News 24 Nigeria
I met him at a party.
One of the very first things I found out about him was that he was polyamorous (a great thing about people in the poly community is that they’re very forthcoming about their way of life) and the next few hours were spent talking about everything from Nina Simone to Star Wars.
Then we kissed and it felt right. Like something just clicked. Even though I knew that he wasn’t monogamous, that he probably had another girlfriend or two (in fact, he had a wife, but more on that later) and that this was just going to be some fun with someone I thought was cool, I was hooked.
And, before I knew it, we were in love.
A month after we first met, I met his wife and her girlfriend. It was perhaps a bit odd at first, but we became good friends very quickly.
Then we became a family, the four of us, and it worked quite well. There was a lot of support and love in our little group and we did what we could for each other when we had the means.
But, unfortunately, sometimes love is not enough and my relationship with my partner dissolved after 14 months together. It was sad to end it, but it was best for both of us.
And, although I probably won’t become involved in another polyamorous relationship because I’ve realised that I prefer monogamy, I still think polyamoury is beautiful and rather misunderstood.
So, since my polyamorous relationship didn’t work, I went in search of someone whose relationships did.
Meet Anie*, a 35-year-old NGO adminstrator from South Africa who lives with her husband, Jeffery*, her partner Stuart* and his wife, Betty*.
Anie says that while she has never personally been comfortable with being monogamous, she does “…have a deep aversion to cheating. So, in my late teens when I began to date, I was monogamous. I soon discovered that I never fall out of love, love just changes.”
She tried an open relationship when she was about 20, but it didn’t work out because her partner at the time was uncomfortable. “Swinging and sex without love and emotions never appealed to me,” says Anie.
Luckily, she found a more understanding partner in her husband, Jeffrey, who she’s been with for 15 years and married to for 13. “When Jeffery and I started dating, we were already best friends and had discussed the way, even when totally in love with my partner, I was still attracted to (physically, emotionally and mentally) other people and saw nothing wrong with what was natural for me.
He and I spoke about it and decided to take things slowly, first with me (and him, if he chose to) flirting with others, then kissing. When we got married we vowed to be honest and ethical with each other, but never ‘forsaking all others’.”
But how did they know that what they were looking for was a polyamorous relationship? Anie says that while they were still looking for a non-monogamous option that would be comfortable for both of them, they stumbled upon many options that focused heavily on sex without intimacy or attachment, but what they both wanted was an option that provided them with even more love and intimacy similar to what they already had with each other.
“This is not to say that we didn’t love each other enough, we just see love for partners in the same way as love for children. The more children a parent has, the more love they can give. Same thing for romantic partners. The more love you give the more you have. There is no such thing as too much love.”
The answer came to them not long after they were first married. A new friend described a previous relationship where he was involved with both a man and women at the same time and called it polyamoury. “It was a light-bulb moment. That night we spent hours on Google looking at all the information. The more we read, the more it resonated with us,” says Anie.
One of the biggest concerns when choosing this lifestyle is telling your friends and family. Should you tell them? When should you do it? And how? How will they react?
Anie’s parents were not happy with their lifestyle choice when she and her husband came out to them. They thought it would be dangerous for their marriage and Anie’s mother said she would give it 10 years, while her father refused to talk about it at all.
But things started to change in 2015. “About a year ago my family started to ask questions. Supportive questions, as they had seen how happy we were with our extended link of partners. This was just over ten years after we told them about it. They began to worry less about us, not just our relationship, but our general well-being as individuals. They began to be grateful for the support we got from our partners. They have accepted my partners as part of my family, if not of theirs yet.
“Although while I have been dating my one partner now for over 3 years, they don’t want confirmation that we are together, they prefer not to have definitive proof. It’s still a bit uncomfortable sometimes, but mostly they are used to it by now.”
“My father has even defended polyamoury when it was wrongly referred to as ‘ethical cheating’ in the media. He got very upset because it is not in any way cheating. Cheating implies a lack of honesty and ethics. It’s like calling an open book exam cheating. It’s simply not the same thing,” says Anie.
Anie is openly polyamorous with her family and friends, but has to be careful of who else she reveals her private life to. “Most people are supportive because they see how happy we are. I can’t be completely public because one of my partners can’t be open with his family without there being major repercussions.” …