Sounded like that boundary wasn't something you could tolerate and that you felt that his life should be open to you even during her time after he came up with the schedule to keep things fair between the you ladies (ie making sure she had some holiday time as well)
I wonder how much of his being incompatible with her desires was more of you trying to break that boundary she had this past year.
But like I said, you want inclusion, she wants exclusion and he chose to keep you over her since it's kind of all or nothing for you. She was at least making an effort (shaking you hand and greeting you). she obviously loved him enough to put herself out there like that and maybe given the chance would have slowly improved since she decided to work on that despite being extremely antisocial.
I'm not sure how much, if any, of
my blog you've read, but if you go back into the archives, you'll see that for the first nine months of that year (I guess I didn't start writing it until June, so you could see June to November), I had no contact with her at all, and that *I* was the one pushing for equality and fairness, for her getting her share of the time, etc., while he flailed around like a bull in a china shop (his own words). If I'd stayed out of the matter entirely, he would have chosen
of his own volition to give her far less than she ended up getting with my tempering him, and it probably would have ended a lot sooner than it did. That she believed that the schedule changes came from him was due to the fact that everything had to appear to come from him, because he didn't want her to know I was "helping" in the background. Some of that backstory of my trying to help is also addressed in
this post.
As for the "major holidays" she mentioned in her post...I wasn't going to pick that bone on here, but there are no "major" holidays between March (when I started dating him) and Thanksgiving (the event that pissed her off), especially since none of us is Christian. BUT of the "minor" holidays, she had St. Paddy's, Easter, Memorial Day, July 4th, and Labor Day. I had Halloween, but he still stopped by to say hi to her before hitting the town with Sam and me. There are other blatant, verifiable inaccuracies in that post that I chose not to address while she was active on the board, because I didn't want to stir up drama, and there's no point in going into them now. I'm not sure if she was purposefully mis-representing things, or if she really believed them, but I have hard evidence that I'm not the one who was remembering things wrong. It's impossible for anyone to know the full backstory of anyone else's situation based on these posts alone.
I doubt it's peaceful for her.
Unless my boyfriend lied to me,
she came to their meeting just as certain that she wanted things to end as
he did, and this was a culmination of differences between
the two of them that stemmed back many years. Neither of them blamed me. Neither of them blamed poly. Both did soul-searching and admitted that they had shortcomings in the situation and agreed that they weren't compatible and it was best for them to part. Thus, peaceful for everyone, in the way that they felt that they could find the most peace.
In truth, I've gotten the impression from much of what you've written about her over the past year that, in fact, you do feel superior to her, more mature, etc. I have to think that didn't help her want to be friends with you.
My first impression of her
was that she was quite mature. The things he told me about her early on impressed me, and I felt like it was a situation that could work. Over time, her reactions to things changed my mind about her. With more information, I re-evaluate and change my opinion. So the bottom line is that yes, I do believe that I am more mature than her. It's not surprising, though, since I have five years on her. I don't begrudge her her time to mature and grow and learn; I just don't want to be along for the ride. I have friends who are more mature than me (Oona, for one), and who know it, and I don't resent them for it; rather, I admire them and aspire to be where they are, eventually, if I continue on the path of self-growth that I try to stay on.
There
are ways in which I am superior to Claire. And there are ways in which she is superior to me (for example, Rider tells me she has a green thumb and a great sense of plot in her writing, neither of which I am ever likely to have, and she sings better high notes). That's life, and in my own blog, I feel safe to discuss those things. I never expected her to stumble upon the forum, and I expected even less for someone to point out to her who I was. Thankfully for everyone involved, she seemed not to exercise the curiosity to read everything that I was writing from (I thought) the safety of anonymity. My blog is a place where I spew and vent sometimes on topics that I'd rather not share with IRL friends, and, as such, it contains thoughts that I wouldn't express to people that I actually know (including Rider; I sometimes give him bowdlerized excerpts, but he doesn't need to see all of my rants and vents either).
~~~
As for
me, I am not compelled to stay in a situation that is unpleasant or uncomfortable for me. We are all free to make our own choices. I chose to walk away from that situation—my choice. He chose to walk away from his situation with her, for his own reasons, but in part because he decided that the style of poly that he wants is not the one that she wants—his choice, not mine. SHE chose to walk away from her situation with him, for her own reasons, which I cannot totally know—her choice, not mine. So she and I both walked away, and he chose to follow me—again, his choice, not mine.
For those of you who disagree with my choice to walk away, what would you have suggested? (I'm not being snarky here—I'd honestly like to know what other option you saw for me.) If I hadn't walked away, I would have continued in a situation that felt wrong FOR ME. This did not seem like a viable option for me. If I had walked away and he had chosen NOT to follow me (to follow her, or to become single), I would have had the opportunity to lick my wounds, remain quasi-single for a while (only LD connections), then eventually pursue a situation better suited to my needs. This would have been a viable option for me, but I control my action, not the outcome, and my action here would have been the same. Instead, when I walked away, he chose to follow me. And I love him, so I am pleased with that decision and have accepted his choice.
I hope someday I can experience a polyship that isn't going to have incompatible poly styles.
I hope the same for you, and for myself! When (and it will be not "if," but "when") Rider and I start really dating others locally and seriously again—be it weeks, months, or years from now—I really hope that there are fewer snags, now that we know more about ourselves, more about each other, and more about poly. He and I want close enough to the same thing that
we at least are on the same page; it's just a matter of finding others with a similar enough outlook. I *know* they're out there.
What I've learned is that other styles of poly can be just as wrong for me as monogamy is—I don't want a highly separated metamour relationship; I don't want polyfidelity, as I value sexual openness; I don't want to be someone's secondary if they're my primary, because mutual primacy is something I value; etc.
I've found the first building block of what I want, and it's just a matter of slowly continuing to build over time. I can be patient and wait for the other right person(s).
