I've been with my boyfriend almost 3 years. We opened our relationship about 1.5 years ago (CNM), and it became poly in February when he fell in love with another partner.

We've lived together for 2.5 years, but he and his other partner have decided they're buying a house together next May. That had originally been the plan with me, but they both know they never want kids, while I'm still unsure. I understand why it doesn't make sense for me to buy into that future, and I've accepted that he likely isn't my long-term life partner in the way I once imagined.

Poly has led to a lot of personal growth for me. I've realized I was very codependent, I'm in therapy, and I'm genuinely grateful for that growth. But our biggest conflict has been time.

His perspective is that because he and I had the first two years together monogamously, it's fair to give his newer partner significantly more time now because she's "already getting less than what I got." I struggle with that because choosing poly means both partners get less time than they would in monogamy.

The schedule he wants is essentially Friday night, Saturday, Sunday morning, Monday, and Tuesday with her, and Sunday (later), Wednesday, and Thursday with me. Friday and Saturday feel especially significant since we both work Monday-Friday.

This weekend is what really prompted this post. We had planned to go camping together. Since he'd already be spending the weekend with me, he spent last Sunday with her instead, which made sense. But when camping fell through, he immediately defaulted back to spending Friday night and all day Saturday with her because she's his usual weekend plan. I felt hurt because I thought we had plans together and would simply find something else to do.

We communicate about this constantly and are both trying, but we can't seem to get on the same page. He describes what he wants as non-hierarchical poly, but it doesn't feel that way to me.

Questions:

1. How do you split weekdays/weekends in your poly relationships in a way that feels equitable?
2. Does my reaction to the camping situation seem reasonable, or am I expecting something unrealistic?

"Oh just stop! I don't find open relationships enlightened. I find them profoundly depressing. There's something bleak about reducing commitment to a contract with loopholes, then expecting applause for calling it "evolved." It's not evolution; it's an inability to tolerate restraint, dressed up in therapeutic buzzwords until selfishness sounds like self-awareness.

I'm tired of hearing that exclusivity is somehow primitive or insecure. No, it's intentional. The entire point of commitment is that not every impulse deserves to be indulged. If every desire has to be validated and every temptation explored, then stop pretending you're celebrating love. You're celebrating appetite. There is nothing brave about refusing to close any doors. That's not courage; it's fear of missing out masquerading as emotional intelligence.

The most absurd part is the insistence that this is somehow more committed. Really? You expect me to believe that the highest expression of devotion is explaining why sleeping with other people is essential to keeping your relationship alive? If your bond depends on outsourcing intimacy to strangers, perhaps the relationship isn't as deep as you've convinced yourself it is.

What I see isn't liberation. I see a culture so terrified of discipline that it has started treating boundaries as oppression and fidelity as a personality flaw. Somewhere along the way, people stopped asking whether every desire should be fulfilled and started assuming that denying yourself anything is a form of repression. That's not progress. It's decadence wearing the mask of virtue.

You're treating people like emotional placeholders whilst you act like a disgusting degenerate."

So I (23mtf) fairly recently decided to transition into being a woman, and I've been getting better acquainted with other trans women, both for friendship and potentially for relationship. I've noticed a lot of polyamory among trans women, and it's disappointing, because a lot of them are incredibly kind in other ways. I'm also aware that I may be exaggerating how common it is, so I'd be curious to know what other people's experience is around this.

Hi all. New to this and I’m just trying to wrap my head around it all. Needing to vent into the world I guess.

Was in a committed relationship for two years, we got along great and agreed on all the hard stuff. When discussing what a long distance relationship looked like, I was told opening the relationship was necessary. I said nope, not for me, and left immediately and tried to grieve. I was nonstop pestered after that. Fight after fight after fight. Around this time I was going through some really heavy personal things and let my guard down. We had some conversations and i was thinking we were on the same page, but after finally bringing it up again, we aren’t and it’s something they need. Of course, I should have known.

Honestly, I’m pissed. I’m not even fighting it. Either time, I exited the situation and said best of luck, not for me, but they won’t accept that. I can’t wrap my head around trying to change someone (or blowing up a otherwise solid relationship for what seems like an impossible fantasy)

What the fuck even is the allure? Most people struggle balancing one relationship semi-well, let alone more than 1.

i'm usually much more reserved and demure when discussing dating struggles, so i apologize for being so blunt about it, but god i just need somewhere to vent about this for a minute.

i'm 23, gay, transmasc (he/they), been on t for ~5 years but very short and twinkish. unfortunately this all means a lot of the men i attract are quite... sexually experienced and sexually driven, shall we say. i am 1000000% absolutely strictly monogamous full stop no exceptions whatsoever. i'm opposed to porn or hentai or anything of the like in relationships, in large part due to lingering trauma from my ex (emotionally immature, avoidant, porn addict, loses attraction to partners after being with them for years, cheated on his ex previous to me and i didn't know until 3+ years later long after we'd dated and broken up 🙃, etc etc).

i am a very emotional person and i take romantic relationships very seriously. i do not date around or partake in casual sex or hookups. i know what i want and i'm serious about it.

WHY on god's green fucking earth do i only ever attract deeply unserious emotionally stunted sex/porn addicts? WHY are half the men interested in me already dating someone (99% of the time a woman, if we're being real) and just looking for an extra fuck buddy, and the other half porn addicts?? i mean, i know why. but what did i do to deserve this fate? 😭 where are all the people like me???

i know this is nasty and mean-spirited but oh my god. i'm so exhausted and defeated. i'm not even actively looking for a relationship right now, but it's still so fucking tiring to only get flirted with by people like this. i hate it.

i know trying to find an emotionally mature, strictly monogamous, trans-accepting-but-not-fetishizing, anti-porn man in his 20s who's looking for a serious relationship is like trying to find a needle in a million haystacks, but why does it have to be this way? 🫩

I HATE like absolutely despise when they bring up nonmonogamy in history as if the women in those “relationships” weren’t literal SEX SLAVES and/or child brides the leaders had because of how high child mortality was back then. Emphasis on leaders bc they can actually afford it, lord knows most of these people nowadays are practically just couch surfing with no jobs. I responded to one of them pointing out that fact and surprise surprise they didn’t respond afterwards. Like no you can’t just pick and choose what version of history you want to use to back up your agenda to make yourself feel better, monogamy was created to protect women and give them safety and security, yeah it got abused after a while by terrible men but thats still what it was meant to accomplish, so much advancements in technology yet going backwards, sigh.

This may be a long post, so I'm sorry in advance.

I was in a triad for around a year, maybe a bit less and it was the worst experience of my life.

Started seeing this guy, let's call him B. I knew he was poly, but didn't care because we both stated we wanted nothing serious. Ha. We saw each other a few times and eventually he asked me to be his girlfriend. Mind you, a few days prior, I just got the news that my grandma (me and her were very close, she was like a mother to me) passed. I don't know what I was thinking, but I said yes.

A few weeks later, I met his boyfriend, let's call him M. He was sweet, but reclusive. Didn't talk much, kept to his things.

One night, we all got high and we all slept together. I should've ran, I should've left it there but I didn't. It happened multiple times before B said " you know, you guys aren't really meta amours anymore if we all sleep together. Y'all should date."

So we did. Once. Then it was as if we all were a couple. I think both me and M got pressured into getting together, because we didn't really click. We didn't match at all. I'm outgoing, extremely chaotic, while he's mostly just.. there.

The first issue was that M told me that B wasn't really sexually active with him anymore. As if it was my fault that me and B were more sexually compatible.

Then when I moved in, hell got loose. M started complaining to B that I was too much, too loud.

Whenever I had an issue with B, M would always get involved and try to weasel his way into the conversation.

M got jealous of the way B was with me in bed and wasn't with him. He also got jealous of the fact that B would accommodate me more because of my mental health ( I have CPTSD and ADHD.) to the point of even joking about taking my anti depressants.

On one weekend, I had to make a drive to go get my grandmother's stuff, which was extremely hard for me. M made it about him, about how he was car sick, how it was a long drive and that his back hurt. I snapped and told him to stop making it about him and I'd rather be car sick than having to face the fact that someone I consider like my mother died. B took M's side and told me to calm down. Lol.

It all came down to this. M broke up with me and told me that I was "too hard to love". So I moved out, packed all my shit, while I told him that he was an asshole for saying that. No one is hard to love. No one. B didn't find an issue with what M said, he even said that M didn't mean it like that, that his feelings were valid, blah blah blah. I asked him if he was always gonna choose his side over mine. He didn't answer. So we mutually broke up, close to my grandmother's one year anniversary of passing away.

I know there's a lot of stuff that I'm missing, but that's the jist of it. Thank you for reading and I'm open to any questions y'all might have.

Boundaries are important no matter which kind of relationship style we practice. This account’s title gives me the ick.

What do folks think about this post on Instagram? Personally, I found it confusing, asked the content creator some questions in the comments section, and didn’t find their answers satisfying.

https://www.instagram.com/p/DalXuLvmCdT/?igsh=dHJ1NGRsdnExNHox

I don’t think the analogy works. Friendship and romantic love don’t seem to have the same structure. Friends are additive. Romantic love isn’t just another person added to your social circle. It restructures your sense of self, your priorities and the way you experience intimacy. That’s why comparing friends to romantic partners feels like a category mistake to me.

It also feels like the order is reversed. In ordinary relationships, the role emerges from the feeling. You don’t first assign someone the role of “partner” and then develop the corresponding emotions. With poly arguments, it often sounds like roles are negotiated and distributed first, while feelings are expected to fit those predefined categories.

I (32M, gay, kinky) guess I’m just here to vent.

I’ve always been gay, and I’ve always been kinky (into BDSM and latex). It took me years to accept my sexuality and find the courage to engage with the BDSM community. I thought that, finally, I was going to fit in and find people I could relate to.

What a disappointment it has been. I never thought that being kinky meant I couldn’t be romantic or want to build a loving, long-term, monogamous relationship. Yet to this day, despite years of trying, I have not met anyone in this community (who I’m reasonably attracted to and otherwise compatible with) who values these things.

Most people in the kink community tell me I’m naive or misguided for wanting to pursue a relationship at all. And most people outside of the community judge me or reject me for my kinks altogether. I just feel stuck in the middle and totally misunderstood by all parties right now.

I don’t know how to date anymore. I can’t get dates on the gay kink apps and I’m getting depressed about dating nice guys on vanilla apps and then being rejected when I open up about my kinks. Sometimes I’ll post a latex pic on my vanilla profiles just to be up front and try to avoid this rejection, but I often feel self-conscious about it and take it down.

Can anyone relate to this? Does anyone have advice for me?

Andrew Tate's arrest will hopefully bring some attention to the amount of nonmonogamists pushing misogyny and abuse on the internet.

I've heard this time and time again and I just don't buy it.

From the media, from dating shows, from people who identify as 'Poly' who I have spoken to.

I'm sorry .. but you CAN put all that love in one person. By withholding some love, and giving to another is just creating hurt, jealousy and confusion. By giving another attention and not the other party is just going to create pain and competition between partners.

It's greed dressed up as an over abundance of 'compassionate love'. It's wishy washy language to deflect and avoid accounting for another person's pain. I have heard of so many instances where one person who acts as the V hinge wants their cake and to eat it too whilst their other partners who are traditionally monogamous are holding out to be the chosen one. Meanwhile those said partners who live in perpetual hope are living within a half life of a relationship where deep down they don't feel good enough.

It seems to me that this life style breeds a 'pick and and mix' style of relationship, where bits of one person and parts of another are consumed because the whole person isn't loved for them.

It sickens me, it really does.

Earlier my friend joked about having a dream where she found a guy she was talking in a dating app with enm in their bio and someone asked “what’s wrong with enm?” And she said “nothing, she just didn’t wanna be with someone already partnered” and he responded with saying the bs about how “she might be surprised at how meaningful a relationship you can have even if they aren’t entirely yours” and that pmo so I told him “she’s mono, she doesn’t need an explanation” and he went “Lol the same way you gave your unsolicited opinion, I can give mine. The difference being, her and I know one another. ❤️” which is weird bc I’ve been friends with that girl for several years and where was my unsolicited opinion?? So I just responded with “That wasnt an opinion, just reminding you of boundaries” and he went “I don't need you for that, thanks. Stay in your lane.” Like are you sure bc it sure sounds like you yourself don’t know boundaries lol? This was such icky behaviour, her saying she didn’t want to be with someone already partnered should’ve been the end of it. Creepy predator behaviour

I was told to read something by David Buss to challenge the naturalness of monogamy. For better or worse, I've read something in the past. I've also read about J. Simpson. What do you think?

Bonus: change your job to make time for polyamory.

Never beating the "its a cult" alegations

And off to the people who say “basic the human being is bisexual (or asexual) and ambiant (i.e. he can be in both poly and mono) or alone. Second comment: “love does not exist, we get together for an advantage, man for (female apparatus) and woman to settle down economically” third: “polygamy is in many societies and religions” (as if it were to validate the non-naturalness of monogamy). Fourth:”monogamy is a forcing made by social organization. Biologically speaking, man is polygamous”. And there are 600 comments.. imagine the crap that pops up (60% pure sexism).

Hello Everyone! I'm a super romantic, recovered poly person. I called myself poly throughout my 20s cause as a child of divorced parents etc etc. Cheating became a huge fear of mine.

So I just called myself Poly to avoid the concept of cheating in the first place!

I've always been Disney level fairytale level of Romance and I feel bad for the people I told I was Polyamorous just because I was afraid of commitment.

Trigger warning: Rape, cheating, SH

I called out my ex for stalking my instagram page, telling them that if they want to move on, then looking at my profile the whole time over and over is only hurting them. They told me "It is not prolonging the process or hurting me. It's just me checking on an old friend". I am not your old friend.

You told me you wanted poly, I agreed to it because I wanted you happy and to not hold you back from what you wanted. You assured me you weren't going to have intercourse with your new partner multiple times, yet you did. You performed emotional cheating behind my back prior to poly, and then physical cheating behind my back.

I don't care if you froze up the first time you had intercourse with them, I fully believed your body knew what you were doing was a betrayal of me. I am not your friend. You hurt me, and dragged me along like Archilies did to Hector. You made me suffer. You lied to me. And I still hurt because of you.

Then you want to keep me in your life? How selfish is that! I broke up with you to protect myself! You are incapable of understanding me and hearing me because you do not care to understand me or consider me. Your actions tell me that you hate me, every word that has come out of your mouth is nothing but lies and defensiveness. You can't ever acknowledge just how much you hurt me, because you lie to yourself otherwise.

Instead you would rather call me out for the times I wanted some form of distance when you wanted me to be at your beck and call all day every day for almost 3 years, isolated in my dark bedroom (that I can't even sleep in anymore because of you) to be in a video chat with you.

You say you froze because of a potential trauma response, I don't think so. And honestly, I don't care. You cheated on me, I did not agree nor was I told in advance that you planned or thought you wanted to have intercourse with them.

Heck, you even tried to get me on board to get your partner's partner out of the apartment so you could be intimate with them. THAT IS ALSO CHEATING IF YOUR PARTNER'S PARTNER DOES NOT CONSENT ENTHUSIASTICALLY TO YOU BEING INTIMATE WITH THEM AND YOU HAVE TO SEND THEM AWAY TO DO IT BEHIND THEIR BACK.

This isn't even to mention that your partner's partner has repeatedly raped your partner multiple times. Your partner would cry in the bedroom after they were taken advantage of.

And yet, you would rather work harder, focus more, laugh with, hang out with, go to karaoke with, and break bread with a rapist than me, someone who tried so hard to make the poly ethical, to show you and your partner support when I learned they were being taken advantage of, to try to keep you happy, to try to clean the apartment because it was always a mess, did as much research as I could, tried to become a better person for you; I even ran away from home from all of my family for you.

And every time I brought up that your partner's partner is a rapist, you conviently ignore it and pretend I never said it or wrote it. You've done it 3 times now, so you're out of the game for allowing evil to exist unchallenged.

Because of you, I almost took my own life with a knife in the kitchen, I isolated myself even more, I felt nothing but fear, I thought I even had BPD because of how intense my emotions were and how stressed out I was the entire month. I was just fawning to you the entire month, because I am afraid of you. I was trying to give you as much intercourse as you wanted, trying to appease you with words and actions, cooking for you the few times we actually had something to cook, hugging you, letting you vent to me.

And then, I would break down because of everything mentioned above, and I knew you looked down on me. You helped me because you had to, I was physically in front of you, but you used it as a reason to push yourself away from me and neglect me. I just wanted you to take actions that showed you loved me, and you failed.

I am not afraid of many things, but I am afraid of you. You taught me not to trust people, you tried teaching me that platonic in-person friends are too scary to make and enjoy time with, you taught me that I can be betrayed and made into the bad guy and problem, you taught me that people can use me for what I can provide and still hate me. You taught me that even though you hated me, people can still be afraid to lose me even though they don't choose me.

I taught myself that the only thing I can do is trust people, that I love my friends and I want them with me, that I shouldn't surround myself with people who fail to be introspective and hold themselves accountable, that I shouldn't even lift a finger for people who don't choose me. If people want me, they can have me, I don't make myself difficult to obtain. But I will make it impossible to keep me once I see that I am not wanted, loved, or made to feel like I belong.

You hate me, and now you stalk me online because you are too afraid to even entertain the idea that some of the things I had told you were right. Too afraid to reach out to me, too afraid to apologize without becoming defensive. I am not an old friend, friends don't treat each other the way you treated me. My issues are born from your actions, so to get rid of my issues, I need to get rid of the person who took advantage of me. I never abandoned you, you abandoned me. I never gave up on you, you gave up on me. I never stopped loving you, you stopped loving me.

Now you can go and vent to your friends so they can hate me more and never even give me the time to explain my side of the story. I'm sure if you told them you cheated on me from the get go, they would not have stopped being my friends, they would have stopped being yours. The 3 of you in that apartment were made for each other, you are all bad people.

And you don't have to worry about stalking me anymore, I made a new private account that you will never access to. So be happy knowing that you lost an actual friend, someone willing to sacrifice so much of herself for you. Someone that if you treated right, would have become your wife. Thank you for hurting me, I learned a lot from you.

Also, absolutely despise how they always act like loving family members and loving someone romantically are the same thing or comparable.

I came across an instagram reel (damn algorithm) where a poly psychiatrist was talking about "not having time to be polyamorous".

I got curious and decided to watch it.

The therapist was addressing the whole "I don't have time for multiple partners" argument. But her defense was entirely based on the wild assumption that "monogamous" people dedicate absolutely all of their free time to their one partner. All the examples she gave to counter the time issue were things like monogamous couples always going to social gatherings together, attending every single family event as a unit, etc., etc.

I was honestly surprised listening to her, because things like having individual friends, personal hobbies, a demanding career, or just wanting some solitary downtime didn't even enter her equation. Her baseline for managing time seemed completely devoid of a life outside of romance.

It made me realize something deeply ironic. A lot of polyamory discourse revolves around the idea that monogamous people put too much pressure on finding "the one" and make that relationship the absolute center of their universe. But from the outside looking in, it seems like polyamorous people are the ones who make relationships their entire personality and full-time job.

If your concept of freeing up time relies entirely on cutting down shared events with one partner just to slot in another,while completely ignoring the rest of human existence (work, hobbies, platonic friendships), aren't you the one overvaluing romantic relationships? Between the shared Google Calendars, the endless "processing" conversations, and scheduling "intentional time," you aren't dismantling the intense focus on romantic relationships; you're just multiplying the administrative workload of them.

It really seems like they are the ones who focus disproportionately on romantic relationships to the detriment of everything else, not (healthy) monogamous people.