Long story. But looking for non-dogmatic support and feedback.

P

polywollydoodle

New member
Forgive the length and the inevitable typos. I've written "my wife" to keep her name out of it.

Part 1:
So we could go back to my childhood but for now let me just say that my adolescence and the whole decade of my 20s and even early 30s were incredibly isolating and lonely and painful in terms of friendships and relationships with women. I was decent looking, smart, talented, and fun by most accounts when I was younger. I was an actor and writer and I did make friends and work a little in the theater in New York and all that.

But for whatever reasons, my own profound, emotional blocks and fears or even just some weird destiny kept me from experiencing love and sex or even the slightest interest from anyone I was attracted to from age 18 to 31. I had one girlfriend for a year when I was 26 but other than that, I was almost completely alone in all that time. In some ways, I was just a regular guy who grew up in the middle class, suburbs of Canada and in other ways, I was Travis Bickle, broke and alone in the underworld of New York City.

Career wise I had a great start when I was 22 and got the lead in the national tour of a Pulitzer Prize winning Broadway play. But things took a nose dive after that and never recovered. Another source of tremendous pain. And isolation.

But I got involved in a great theater group in 1997. I was born in 1971 by the way. And I made friends and found an artistic home and met this extraordinary girl. She was just finishing college and I had recently turned 30, directed my first low budget movie and like everyone was reeling from 9/11. The world was changing.

We fell madly in love and got married and within a year had our first child. I directed her one woman show and then we moved to LA where we struggled financially and professionally, but were still very very happy together.

We had another child and were a happy family. We didn’t get out to network and further our career because we had kids and neither of us ever felt part of the club anyway. I could never get work as an actor or writer, a director or editor, but I have waited tables, served coffee, worked in offices, you name it. My wife is an extraordinary talent and managed to get some great breaks, costarring in real movies and shows. But not enough to make a real living and there was always a strike or pandemic or some other setback.

In our marriage, we were always in love. Sex was always great. In some ways she was reserved, but I knew we had our whole lives ahead of us so I wasn’t impatient about those things.

But because of her own upbringing with what I would call an emotionally abusive mother, she’s always had deep insecurities and fears. She was always asking me if I was attracted to other women. Whether on TV or in life. I never gave her any reason to think that. I’ve never flirted with anyone else and I’ve been so happy to be with her that it never occurred to me to be bored or long for someone else. And after all those years of isolation, I would never jeopardize what I was so happy to have found.

She would always say that she wasn’t remotely attracted to anyone else and I believed her. But she would still always wanna check my emails and phone messages to make sure I wasn’t doing anything behind her back. Again, there was no reason in the world for her to believe so but I knew she had fears that had nothing to do with me and I was an open book.

Then, after being together for 10 years, I noticed something happening. She started having a real awakening, emotionally and sexually. I was shocked when she let slip that Jesse Pinkman on Breaking Bad was hot. Now it wouldn’t have bothered me years earlier, but after all her suspicions of me, I was so surprised.

Then she started researching women and ancient Celtic cultures and discovering how much power and equality they had and that they lived non-monogamously. During sex, she would start introducing the idea as a fantasy. And one day after years of saying “I love your cock”, she suddenly started saying “I love cock.” It was a shocking turn of events. But it was also exciting and an incredible turn on.

She started learning about polyamory and introducing all those ideas to me. I was very wary of taking it on for real. Our marriage was the most important and precious thing to me and I said I did not want to endanger it in any way. She agreed but kept going deeper down the rabbit hole and meeting more people and getting involved in communities and reading books and researching, and it grew and grew inside her. She was almost becoming another person. She was overwhelmed by the need to be with other people. And the more I felt pressure the more I rebelled against it. One day she said that if I didn’t want to do it, then we wouldn’t but that something would die inside her.

Now, the last thing I wanted to do was to go back to a life of trying to date again and be rejected and go through all that pain all over again when I had had 10 years of bliss and safety and assumed that for the rest of my life. The idea of putting myself in that position again terrified me.

But I agreed to try it. Part of what was exciting about it, besides our sex life becoming better and better was the honesty it brought out. There was so much we could finally talk about that we didn’t even realize we had buried.

I said I would try it, but I had to go first. I knew she could get a man instantly and I was concerned nothing would happen for me. A few weeks passed and she got more and more impatient with me, which was really hurtful. She encouraged me to go on Tinder. I did reluctantly but I actually met someone quickly. She was from Taiwan and studying for the bar in California. We got together quickly and it was incredibly hot and exciting and sweet so I told my wife that she was now free.

But I emphasized from the beginning that we had to be incredibly careful and take it slow because our marriage was the most important thing in the world. Not only did she agree, she added the instructions “no feelings“. I said no problem.

So she jumped into a car with this guy Matt that she met and they drove to a nearby park and took her top off and made out and fooled around so quickly. She came back and told me and while I projected fun I was secretly in pain that she had been wanting this so bad for so long and couldn’t wait to get away.

Nevertheless, it was all exciting and we both agreed that the strangest thing about it was how normal it felt at the same time. So I saw the girl once every week or two and my wife had brief flings with many men. The irony is that she wanted what I had, an ongoing thing with one person and she just had a wild variety of sex which is what I had envisioned for myself. Her stories turned me on to no end. She had a few threesomes with a couple and a hot affair with a woman and many other men.
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Part 2:

Months went by and the girl from Taiwan lost interest partly because she really wanted this other boyfriend to love her back. It’s too bad she couldn’t just enjoy what she and I had but I didn’t take it personally, and we eventually parted on good terms after a nice six months.

But around this time I discovered that my wife was developing feelings, possibly even love for someone. This threw me into a panic and I became like a jealous boyfriend. Checking her phone and freaking out. I said this wasn’t supposed to happen and she said that things change. I was so hurt and so upset and I didn’t know how to get out of it. But one night I went down to the bookstore for some quiet and I sat and read through a book by Tich Nhat Hahn called Taming the Tiger and by the end of it I had traveled through my wife's whole life in my mind and in my heart and I let go of all my preconceptions and my fears and found a bit of that magic word, compersion.

I came home and I held her and I told her that she was allowed to love and I was happy for her and that I love her for feeling love and that she could love anyone she wanted. She cried and couldn’t believe it. By then she actually had already started losing interest in the guy, but we had had yet another breakthrough. It was more about the freedom than the guy. I guess.

This was the summer of 2015. I had also spent a year planning and building a school. This was partly a personal passion of mine besides film and theater, But I also desperately needed a good steady job that would bring in income. We were also trying to raise money for the movie we wanted to make together. Sometime in August, my wife flew to New York to do a play for a few weeks and the very next day at an open house for my school that was going to open in September a young woman came in with her daughter. I knew on sight that something was happening.

She and I spent the afternoon talking and then we all went out for pizza with our kids. Then we ended up back at my house. The kids became such fast friends and were having a ball. Me and the woman whose name was "K", became lost in wonderful conversation and a bottle of wine. Night fell and the kids begged for a sleepover and we agreed. K and I stayed up late. It seemed to me at the time that she was one of the most beautiful women I’d ever seen, inside and out. We went to bed together and spent the next two weeks starting a beautiful, passionate relationship.

It seemed like this could be the dream my wife had described to me, true polyamory. With our kids and our partners all sharing life together. After two weeks, it was time for me to take the kids to New York to spend time with my wife because she couldn’t stand being away from them for that long.

K and I texted and sexted every day for the next two weeks and she said she couldn’t wait for me to come back and that we were gonna have so much fun. But the day we flew back something changed overnight. Her texts were cold and she wouldn’t see me. And then she ghosted me without explanation.

My kids were devastated. I was devastated. My wife wondered what the hell was going on. Then that same week my school fell apart because the owner of the building hadn’t renewed a certain permit, and hadn’t told anyone. Also, that same week these producers who were going to make our movie dropped out. I imploded and fell into a depression. This had such a terrible impact on my marriage. Just as opening had brought out the wonderful side of honesty, now the dark side was out.

I don’t remember the details, but my wife has never forgotten or let me forget. I was really bad to be around and was probably angry at her for dragging me into this whole thing, with all I had feared in the first place. Being ghosted without a hint of explanation had been my former life for over a decade. Almost my only experience before my wife. The old ghosts come back to haunt me again. But after three months, I was determined to pull myself out of my depression without medication or anything like that.

So I got to work focusing on getting our movie made low budget and independently. We did and it was a wonderful experience and pulled me out of the darkness. During the shoot we set about getting pregnant with the third child we had always wanted. Even though my wife and I hadn’t resolved all the conflict that had come up we put it aside for a while.

We found a beautiful house in upstate New York and finally left LA, which had been so toxic for us. And as the years passed, strangely, my wife reverted to her old jealous ways. She kept asking me if I was attracted to other women. I would say “No, honey “, playing a ridiculous game. She was also so upset with me about my recent dark time that she wouldn’t have sex with me for over a year. But then, even as we were recovered and grew close again, she reverted to her old repressed ways in bed.

Exactly one year ago and nine years after first attempting to open our marriage, my wife started having a second sexual awakening. Once again, suddenly one day she went from saying “I love your cock” to “I love cock“. Despite everything this was actually something I’d been praying for for years, but never thought would happen again. A second chance to try it all.

What I had missed the most actually was the honesty. And I told myself if I ever got a second chance not to screw it up. We had a brief talk after my wife had said “are you gonna let me?“ I said, I thought that if she wanted to try it again, it would be when we had money. Which we don’t at all. We are in debt and struggle to get by every day. Among other problems this makes it impossible for a man to date anybody. But she waved it off and I let her.

I said I wouldn’t make her wait for me this time and I wanted to be able to do this without the crutch of seeing someone myself. I said she was free. But this time we had to be smarter and go really slow and be very careful. She agreed. Within days she was having sex with this guy she had been private tutoring. I should’ve stopped her right there because of the speed, but it seemed light and adult so I just went with it. Having her open up this way was hot all over again. And our own sex life went to the next level. I’ve never felt sexual jealousy which I’m grateful for. But only a month later, I was completely blindsided when she said that they were in love.

At first, I took it in stride because this was supposed to be what I signed up for. But that it happened so fast and they got so serious so quickly was so painful and sent me reeling. I told her it wasn’t her. It’s something that I wanted and that my head was fine with it, but my nervous system was not. I kept asking her to slow down, but she would do the opposite. Instead of staying with him one night a week she was afraid of losing him and I got pulled into agreeing to making it two nights a week. I again begged her to slow down and she agreed but then the next morning I walked in on them having sex in our private office. I lost it and she said she didn’t think it would be a big deal. This is something I wrote at the time:

————
“I’ve hit a big wall. We said we’d be more careful and slow. But my wife evidently has a hard time doing just that. Within six weeks, she said she was in love and talking about this brand-new relationship as long term. She's eager for us to meet. This time I have handled it much better. I’ve been genuinely happy for her. I understand that we all have feelings and love, and that’s the point of all of this. But her NRE has become a ride that I am hanging onto. There has been so much for me to process and adjust to. Despite my head being fine with it all, my heart started hurting. I’ve never experienced the love of my life falling in love with another man. It’s gone from mild jealousy to real pain.”

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Part 3:

“Once again, I asked her to slow down. She says she didn’t mean to fall in love, and she can’t help her feelings. She’s avoided the idea of slowing down. She just wants us to work through my feelings without making her feel put in a cage, or hurting her boyfriend of three months. She often puts his feelings and experiences on par with mine. And talks about the future in terms of years without asking me if I am ok being connected to this stranger for the rest of my life.

Last weekend, I gently told her over and over that I needed her to slow down. She agreed and said that we needed to talk about what that meant but couldn’t have that conversation for a few days. Then, the next day, on Monday morning, I went to our shared private office and walked in on the two of them. The boyfriend, who I hadn’t met, was just pulling up his pants.

I went into a panic of betrayal and left. The rest of the day my wife was apologizing, saying she was going to tell me after, and didn’t think it would be a problem, because he’d stopped by our office in previous days to fuck her and I’d been ok with it. (She’d told me after the fact then, too, so what choice did I have?) I said, "You call this slowing down?" And she insisted that she didn’t think it counted, because it was so brief, and that she can’t read my mind.

So look, I don’t want to control my wife’s feelings or her sex life. It’s exciting and beautiful and arousing to me and I love hearing about it. But the last few days and weeks I have felt betrayed and triggered like never before and am now in full blown fight or flight, trauma response. I don’t want to close up again, but my wife is so resistant to even pausing for a month (that it’s too late for that and would hurt her and her boyfriend) and holds over me that she will feel repressed with me, because what moves her and attracts her to me the most is when I allow her this freedom.

She’s not insensitive to me. She’s been crying with me and is in pain that I’m in pain. She told me over and over that she would never leave me, while I sobbed. She says we might not be able to handle all this. I think we can, and that the light at the end of this tunnel will be brighter than any other. But I feel stuck and in terrible pain. She says this is what I wanted and I said but it’s not how I wanted it. I know life is never how we expect it to be. But I am utterly unprepared to face so quickly a mourning for the marriage we’ve had and for who my girl has been to me for twenty years. I know those things are normal and I can embrace them and celebrate the new normal as even better and more alive than the old normal.

But the speed feels like when the doors dropped on Normandy Beach and the guns opened fire. The price for freedom? I’ve reached out to a therapist who does somatic and Eastern-based relationship therapy, and I’m optimistic that I can clear out the old trauma that this is obviously bringing up. I want my wife to experience love, just as I would expect the same gift from her in return. I want to be able to not only endure her feelings, but love them all, and without the crutch of trying to balance it out by finding another woman for myself. But her NRE is out of control, and plowing through my intense pain is only making it worse.”
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Then in the middle of all that I got double pneumonia and was in bed for two weeks. It was the sickest I’ve ever been in my life. As I started to come out of it, after my wife had taken good care of me, we started talking more honestly again. She had so much pent-up anger with me about all kinds of things from our whole 20 year marriage. I don’t have the energy to get into all that here, but it was a lot.

And the fact that she was carrying so much resentment brought up so many things that I’ve tried to talk to her about for 20 years, but that she has refused. And it brought up a lot of terrible ways she’s treated me from the beginning. And she finally admitted to them. One of which is that much of the time, she has been ashamed of me, especially around others, (even though our friends and people we know seem to really enjoy my company; I used to be quite well loved and had friends but I don’t anymore). A lot of this comes from the trauma of her parents, both how they raised her, and also the fact that they hated me from the beginning and made her life hell when we got married. So we started to get a lot out. And I started learning about attachment, trauma and somatic therapy. I wanted to accept that my wife was in love with someone else, but it brought so much darkness up. I found a somatic therapist and started to address some things.

Finally I found myself in a bath for five hours, sobbing and crying out for help. So I flew to Phoenix to see some friends of my wife to do psychedelic therapy with 5MEODMT. That’s a long story as well, but it was extraordinary and I came out of it pretty much resetting my system and clearing out all my childhood traumas. I came back and found myself really loving my wife and even loving the fact that she was in love and I found it lovely and felt compersion. So we arranged to meet and the three of us went out. Another big setback.

I was in shock at who this guy was. First of all he was extremely overweight. I'm not trying to fat shame but I am always in average to pretty good shape, depending on how life is going, but have endured comments about my weight from wife for years. And to me he was dull, not very smart and was having huge emotional and psychological problems. He is a war vet and suffers from real PTSD ans well as obvious attachment trauma from his upbringing and his recently uncovered, sexual abuse. He is extremely depressed and lives in a kind of trailer. He’s a trained nurse, but can’t work because of his PTSD. And has expressed recent suicidal thoughts. The relationship with my wife has been a rescue light in the darkness.

I could not believe this was the big love that had caused all this drama in our marriage. It just seemed so random, like she’d picked out a guy blindfolded, in line at Walmart. The guy that she just couldn’t help herself with, couldn’t slow down with, was always prioritizing over our foundation, newly fragile in this experiment. To her, the risk was losing him.

I tried to hide my reaction from my wife, but it didn’t take much for her to get it out of me. I said, that I wasn’t dating him and she could do what she wants. But she was so upset that I didn’t like him. Of course that was an understatement.

Time went on and I just couldn’t get over it. Even after meeting him a few more times, I couldn’t get used to it. I couldn’t believe my wife was intimate with this guy. And it made me feel repelled from her. She was angry and upset with me. I said that there could easily be a scenario where I would be in love with someone that she found repellent, but she didn’t want to hear it.
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But I let time pass, and I began to accept it more. Meanwhile, the boyfriend, Bryan, became more jealous and was having a really hard time with the arrangement. He was so in love with my wife and couldn’t handle being apart from her. He was having breakdowns and saying he wasn’t sure he could keep seeing her without having her to himself. They would both sob together. I was aware he had a gun and I asked if she was safe, which annoyed her. But I had to ask. How many stories are there?

To make her point and, it seemed, rub it in, my wife shared and said things to me that still feel like a knife in my heart. She said they were just so in love. She said she wished I understood how well he loved her. And by the way, from the beginning of their relationship, she started trying to get me to lower my voice (like his) and talked about how great it was to be with someone who was just bigger and enveloped her and all these things that he does and is that she’s dreamed of. And that they would say to each other that they were so in love: “What are we going to do?”

In July, on my birthday, my wife insisted on taking me and our three kids on a long drive to a place she wanted to go but I didn’t. We didn’t enjoy it but I put on a happy face and we had a nice evening at home. That night, as I was falling asleep, she kept checking her phone and went into a panic. Bryan was on a date. She started freaking out getting in and out of the bed, going in and out of the house trying to reach him. Why had he not texted? She was freaking out. Finally, she heard back. He had tried to have sex with this woman (unsuccessful because of his meds). She FaceTimed with him and was furious and hurt. And kept coming back to our bed, wanting me to deal with it. Happy Birthday.

The next day, Bryan apologized profusely to her and they agreed that neither of them was ready for him to see other women. My wife told me that they communicate better than she and I do.

One night I looked at her and said “I love you (my wife). She looked at me with love and said, “I love you, Bryan.”

Then, this past August, he started to break up with her because he couldn’t handle sharing her anymore and she had a full on anxiety attack. I guess luckily he’s a nurse and was able to treat her. This sent me over the edge. This wasn’t remotely what we had agreed to. This was not going slow, being careful, putting our marriage first. My nervous system shut down. Pure fight or flight.

I got up in the middle of the night to look at her old texts, and I found out that she and Bryan had been consistently texting personally for eight months before my wife suggested opening our marriage. Which of course made me wonder, as I had when they hooked up so fast, if she had only wanted to open the marriage in order to get together with this guy. She denies that to this day, but it’s hard for me to believe.

So I woke her up and asked to see her recent private correspondences with Bryan. She didn’t want to, but I said she could show it to me or the whole thing was over right now. She did, and there were only a few days worth of WhatsApp texts because she had deleted everything before that, not trusting me. Though I have never snooped at all. And in this case, I had asked her to show me. The thing that jumped out at me was that, in the midst of this break up because of his pain of not having her to himself, Bryan said to her “Let’s grow old together.” This really crossed the line for me. From both of them.

I told my wife over and over again throughout the year that at least for a while I was not interested in kitchen table polyamory. I did not want some second husband. He was her boyfriend, and that should be good enough for a long time. Within weeks of starting to date him, she was talking about him being in our lives forever and ignoring my pleas to slow down. (By the way, this whole year, I went on one dinner date with a woman who turned out to be awful. My wife and I are still broke and we live in a small town and the prospects of me participating in this experiment are tiny.)

So I said it’s important to me that Bryan understands that he is not going to grow old with her. My wife said that that was just an expression of affection. I said no it’s not. It means what it means. It means let’s spend the rest of our lives together.

She got mad and insisted that’s not what it means. I felt like I was in crazy land. I’ve since done an informal poll and haven’t met anyone that doesn’t understand that that means actually growing old together.
Either way she said she would not communicate that to him. I said it was really important to me that she make sure he understands that. She refused. So the next day, my world is collapsing and I feel I have no choice. I text the following to Bryan:

"Bryan. I want you to know that I haven’t seen any of your private correspondences with my wife and would never go prying into private messages. And I’m well aware of the close and passionate feelings you have for each other. But after it recently came to my attention that my wife had been corresponding with you far before we decided to open our marriage I asked to see some of her recent texts with you. I only saw one recent exchange but it included that you wanted to “grow old together”. This is incredibly inappropriate and deeply hurtful to me. Devastating, in fact.
She is my wife and it was understood when she approached you that we were beginning to experiment with an open relationship. As the person who knows her best, I can tell you she has a history of getting carried away with her feelings and you have known her for only a few months.

It’s clear there is a lot of dramatic, trauma-based attachment and fear of loss between the both of you, which I understand all too well. But you are her boyfriend. Not her partner, nor a second husband. You are not going to grow old together unless she chooses to divorce me to be with you and destroy our family. Until that happens, I continue to support her freedom to make choices in who she sees, including you and others in the future. But I’d appreciate it if you would remember what this is, a meaningful, part-time relationship with a (hopefully) happily married woman. Along with the wonderful freedom you have to be with other wonderful people you meet along your travels.

The drama of all this has wreaked havoc on our marriage and caused us both intense pain. Every day lately I’ve decided to close our marriage back up in order to save it and every day I decide to give it one more day for her sake.
But I’m hopeful that, with help, you can find a balance and enjoy your relationship for what it is instead of the pain and longing of what it isn’t. And we can all calm down and enjoy each other’s company whenever we have it. I appreciate your cooperation in this admittedly insane situation.

-Alex

P.S. She will be furious that I’ve texted you, but my heart is in pieces and I don’t feel I have a choice. So be it."

Bryan responded:

"Alex, you have never been far from my heart and thoughts from the beginning of this experiment. Even now you are ever in my thoughts, especially knowing the pain you’re in, the fear you’re feeling, the part that my presence plays in those, and that because you sought and read something that only caught a momentary raw expression that I didn’t volunteer to you, all of those feeling you have are exacerbated more. I’m so sorry those words feel like such a betrayal to you right now. If you can, please trust me that they are part of a much larger context in my heart and mind. Please trust, if you can, that I am feeling in me your feelings and they are real and present to me much more than you know. You matter to me. Your family and marriage all matter to me. I know and see in (your wife’s) eyes and heart how much you all matter to her. None of you are ever far from my heart, my thoughts, my prayers. She’ll know you texted me. She’ll know I responded to you. She may be furious on both accounts, but maybe there’s a part of her that will feel better for it too. She’s holding so much right now. I’m so sorry that this is where we are right now and for my part in your pain. I hope you hear my heart in this Alex, that it can at least give you a small measure of peace in this storm."

Since he didn’t answer my question, I wrote again:

"That’s nice of you to say. My understanding is that the idea of growing old with someone is not usually a passing expression, especially to a married woman. So I’m not quite sure what you mean by it being part of a larger context. But I will let this go since I have to focus on myself and her as our marriage is in crisis right now which is not your fault. But to be clear, your relationship together may be short term, or it may very well be longer-term, but regardless, do you understand that you’re not actually going to grow old with her? I just need to know that you know that if we are all going to work through polyamorous relationships where those kind of understandings and boundaries are clear to everyone."

Minutes later, my wife called me screaming at me. She said Bryan didn’t deserve that and that I was disgusting and she wasn’t sure she wanted to be with me anymore. To this day, even though we have talked through a lot, she will not accept that I texted him or understand why. And even though he had already broken up with her, she blamed that text for him not being able to be with her after that.

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We had the biggest crisis in our marriage. Existential. She went off on me for days telling me every horrible thing about me that she’s been carrying for 20 years. I just took it and apologized, even for things that I disagreed with or I knew we were untrue. I just let her unleash. I was devastated.

And yet after a week, all of this finally brought up how taken for granted and unappreciated I had felt for so many years. And how truly shamed I had felt by her and held back, and not listened to and not accepted for who I am and for the first time I started to wonder if maybe I deserved someone better and I told her so.

And while I acknowledged there were things I needed to change if I wanted to keep her, I let her know that she could lose me too, and that I was now considering it just as much as she was. And I guess she took that a little seriously. And admitted she has been ashamed of me around other people, and how much her parents' rejection of me had poisoned our marriage and her faith in me from the very beginning.

So while we were going through this, she would meet with Bryan and have a drawn out break up, crying, and then sometimes having sex until she finally told him that she couldn’t keep doing that. And my wife and I could focus on each other, even though she was going through full on break up heartbreak and seemed to want me to comfort her as she cried and said “I just can’t believe I might never see him again.”

I had brief moments of feeling compassion and compersion, but they were fleeting. There’s only so much my nervous system can take. I was exhausted. And I was so relieved to have Bryan out of our lives. So through Autumn, because I’ve needed a break from all of that and have enjoyed the peace, I didn’t talk to my wife about how she was doing or if she was still pining for him which I was sure she has been.

I could sense that she wished she could share that stuff with me, but after everything, that just seemed so unfair. In a moment of peace she asked me what I wanted from her. I said the only thing is to know you will always love me the most. She got angry and said she couldn't say that right now for many reasons. I waited for three months for her to be able to say it but she never did.

Looking back at the past year as the holidays approached and I was told by my wife that Bryan was moving on, not in touch very much and only as friends, I began assessing everything. While of course I have not been perfect and there’s a lot about it that has not been easy for my wife, I’m still shocked at her selfishness.

I am hurt and angry and frightened by how quickly she has always been able and willing to go from 0 to 60 in 10 seconds with total disregard for what to me is supposed to be the focus of our lives, our beautiful marriage.

She has said many times “This is what you wanted!” But this is not how I wanted it and we both agreed on that at the beginning. She said, “I just can’t be as sexual with you unless I’m free.” But if she is dependent on others in order to be free with me, it makes our previously sacred intimacy merely conditional.

She said a lot, “I didn’t expect this to happen. I can’t help my feelings!” But the very fact that she can’t help her feelings is the thing that is most hurtful and makes me the most angry. If she has feelings that are so easily unleashed, that are so powerful that they dwarf any ability to stop herself and see clearly, to at least step back and take one step at a time and build up to new ways of doing things over time (months or years, not weeks) a careful, deep rewiring of everything, instead of racing recklessly ahead, with or without my well-being, feelings that are bigger and more powerful than the care and protection of the two of us, then I’m really not sure this is someone I want to stay married to.

I’ve spent the last few months waiting for my worst feelings to pass. And they are, slowly. But it’s up and down. She has repeated “I did nothing wrong.” and won’t accept any other reality. I said if she was a man she’d be seen as an entitled villain and people would cheer for me to leave her. I said she was a narcissist. She said she didn’t think she was and I said narcissists never do.

Despite all this I have been trying to move closer to her again. We have miraculously been warm to each other and hold each other in front of the TV. But there are also days when I’ve come close to coming home, waiting for the kids to go to bed and then asking for a divorce. She has lost my trust. Something I never could’ve imagined was possible.
(continued:)
 
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Part 6 (final):

Despite that, for several weeks we've been warmer and loving to each other (though no sex for over five months, which is a mutual state I’m sure). We’ve been avoiding discussion as we try to find a couple's therapist which has been really hard, re. insurance and scheduling. After I asked her for years to see a therapist about her childhood issues (which are now obviously deep attachment wounds, though she still denies that it played any part in what happened) she has finally started seeing someone, though it feels like it is only empowering her to only focus on whatever I have or have not given her in our marriage.

But to get through this time I asked for one meeting, with the goal of just getting her to acknowledge that I have been traumatized and that she hasn't shown any willingness to accept responsibility and start to repair beyond saying "I can't help my feelings. …You wanted this. …I'm sorry you were hurt. …I guess we can't do Poly".

She listened and acknowledged it without reframing or defending. And while it didn’t feel overt, it seemed enough and I felt a bit better. And thanked her for days, for beginning to lift that weight from me.

Then a week later I discovered she and Bryan were secretly writing, 4 months on from their breakup, as we are trying to save our marriage. My wife had deleted their correspondences but I saw this much from him to her:

"I'Il look at them. I love you. I want to make love to you all the ways...our dance, our talks, our cooking, our walks, our
enjoyments ...I want you to know that desire hasn't diminished even though I don't say the words. I love you. I want you to be happy and well."

Without letting on my discovery, I calmly asked my wife if she and Bryan were communicating romantically or sexually and she said no. So now that she was lying, I looked further, and found she had been texting her friends things like this:

Friend: "I'm so glad to hear there's less tension with Alex since he was able to get things off his chest.”

My wife: "My challenge now is that I feel a bit like I'm acting cause I don't feel seen or understood, still... but it's best to get through Christmas and also for navigating this without a therapist. I'm a little sick so I'm able to use that as an excuse for seeming a little off."

and:

“Is it normal to feel like I won't be able to fall in love with my husband again?”

"I've felt more empowered and could see how horrified my therapist was by the things Alex has said and done recently. Not that I was trying to make him look like a bad guy-| was defending him too. But it's been a lot Including A telling me I really need to get to therapy So convinced that I'm riddled with problems and he has it all figured out, kind of, is the vibe So gross. So then I'm just not attracted to him."

and:

"If I were to leave Alex and date Bryan again, there's things about life with B that I'd love, and things that I'd worry about a little too, not to mention how much it would hurt my kids, especially the little one."

and:

"But like him saying he's been waiting every day for me to say that "line" (which my therapist said, wow, that's really weaponizing what's supposed to be a loving word), I think of all the things I've asked for and never gotten. For years."

"I wouldn't have done poly if I knew the love would have felt like betrayal to him."

Friend: "You can feel a little responsible! Okay but not guilty ! Not totally responsible for his feelings! I hope you can continue your love story with Bryan."

My wife: "Me too!"


It came out that I'd seen all this and she said I'd twisted it all and it didn't mean what I thought. And that Bryan had only recently started talking like that again. And she offered to totally break ties with Bryan finally and I said yes. And so she apparently has. And I shook and sobbed. As I have so many times for the last year.

But ultimately, my trust, my sense of self, of safety, of the future and my faith that my wife can ever take responsibility for anything and put us first has been shattered.

So all I’m doing right now is trying to take care of my nervous system every day, waiting for my anger to pass. Despite everything I remain open to the idea of being open, don’t ask me why. Maybe if only to counter the unfairness of everything I’ve experienced.

But I would never pursue anything like that without feeling I can trust my wife again. And that our marriage is once again the center of our lives, the holy ground we both walk on. That’s hard to imagine when she won’t even acknowledge the depth of what she has done. I started with a new therapist for myself and he said it’s possible she isn’t capable of seeing and taking responsibility for this.

But if she can't, I will not feel safe with her and will have to leave, destroying our family, especially our little 8 year old boy.

One thing she has been right about is when she said at one point she’s not sure she can handle polyamory (because she feels too much).

I guess one question I have for all of you is, is any of this ethical non-monogamy? Because it isn't to me.

After months of searching and scheduling we finally have our first couples therapist appointment on Wednesday. It’ll be hard to know how to even begin. Or if I will be heard. I’m terrified.
 
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Hi, would you mind going back and adding more paragraph breaks? Part 6 looks good, but the other parts won't attract readers. Walls of text are difficult to parse. You have a 24-hour edit window. Thanks so much. I look forward to reading this.
 
Hi polywolly,

It seems to me that the crux of the matter is that you need your wife to slow down, whereas she is unwilling and/or unable to slow down, she has been moving really fast. In order for it to be ethical nonmonogamy, you would have to consent to it, and I don't think you do consent. It has been conducted in a way totally contrary to what you wanted and needed, and to what she agreed to do. If she had slowed down like you asked her, I don't think any of these bad things would have happened.

Sympathetically,
Kevin T.
 
I hope you feel a bit better for writing all that out. I did my best to take it all in, but may have missed some bits.

You have a LOT going on. Internet people might be able to help you with 1 or 2 things, but I honestly think you need a counselor for longer-term support. I'm glad you are looking into that.

You don't seem to have a problem with polyamory. You seem to have a problem with how your wife practices it. At first "no feelings" were allowed, and then, when it happens for her, it's allowed. You’ve described a lot of up-and-down dynamics with her.

I could be wrong in my impression, but the deeper issue seem less about polyamory in general and more about not really being able to trust your wife. She overshares as a hinge and does some really poor behaviors. Some of your shared agreements are not reasonable nor realistic. And then some of her behaviors are worrying --

  • She moves too fast in new relationships
  • She ignores your emotional limits.
  • She prioritizes her NRE (new relationship energy) over the well-being of the marriage, she takes the marriage for granted
  • She doesn't take personal responsibility for how her choices/actions affect you/kids/household.
  • She lies or omits information about ongoing relationships.
You end up stressed, trying to “protect” a marriage that isn’t emotionally safe for you to be in. But the one causing marital harm is her -- one of the spouses. Gently... what are you really protecting the marriage from? Changing it? Ending it?

Maybe it’s okay to let it go and prioritize protecting your health and well-being, and that of the kids instead.

Maybe you two would work out better as exes and coparents. Then she is free to date in whatever way she wants, and you are free from seeing all that, because you live elsewhere and are not the spouse anymore. Her dating life no longer is your concern. You could poly date other people who are healthier than THIS. Or you could choose monogamy. Up to you. And your dating life is no longer her concern.

Relationships need to be healthy. It could be healthy friendship, healthy family, healthy coworkers, healthy monogamy, healthy polyamory, healthy kink, etc. But the main point is HEALTHY, regardless of relationship type.

This doesn't sound like ethical or healthy poly to me.

You can set whatever personal boundaries you like, but the one who enforces them is you. If she crosses a line—even a dealbreaker—and you don’t act, and you don't break the deal, all you teach is that you will complain but still stay. She doesn’t actually have to change anything. You become ignorable.

I don’t say this to be unkind. I say it because this is serious. I’m sure there were good times in your marriage, but if today it’s causing you a lot of pain, and she won’t work with you, you cannot stay in harm’s way just because it used to be nice in the past.

I am glad you have a couple counseling appointment set up. I think you could benefit from talking to the counselor on your own, as well. You could both do individual sessions and then a couple one in rotation. Or even if she isn’t ready for couples therapy, you could still go. It can help you figure out what you want to do next.

If the marriage has to end, it doesn’t mean “destroying” your family. Families come in all shapes—divorced, blended, widowed, adopted, etc. Your kids can still have two loving parents, and it might actually be healthier for them to have calm, peaceful parents in separate homes rather than parents who are unhappy together and arguing in this home.

I hope things get better for you, one way or another.

Galagirl
 
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Thanks for editing for legibility!

I concur with everything GG said.

Otherwise, I will add a couple quick short notes.

It sounds like you're in your 50s and still "broke." I am not sure if you have a steady job, and enough insurance to cover therapy. I am not sure you and your wife between you could afford two residences with enough space to house three children in a shared-custody agreement, should you decide to split and stop this horrific arguing and pain. I'd be curious about that.

Next point: I am not sure why you started snooping in your wife's phone, and then lied about it in your message to her bf, Bryan. Here, you tell us you snooped. Yet you outright told him you didn't snoop. And you continue to snoop, looking at her private messages with her friends about her relationship problems.

If I were your wife, I'd put a password on my phone, to stop this.

It's not ethical to snoop, and it's not ethical to lie and say you didn't. And it's weird to act as if you got this info from some other source besides snooping and spying and prying. It's underhanded. I guess you feel you have no other way of getting to the truth. Which is sad. It shows the deep disconnect.

I don't see anything "sacred" about your intimacy with your wife, at this point, I am sorry to say. :( I see desperation, pain, lies, deceit, disregard. On both sides. Yes, we could say it is more "her fault," since she's the one with a boyfriend, but your insecurity around her dating is causing you to act in... ways that aren't helpful, let's say.

Next point: I think Bryan had every right to say he wants to "grow old" with the woman he loves. You sound very territorial. As if only you, the sacred husband, have a right to grow old with her. Why? In polyamory, people commit to each other. They may have two or three partners for many years, and the relationships may only end in death. Were you thinking "love" in polyamory (which means multiple loves) has to be somehow more shallow for the "secondary" partner, not serious? It should be a temporary love, somehow, and expected to end after a relatively short period of time?

For example, personally, I have been with my partner Pixi for 18 years, and my partner Aries for four years. He loves to tell me how he is never going to let me go. I think if Pixi knew he said things like this, she'd just be happy for me that I have such a loyal loving partner. (Just a note, that Aries has another serious gf, plus a couple newer people he is in earlier stages of getting to know. So I actually enjoy his reassurance of commitment and deep love.)

He is consistent in his attentions. We see each other every week, usually two days a week, with overnights. We have since very early on, and that hasn't changed. He considers me his "primary" in his heart. I consider him and Pixi to be my co-primaries. Maybe you strongly dislike the idea of having co-primaries? Of course, that designation has to be earned over time. He didn't just step into that role after a couple months.

Please accept my views as trying to be helpful and offer some clarity from a person with a couple decades of experience in polyamory. I know you're suffering and confused and angry, and I'm sorry.
 
After months of searching and scheduling we finally have our first couples therapist appointment on Wednesday. It’ll be hard to know how to even begin. Or if I will be heard. I’m terrified.
Click to expand...

I don't know if this helps you any for your upcoming couple counseling appointment.

Counseling is expensive and emotionally demanding, so be as honest and direct as you can. The therapist will hear you. Your wife might not—she may deflect, deny, or minimize—but the therapist will. That matters.

It can help to state the problems plainly. Most of what follows comes directly from things you’ve already written. If you’re worried about not being able to speak freely in session, it’s also okay to email something like this to the therapist ahead of time so they are clear on what your hopes/goals for counseling are.

Blue just to visually block it off. Edit at will.

“I no longer trust my wife after a botched attempt at polyamory. There have been behaviors that damaged the marriage—neglect, dishonesty, and broken agreements. I’ve also engaged in behaviors I’m not proud of, like peeking in her phone because I was trying to figure out whether I was being lied to again. I’m not happy living this way.​
​
I used to put our marriage on a pedestal and believed things were fundamentally good. Recently, she told me she’s been holding onto resentments for 20 years and hadn’t been honest about them. For the first time in my life, I’ve started seriously considering divorce.​
​
We experienced a major crisis in our marriage on ____. It felt existential. For days, she told me everything she’d been carrying for decades—many things that were deeply painful to hear. I listened and apologized, even for things I disagreed with or believed were untrue. I was devastated. She admitted she had been ashamed of me in front of others, and that her parents’ rejection of me had poisoned her trust in me and our marriage from very early on.​
​
I don’t understand why all of this was kept hidden for so long rather than just be honest and end it with me sooner. What finally surfaced for me was how taken for granted I’ve felt for many years, how unappreciated and unheard I’ve been, and how much shame I’ve carried in this relationship. For the first time, I began to wonder whether I might deserve something better than this, and I said that out loud.​
​
I acknowledge that there are things I need to change in my own behavior if we continue. At the same time, I made it clear that she could lose me too. For me to stay in this marriage, there are behaviors on her side that must change.​
​
We are here in counseling to determine whether repair and reconciliation are actually possible and actually wanted by both sides, and if so, to get help with that process. If not, then the counseling goal is support in ending the marriage respectfully and transitioning into healthy co-parents and ex-partners.”​

I think that going in clear about why you’re there and what decision you’re trying to make gives therapy the best chance of being useful—for either outcome.

While you are waiting you might use this to assess as well.

www.scarleteen.com

Should I Stay or Should I Go?

Feeling unhappy in or unsure about your relationship? Having problems you don’t know how to work through, or don’t even know if you should? We’ll talk you through making these choices, including how-to’s on conflict resolution and doing breakups better.
www.scarleteen.com www.scarleteen.com

I'm not a doctor and can't DX a personality disorder. Since you think she might be a narcissist (or maybe something else), you might look at

outofthefog.website

Out of the FOG | Personality Disorders, Narcissism, NPD, BPD

Helping family members & loved-ones of people who suffer from personality disorders.
outofthefog.website outofthefog.website

esp the list page at

Top 100 Traits & Behaviors — Out of the FOG | Personality Disorders, Narcissism, NPD, BPD

of Personality-Disordered Individuals
outofthefog.website outofthefog.website

to name behaviors you experienced. And bring it up in counseling. You are worried about ____ behaviors and are concerned she might be a narcissist. And how all that might impact you whether you repair or divorce.

Galagirl
 
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Hi polywollydoodle

You first posted about this back in March 2025: https://polyamory.com/threads/her-nre-and-my-trauma-response.157747/#post-514514
Because you have some stuff from months ago phrased as "last weekend" it is a little hard to understand your timeline.

You also posted in July saying you found Bryan offputting https://polyamory.com/threads/help-my-metamour-has-turned-me-off-my-wife.158179/

And in August it seems like that's when you found their messages about growing old together https://polyamory.com/threads/is-growing-old-together-just-an-expression.158535/ and this very biased poll.

IMO, the majority of what you were were doing was ethical non-monogamy: there was knowledge and consent of all involved. It seems like the situation is that 1. that you originally both just wanted sexual freedom, 2. she and Bryan developed feelings for each other (which was unexpected, but happens), 3. you aren't coping with the idea of polyamory and you don't understand what life can look like when a shared partner, such as your wife, can "grow old" with two people in separate households. You're jealous - afraid of losing her - which means you try to hold tighter (which is controlling) and that just ends up driving a bigger wedge between you.

To me, it sounds like your wife is afraid of you, specifically of your emotional reactions to everything to do with Bryan. She's also showing you that she wants more autonomy (like ENM often affords) than you are capable of "giving" - or more ethically, co-existing with.

It's unlikely your marriage will actually recover from all this. How about you work on a co-parenting arrangement that won't "destroy" your youngest's life? (BTW, have you noticed your continual use of dramatic language? Perhaps you struggle with heighted sensitivity and emotional reactions, as per your childhood and youthful traumas?)
 
You know what? Thanks for trying everyone. I’ve realized that the lens through which most people are viewing on this site is more ideological than therapeutic, more dogmatic than problem-solving. These things are not one size fits all and posting here has helped me learn that the rules that have been developed in some of these communities are not very good at supporting the wide variety of relationships, attachment and trauma histories of every day people. Thanks again but I won’t be back.
 
I'm sorry to hear that we have let you down, I don't blame you for leaving but I still hope you'll stay. Was it something particular I said that rubbed the wrong way? I'm sorry if it was, let me know if I can make it right.
 
Funny how it's "dogmatic" even though there were very different perspectives, all with different suggestions on how to problem-solve this situation.


Note User Guidelines 12 & 13.
 
I’m sorry the forum feedback wasn’t quite what you were hoping for.

I hope your couple counseling session is helpful and that things improve for you, one way or another.

GG
 
polywollydoodle said:
You know what? Thanks for trying, everyone. I’ve realized that the lens through which most people are viewing on this site is more ideological than therapeutic, more dogmatic than problem-solving. These things are not one size fits all and posting here has helped me learn that the rules that have been developed in some of these communities are not very good at supporting the wide variety of relationships, attachment and trauma histories of every day people. Thanks again but I won’t be back.
Click to expand...
I'm sorry, but this forum is a place for people to post a wide range of experiences, many of which can be shared and learned from. You might relate to some of it, but not relate to others. That's fine. Take what works and leave the rest.

We don't have many rules other than to be friendly and not act like an asshole. We are damn good at supporting a wide variety of (ethically open or non-mono) relationships. We can't heal traumas or attachment disorders. That's where therapy comes in.

Best wishes.
 
When someone says that they identify with Travis Bickle (the protagonist of Taxi Driver), I tend to suspect that further conversation won't go very well.
 
Ok, I finally managed to read through all the (hi)story, and it's actually quite a lot and rarely we get such an in-depth look.

polywollydoodle said:
You know what? Thanks for trying everyone. I’ve realized that the lens through which most people are viewing on this site is more ideological than therapeutic, more dogmatic than problem-solving. These things are not one size fits all and posting here has helped me learn that the rules that have been developed in some of these communities are not very good at supporting the wide variety of relationships, attachment and trauma histories of every day people. Thanks again but I won’t be back.
Click to expand...
Yup. We are actually bad at supporting arrangements where love is supposed to stay out of the picture. That's because we are a polyAMORY forum.
We're mostly terrible at supporting relationships that are supposed to be open for sex only, pretty judgemental of one penis policies and rather bad with unicorn hunting too. And, we've seen too many broken-harded 'secondaries' to endorse hierarchy.
Your idea of a 'poly' relationship seems to fall somewhat on that spectrum. Hierarchy is pretty much a hard limit for you, which, however, wasn't negotiated before reopening - and even if it was, it's a problematic agreement, which - just like vetoes - backfires really often.

I'm sorry this hurt you so much, and your wife isn't flawless. She didn't excell in controlling her NRE, and there's probably indeed trauma playing a role in all three people.
However, you must accept your part. It was YOU who stepped over your own boundaries by agreeing to full-on poly.
Buddhist philosophy and 5MeO DMT played their role in making you overly optimistic about your higher self and helped you handle new circumstances temporarily. While personal development can be fun, I think this is called spiritual bypass. Let that be your future warning about making decisions under the influence of a book, seminar or psychedelic without taking propper time for integration.

So as a result, it seems you agreed to polyamory but wouldn't accept actual love developing. (Of course people in love naturally seek ways to grow old together! It may not happen that way, but it's what they feel they want!)
You didn't make the necessary paradigm shift from couple-centric to network of equals, presumably because that's just not what you want. But your wife isn't living in the couple-centric paradigm any more, and you are blaming her. You even pathologise her as narcissistic. I see no indication she is.

Then there is the 20y old disconnect, where needs go unmet and both people feel unseen and carry grievances. That's also hardly to blame on one of you only.
AND there is, unfortunately, dishonesty on both sides. She would not admit her prior messaging with her lover. You go through her phone. That should be taboo! Her conversations, where she may be sorting through grievances with you with her support people, are NOT for your eyes. She's obviously unsure if she wants to stay with you right now - can you blame her?

Listen, if you want to find love and peace in your relationship again, you'll have to accept that you both hurt each other equally badly throughout this period. You are now estranged with a lot to sort out. Lasting grievances and unmet needs throughout the whole marriage. A different take on non-monogamy, which may tear you appart unless you can agree (either on monogamy or on each letting the other practice their preferred model). And a lover waiting in the wings for your wife's decision.
Your wife doesn't want to leave your marriage, otherwise she'd be gone already. She's considering it, but she's perhaps just as afraid as you.
Take your part of responsibility for what happened and get to work on actually being a loving partner.
 
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