Self-worth and openness

[Asparagus]

I'm new here, and fairly new to poly. I've been in an open poly triad for about 4.5 months now. I am absolutely loving my triad- I'm with two amazing people in all senses of the word. Each of my partners dates someone else, one long-distance, one fairly regularly but at a much lower level of intensity than with the three of us.

What I'm finding is that while dating a couple seems completely natural and easy and smooth, I'm finding I'm having the openness with dating others in there is a bit more of a challenge. I think I'm naturally more orientated to closed relationships than they are by a lot. While there's not a huge amount of outside activity, around and especially after my partners having a date with others, I can have varying levels of compersion, joy, and discomfort, and when it gets really bad (usually over a lack of communication), feeling like I'm not going to be able to handle continuing the relationship. We've talked about what makes me more comfortable, and what I need to have a high chance of success, and I think we're pretty close to getting the circumstances as ideal as they can be. I'm doing some occasional attempts at dating partly as a way to understand it from the other side, and partly to take advantage of the freedom I have.

The biggest obstacle as I see it right now is that while my head says, "it should have no effect on your self-worth or how you perceive the others see the worth of your relationships that your partners are dating others besides us three" my heart has not caught up. It seems like something I can work through, but it is uncomfortable until I get there.

I would love to hear other people's thought processes or advice around getting my feelings and thoughts in a more accepting and comfortable space.

 

[gorgeouskitten]

I'm new here, and fairly new to poly. I've been in an open poly triad for about 4.5 months now. I am absolutely loving my triad- I'm with two amazing people in all senses of the word. Each of my partners dates someone else, one long-distance, one fairly regularly but at a much lower level of intensity than with the three of us.

What I'm finding is that while dating a couple seems completely natural and easy and smooth, I'm finding I'm having the openness with dating others in there is a bit more of a challenge. I think I'm naturally more orientated to closed relationships than they are by a lot. While there's not a huge amount of outside activity, around and especially after my partners having a date with others, I can have varying levels of compersion, joy, and discomfort, and when it gets really bad (usually over a lack of communication), feeling like I'm not going to be able to handle continuing the relationship. We've talked about what makes me more comfortable, and what I need to have a high chance of success, and I think we're pretty close to getting the circumstances as ideal as they can be. I'm doing some occasional attempts at dating partly as a way to understand it from the other side, and partly to take advantage of the freedom I have.

The biggest obstacle as I see it right now is that while my head says, "it should have no effect on your self-worth or how you perceive the others see the worth of your relationships that your partners are dating others besides us three" my heart has not caught up. It seems like something I can work through, but it is uncomfortable until I get there.

I would love to hear other people's thought processes or advice around getting my feelings and thoughts in a more accepting and comfortable space.

Well for one...youre feelings are yours, go ahead and own them. I hate my boyfriend dating.. the idea of it turns my stomach. Am I jealous? am I afraid of losing him? its actually much more complicated....but that's me. Anyway my point is, discover for yourself where your feelings come from. understand your own feelings, your own wants needs, and desires. take care of you

 

[GalaGirl]

I am sorry you struggle.

To me feelings ensue after behavior. In this case, thinking behavior. I think you can work through it. Just take it slow and easy. Examine how you related to yourself in your head (intrapersonal skills.)

I don't find this line of thought helpful in my own emotional management because it is organized odd to me:

The biggest obstacle as I see it right now is that while my head says, "it should have no effect on your self-worth or how you perceive the others see the worth of your relationships that your partners are dating others besides us three" my heart has not caught up. It seems like something I can work through, but it is uncomfortable until I get there.

To deny that I feel what I feel? Just doubles the load to me -- the original load and then the stress of holding back expression, arms distancing from it, etc. That stuff accumulates and one day BAM! from the pressure cooker.

Rather than "should" you could swap it out with "could" in your thinking to yourself. You could use "I" statements in there also rather than "arms distancing it away" with "you." It's all "you" until the end when it becomes "us." Smaller chunks too.

It then could be framed as:

"My partners dating outside the triad could have no effect on my self worth or how I perceive how they value me in our relationship. But at this time it does. Why? "​

Then you could see that you could reorganize that more clearly as "behavior done/not done" and what feelings ensue.

• Action behavior: My partners date outside the triad.
• Thinking behavior that follows: I think they value me less if they date outside the triad.
• Ensuing feelings: Because I think they value me less, I feel yucky about my value.

That gives you clues as to what could change in future. It's ok to need a period of adjustment, it's ok to have yucky feelings come up. It's how you choose to handle your emotional management that matters.

Not trying to be like you never experience yucky. YKWIM?

Hang in there.
Galagirl