Hey Everyone,
looking for any advice or anyone to weigh in on my new/tough situation, as I’ve been kind of a mess lately. please bare with me, here’s my story....
so I recently found myself entering a polyamorous relationship, not necessarily by choice of my own, but of my partner.
I’ve been with Natalie for 2.5 years now. I live in Canada and her in the States. We were doing the long distance thing for the first 2 years. I travel for work as a full time musician , so we’d travel back and forth To visit eachother in between my tours. It was tough at times only seeing eachother for short periods but we’ve made it work. Earlier this year, I made the next step and moved in with her on the east coast. We were finally getting ready to start a new chapter of our lives together, but then COVID hit in March and we decided to get out of the east coast until things calmed down. I went back to Canada and she went back to the west coast to stay with family. We knew it was gonna suck, but we’ve been used to the long distance thing so were ready to stick it out.
So in June, Natalie approached me about seeing other ppl while spending all this time apart. We’ve discussed in the past about being open to casually see other ppl when apart, having someone join us, ect. but never acted on it, until now.
I was all for this, as for me, I’m ok with if it’s just casual and just sex. I’m not jealous at the thought of her sleeping with someone else. I hung out with some ppl casually and She was hanging out with one guy casually but things ended with him after he got weird and attached. During this whole time, she was spending a lot of time with her friend Mark, as they shared a lot of hobbies and he was coming out of a bad relationship himself. Shortly after the fling with the weird guy ended , she told me that her and Mark starting hooking up. I was a little surprised at first as I thought of him as just the close friend.
so finally this summer, after over 4 months apart, we decided to meet back on the east coast but it was to be a bittersweet reunion. We decided that we have to give up our apartment because we’ve both been out of work due to covid and no clue when our line of work will resume. (She’s in entertainment as well)
so we reunited excited to see each other again but crushed about having to give up our apartment and chance of taking our next step together. What a cruel tease it was.
As we reunited, Natalie told me that things have gotten serious with her and Mark. They really fell for each other. Natalie then proposed that she wants us both to be her boyfriend. As soon as she said those words, I felt my world fall apart. I suffer from bad anxiety and right away this news drove my head in a million directions. It was a shock to me and I immediately saw this as a threat to our relationship.
Here we were, taking the next step in our relationship only to have it taken away from us and having to go back to a long distance relationship only this time it’s polyamorous where Natalie and Mark are basically going to be living together and I’m long distance. among the many thoughts running inside my head, my initial being very doubtful this can work, especially with the position I have in this , I just felt like I’m going to be replaced. After many long talks, being honest about everything, Natalie has reassured Me she still wants me in her life and wants to make this arrangement work, whatever it’s going to take. I’m still trying to see if I will have what it takes to pursue this, I’m doing this for her cuz I can’t picture her not in my life and she feels the same.
the next step was to see how the 3 of us can coexist and what’s it like to be together. I spoke on the phone with Mark a few times and he seems like a very nice guy who really has fallen for Natalie and emphasizes how hard my situation in All this is, and how new this is for the 3 of us. We all spoke about how to do this, signs of affection, sleeping arrangements, times Natalie would spend with each of us, ect.
he came out to stay with us for a week last month and to be honest, it was one of the hardest weeks of my life. All these insecurities I’ve never had, came to life. I tortured myself with My anxiety and just watching how they interacted, killed me inside. she seemed so up and happy with him while I felt I was the one bringing the mood down cuz I’m having trouble adjusting. But then there were also a few times where Mark had freakouts openly. I would go for a walk if I was feeling crappy and uncomfortable, but he handled his emotions a little more dramatically in front of us. Needless to say, this trial of seeing if the 3 of us can comfortably hang together wasn’t too successful. 3 of us had long talks and realized we maybe need to separate things a little more moving forward. We’re all on the same page with Communication and all want to get to a place where we can just be comfortable. Although I know he has a much easier place in all this than I do . They have that fresh energy together, she is going back west where their relationship will only progress, and i have to be to the one trying to adapt to this huge change all while being long distance.
this is all still very new for us , so there’s a lot to learn and experience. Has anyone on here been in a similar poly situation? Dealing with long distance? Dealing with your partner wanting to bring someone new in?
sorry if this was very long, but I hope I painted the scenario well enough for everyone to weigh in with thoughts, advice ,anything on how to proceed with this situation or can relate to what I’m going through ?
any questions are welcome please!
Thank you !!
looking for any advice or anyone to weigh in on my new/tough situation, as I’ve been kind of a mess lately. please bare with me, here’s my story....
so I recently found myself entering a polyamorous relationship, not necessarily by choice of my own, but of my partner.
I’ve been with Natalie for 2.5 years now. I live in Canada and her in the States. We were doing the long distance thing for the first 2 years. I travel for work as a full time musician , so we’d travel back and forth To visit eachother in between my tours. It was tough at times only seeing eachother for short periods but we’ve made it work. Earlier this year, I made the next step and moved in with her on the east coast. We were finally getting ready to start a new chapter of our lives together, but then COVID hit in March and we decided to get out of the east coast until things calmed down. I went back to Canada and she went back to the west coast to stay with family. We knew it was gonna suck, but we’ve been used to the long distance thing so were ready to stick it out.
So in June, Natalie approached me about seeing other ppl while spending all this time apart. We’ve discussed in the past about being open to casually see other ppl when apart, having someone join us, ect. but never acted on it, until now.
I was all for this, as for me, I’m ok with if it’s just casual and just sex. I’m not jealous at the thought of her sleeping with someone else. I hung out with some ppl casually and She was hanging out with one guy casually but things ended with him after he got weird and attached. During this whole time, she was spending a lot of time with her friend Mark, as they shared a lot of hobbies and he was coming out of a bad relationship himself. Shortly after the fling with the weird guy ended , she told me that her and Mark starting hooking up. I was a little surprised at first as I thought of him as just the close friend.
so finally this summer, after over 4 months apart, we decided to meet back on the east coast but it was to be a bittersweet reunion. We decided that we have to give up our apartment because we’ve both been out of work due to covid and no clue when our line of work will resume. (She’s in entertainment as well)
so we reunited excited to see each other again but crushed about having to give up our apartment and chance of taking our next step together. What a cruel tease it was.
As we reunited, Natalie told me that things have gotten serious with her and Mark. They really fell for each other. Natalie then proposed that she wants us both to be her boyfriend. As soon as she said those words, I felt my world fall apart. I suffer from bad anxiety and right away this news drove my head in a million directions. It was a shock to me and I immediately saw this as a threat to our relationship.
Here we were, taking the next step in our relationship only to have it taken away from us and having to go back to a long distance relationship only this time it’s polyamorous where Natalie and Mark are basically going to be living together and I’m long distance. among the many thoughts running inside my head, my initial being very doubtful this can work, especially with the position I have in this , I just felt like I’m going to be replaced. After many long talks, being honest about everything, Natalie has reassured Me she still wants me in her life and wants to make this arrangement work, whatever it’s going to take. I’m still trying to see if I will have what it takes to pursue this, I’m doing this for her cuz I can’t picture her not in my life and she feels the same.
the next step was to see how the 3 of us can coexist and what’s it like to be together. I spoke on the phone with Mark a few times and he seems like a very nice guy who really has fallen for Natalie and emphasizes how hard my situation in All this is, and how new this is for the 3 of us. We all spoke about how to do this, signs of affection, sleeping arrangements, times Natalie would spend with each of us, ect.
he came out to stay with us for a week last month and to be honest, it was one of the hardest weeks of my life. All these insecurities I’ve never had, came to life. I tortured myself with My anxiety and just watching how they interacted, killed me inside. she seemed so up and happy with him while I felt I was the one bringing the mood down cuz I’m having trouble adjusting. But then there were also a few times where Mark had freakouts openly. I would go for a walk if I was feeling crappy and uncomfortable, but he handled his emotions a little more dramatically in front of us. Needless to say, this trial of seeing if the 3 of us can comfortably hang together wasn’t too successful. 3 of us had long talks and realized we maybe need to separate things a little more moving forward. We’re all on the same page with Communication and all want to get to a place where we can just be comfortable. Although I know he has a much easier place in all this than I do . They have that fresh energy together, she is going back west where their relationship will only progress, and i have to be to the one trying to adapt to this huge change all while being long distance.
this is all still very new for us , so there’s a lot to learn and experience. Has anyone on here been in a similar poly situation? Dealing with long distance? Dealing with your partner wanting to bring someone new in?
sorry if this was very long, but I hope I painted the scenario well enough for everyone to weigh in with thoughts, advice ,anything on how to proceed with this situation or can relate to what I’m going through ?
any questions are welcome please!
Thank you !!