Dear Elizabeth,
We are a generally happily married couple in our late fifties. We follow the news and consider ourselves conventional if open-minded people, but we keep reading about polyamory, even in the New York Times.
Are we missing something here? Is this an option other people actually do successfully, or is it just another way to slow walk toward heartbreak and divorce?
(Possibly) Polly
Dear Polly,
Polyamory has indeed been having a lot of exposure recently in mainstream media. It’s made the cover of New York Magazine, been discussed repeatedly in the New York Times, and even the Wall Street Journal wrote about polyamory and its related scheduling challenges.
Not surprisingly, I’ve been getting a lot more questions about polyamory from my readers and coaching clients alike. I’ll share a bit about what poly is and isn’t, along with some advice for the curious couple.
Polyamory comes from a hybrid of Greek and Latin word roots, poly meaning multiple and amor referring to love. Polyamory simply means having multiple loving relationships simultaneously, with full consent of the people involved.
While the idea of polyamory is new to many people, odds are good you already know someone who has tried it. According to the Kinsey Institute, one in nine Americans has been in a polyamorous relationship. That same study found that one in five respondents had been involved in a non-monogamous relationship situation more broadly, which could have included swinging or an open relationship.
It’s a myth that people pursue polyamory as a highway to a free endless sex buffet. It’s also a myth that polyamorous people are incapable of commitment or unhappy in their relationships. While there may be some polyamorous people who are commitment phobic, 76.9% had poly relationships that lasted over a year, and the vast majority were happy with their relationship choices, with only a 17.5% dissatisfaction rate.
If it makes people happy, why don’t more people do it? Several reasons. Most importantly, it’s not for everyone, just like heterosexuality isn’t for everyone. There are people wired for poly, and others who are poly capable and willing to work through it to keep their partners happy. Additionally, poly is a tremendous amount of work. Aside from the scheduling headaches, managing multiple partners’ needs and feelings requires a tremendous amount of emotional labor and communicative competence. As one person in my dissertation research explained: having two partners isn’t just double the work, it’s work squared, but it’s also rewards squared.
While monogamy has a rich cross-cultural history, we aren’t completely certain when it started to become the norm. Looking at our closest relatives, there are numerous primates that practice monogamous pair bonding, but others that have group sexual practices (I’m looking at you, bonobos). We don’t have enough fossil records to know with absolute certainty what mating practices looked like in the paleolithic. That would require large numbers of family groups to all die together so we could analyze how they were related.
Life for early hominins was often very brief, and menstruation started much later than it does now, so even a life-long mating partnership would have been a fraction of the duration it is today. For some early humans, monogamy could have been a safe way to prevent infanticide by competing males or to ensure fathers participated in parenting.
To answer your other question, I’ll share tips I often share with couples who are seeking guidance on exploring polyamory together. People assume they just go out and start dating, but that’s unfair to each other and the people you are approaching. There are two preliminary steps to take. First, do some reading, starting with Polysecure by Jessica Fern. It will help you understand your attachment styles and how to manage the feelings involved with making the transition to multiple partners.
Second, spend some time acclimating to the idea of being apart while you engage in independent activities. When’s the last time you were home alone while your partner was out with friends? Couples are often so dependent on each other for entertainment that they rarely function as discrete units. My homework assignment for couples: each of you spend one night a week out with a friend, or out solo, while the other partner is at home alone. It can’t be the same night, or you won’t have the experience of being home without them. Don’t date yet, just get used to the idea of having your own life outside of the partnership. Have discussions about how it feels, and have proactive conversations about how many details you’d want to know about each other’s activities.
Only once this type of activity becomes boring and uneventful are you ready to involve others in your love life.
E.R.B.
Elizabeth R. Busbee earned a doctorate at Yale and specializes in issues of gender, sexuality, and communication. She has been helping people explore and enjoy intimacy for over 20 years. Her private relationship and intimacy coaching practice can be reached at alternativeintimacy.com
Have a question you’d like answered? Write to Elizabeth at UnconventionalLoveCoach@gmail.com