Struggle bus

[Jules6486]

I'm new to this site and found it by googling about poly/mono relationships. I definitely need some guidance as I'm feeling torn and no one in my life can relate because I don't have any other friends who are Poly or are in ENM relationships.

My husband and I opened our marriage over a year ago. He has had outside relationships and even fell in love with someone else. I have also had outside relationships and have fallen in love.

In early December he sat me down and said he can't continue with this lifestyle. He feels it is too difficult to maintain more than one love connection. He wants to be with me and only me. and he wants me to be with him and only him.

The problem here is that I feel like I finally found my a part of myself that I was denying for a long time. I truly enjoy having multiple partners whom I love. I usually only have one other partner, as I'm very intentional about who I'll spend my time with.

I feel extremely torn because I love my husband and I don't want to lose him, but I also don't want to lose this part of myself. We have our own issues that we need to work through, as well. But this issue seems to trump them all.

I'm curious if others have found they can be happy in monogamy when polyamory makes them so happy. I really do not want my marriage to end. We are currently doing a trial separation and it's making us both miserable. (We still have to live together because of financial reasons and that further complicates things.)

I'm still seeing my secondary too and I feel this selfish, almost childish, feeling of, "I don't want to stop seeing my other partner." My husband says he doesn't understand why this other relationship feels so important to me, and it's so hard to explain why to him, other than saying, "It just does."

Am I being too selfish? I feel very alone and I'm struggling to figure out what would be best for me in the long run. How do you figure out what's best for you in this type of situation? Overall, our marriage is amazing and he is a wonderful partner, one I'd hate to lose.


Any advice or questions are welcome, blunt or otherwise.

TIA

 

[Jules6486]

I should probably also mention that I'm bipolar and in a severe depressive episode that is making it very difficult to think with any sort of clarity. I have slowed down on the amount that I'm seeing my secondary, as well. I used to see him 2-3 times a week and now only see him once a week to once every other week.

 

[GalaGirl]

I'm sorry you struggle with your feelings, but the actions are straightforward.

In early December he sat me down and said he can't continue with this lifestyle. He feels it is too difficult to maintain more than one love connection. He wants to be with me and only me.

That is fine. He can pick for himself what he wants to do. If he wants to stop dating on his side, he can choose that.

and he wants me to be with him and only him.

He might like for you to stop, too, but he doesn't get to actually decide that part of it. YOU decide that part of it. It sounds like you don't want to stop poly dating. So, if he is not up for mono-poly, and you aren't either, then you two have become incompatible, and need to work on accepting that.

I feel extremely torn, because I love my husband and I don't want to lose him, but I also don't want to lose this part of myself. We have our own issues that we need to work through, as well. But this issue seems to trump them all.

If you two have to end the marriage because he's no longer up for poly and does not want mono-poly, but you don't want to go back to monogamy, why would it mean "losing" each other? It could change to "plain exes," to heal for a while, and then change again to "exes and friends," if you both wanted that. You could be in each other's lives that way. Have you had that conversation yet?

We are currently doing a trial separation and it's making us both miserable. (We still have to live together because of financial reasons and that further complicates things.)

You may have to work on moving to where this trial separation can be in separate homes, because emotionally it may not be giving you a chance to separate/heal.

My husband says he doesn't understand why this other relationship feels so important to me, and it's so hard to explain why to him, other than saying, "It just does."

Husband asking you to dump your partner when you don't want to break up with them is painful for you, just as bad as if your partner were asking you to dump your husband when you didn't want to break up with your husband. Each one would be treating people you value a lot as disposable.

It's also not just dumping this partner or that partner, but husband wanting you to end your poly practice as whole, when you don't want to stop practicing poly. You finally are living as your authentic self. Him asking you to "go back into a box" to suit him is not a great feeling. He might be coming at it like you don't love him enough to go back. And you might be feeling like he only wants to love the "acceptable" parts of you, rather than all of you, as you are.

It's the same as if you were asking him to do poly things he doesn't really want to do. That would not feel good to him.

The solution is not taking turns sitting in the misery box. The solution may lie in disbanding the marriage and allowing the relationship shape to CHANGE.

It changed before. There was a time you didn't know each other at all, a time when you were friends, started dating, got engaged, got married, etc. This is simply contemplating changing the relationship shapes AGAIN. I don't know if that POV helps you any.

You two might consider counseling and decide if the goal is to get help with making separation agreements, for a peaceful parting, or to figure out how to be together in a new way, or a combo: parting romantically and divorcing AND being together in a new way.

When you cannot have all the things you value, go with the highest value. Here it sounds like living as your authentic self trumps the rest. So you'd pick being true to yourself, letting the marriage end, and allowing the relationship with him to change to something else, whatever the next shape might be.

Even if it's hard, and even if the marriage ends with a lot of sadness because you value it a lot, you cannot value the marriage shape so much that you put "keep the marriage going at all costs -- even ahead of my own long-term well-being" as your top thing. Doing self neglect or self harm is not a good thing.

Galagirl

 

[kdt26417]

Hello Jules6486,

How polyamorous are you? If you are 50% polyamorous, then you can probably be happy in a monogamous marriage, as much as you could in a poly marriage. If you are 90% polyamorous, then a monogamous marriage will probably be really hard on you. I think you are closer to 90% than to 50%, but ultimately only you can say.

To me, it would be unkind to break up with my secondary partner, as my secondary partner did nothing wrong to deserve to be broken up with. So no, I don't think you're being selfish at all, you are just trying to figure out how to be fair to both partners (primary and secondary), and it is proving to be an impossible task.

Sympathetically,
Kevin T.

 

[dingedheart]

Hi Jules,

Welcome to the forum.

How, what or who was the driving force behind opening your marriage? How long were you married or a couple prior? Are there kids in the mix?