Y'all. I know that there are a lot of holidays that capitalism really takes advantage of, but I fucking love Valentine's Day. As someone who identifies as polyamorous, I love Love. I love that I feel like my love is infinite and I love that I can share it with so many people I care about.
Since this was my first Valentine's Day identifying as polyamorous and being in an open relationship with my husband, I decided that I wanted to really celebrate by sending letters and baked good to my friends that I've been able to be my true and authentic self with.
I had a lot of fun baking these sugar cookies and frosting them with homemade pink and white icing! I packed an assortment of these cookies into Ziploc bags and into 4" x 4" x 4" boxes and it was really fun sending these to my friends who were so so so happy to receive them! <3
I think it's really important to celebrate love with chosen family because I don't know who I'd be without their support.
I also got to write letters and decorate the envelopes with Valentine themed stickers. Writing letters can feel so meditative because I can focus solely on what I want to say to the other person and try my best to formulate a message that can best convey how I feel towards them. Completing each letter and dropping them off at the post office was just so gratifying. I felt like a little kid making candy grams for their classmates lol
Other than celebrating Valentine's Day with friends, my husband and I went on a cute little date together, I exchanged very flirtatious letters with Angel, and I gushed together with my platonic soulmate and platonic partner about how much we love and appreciate each other.
Normalizing Polyamory in Conversations with my Husband
Saturday, May 29, 2021
The other night, my husband had come home from work and I had just finished preparing dinner. He placed his phone on the coffee table and as I was putting our dinner on the table, I accidentally saw his phone light up and he received a message from someone saying, “Get a room?”
I didn’t look any further, but as we were having dinner, I asked my husband if he had any weekend plans. He said that he didn’t have any at the moment and cut the conversation there. I realized he didn’t want to talk about it, but one of the things that we’re trying to transition into is having him communicate his plans better with me. His dates tend to happen very last minute and it causes me a little anxiety when plans suddenly change, so I thought it would have been nice for him to at least mention that something *might* happen this weekend, so that I could mentally prepare for it.
I decided to mention to him that I accidentally saw him receive that message on his phone and I tried my best to communicate with him, “It‘s okay if you have a date planned or are planning a date, I just would like to know in advance so that I can prepare myself.”
He took it pretty well and told me about his “maybe plans” but the reason he was a little weird when talking about the text he received is because the lady he received it from is someone he wasn’t sure he should continue attempting to have a relationship with.
I wanted to know more and ended up prying, but he got a little defensive.
We later talked about him being defensive, and he just explained that he’s still not sure what the proper etiquette is in terms of what he should and should not communicate with me since this polyamory stuff is still relatively new to both of us. He doesn’t know what will make him jealous, he doesn’t know what will make me jealous, so this results in him doing weird stuff like hiding certain details and not being sure what he can share or not share even though he knows we are both consenting to a polyamorous relationship.
I later chatted with another poly friend about this (she’s in a poly relationship with her boyfriend) and she explained that her boyfriend was similar in the beginning. She thinks the reason why her boyfriend and my husband try to hide things (despite knowing there’s nothing wrong with what they’re doing) is because there’s this huge stigma and sense of shame associated with being a polyamorous man. There’s a lot of people who *assume* poly men are just cheating on their spouses or that the man was the one that asked to open up the relationship and the woman was just forced to go along with it. However, in both my friend and my relationships, we (the women) were the ones that had asked to open up our monogamous relationships.
In the end, my friend just suggested to be patient with my husband and understand that he might be more insecure identifying as poly than I am because of the stigma associated with a poly man versus a poly woman. It’s going to be a bit of a learning curve, but at least I’m aware and I’m able to communicate this with my husband as well so that he’s aware of his own feelings and reactions.
Managing Expectations that are Based Off Assumptions
Wednesday, May 19, 2021
My husband went on his first date with another woman tonight and I did not expect to handle it so poorly.
In the book, “More Than Two” by Eve Rickert and Franklin Veaux, there was a part where they talk about how nothing in the world will ever prepare you for the first time you see your spouse holding hands with another person. You can do all the suggested work to manage your own insecurities and jealousy and still not react very well to that first time.
I think that reading this before pursuing dates with other people has been very helpful. When I went on my date yesterday, my husband told me that he was mostly okay with it, but later in the evening, his stomach was up in knots from being nervous about me going on a date with another person.
What I’m really grateful for with both of these experiences is that both of us are learning more about ourselves and each other with regard to how we feel and communicate.
I think my biggest mistake was making assumptions and creating expectations out of them. For some reason, I made up this story in my head that my husband left work early to go on this date with the other girl and when I hadn’t heard from him at 9:30pm, I thought he had basically spend 4-5 hours with this other woman and that he wasn’t planning to come home tonight.
I was wrong on so many of those points hahaha...
It turns out this date wasn’t really a date because this girl wasn’t interested in “sharing her man with another woman.” They were only meeting up to see if they were compatible hiking buddies. My husband also didn’t meet up with her until 7:30pm and he had not plans of staying overnight.
I don’t know why, but knowing these details made me feel a lot better about the situation. I also think I was probably having a hard time because I wanted to talk to people, but I felt like everyone was busy, so I felt very alone. I ended up spending most of my night organizing some collections and decorating my office. After I was able to keep myself busy, I was okay.
It turns out that the girl my husband was going to hang out with also felt like my husband communicated poorly. He showed up to the place at the time they had agreed on, but she didn’t know he was already there because my husband didn’t say anything.
My husband learned that he needs to be more clear and work on his communication skills.
I learned that I really need to stop making up stories in my head about what could happen and not make assumptions based off details that were poorly communicated.
I thought I was getting ghosted by the girl I was casually dating, but...
February 3, 2022
[[Note: This was saved in my drafts and I felt compelled to post it because I wanted to share all aspect of my journey in polyamory, even if they're all over the place]]
I was on TikTok the other day and I couldn't stop laughing at this particular one:
https://www.tiktok.com/@ricstevens/video/7050073923563572482
[Description:
Caption: "Dating as a 24 old in 2021 be like"
Person is holding their phone and reads out loud, "Read 3 hours ago." The person then throws their phone. They get their teddy bear and softly pet it, then say, "Fuck you man, I don't care if you ever message me again... bitch."
A couple seconds pass by and you hear their phone's notification sound go off. The person immediately grabs their phone and scrolls through saying, "Fucking love of my life, what's up? What's up?" ]
I think I was laughing because I found it super relatable. I had set up a third date with the girl that I was "casually dating" (let's call her Angel), but she had cancelled on me at the last minute. I tried to take the cancellation at face value because she said she'd "make it up to me," but of course, I'm human and after not hearing from her for 3 weeks I thought that I had done something wrong and that she was no longer interested in me.
At that point, I started going on dating apps again because I didn't want to get stuck on Angel if she really decided to ghost me. But as I had started swiping and trying to converse with potential dates, I got frustrated because I kept thinking about Angel and how much I wanted to see her again and I kept comparing my interactions to these other potential dates with my previous interactions with Angel. And that's when I realized that I *caught feelings* for her and that I also don't know what the definition of casual dating is even if somebody wrote it on a brick and threw it in my face because I don't just casually date people. I court the fuck out of them.
ANYWAY, so I'm frustrated with dating apps because swiping on people, matching with them, and having empty conversations can't fill the void you feel when you've made a genuine connection with another person who decides they don't want to contact you any more. Fine, that's cool. So let me just grieve my short lived romance with this person I thought was going to be a potential lover. Cool cool cool.
BUT THEN, my phone dings and it's Angel. She texted me again. And she said,
Hi cutie!!! Sorry I've been super busy lately. I hope you've been doing great and that school is going well have a good night!
So of course I'm over the moon and just excited to hear back from her and I forget all my angsty thoughts that I had in the past 3 weeks because none of them are true! She's still interested in me, she was just busy!
My dumb flirtatious ass decided to respond back by saying,
Good morning pretty lady!
Thanks for the lovely text - I hope you've been doing super well!
Sorry you've been busy lately, but let me know when you're available to "make it up to me" 😚
Happy Friday!
In all seriousness though, I'm joking about the "making it up to me" (unless...) 👀😏
But I'm really happy to hear from you
School is starting to make me busier but I've been managing to stay afloat
And Angel responds,
I'd love to make it up to you actually... in all seriousness. 😏
I miss you and want to give you a kiss. I love your lips :) hope you had a great day. I am busy these 2 weeks unfortunately BUT if something clears can I message you? If not, wait for me until then 🖤
So here I am, immediately getting off the dating apps because Angel gave me hope again lol
And honestly, I ain't even mad. I'm just allowing myself to ride this wave of queer flirting because I'm enjoying myself.
In previous relationships, I was usually the person that got dumped (this was probably because I used to be so codependent that it would scare previous partners), so this was a rather new experience for me.
I remember prior to making my decision, I had a lot of biphobic and polyphobic thoughts where I was defining my identity based off the relationships I was in, but then I reminded myself that those identities are not tied to experience, they're tied to desire. So even after I broke up with my girlfriend, I was still very confident that I'm still polyamorous and I'm still bisexual despite the fact that I am no longer in a relationship with a woman.
Anyway, I don't really want to dive into too many details and I feel like my childish self paints all breakups in a light where one person is villainized and the other person is the victim. BUT as an adult, I can acknowledge that my ex-girlfriend was a sweet, caring, and loving individual. She didn't do anything wrong and I genuinely hope she's okay and finds happiness even after our breakup.
However, one of the reasons why I ended things was because I found our relationship going into the same trajectory as a relationship I had in middle school: I dated this dude who I knew I didn't want to be with after dating him for a week. I ended up brute forcing myself into staying in that relationship for 3 months because I was ashamed of short-term relationships and I pitied him.
I am no longer in a place where I am ashamed of short term relationships and I am no longer the person who is willing to stay in a relationship that's not working for me out of pity for the other person (that's a disservice to both parties).
I was also thinking about a quote that I constantly repeat to others: "The opposite of scarcity isn't abundance, it's enough."
I noticed that one of the motivating factors for me to stay in that relationship was because I was operating under this idea that the pool of people that I would match with was "scarce." And I'm trying really hard to operate under this idea that I don't need coerce myself into keeping things or staying in certain situations because what I have right now is enough.
Interestingly, an Instagram I follow called "polyamorouswhileasian" had a segment about breakups in polyamory soon after my own break up. One of the great nuggets I got from their segment was, "Sometimes you have to say "no" to situations so that you can say "yes" to yourself." Another quote I got that was very relevant to my own situation was, "If someone is not right for you, you feel it and it grows in intensity... don't doubt your intuition."
I ended up learning a lot about myself through this relationship and I'm very lucky to have surrounded myself with a good support system. I learned that I need to be with someone who is engaged with the world and more sensitive about certain topics (especially topics involving racism). I think I also need to be with someone who is relatively more self aware.
I reached out to the people who I knew would say the things I needed to hear, and I reached out to people who I knew would listen. My husband has been very supportive of me throughout my relationship with my girlfriend, but it was also nice to see how he supported me through my breakup as well.
One of friends pointed out to me, "You know you're allowed to break up with people right?" And I realized that I never really thought of that option before because of how my parents have modeled relationships for me. (I feel like my mom is forcing herself to stay in a relationship with my dad due to divorce being highly frowned upon in her practice of Catholicism) Thankfully, I have healthier relationships to model my own after, but that reassurance really caught me off guard.
Anyway, I might talk about this more in the future, but I thought I'd share some of my thoughts because breakups are still a thing in polyamory and navigating through it is new territory.
I met my girlfriend's boyfriend today and he's actually a lot nicer than I initially thought he was.
Katia's relationship with her boyfriend (Luke) is very different than my relationship with my husband. So sometimes she'll tell me something that I might misunderstand (because my own experiences filter how I might read a situation), but then I have to remember, "To each their own."
Anyway, Luke is actually pretty accommodating and sometimes I have to remember that they have a very big d/s dynamic with each other because sometimes he'll do/say something controlling that I'll get up in arms about, only to realize that he's doing it because he knows it turns our girlfriend on.
On a side note, Luke and I have both been busy with school so Katia has been more clingy than usual to the point where Luke was asking, "WHEN IS YOUR NEXT DATE WITH <polymousecoco>?!" lol
Apparently, before we had met, he thought he saw me around campus and wanted to say hi, but he thought it would be weird. His first thought when seeing me in person was that I was a lot smaller than he thought I'd be. Katia used that as a segue to say, "It's because you have such a big personality!"
My girlfriend and I were talking about having our partners meet each other on a date.
Me: Oh, a double date! How fun!
Girlfriend: Wait, wouldn’t it technically be a triple date because there are three couples going on one date? (You + your husband, me + my boyfriend, and you + me? )
Friend: No! It’s a single date with two third wheels! It’s a double trike date! You and your girlfriend are on a date and your husband and your girlfriend’s boyfriend are just tagging along!
Today, I went on my second in person date with Katia and it was nothing short of *AMAZING*!!!
The plan was for me to go to her house, watch anime, cook together, eat dinner, and essentially just chill together. I think in my head, I knew there was a possibility that we might get intimate with each other, but I didn’t know how that would play out, so I kept my expectations low and was happy if we just kissed and cuddled.
So I go over to her house, we watch anime, cook together and have dinner as planned, but afterward, she asks if I’d like to on a walk after we’ve finished eating dinner. Of course, I love walking after eating dinner (that’s part of my daily routine), so we go out and have a lovely walk with her dog out in the fields.
Prior to going on this walk, I checked the forecast to see if there was a chance of rain and there was a 60% chance that it would rain, so we brought one umbrella with us. Sure enough, as we are walking back to her house, it starts to rain, A LOT. At first Katia felt bad that it had started to rain so much, but then it actually gave us a really good excuse to walk very close together under her small umbrella. I put my hand around her waist and held her close while holding the umbrella for both of us. She put her hand around my waist while holding her dog’s leash. It was actually quite romantic and at one point we just looked at each other and started to kiss. (Kisses with her are so magical ✨)
We got back to her house and we were absolutely drenched - we definitely needed to take our clothes off to let them dry. I had some spare clothes with me (because I came directly from work and changed into some cute date clothes), but I left my pants in my car. Katia was kind enough to offer some of her own clothes that I could change into, but I told her, “If you don’t mind me walking around your house with no pants, then there’s no need for me to get your clean clothes all dirty.” She immediately told me, “I don’t mind at all!”
And I think that was the perfect segue into just cuddling with each other half naked on her couch… which lead to some making out… which lead to some “fun.”
Let’s just say, I had my first intimate experience with a woman on this date and WOW, DUDE. W-wwo-women… are just seriously wow.
Fast forward to me being absolutely exhausted on her bed and us quietly cuddling together. We chatted a little bit about what we just did and she asked me, “Does this mean your my girlfriend now?”
It was kind of funny because it didn’t occur to me that I just had sex with someone who I was not in a relationship with until she asked that question out loud. (I’ve only ever had sex with my husband and even then, we were in a relationship for a month before getting that intimate together).
Her question was really cute and sweet and I didn’t know if we were going too fast or slow (we’ve been talking on a regular basis since April), but it just felt right. So I went along and replied, “If that’s alright with you, would you like to be my girlfriend?”
She ecstatically replied, “Yes!” and so we just enjoyed cuddling each other for a bit after that. Afterward, we went to her kitchen and she brewed a pot of tea and pulled out a board game called Splendor. Katia is quite competitive, but she told me she’d go easy on me the first round. I had never played it before, but she explained things well enough that I actually ended up beating her at the game… twice. lol
And then we looked at the time and decided that we only had time to watch one full episode of some anime. We cuddled and everything just felt really soft and nice.
We kissed each other goodbye and when I got back to my car, I opened my phone to text my husband that I was on my way back home. He told me that he’d probably be in bed by the time that I came back home, but he hoped my date went well. I told him, “I have a girlfriend now!”
