#texaspumpkinpatch

It was kind of a slow process at first...I became more aware of polyamory as an actual thing (rather than a vague, nebulous idea that I'd only heard about in passing) mostly, amusingly enough, through fandom. I'd never really heard of OT3's before, or the concept of that kind of relationship, until I started reading Legend of the Seeker fic that solved the problem of who Kahlan should end up with by just making her end up with both Richard and Cara. It's a little silly, I suppose, but reading (and then writing) about that relationship opened my eyes and mind that little bit further.

Now, I've been so incredibly lucky to have the relationship I do with my wife, but that's not to say we're without problems. One of our biggest ones has been our disparate sex drives--my depression/anxiety/autism has made sex a kind of complicated thing for me, the desire to have it in particular, whereas my wife's libido could usually rival that of the most hormonal teenage boy. It got to a point a while back where I would freeze up if my wife just casually flirted with me, or made the most mild of advances or innuendos.

As an interesting aside, it turns out that irregular sex can be hell on your hormones and consequently your emotions--it's healthiest to either have regular sex or no sex at all, and no sex at all wasn't really an option. My wife's desire for sex isn't entirely a physical one--she craves the intimacy and connection, and it was hell on her emotional state to not be getting that on a regular basis. 

We ended up having to schedule a weekly "date night", so I could prepare myself mentally for sex and not get caught off-guard and freeze up over it. This helped a little (and we still have our weekly date night), but a lot of the time it felt like it was more of a chore or a duty somehow, and if something happened on the day of date night--one of us had a migraine, or I had a really bad day and was stressed out, or our uteruses cockblocked us--then it ended up making us both feel crappy. She would be grumpy because she was essentially "promised" sex and didn't get it, and I would feel guilty because I couldn't fulfill that need and also because guilt is just what I do. 

At this point I always feel like I have to make it very clear, though: she never pressured me about sex. She always understood, held me while I cried out my anxiety about it, never guilt-tripped me over not meeting her needs. Still, she's human, and she couldn't help it affecting her mood. 

One night, while we were lying in bed, I commented that it was too bad she was so hung up on monogamy, because I wouldn't have a problem at all with her sleeping with other people. It was kind of just a casual one-off comment, when we were both a little drunk, and I wasn't really seriously suggesting anything at the time. I pretty much forgot about it until a couple of weeks later, when she brought it up again. That was the first time we talked about polyamory as a viable option.

That was about a year and a half ago. We started out the way I think a lot of couples do--"I'm okay with you sleeping with other people, but I don't want you to fall in love", and that sort of thing, and it was only her that was looking because that was the whole point of trying it out--to find her another sexual outlet. She met a woman on OkCupid, who was married to a man but wanting to explore things with women, and they hit it off right away. 

Once it started happening, I realized that I wasn't actually all that afraid of her developing feelings for someone else. This is mostly due to the fact that her and I talk about everything, and are very vocal and demonstrative of our love and affection for one another--I never doubted that she wanted to be with me first and foremost, and I sort of realized that it would be dumb to be afraid of her finding someone else and leaving me, because we're one of those rare couples who really, truly just know we're in it for the long haul. It's a big deal for me, because of life-long abandonment issues, but it's been surprisingly easy to feel that certainty with her. 

So she and the girlfriend got closer emotionally, and my wife fell head over heels (and it was the most adorable thing I've ever seen in my life, fyi). Unfortunately though, it didn't work out, and they broke up. 

Then the saga of the Hot Friend began, lol. I posted a bit about it last year when it was happening, but basically what happened is this: one of the wife's friends got out of the military and was staying with us a few days a week while she looked for a place to live. The friend is one of those massively flirty dykes, and I...don't get flirted with. Like, ever.

I developed a huge crush on her, and even got some small indications that there might actually be attraction on her end, too...so I broached the topic with my wife, asked her how she would feel about me dating other people. She was a little more hesitant about it, but ultimately okay with the idea. 

Funny enough, actually, she was sporting her own crush on Hot Friend. It was sort of a strange, giddy time for us, because we both have dangerously vivid imaginations, and ended up fantasizing about how awesome it would be if we just ended up in a triad. Think about how your imagination gets carried away when you have a crush on someone, and then imagine having someone to bounce those fantasies off of and feed into them. It was like high school times a billion, lol. 

The wife is less patient than me (and, well, I was enjoying the flirting and the "what if?"-ness of it, and didn't feel the need to hurry anything), and finally ended up writing to Hot Friend on Facebook and coming clean about the fact that we were both interested in her. Sadly, her response was simply that she doesn't like to share her women, but we're still all really good friends so it wasn't as terrible as it could have been. 

After that, though, we were both left with the newfound knowledge that we really are both fine if the other pursues relationships with other people. 

She has a girlfriend right now, whom she loves and doesn't get to see nearly as often as she'd like. For a while she had a long-term male FWB, who ended up getting too obnoxious personality-wise and she broke it off with, and there were a couple of guys that she slept with on a less-regular basis. I've yet to actually branch out very far; I've had some fun with the wife and a couple of her boytoys (not at the same time, sadly :P), and went on that one disastrous date that landed me with an almost-stalker for a little while, but for the most part it's only been her seeking out other people--mostly because I find the whole dating/meeting people thing very stressful.

As much as I would love to meet other people, mostly because I'm a total NRE junkie, I just don't have the social skills required to navigate the dating scene--especially since looking for potential relationships gets a lot more complicated when you're already married (and there's a real stigma about poly people that still sticks with a lot of people). So I'm mostly just keeping the option open for myself; if anything happens, awesome, and if not, I'm not too disappointed because I'm not overly invested in the idea of finding someone (Although it is my dream to find myself a fandom girlfriend, because my wife just cannot get into things as much as I do :P).

Ultimately, the wife and I would love to end up in a triad with another woman (at the very least)...it would solve a lot of minor things, like when I need alone time but she wants to cuddle, or when she wants to go out and do things and be social but I just want to stay home...just little stuff like that. We've both enjoyed sex with guys, but there's zero romantic interest for either of us. They're more like fun, interactive sex toys, as callous and objectifying as that is :P