That’s what’s on this week’s episode of Non-Monogamy Help.

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Podcast Transcript

My partner and I are in an ethical non-monogamous relationship since three years. Initially, I loved it and enjoyed dating others. Over time, though, I lost the drive to date. I struggled with the open relationship model but endured it for the sake of the relationship without discussing my feelings much with my partner. During this time, I pushed myself to have affairs. Partly because I found it hard to accept that my partner was dating others while I wasn't. Partly because I wanted to rediscover why I wanted an ENM relationship myself. Since then, I’ve had affairs or one-time sexual experiences that I don’t want to miss. Between these, there are always longer pauses when I don't date.

I actually enjoy having the option for other sexual relationships, even though I am not acting it out frequently. But I feel intense and overwhelming jealousy when my partner dates. Nowadays, I am talking with my partner open about these feelings. This jealousy manifests physically (nausea, nervousness, tension) and mentally (obsessive thoughts about their date) and it can last for days. I imagine they had a better time than we do, and I create scenarios about their date, which fuels my jealousy. Sometimes I ask about the date cause I want to have a reality check, but when my partner shares non-detailed, positive descriptions of his dates, like „easy going“ or „funny“, it intensifies my feelings.

The only answer that would actually calm me down would be if it was boring or nothing happened between them. I am wondering if we should try „don’t ask, don’t tell”. While dealing with these emotions, I am withdrawing from him emotionally, which he perceives as coldness and punishment. Probably I really want to punish him subconsciously, because I feel hurt. At the same time, I’m craving to reconnect and want to feel that everything is fine between us, but in distancing, I end up doing the opposite of what I actually need. What we could do to make the situation easier after a date?

To give you a bit more insight, these questions are also in my mind: I remember the first year when I enjoyed the open relationship and wasn’t as jealous, so I wonder what has changed. Is the jealousy indicating of what I am missing? That I want dates like he has (long term sexual friendships)? Or is it showing me something missing in our relationship because I think his dates are more exciting than ours? Or is it just the sign, that I am overwhelming myself? I want to find out if my struggle is with the open relationship model itself or if there’s something lacking in our relationship.

Thank you for your advice!

Response

I think that there's something that I'm wondering about this situation that sticks out for me, and that is that for whatever reason, whether it's because of something that's going on in your relationship, or it's because of your own personal way of looking at the relationship, when you didn't feel like you could say that this wasn't working for you, and you kind of hid that you betrayed yourself in that instance.

And that, in and of itself, I think, causes a lot of emotions and negativity and unhappy feelings. When we go along with situations that we don't want, because we don't want to have the other person upset with us, or for whatever reason, when we go along with things that we don't want to do, that I think, creates a really big conflict that kind of festers and really has long, lasting impacts on anything that we do, pretty much, and I don't know if that has ever really been addressed in your relationship.

Have you ever— you're more open now, it seems, with your partner than you were before, about your feelings. But have you ever really, either with yourself or with your partner, answered the question of, why is it that when you started to feel like this wasn't working for you, you didn't want to talk about it at all with your partner, or you just kind of buried it? Because that is something that I feel like is the core of the issue, right? Because, yeah, you're, you're doing the comparison thing, and you're, you're kind of creating a competition.

But you're creating a competition because, on a basic level, you're not sure if you want to do this anymore. So of course, you're going to feel like any other relationship, is going to be a threat, because they may be somebody who actually does want to do this, and you have a really understandable fear of losing your partner to someone else who is happy to do this, right? And that's why all of these kind of easy-going, funny things hit you right in the feels, because on a basic level, you're like, “I'm not happy doing this.

“I'm continuing in this situation. I'm watching my partner have all of these things that I wish, that I have, which builds resentment, and then on top of that, if they figure it out that I'm not happy doing this, then they could easily go off with any of these other people who seem to be more than happy doing this”. And then you've also forced yourself — and it's really telling that you call it affairs.

And I don't know if this is like in English as a second language thing, but affairs are usually — that's cheating, like that's something that you do that, isn't it… Polyamorous people don't have affairs, people who have agreed to be in a monogamous relationship, who are going against what they agreed and cheating on their partner are having affairs. But it's really telling for me that you chose the word “affair”, and maybe, again, maybe it means nothing.

But it makes me wonder if you do feel like you are hiding something, because what a lot of people define as cheating within a polyamorous context, you know, when exclusivity isn't part of the deal, a lot of what people define as cheating is hiding. Hiding, like lying to their partner about somebody else, or lying about the truth, or lying about what's happening.

And in a way, if you're not being honest with your partner, you are, in a way, lying. I'm not saying you're cheating, right? I'm not saying that, but I'm saying that you are having these dates and these experiences that you don't really want to have, and you're not telling — and you know, and I don't know if you did tell your partner eventually, but you're not really telling them the whole truth, which is that you're not sure if ethical non-monogamy or if this situation is something you want.

And I understand why. It's perfectly understandable, because that could end the relationship. That's a really scary conversation to have if your partner is really sure that this is the style of relationship that he wants to have, and you're not sure, that could trigger a fundamental break.

However, I do think that there are a couple things that you could address that might help you feel a little bit better, because I don't necessarily think that ethical non-monogamy is like, not for you, but I do think there are a few things here that you're you're kind of doing that might make it much more difficult. Firstly, it makes perfect sense to be sick and tired of dating. Dating is exhausting.

Some people enjoy dating and if that's you, I'm so — I'm happy for you, and it sounds like I'm not really happy for you, and I'm being sarcastic. But genuinely, I'm happy for you. I hate dating. I don't like it. It's annoying. I hate dating sites. I hate — just I don't like it. I wish that I just knew people I don't want to get to know people. I just want to know them, and it's silly, but that's how I feel.

And I've been non-monogamous for like, what, 13 years, 12 years, I don't know. I've been non- monogamous for a while, and for the vast majority of that time, I have not actively dated because I hate it. I hate it! And not wanting to date doesn't make you not, you know, not non-monogamous, it just makes you a human I think, but you're putting this kind of pressure on yourself. And a lot of people do this. A lot of people feel like, if their partner has another partner, then they've got to find one.

There's this weird, like, not weird, but there's this intense sort of competitiveness that ends up happening. And obviously, like, if you — you know, agreeing to polyamory or agreeing to non-monogamy, any form of non-monogamy, it means agreeing to your partner having less time with you. So if your partner is spending time with other people, you naturally want to spend that time with other people. You want to have an equal share in the time between your partner. But sometimes that's just not going to happen, right?

And it doesn't mean you failed. It doesn't mean that you're not doing it right. It's just like, maybe you just don't like dating, man, and that's okay. You don't have to like dating, but you're kind of creating this scenario in your head where, like, you have to like dating, and if you don't like dating, then you have to force yourself to do it.

Or, yeah, you know, just— Maybe you can go a little bit easier on yourself. Maybe you can be like, “okay, you know, I was really into dating”, and that's, I think that's quite normal, like, I was really into dating. I was like, on all the apps and doing all the things and going to speed dating events. And then eventually I was just like, “Man, this sucks. I hate. I hate it”.

And I stopped doing it. And I get that occasionally, like, I'll try it for a little bit, and then I'll be like, “Oh, I'm done with this”. I just hate it. So maybe just like, acknowledge that you don't like dating that much. And it doesn't have to mean anything. It doesn't have to mean, you know, it doesn't have to be a competition between you and your partner.

Find other ways to enjoy your time. Find friends you enjoy hanging out with, find hobbies that you enjoy doing. You don't have to fucking spend your time dating and be like— sometimes I think like, there are certain hobbies and certain things that I think people get really into that kind of subsume their entire personality.

I'm not saying this is you or your partner or any I'm just speaking in general terms. And it doesn't like — I feel like sometimes polyamory becomes that for some people, like, their whole life becomes about, like, dating and relationships. And it doesn't — like there is more to life than those things. And if that's your life, that's what you enjoy, that's fine. I'm not judging, but I'm just saying, like, it doesn't have to be that way. Like, yeah, you can go to parties and hook up things and blah, blah, blah, whatever.

You can do that if you want, but it doesn't have to be your whole life. There's other things in the world to experience. There's other things you can delve into. You can fill your time with other things other than dating and relationships. So that's one thing to keep in mind. I think also you — it doesn't seem like you've had and maybe you have had, but you know, you might not include this in your letter.

But have you had those, like foundational discussions with your partner about how other partners fit in your life, how much time you'll spend together? This is a thing that I constantly encourage people to do, because I think that it makes sense to be afraid of losing your partner. That's like, I think everyone, the vast majority of us, are going to experience that fear because we grew up in a monocentric society that presented us with one type of relationship, one type of way of doing love.

We're not just going to be able to undo that really strong kind of social conditioning. Sounds really intense, but that example that we've been given our entire lives. We haven't really been given any model for polyamory. So of course, we're going to be like, “Ah! I'm going to lose them. Ah, they're dating someone else. Ah!” That is understandable.

There's nothing about that that I think is completely odd. But I do think that having to deal with that on top of dealing with the idea of your partner— you have all this time with one partner, then all of a sudden they start dating somebody else, and then you lose all that time. That's normal to be sad about that.

I mean, think about it, if you had a best friend, and you know, your best friend — you spent all this time together, and then your best friend picked up karate, and now, now they spend, like, some of the time that they would have spent with you, they're off doing something else, and then you miss them.

Like it makes total sense, because you're dealing with a lack of time, and that's going to cause some understandable sadness. Well, what you don't want to do, and what you what is even more difficult is to deal with that understandable mourning of the loss of time, and then also deal with the fear of losing your partner. So have you really had a discussion about, like, how other partners fit in your lives together?

How you— you know, are those relationships going to be something where they can escalate because you said ethical non-monogamy, which makes me think that mostly other relationships are about, like, sexual experiences. So maybe that isn't something that's going to happen, but if you have a really clear idea, and if you have scheduled dedicated time together, it makes some of these things a little bit easier.

I think also when it comes to sharing details, I mean, I think it's okay to temporarily be like, “Hey, look, I'm dealing with a lot of like, up and down feelings about things. Could we put a pause?” — but you have to also not ask about the date to give yourself some kind of reality check, because it's obviously not helping you. I think, you know, it's okay to be like, “You know, I don't want any details at the moment, because I'm dealing with some feelings” like, that's fine. That's not don't ask, don't tell.

Okay, don't ask. Don't tell us where you pretend like you're in a monogamous relationship with someone and they, you know, they keep everything hidden. That's not don't ask, don't tell. Asking for a little less details while you deal with some of the sort of emotional turbulence that you're dealing with is absolutely fine. That's okay, but you have to also, like, not open Pandora's box because you think you're going to be able to be able to inoculate yourself against these feelings by exposing yourself to them.

That's not really how it works. I think if you have scheduled dedicated time together, you know when you're scared, when you get that inner feeling of, like, “Am I not good enough for somebody else?” There's a couple things you can do with that. One of them is to focus on the gratitude and the positive aspects of your relationship. Whenever I was dealing with those feelings, my partner was out with somebody else, because, like I said, I don't like dating.

I'm kind of an introvert. I don't really like social interaction that much. And I would date people who were super huge into parties and big social butterflies and things like that. And I'd always feel really anxious about like, “Oh, they're gonna — I'm no fun, you know, I'm a wet blanket, I'm boring, I'm, you know, I go to bed at nine. I'm not exciting”. So whenever my partner was out with somebody, or out at a party, or, you know, doing the thing that I didn't want to do, sometimes I'd sit and I'd write them a letter, or I'd write them a card, and I'd focus on all of the things that are positive in our relationship, all of the reasons why I care about them, all of the ways that they showed me that they care about me, and that really helped me a lot.

So I think like doing something like that might help a lot. I think also thinking about, do you have dates together? Do you have scheduled dates? How can you make those better? How can you do something new? I think that you know ways to improve that is also helpful.

And I think that another thing that's really, really helpful, and I talk about this in my 101 article. If you haven't read it, it's at nonmonogamyhelp.com/101 — but I think it's a reasonable, understandable reaction to feel like you can control whether or not your partner stays with you by being more interesting or by you know, and I think polyamory — a lot of starter polyamory advice really encourages that you know, this idea that you're you know, your partner loves you, for you, and you have something unique to offer.

What if it's not your job to offer things? How about that? How about we turn that on its head and we say, actually, you know what? It's not my job to be super interesting, like, obviously, yes, you know, in any kind of relationship we have, we want to be a kind person. We want to be a person who offers support to people. We want to, you know, we want to reciprocate other people's energy, for sure.

I'm not saying, you know, be a lazy bum and don't give anybody anything, but I'm saying that when you reinforce the idea that it's your job to provide somebody with something, and that your existence in a relationship, and the ability to get love from somebody else is connected to your utility, your usefulness, or your ability to offer something that isn't something that I think creates a positive thing in your head, because it's then, like it's always your job to then provide something, and the second you stop providing something, then you're going to get dropped. And I don't think that that's the way relationships realistically work.

And I don't think that's necessarily a healthy way of looking at yourself. You're not a resource. You're not there to be a convenience to other people. You're not there— Your goal and purpose in a relationship isn't to be an interesting, you know, easy-going, funny person that you know — that's not your the price that you pay for existing in the world, that's not the definition of your worth as a human being. And I think that challenging that idea might be really helpful for you, because on a basic level, this comparison that you're doing with other people comes down to a fear that you need to provide something.

I think it comes down to not only the fear that you need to provide something. Also there's that issue that I mentioned at the beginning of the podcast, which was that you don't want to do this, and you haven't really addressed that, and haven't really talked with your partner about being scared that this may not be something you want to do, but also from the fact that, like you think that it's your job to keep your partner around by being interesting, by being better than other people.

And if you have an ethical non-monogamous relationship where other relationships are only meant to be sexual, that's only going to intensify this, because then you've created a kind of pedestal. Then you are the one he has romantic connections with. There is one seat available for that attribute in a relationship. You currently occupy that seat, but somebody else could, you know, could replace you.

So that is another reason why you might be feeling this intensity. But I think sometimes stepping away from that and going like, “Hey, wait a minute, it's actually not my job to keep people around by being the most interesting person in the room. It's actually not my job to keep my partner with me by being better than everybody else. That isn't my role.”

And that it's not even the way that people tend to look at relationships realistically. So I think that challenging that idea will be a little bit helpful. I also think that if you can work out— because at this point, like, I understand that you have felt that ethical non-monogamy is not for you, but I think that if you can work out having scheduled dedicated time with your partner, and I think that if you can give yourself a little bit of a break for not liking dating, and just let yourself not like dating and get into other things, you might feel a little bit better, and then you can see.

It may not be for you, like, I can't really tell you that. I don't think anybody else can tell you that. But I think there are other things here that you can address that might make it more reasonable for you, because you said that you enjoy having the option, even if you're not “acting it out”. And I think that that's a sign that this is something for you, but you you can put yourself under less pressure to be dating all the time, like you don't have to be dating.

I think that comes from like this fear also that, like, you're gonna be found out that you don't — you're not that into it, or that you're gonna be you know, that you're gonna lose him. So you need someone who's a plan B for you as well. Like, I just think that if you let yourself be, you know, let yourself not be that interested in dating, you don't have anything to prove to anybody.

And find other relationships and other sources of joy, other sources of love in your life, like romantic relationships, are not the only source that you have for that. And if you figure that out, then I think that will, you know, then it may not be such a big emotional roller coaster. I think you're still going to have these feelings, right? You're still going to be afraid to lose your partner. You're still going to have some of these understandable fears.

But I think that if you allow yourself just the ability to exist without like, “Okay, I don't have to be dating all the time”, or “I don't have to find another relationship right away”, you know, I think that will make you feel a lot better. It might be helpful for you to also think about the fact that you're creating a reality that may not exist. I think that sometimes a grass is always greener, and it's easy to think — and this happens all the time in polyamory and in most non-monogamous situations, because a lot of people have the situation where one partner has more “success” than the other.

And it's very easy to think that just because somebody has a lot of relationships, or has a lot of opportunity to have a lot of relationships, or seems to find dates easy, that this is a better situation to be in, and from the other side of not getting any dates and wanting dates, obviously, like, yeah, it seems like a lot better of a situation to be in. But the grass isn't always greener, and there aren't always situations where having more people to divide your time with is something that makes things easier.

So I think also reminding yourself of that would be a little bit helpful, because even if your partner does seem to have these connections, it doesn't mean that his life is like awesome and that everything is going well. So that can also help a little bit. But I think overall, like have a discussion with each other. Make sure you're having dates. Make sure you're having scheduled, intentional time together. Focus on how you can improve those things together.

Focus on the gratitude that you have with the connection that you have with one another. I think you might need to talk with each other about your fears that you know, just be, can you be honest with your partner? Can you say, like, “Hey, I'm afraid that this isn't for me. I'm not, you know, saying that it's not, but I'm I'd like to be able to talk to you about that. I like to be able to be honest with you about that and be vulnerable about that”.

Because I think that you keeping that and whether it's because your partner has given you a reason to think you can’t be vulnerable with him or not, or if it's just that you've kept this under because you're scared of what having that conversation will elicit. I think that that's kind of a crux here of this issue, like, why is — maybe you can work that out with your therapist, or work that out with a couple's therapist, but why is it that you've that you hid that from him?

Why you know you felt like you couldn't be vulnerable with him. Why is that? And can you both address that together? Is it something that you do yourself? Is it something where you understandably are afraid that this would end the relationship if you shared it? So you're hiding it, but then you end up doing stuff you don't want to do, and you end up betraying yourself, and that creates resentment.

That doesn't solve the problem. So really address that, because I think that that will really, really get to the crux of the issue. And also, to recap, I don't think that you're necessarily not non-monogamous. I think that you're putting a lot of pressure on yourself to date. You're creating a competition, and for understandable reasons, but you're creating a competition that is making you miserable, and it doesn't have to. If you don't want to date, you don't have to date. You don't have to always be dating.

You can fill your life with other activities that aren't relationships or aren't relational based or are relationships that aren't romantic, you can do other stuff. So maybe give yourself a little bit of a permission to not date for a while, and find some other things that you find interesting, find some other hobbies, find some other groups of friends, anything that will bring joy to your life. It doesn't have to be relationships.

And then I think, last but not least, challenge your own perceptions that everything is going amazingly well when it comes to his relationships, when that thing pops up. You're telling yourself this narrative that you know he's having the whale of a time, and you know you're you're missing out on all this other stuff, but you have no idea what you're missing out on technically.

So you know you could be missing out on a heck of a lot of frustration and difficulty. With more relationships sometimes it comes more heartbreak. So you know, it's easy to tell yourself you're missing out on something great, but you may, you know, I always tend to find that when I when I have rejection, whether it's romantic rejection, whether it's any kind of rejection in my life.

It's easier for me to face that when I go, when I look at — I can't choose whether or not someone else chooses me right like, I can't change that rejection. It is what it is, but what I can change is how I decide to look at it. And I can— like if I say someone turns me down for a job that I really, really wanted, from that standpoint, from that point of view, I can decide to look at it as, “Oh my God, that would have been the best job in the world. I've lost this opportunity. This sucks” Like I can really dig into that, or I can go, “Well, maybe that job wasn't that great actually. Maybe I would have been working really long hours, maybe I would have had a really terrible, awful boss”

“Maybe I would have been in, you know, really toxic workplace”, or, you know, all of those things like, because I don't know. I have no idea what that job would have been like, and I'm sure that you've been in situations where you got what you wanted and found out that it wasn't what you wanted. That may be how you're feeling about ethical non-monogamy right now. But you know what I mean?

Like, when something is cut off in terms of an opportunity, you have the choice to look at it as, “Okay, this is the best situation that I could have been in and I've lost something”, or you have the option to go, “Maybe it wasn't even that great”. And I think that you can — if you decide to do that instead, if you decide to go, “Maybe it wasn't that great, maybe it wouldn't have been worth it. Maybe it would have been terrible”.

It makes it easier to cope, and that's really what matters, because you're never going to know. You've been rejected, that that part has been shut off for you never gonna know if that would have been a great situation or not. But if you can tell yourself, like, “Eh, maybe it wouldn't have been that great. Maybe that person would have been terrible”.

“Maybe it, you know, they would have been, you know, we would have been really incompatible, and the breakup would have been really rough”, like all of that makes it a lot a lot easier to deal with and a lot easier for you to cope with. And then, as a last, this isn't last actually. This is just something I forgot to mention.

If you want to say that you don't want any like detail about things, that's okay. That's not, don't ask, don't tell. Asking for, you know, saying, “I'm going through some stuff emotionally right now, and I'm noticing the details about, you know, the people that you're seeing sometimes trigger things. Can we just little little bit of a pause on details for a little bit while I work this out for myself?” Like, that's fine. That is fine.

Think of it like if you were, if somebody was pregnant and they were experiencing, like, really sensitive smells, and they asked people, like, “Hey, can you wear less perfume while you're around me? Because”. Like, that's that's okay. I mean, it's obviously a different thing.

But asking for something like that, you know, for a short, temporary period of time would really help because, and I think that if you, if you focus on these things that might help with you, kind of pushing your partner away, right? Because if you, if you can ask for that, ultimately, I think what this, all this comes down to that you don't feel comfortable being intimate with your partner. You don't feel comfortable being honest about your feelings for whatever reason, maybe that's something that they've done.

That's something you need to work out in couples counselling, perhaps together, but you don't feel comfortable being honest. And then you're naturally if you can't be honest, if you can't be vulnerable, then your reaction to that is to push that person away because you're like, “Oh, I can't be myself around that person, so I need to go be myself somewhere else, and then come back to them when I'm prepared to put my mask on again”.

And I think if you can figure out why that is, and if you can work on that together, if you can, instead of thinking about the other relationships, bring yourself back to talking about what relationship you have together, rebuilding that, connecting that, focusing on the good things that you have together, then I think a lot of this, you know, a lot of this, will be solved.

And because, again, I don't necessarily think that it's that non-monogamy isn't for you. I think that there's a combination of the fact that you're not fully able to be honest with your partner about your feelings for whatever reason, and then also this sort of thing that you're putting on yourself to be this dating machine that you don't have to be.

So yeah, I hope that helps and good luck.