, you are full of NRE dopamine, which increases your feelings greatly. This increases the love you feel, as well as the jealousy. The good thing is, it’s just a feeling. Your feelings are also caused by your thoughts. Ask yourself: What is the story in my head when she’s with someone else?

Are you worried you’ll lose her?
Worried they are more attractive than you? Better in bed than you?
That they will take her away from you?
Or take away her feelings for you?
Or are you wanting that time for yourself? (This is envy.)

Many times, when you recognize the self talk, you can change it. Think of more positive thoughts or even find ways to distract your mind when she’s out on dates.

You can always tell her how you feel and ask for support.

Jealousy is a normal feeling. How you respond to it is important. It does get easier over time. The more she goes out and comes back to you, the less you’ll feel this way.
 
You sound really smitten, deep in NRE. The husband is understandable, you can honour him as primary but the partners as equal secondary is galling. You want them tertiary, at most, but your sweetheart reneged on that possibility (or more) and to be frank, you're jealous as fuck but perhaps aren't quite finding your "why" about that yet.

How to get past it is tricky when you're deep in new relationship energy, that feeling is designed to want her all to yourself (bar hubby). For whatever reasons, you simply do not respect these other men as an important or essential part of her life. You want her to dispose of them and to be with you (and hubby) exclusively. Except it's these relationships that make her who she is, she is a person who connects with others perhaps easily (albeit with pickiness to keep them around) and deeply and if she wasn't, then you wouldn't have gotten to be in her life the way you are now.

Have you been objectifying her, even subconsciously... seeing her as someone you need to possess, to cherish to the point of isolating her from them? This is unhelpful and unhealthy for both of you, I'm sure you don't want to be overbearing and creating a power imbalance. You're just head over heels, and it's hard to accept so many others in her life. But they really are part of make her who she is, if they were to be stifled by your desire for exclusivity, you would miss out on her full self, too.

So, you reframe the narrative in your head about who she is, what she is, and how she exists in the world. She is who she is and you don't want to diminish her personal power or stifle her personality. That's a way to move "past" it - move into it, through it.
 
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Hello SadishWolf,

Sorry you are struggling with these devastated feelings. Just a question, are you getting the time and attention you need from your new partner? When she is with you, does she put the focus on you, and for example does she turn her phone off when she's with you?

Here's some ideas of things you can do to cope when she's with one of the others:
Hopefully that helps.
Sincerely,
Kevin T.
 
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