I started my polyamorous life in my late twenties, soon after I moved to Los Angeles in 2014.
Until that point, I’d always subscribed to a classically heteronormative lifestyle. I’d been unquestioningly monogamous with just two partners my entire life – a husband together for eight years followed by a boyfriend I dated for about a year after my divorce.
My parents got married around the same age I did. They’re now approaching four decades together. Their example was simply the default I’d considered for myself, albeit with a good dose of ambivalence. I wasn’t the most fervent bride but I’d never seriously contemplated any other possibilities. I’d stepped on the relationship escalator and let it take me for a ride.
Two years out from my divorce and newly settled on the West Coast, I was ready to figure out who I really was and actualize who I wanted to be. Exploring my sexuality and sensuality was a big part of that – I started pole dancing around the same time I sought out sex-positive groups and meetups. That’s where I found polyamory and ethical non-monogamy.
My early experiences with non-monogamy were exciting and overwhelmingly positive, although not always the healthiest. Just like monogamous relationships, my polyamorous relationships have spanned the gambit of hits and misses. As I’ve become more experienced in non-monogamy and dating in general, I’ve gotten better at recognizing what serves me versus what doesn’t and how to communicate and set boundaries with existing and potential partners.
When I look around myself now, I marvel at the amazing partners and metamours I have in my life. I feel so grateful to be appreciated, supported, loved, and cherished by some of the best people I know, people I admire and love in return. I currently have four regular and semi-regular partners along with occasional play partners and comet lovers.
From Solo-Poly to Simply Polyamorous
In the first four years of my polyamorous life, I identified and operated as solo-poly.
My independence was extremely important to me and I led with that in all of my potential relationships. I wanted to make sure that everyone knew I wasn’t interested in nesting with a partner or escalating the relationship on conventional terms anytime soon.
In many ways, I identify with relationship anarchy – each relationship standing on its own, independent of your other relationships, and free from societal expectations. But relationship anarchy gets a bad rap as a way to avoid emotional intimacy and excuse selfish behavior, so I never embraced that term. Here’s a better definition of the ideals of relationship anarchy, which focus on transparency, freedom, and non-hierarchy.
Eventually, I met a partner who changed my stance on the “solo” part of polyamory. Our lives became deeply entwined and I could see this partner in my life forever so the solo label didn’t fit. That’s when I started identifying simply as polyamorous. My independence remains important to me and I’m still not interested in a nesting partner. Unless the house is big enough, but that gets expensive in LA!
Practicing Safer Sex in Polyamory
I have an IUD so pregnancy is thankfully not an issue. I have one partner with whom I am fluid-bonded – i.e., we don’t use any barriers or contraceptives during sex. With all of our other partners, we use barriers (usually latex condoms) for penetrative sex but nothing for hand contact or oral sex.
My fluid-bonded partner and I each get a full blood-drawn STI test once per year minimum, sometimes twice. We usually stagger our doctor visits so as a pair we end up getting tested more often.
I always ask new partners about their known STI status and when they were last tested. I know and trust that my other regular partners also get tested at least once per year. Usually, they tell me their results whether they’re negative or positive.
I asked to get the HPV vaccine in my late 20s before I entered the dating pool after my divorce. My fluid-bonded partner plans to ask his doctor for the HPV vaccine as well. Despite being vaccinated, I have dealt with having a high-risk HPV strain and the higher-stakes complications that can cause.
I personally assume everyone around me has had HPV and I don’t need their status to be disclosed. That is simply a risk I take as a given with modern sex, even in monogamous dating. However, I once learned the hard way that other people do not carry the same assumption that I do. So I now include HPV as part of my STI conversation. Although my last HPV test was negative, I tell partners that I’ve had a history of high-risk HPV.
I don’t believe I’m positive for either oral or genital herpes (HSV) as I’ve never had a breakout. However, I’ve also never been tested as it’s not included in the usual STI panel. I’ve had partners and metamours who manage active herpes outbreaks as well as partners who had a breakout once long ago but never again. I have a parent who gets cold sores. It’s entirely likely that I’ve been exposed to HSV at some point.
I prefer to know if a partner has ever had a herpes breakout or actively manages breakouts. However, I have found out after the fact from partners that they had one cold sore when they were kids or something. I don’t hold that against anybody since the risk of transmission now is so low and the intent is rarely to deceive. Unless a partner suspects that they currently have a breakout, HSV hasn’t been an issue for me. My fluid-bonded partner and I have also had a conversation establishing our boundaries with HSV.
When it comes to STIs, I know now that disclosing too little is way worse than disclosing too much. So I try to be as open, forthright, and thorough as possible during this conversation. Even with all of that, it takes maybe 5-10 minutes to cover everything we need to between a partner. It’s definitely worth taking the time to have the conversation and the more you do it, the easier and more natural it gets.
My Current Polyamorous Relationships
What is poly-saturation? In non-monogamy terminology, getting poly-saturated means you have as many relationships as you can handle.
I tend to get poly-saturated at around 3.5 active, regular relationships. And wouldn’t you know it, I also happen to have that exact number of active relationships right now!
Based on the amount of energy and time required, a “full” relationship is someone I see a couple of times per month or more. In comparison, a partner I see once a month or every other month takes about half of that time and emotional energy. Play partners and comet lovers who come around every once in a while don’t count towards this number for me.
* Names have been changed to respect partners’ privacy.
I have an anchor partner Ron, who is a central and important part of my life. We are both each other’s longest current and active relationship. Our daily lives are quite entangled, we’ve committed to being with each other long-term, and he’s essentially my dog’s stepdad. I see Ron a few times per week and we live close to each other. When the COVID-19 pandemic made us functionally monogamous for over a year, we operated a lot like primary partners.
While I don’t want kids with a nesting partner, Ron does. About a year into our relationship we did a living together trial for one week. Afterward, we took a week to process our feelings then we scheduled a time to talk about our takeaways. After our trial, we both decided not to move in together. I still valued my personal space too much for it and Ron wanted to take that step with a nesting partner who was on board with moving towards kids in the future.
Recently, Ron has started dating with intent toward that goal. He’s specifically avoiding new partners who aren’t aligned with what he wants, so he’s been turning down potential play partners, casual hookups, and friends with benefits. I’m proud of him for sticking to his goals and I support him completely in his quest. I look forward to being an awesome auntie to his kids while he gets the benefit of having me as a babysitter when he and mom need it.
Although I am personally poly-saturated and not actively looking for new relationships, I recently updated my online dating profile so that Ron and I could link our profiles together. That way, potential partners can get to know me, too, since I’m a part of the deal.
In addition, I have a long-term romantic relationship with my partner Cary. Although Cary and I didn’t start dating until later, I actually met both Cary and Ron at the same event.
Cary is a part of Ron and my close circle of friends. I attended Cary’s wedding to our other friend Celeste about three months after Cary and I started dating. Our baseline is two dates per month. (Our schedules are a polyamory cliche, what can I say?) It’s been a joy to deepen our emotional connection over time and I can see him in my life for the long term.
Recently, I started a more-than-friends relationship with my friend Wayne, whom I met through our mutual social circles. We also see each other a couple of times per month.
I also have a friend and play partner Colin whom I see about once a month. I met Colin because he is a partner of Ron’s partner Mara. Yes – that forms a relationship square.
I currently have one other friend and comet lover who lives out of town and comes around every couple of years. We met shortly after my divorce but didn’t connect more than friends until several years later. We usually see each other when one of us is traveling.
My Relationship with Metamours
What is a metamour? A “metamour” is a partner’s partner. For example, my partner’s wife would be my metamour, and vice versa.
Recently I had a discussion with polyamorous friends about what type of relationship we preferred to have with our metamours. The consensus was that friendship between metamours was nice but never required and that forcing it was sure to backfire.
I personally like to be friendly if not friends with metamours if they are also open to it. I also appreciate when my partners make an effort to be friendly and respectful to my other partners. Some of my current partners are long-time friends or in the same or overlapping social communities, so running into each other is an inevitability. Logistically, it helps to get along.
I don’t struggle with jealousy often, but I do feel jealous sometimes just like anyone else. I deal with jealous feelings by looking inward, examining the source of my thoughts, and disarming them until they take up less mental space. Dealing with jealousy gets easier with practice over time.
My Experience With “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” Relationships
My first polyamorous partner was in a “don’t ask don’t tell” (DADT) open relationship.
Initially, my partner explained that his long-term girlfriend simply didn’t want to hear the details of his other relationships. I met his girlfriend at polyamory events so I knew that she was aware of the situation. This was fine for me until I once forgot a pair of shoes at my partner’s house.
When I picked up the shoes a week later, my partner led me to a shoebox buried under a pile of boxes in an unused guest bedroom closet. It was so absurdly secretive that it veered into unethical non-monogamy for me, i.e. cheating. Later, my partner admitted that his girlfriend was uncomfortable with their non-monogamous arrangement but he knew she went along with it because he wanted it. He was unwilling to be monogamous with her despite knowing that’s what she wanted.
Since then, I don’t engage with don’t ask don’t tell relationships. Although every relationship is different, I personally prefer not to be a part of that type of dynamic. I prefer open, transparent communication. If a relationship threatens to fall apart at the mere mention of another partner or metamour, that is not ethical non-monogamy to me. Clearly, someone is not okay with the situation. What happens if there’s an emergency? All the people who care for you will want to be around your bedside. Your partners should at least be able to communicate for your sake.
Discomfort with other partners is part of the reason I don’t love the idea of dating people who are newly opening up their relationship. I might make an exception for the right chemistry but I breathe a sigh of relief whenever I hear that my metamours are experienced with polyamory.
Another reason metamours are so important to me is that I was quite isolated in my marriage. My husband regularly told me that nobody liked me and that I had no friends. Eventually, the latter became true. So I want to have that extended family. I would be open to living with my partners and metamours in the future if the chemistry and circumstances make that a possibility. Another upside of non-monogamy: the bigger your polyamorous household, the more people you have to share the mortgage.
My Current Metamour Relationships
I am grateful to have some pretty rad metamours in my life. I was honored to be invited to Cary and Celeste’s wedding. Mara has an incredible green thumb and two of the plants she gifted me are thriving in my house. I am constantly amazed by Shelley’s professional capabilities.
I have more metamours I’ve never met or met just once or twice – usually the ones that are outside our regular social circles. Again, I don’t try to force the relationship. But I am open to friendship and open to meeting and bringing along metamours to social events.
How Do You Prefer to Meet Metamours?
Meeting a metamour for the first time could be just like a first date. First Impressions can go a long way – for better or for worse. Of course, you can always overcome a less-than-ideal meta introduction, especially if both metamours are open to meeting each other in the middle.
I was once with a partner whose metamour stormed out of the room after seeing me at an event. By the end of the night, I was giving my metamour a ride home.
There are many ways to make that metamour introduction. If you’re meeting a metamour for the first time, how would you prefer to go about it?
- Would you prefer your partner to be there when you meet your metamour, or would you rather it be just you and your metamour meeting each other?
- Would you prefer to meet your metamour with only your partner there, or would you rather meet them at a larger social event with more people?
- Would you prefer to dine out together or do an activity?
Each scenario has its ups and downs. I generally like to have our mutual partner there when I meet a metamour, especially if it’s a personal introduction and not a large social gathering. A larger social event may put less pressure on metamours to connect compared to going out with just the three of you. An activity could be fun compared to dining out, but you probably want to avoid anything that triggers a competitive dynamic between metamours.
And there you have it – my polysaturated life, seven years in. As much as I love my polyamorous life, it comes with its share of annoying little pet peeves… just like any other relationship structure. You’d be surprised how much laundry comes with this lifestyle!