TomVaMan

1. People should be more accepting of non monogamous relationships and respect them as actual relationships.

2. Polyamory is valid and not just people “experimenting” or being “unfaithful”

3. Open relationships can work if both parties are honest and continue to communicate at all times

You should feel loved by both partners.

This seems like common knowledge, but the difference is hearing the words and truly understanding them.

When I was in my poly relationship, in the beginning it felt as though that were the case. Both cared about me equally, or at least it felt that way. The two of them had been together already for a long time, so their bond with eachother was stronger than either of their bonds with me, that was to be expected, until it became apparent that both of them had two different goals.

One truly cared about me. They loved me and supported me and wanted to learn my interest so they could in turn learn more about me. We had been friends before, so now it just made our friendship stronger.

The other one would say they would care, but ultimately, they really just wanted me there for the physical part of it. They almost obsessed over an ideal poly relationship. Having a certain way they wanted it to go, we all agreed it should be equal, but I didn't live with the two of them, so it wasnt going to be equal.

When I would visit it was a constant battle between giving each of them what they wanted, and they even argued among themselves and fought over me due to me not being around as much. It was stressful to try and please two totally different ideals of my role in the poly relationship.

If you ever feel like that. Get out. It took me so long to see that yes, nothing is wrong with poly, but if everyone cant work together and agree on being equal it wont work. One saw me as an equal, the other saw me simply as a tool to fill her sexual fantasies.