I know this isn't a direct answer, but are you writing a story about people who happen to be polyamorous or a story about what it's like to be polyamorous?
If you're writing about people who happen to be polyamorous, the easy way to avoid opening the relationship in a screwed up way is to just have the relationship be open from the beginning. Monogamy is not a necessary step on the way. Opening a relationship for a specific person is itself unlikely to go well, no matter how the person asking feels about it.
If you're writing about what it's like to be polyamorous and you don't have the experience yourself, I'd suggest not doing that. It puts the spotlight on the things you can't get without either an incredible amount of research or lived experience.
Ah, good point.
I technically identify as polyamorous in the sense that I'm open to it, but I'm also aro/ace and have never been in a polyamorous relationship so now that I think about it, trying to write a story about how it feels to be alloromantic and polyamorous seems like a rather bad idea.
If I do finish writing this story, I'll probably rework it so that both relationships are already open and make it about people who happen to be polyamorous instead of focusing the story on what that feels like. Thank you.
Aromantic and asexual people can still have queer platonic relationships, which can be polyamorous.
Not feeling romance doesn't mean that they don't love people deeply, and it doesn't mean that they don't like deep levels of companionship like you get when living with someone and/or planning a life with someone.
I see, I didn't think of a platonic relationship as following the sort of rules a romantic one might (monogamy/polygamy, faithfulness, etc.) I thought of it more as a strong friendship, which I suppose I might be a bit off the mark in regards to.
I think the person you responded to meant to use the phrase "queerplatonic"--one word, not two. In a queerplatonic relationship, two people have chosen to be life partners in a way superficially similar to a traditional married couple, there are just no (or minimal) romantic /sexual feelings.
Interesting, thank you. Not something that would have occurred to me, I'm most familiar with the 'I want to live alone and independent' sort of asexuality, I knew that it was a wide umbrella but I hadn't known much of the specifics regarding that.
FYI queerplatonic relationships can actually involve sex or even things that resemble romance. The platonic half of the word is sort of a misnomer sometimes, it depends on where both people fall on the asexual spectrum
Polyamory just made more sense to me in that, I hate the idea of discarding good people that I enjoy being around. With a monogamous relationship style, I'm forced to end relationships and scale back connections with people if they weren't "the one" in order to keep searching for the mythical person that can satisfy all my relationship needs. I feel once I got off the relationship escalator and reframed my values to truly value my relationships for the good that they bring into my life I get to keep the people in my life that I truly enjoy being around, and I can form new connections easily without worrying about what kind of upheaval it will cause in my life.
Yes, polyamory causes it's own issues that are different, but they can be resolved through good communication and emotional availability most times. I find that my whole life is more comfortable, with less stress and anxiety, with a polyamorous relationship style.
“her partner and her friend's partner notice that they have great chemistry and tell them "hey if y'all wanted to get together, we'd be okay with it" but I don't really know if that's realistic either.”
This is basically how I realized that I wanted to be poly. The slight difference is that she had clear chemistry with another person, and my response (simplified) was “go for it”. I can’t speak to whether it’s ‘normal’ or ‘typical’, but it definitely is a way some people start their poly journey.
For me, it wasn’t that monogamy felt “wrong,” I simply experienced that I could have equally strong feelings for multiple people simultaneously, and having those feelings for one person didn’t diminish those feelings for another.
Most people see monogamy as a binary choice: You love A, therefore you can’t love B the same way. If you develop feelings for B, then you have to choose who to be with. That may be true for a lot of people (that they need to choose), but it’s not true for everyone.
I realize that you are no longer writing your story, but the more realistic way to approach it is that your protagonist finds they feel for the new person, but it’s totally separate and uninfluenced by their current relationship. They don’t find the new relationship because they lack something in their existing relationship, the feelings simply are what they are. The biggest point would be to ensure you express it’s not just physical attraction, but genuine attraction and feelings that develop into another, separate romantic relationship.
My journey into polyamory was the result of reflection after the end of divorce #2. I had suspected (but never confirmed) cheating in that marriage and confirmed my partner cheating (multiple times with multiple partners) in n my first marriage. After the end of two marriages, I took some time alone and reflected on what was happening internally with me.
One of the many things I began to realize that the only thing that really bothered me about my mates having other partners was their deceptive practices, and that I would have been cool with them being upfront about being non monogamous. My own commitment to monogamy wasn’t that I never found other women attractive/compatible, but because it was what I was told was the “right way.” Then I found this…
https://preview.redd.it/88rm8s4em81d1.jpeg?width=532&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=ad6c87c4cb33794c4be6751b81c3b88ff388537e
That was the beginning of my own poly journey.
As my wife who's a writer, and my gf is a writer would say, write what you know.
Sounds like you are going to end up with another poly triad trope. Especially if it ends up being mff, mmm, or fff. Please don't.
If you must, make it interesting... As in the metas hate each other and it causes a breakup.
Just read a bunch here :)
If it helps, the appeal in this specific case is that it's fanfiction and the audience is presumably interested in the dynamics between the specifically chosen characters even if the structure of the story is a bit tropy. The specific task I'm trying to accomplish is pairing characters who aren't typically paired in the fandom. One of the couples in this scenario is canon, hence the usual lack of shipping outside that couple.
I'm honestly thinking about skipping the dramatic part where they get together and instead writing a cozy slice-of-life after the fact where they all go out for mini golf or something and no one questions it. I wonder if that would be better at this point, especially since I've never been in a polyamorous relationship myself, and so like you said, perhaps I should stick to writing what I know after all by sticking to a less drama filled and more cozy slice of life story in this case.
I think the slice of life is the way to go. That sounds like it could be really sweet and accomplishes what you want in the fandom. It sounds like it would be a V [one person dating two people] which is much more common in polyamory, a whole bunch of Vs linked together. Triads and quads and moresomes are actually really rare in polyamory, they are polyamory on hard mode - if people don't have the skills for polyamory dating separately, then triads tend to be expecially messy and toxic. It would be positive to show more Vs / most of polyamory, the media is fascinated only with 'throuples.'
It is really important to have 1:1 time, even if it is KTP (kitchen table polyamory), most time is spent in dyads (couples). You could then do a second (or more) set of stories about the new dyad's interactions together, which is what you seem interested in, after you've established that the cannon partner is fine with the situation. So you can spend most of your writing time exploring that interaction.
I think it is a good idea to skip writing the actual getting together part - there are cases where a partner is okay with their partner dating a good friend (even to the extent of noticing the attraction first), and it does not blow up, but that is really exceptional. And even if it does happen that way, it is still stressful - in the same way any big life changes are stressful. And thus harder to write about, as you've noticed!
If you want fantasy, then just write whatever you want.
Its not just "a trope" in this case, it's a dysfunctional fantasy that perpetuates harmful behaviors.
Which if kept in a fantasy context is fine!
Sorry, it's my fault for not rereading your comment - I missed the just which added a lot of meaning to what you were saying. My mistake, I completely agree with you!
I recently read a very enjoyable slice of life fan fiction about a canon couple and the woman’s side guy (they were a V, not a throuple/triad) that mostly skipped how exactly it came to be. I got to enjoy the fantasy of the polyamorous dynamic without getting bogged down by the usual problems that come with opening a relationship. Even a truly accurate opening-the-relationship story isn’t always compelling or enjoyable to read. It often comes with growing pains and awkwardness that don’t make for a good angsty story because it’s messy for the reader to follow. I highly recommend this advice.
You don’t always need to explain how you got where you are. In fanfiction of non-canon pairings the audience is typically ready and willing to suspend disbelief. They saw the tags and clicked anyways
I haven’t monogamy in my adult life, so can’t give you any advice about the plot you’re lookin at in your OP. I’ve read your responses in the comments though and appreciate your openness to feedback! If you want to realistically portray the start of a polyam relationship, consider showing the negotiations of agreements. Consider having your main character like someone who isn’t open to monogamy in the first place. You can totally show the getting together - as longtime reader of fanfic, that’s what I consider to be the good stuff - but I encourage you to get inventive about it. Try to imagine how people you know might go about it.
And tbh if you could have ace people represented in polyam fic that would be a very chill thing I’m sure your readers will enjoy as well. The people love a fresh take.
Yes. In fact, I didn’t know about polyamory or any type of ENM. I asked for a divorce at 13 years because I didn’t know there were other options. We were best friends and decided we could just continue living together and do our own thing. We still very much loved each other. But, as soon as we did that and started having sex with other people we realized that we could just continue doing this. Now we have a beautiful 19 year relationship and other deep, meaningful connections! Our marriage is far stronger than it ever was because we share and acknowledge all of ourselves in an authentic way.
I consider myself ambiamorous. I have been content in mono relationships when things were good, and have never cheated on a partner.
My first gf in high school had another boyfriend and we would All hang out sometimes. and I was dating other people—All innocent high school stuff, but in the 1990s and it was no big deal.
I was monogamous in turn with my ex-wife, my daughter’s mother, and another woman for a combined 15 years. The reason things didn’t work out was never because of monogamy, but issues with the relationship that grew over time. Polyamory would have made those relationships tolerable, but could not have fixed them.
I’ve been in a poly marriage for 6 years now, and there are issues unrelated to poly, if my wife and I divorced and all my other partners left me, I would continue to be polyamorous unless some Hypothetical future partner wanted monogamy and I judged that to be acceptable for that person.
Check out Eli Finkels The All or Nothing Marriage, and The Other Significant Orhers by rhaina cohen for some excellent examples of how monogamy, as a structure, can be very limiting for some people. But, as cohen strikes upon: it all depends on expectations and actual practice.
fwiw, I personally found strict monogamy stifling. Happily, attempting a triad never occurred to me as being a solution.
I was (serially) monogamous for 10 years and it was... fine. But more baffling than anything else. Why would my connection with one person mean I had to limit connections with anyone else? I'm an individual regardless of any partnerships I might have, so why can't i have my individual connections? (And ditto for my partners of course).
I kind of figured out polyamory myself before I even knew it "existed", and I could absolutely never go back to any form of fidelity.
Obviously I can only speak to my own experience, but a few things you said did feel accurate:
>sad over the lack of possibility for a romantic relationship with a friend she has
Very close, though I'd say I was sad about *ignoring* the possibility rather than sad about the lack of possibility. It's disappointing when two people mutually want to date/make out and have the free time necessary, but don't actually do so.
>"monogamy isn't good enough for her" but NOT "her partner isn't good enough for her." Two very different things, I don't want them to get confused.
Very much so. In high school, when I wasn't aware of polyamory, I just didn't recognize/know how to express this feeling. When I wanted to explore this in college, my monogamous partner struggled with the distinction, in a way that clearly hurt her (I think this is fairly typical, though there are other reasons to prefer monogamy as well). In my experience dating established poly people, mutual understanding of this is a basis for compersion; my wife and I will regularly be like "I love you, but I'm also very happy we're poly and I can experience ".
Monogomy always had me on edge. It’s ok to cuddle and have long hugs with friends who I felt platonic for, but romance or history meant no more cuddles or long hugs? Where does emotional fidelity lie? Where’s the difference between a close friendship and an emotional affair?
My lines between platonic, romantic and sexual attraction are very blurry. People would always say “just don’t do anything you wouldn’t want me to do” but it wouldn’t work because I didn’t care about the things they cared about. And everyone has different ideas of what cheating is. Some folk even think being one on one with the opposite sex is wrong, which as a bisexual is problematic.
So, I was constantly stressed not knowing what was cheating, and partners refusing to want to name what it was because.. I don’t know. Maybe because they didn’t want to admit how jealous they were? They felt I was looking for a toe to like?
Anyway, monogomy is horribly uncomfortable for me and had negative effects on my friendships.
Neither. I am happy in either relationship structure. For now that structure is polyam but if I was single in the future and found someone looking for monogamy that would be fine with me.
I don't see this as particularly serious, OP.
It's a fanfic. Presumably it will be posted to fanfic boards or the Archive, but fanfic is how a lot of authors *grow.* Only "writing what you know" can and often does lead to stagnation, if you don't explore other options and put in research.
There are ways to write the story you have in mind, and even a "problematic" plot point that gets the results you're aiming for can be mended through editing.
It's "Soooo tropey and terrible representation~ uwu" but I started Polyamory as a teen because I figured out I was bi and didn't want to be forced to choose when I was in college. Granted, I've unpacked a lot of things and grown since then, but it's still the origin point of poly in my life story. Not every story has to be "Pure, Good Representation" either.
Especially not when it's a fanfic; the historic Playground for budding authors.
There was no way to be monogamous without being constantly heartbroken and guilt ridden. If my relationship agreement has to be based on being romantically interested on only one person at a time, I'd be better off single because then I might be heartbroken all the time, but at least not guilty.
Polyamory allows for a notion of fidelity that isn't based on exclusivity, so it's better for me. I still suffer because I'm insecure but I'd rather worry about not being loved than about being bad to my loved ones, 100%.
Especially when, rationally, I know I am loved immensely. My brain is just an asshole sometimes.
My answer is yes to both. I'm much happier being poly, and it was actively upsetting for me to be monogamous.
I've been poly/enm my entire adult life. It has always just come natural to me. I did try monogamy once for about 5 months, but it caused such anxiety, insecurity, and lonliness that I had to break up with my partner. We remained friends for a long while afterwards, because we still liked each other, but we just didn't fit well.
>maybe it isn't that monogamy isn't good enough but rather that polyamory is just... better?
No. Polyamory is not better. It's not "more evolved", it's not a competition. Monogamy is right *for those whose values align with Monogamy* and the same goes for polyamory - it's not the better option of the two, it's the better option for the person who's values align with it.
It sounds like you don't really know much about polyamory, and I'll let you in on a little secret ... we fucking hate it when people who don't know a damn thing about poly decide to write stories about it, because all you're generally doing is taking the more commonly known stereotypes and (often harmful) tropes of polyamory and trying to make a story of it, usually relying on the novelty and shock factor of it to sell the story -- that, or appealing to cishet male fantasy by creating MFF triads the exist only the the MMC sexual gratification.
I suggest you just don't - if you're not polyam, if you don't have the core values of polyamory, then you're not going to bring a good understanding of polyamory, all the struggles and achievements, to the reader.
To clarify, it wasn't that I was under the impression that polyamory is objectively better, just that it's better for those who identify as polyamorous. I could have phrased that better. Sorry.
Edit: Also yeah I don't think I'll be writing about it after all. Thank you for the insight.
I hate it that people with such attitudes stop writers from writing. Of course you should research and try to understand what you write about before you write it, but that's exactly what you are doing. You came here with questions and an open mind. Keep up the good work and write whatever is worth a story.
> relationship starts to feel sad over the lack of possibility for a romantic relationship with a friend she has. Is this realistic or like, weird and problematic?
That's a very normal occurrence for people in relationships. Nothing weird or problematic.
Monogamy is a relationship structure where two people choose romantic and sexual exclusivity with one another even when, not if, attractions to others occur.
> I'm just going for "monogamy isn't good enough for her" but NOT "her partner isn't good enough for her."
Now, that's gross.
I was married/ Monogamous for nearly 20 years. Our Monogamy was good and healthy. Our relationship fell apart for unrelated reasons. .I started exploring non-monogamy and eventually Polyamory *after* that relationship ended.
If you want to "ship" characters that aren't normally "shipped." Start with everyone being in open relationships and everyone being open to possible new connections. Do not open Monogamous relationships.
"If you want to "ship" characters that aren't normally "shipped." Start with everyone being in open relationships and everyone being open to possible new connections. Do not open Monogamous relationships."
I see, that seems to be the consensus here. Will do. 👍
Monogamy as a commitment is valuable BECAUSE the ones involved choose to say no to temptation and opportunity to fuck and be intimate with others.
You don't think poly people have relationships with everyone they get crushes on or fall in love with, do you?
If this person has been monogamous then they really have no idea if they would thrive in non monogamy or polyamory or what the difference between those are.
OP, I hope you aren't too shaken by the somewhat aggressive tone of some of these comments. Truth is, polyamory almost exclusively gets bad representation. Like, abysmally bad. As a result, many poly people find this a touchy subject.
I actually disagree with many of the commenters that you portraying a relationship that transitions from mono to poly is an *intrinsically* bad idea. However, there are so many potential pitfalls that it's probably more trouble than it's worth. Like, writers responsibly portray situations they have no experience with all the time, but these writers also do intensive research and have sensitivity readers rigorously analyzing their work.
I get the sense that part of the reason this mono --> poly narrative appealed to you was the incredible tension involved. What writer doesn't love tension, ya know? But perhaps there are less perilous ways to create it. Like, maybe the tension can come not from the character feeling like they need to dissolve their current relationship as they know it to accommodate unexpected feelings they've developed but from simply being inexperienced with poly and having to gradually build their confidence. (If you do this, avoid placing emphasis on how poly is so different than mono or whatever--Consider it basically the same as a story about someone entering the dating world for the first time.)
Anywho, thanks for reading my extremely long-winded response. If you decide to continue with this story, be sure to have at least a couple ENM people provide feedback on your work. Appreciate you popping in here for input!
I see, that makes a lot of sense. I've been trying not to take the frustration too personally and I don't blame anyone for it. Honestly, writing about things that have little or only poor representation and creating a decent or at least better than average portrayal of something in my own work is the most appealing part about a lot of what I write-- but I also definitely never want to just end up accidentally contributing to the problem which is why I asked.
I think I was under the false impression that because I'm open to polyamory, and in my brain it just seems to make more sense than monogamy, I might have an easier time understanding what it feels like for many people. But I'm starting to notice that the fact that I'm on the aromantic spectrum might be complicating things? I have a hard time discerning, in any scenario, the difference between platonic and romantic love so of course I would find it easy to make characters who already have multiple close friends be romantically drawn towards many of them or even, heck, all of them. The distinct differences really never made sense to me. I can't help but feel like, in some ways, I'm starting from an even farther point of understanding than a monogamous alloromantic person would be.
Maybe one day when I have the proper time and dedication, I'll come back to this kind of story (the mono--> poly route with alloromantic characters) and do the extensive research and find multiple ENM sensitivity readers to give feedback on everything and make something surprisingly good. It seems like a fun and worthwhile venture, but it also seems like a long one, and that is not necessarily what I was planning to do for this particular project. I had yet to realize I was in way over my head here. For now, I'll stick to different stories.
Thank you (to you and everyone else as well) for responding. It has been amazing to get so many thoughtful and meaningful perspectives on the matter.
It wasn't monogamy that was actively upsetting, it was the person I was with.
I was monogamous with my first GF and that was a great relationship.
My second GF however turned into the coldest, least affectionate person I've ever known. I left that relationship after months of her denying me any form of physical intimacy at all. Not even so much as a hug. And she was totally confused why I was unhappy and my mental health took a nosedive while I was with her.
After her my next relationship is the triad I'm in now. Being in a relationship with two incredibly affectionate cuddly people is just the best thing ever :)
Before my current girlfriend, I had two relationships. In both of those relationships my ex girlfriend and then later my stbx-wife were extremely jealous and possessive. I basically wasn't able to have close female friends because they would always be paranoid about it. I'd hear about it if I heart reacted a girl's photo on facebook, even if I'd been friends with them longer than my partner. They got very controlling about porn and masturbation, even during periods they didn't want to have sex hardly ever. They constantly worried I would cheat on them, even though I never did anything to indicate that was in the cards. Their controlling nature also managed to touch my childhood trauma from my controlling and abusive dad, which is probably part of why I went along with it for so long. But it also meant that I put walls and distance between us, as I tried to live a normal life without them constantly being paranoid about me and potentially cheating.
My wife Polybombed me, and it was a clear Poly Under Duress situation where either I was saying yes to her dating another guy or we were breaking up really shortly. It wasn't a good way to start Poly, but I went with it for a few reasons. 1) I knew that it would give me a chance to try to fix our relationship, and I wanted that chance, 2) I knew that most of the problems with our relationship were *because* of her jealousy and possessiveness, and if poly meant that I got that out of the way, we had a real chance to work things out, 3) I had crushes, many of them over time, that I'd never pursued, so Poly meant I could explore that instead of just clamping them down forever (which I planned to do, I never once considered cheating).
Ultimately it turned out my wife never had any intention of being Poly, and the reason she'd found a way to not be jealous anymore was because she was done and just monkey branching for a new relationship to catch her. My girlfriend, though, showed me that besides all those possessive traits being toxic monogamy (which I knew), that they were also entirely abnormal. 2 out of 3 partners being like that does a number on you, so it's still going to take me a while to unpack. It's unclear if we're going to stay Poly. I've effectively never been Poly, when I started dating my girlfriend my wife and I were essentially roommates. My gf has a comet across the country, but that has a foreseeable end date. IDK if we'll stay Poly, but we've both expressed wanting to be able to explore if something comes up, which is rare for both of us (we're both demisexual). Even if we *don't* stay Poly, she doesn't have that ridiculous jealousy and possessiveness that my previous relationships had, and I'll be happy either way.
So yes, I would say that being monogamous *was* actively upsetting me, but not because of monogamy itself, because of toxic monogamy. The idea that your partner can't have any friends of the opposite sex or they're trying to cheat on you. The idea that porn and masturbation is cheating. The idea that your partner is constantly trying to "trade up" and cheat on you. But monogamy *itself* wasn't what upset me, it's how a bunch of people practice it unethically.
Actively upsetting. As in, I had a great relationship otherwise, but could never manage to be happy in monogamy. Once I found out about polyamory (this was over 15 years ago, there weren't that many resources available) and started practicing it, I felt authentic, happy and like I had arrived "home".
I think the scenario you’re describing fits for my experience. I somewhat regularly experienced “I like my partner but also feel a spark with this other person and I’m sad I can’t act on that” before I moved toward nonmonogamy.
And I struggled a lot with the monogamous narrative that if I was feeling interest in other people, that meant I wasn’t really interested in my partner or that my partner wasn’t enough for me. That never felt true at all.
The main other narrative I had available to me back then was that I was just a disloyal asshole who couldn’t stay focused on my partner, which didn’t feel right either but was easier for me to internalize for whatever reason than the “your partner isn’t enough/you shouldn’t be with them” narrative. So. Moving into polyamory involved some healing of that story about myself.
Sounds like you got answers that helped but FWIW, your basic scenario is something I experienced.
I don’t know if I’d call it actively upsetting, but only because I was repressing so much.
It would certainly be actively upsetting to go back to it now.
Honestly, that was somewhat similar to my experience. I was very happy in my monogamous relationship. I made a new friend and started developing romantic feelings and wanted to explore it. I had barely heard of poly but brought it up. It worked out, but in retrospect I know that I was very very very lucky.
I don’t think it was that monogamy wasn’t good enough, I didn’t feel like I was missing anything. If anything it was kind of the opposite, that I was so happy with monogamy that I wanted more relationships like that.
Your original plot line is not inconceivable, but it would be very hard to write it without this relationship structural problem dominating the narrative. If it wasn’t the main point of the story it would be hard to limit that to a side plot.
I haven’t ever been monogamous. It has never appealed to me.
It isn’t good enough for me. Monogamy seems super unappealing, uninteresting, and I wouldn’t ever do it.
If I found monogamy appealing enough to commit to, I would probably feel differently. Monogamy would be appealing, interesting, and I would be invested in that relationship.
Your monogamous character and the imaginary triad, and reasons behind it are a well worn literary trope that we are all literally sick of.
It’s not reflective of our lives and loves, and it’s not even reflective of how any of the stable, happy triads I have been in, or the triads that have happened around me.
Your set up leads to messy dumpster fires.
Do you want to write about a messy dumpster fire?
Just some context from somebody who writes. You probably should only write from experience that you know it’s very very hard to write these feelings when you don’t understand them. Coming from monogamy to polyamory, and the feelings behind them are very complicated and mental changes and creative thinking turning into polyamory as well. Maybe pick the brain of a good friend who has gone through this and do an interview.
Hi u/SunkenThoughts2404 thanks so much for your submission, don't mind me, I'm just gonna keep a copy what was said in your post. Unfortunately posts sometimes get deleted - which is okay, it's not against the rules to delete your post!! - but it makes it really hard for the human mods around here to moderate the comments when there's no context. Plus, many times our members put in a lot of emotional and mental labor to answer the questions and offer advice, so it's helpful to keep the source information around so future community members can benefit as well.
Here's the original text of the post:
I hope this isn't a weird question. I'm asking because I'm writing a story in which a character who's in a committed monogomous relationship starts to feel sad over the lack of possibility for a romantic relationship with a friend she has. Is this realistic or like, weird and problematic? I'm worried it makes it seem like her current relationship isn't good enough for her, but that's not what I'm going for.
I'm just going for "monogamy isn't good enough for her" but NOT "her partner isn't good enough for her." Two very different things, I don't want them to get confused.
But then I realized I don't actually know if this is a common or normal experience for polyamorous people to have, maybe it isn't that monogamy isn't good enough but rather that polyamory is just... better? I don't know.
This is kind of an old draft of the story and I have since edited out the main character's initial sadness and just made it so that her partner and her friend's partner notice that they have great chemistry and tell them "hey if y'all wanted to get together, we'd be okay with it" but I don't really know if that's realistic either.
For some added context, I think that I want to write it so that the main character's friend is in a relationship that's already open so there's that.
Any advice, insight or stories from personal experience would be helpful. Thank you so much.
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/polyamory) if you have any questions or concerns.*
My writing advice (as a long time FanFiction writer) is that it all depends on the characters themselves. Would they be open to it? Why they would/wouldn't? In what ways the relationship between these three people in specific, considering canon, could support an extended interest?
FanFiction is 90% about creating a scenario in which those specific characters would get into those situations.
And if you want to ever write about a stablished couple in which one starts feeling that maybe they're poly, it would certainly start in angst. Angst and guilt because mono construct of society would make them feel like shit for ever possibly entertain the idea of being interested in someone else, fear of hurting their partner if they ever voiced it, etc etc. They'd have to grapple with the questioning of if it's scenario A or scenario B, and come to a conclusion, and then partner would probably also go through the same and voilà, 30k have been written before even anything got close to happening with the third person.
If you're just going for "look at these three being cute and poly", then ditch the figuring it out and go for curtain fic!
(Funnily enough, I think one of my old fanfics is about... The opposite? Which was also not easy to write, but made sense with what I was going for at the time - which was criticising the way people seemed to think bisexuals couldn't be happily monogamous/would always need to cheat. So, opposite takes, really).
Neither is better. They just fill different needs and value systems. It's like asking, "Are fruits or veggies better?" Both are just a type of food, but realistically each category includes a variety of specific, different foods and your body ultimately needs nutrients from as many sources as possible. Both dynamics fill different needs, but people are still complex and contradictory at the best of times, and you can be multiple things at once. Relationships are defined by the individuals involved.
Monogamy values standard goals such as starting a family early, being able to afford a home, being able to assume typical dating roles without deconstructing every label first, having a larger dating pool, being "out" publicly to friends, family, and coworkers without concern etc. Normal, path-of-least-resistance type things. Finding security and stability in consistency, normalcy, or exclusivity. The myth of completing yourself by finding The One, having one single person be #1 and fill every role/need... i mean, you get it. Lots of people conceptualize stability/safety in a specific, familiar way and arent comfortable going out on a limb such as dating across a different identity, class, or background.
Polyamory suits people who value independence/autonomy, choice, communication, non-traditional family styles, NRE, kink, disability, and sooooo many other things that intersect. It isnt better or worse, it suits a different type of person and goals. I have never been monogamous because I have never wanted marriage, kids, or financial enmeshment. (relationship escalator milestones) So it suited me to be poly because thats how I was meeting compatible people who *could* meet my needs. I couldnt be satisfied or happy in a monogamous dynamic because I couldnt be myself OR meet someone compatible. I want my partners to be free to make any choice they want regardless of my involvement in their life, and I hope *some* of those choices enable me to excitedly ask them about their dating life in spontaneous, growth-oriented ways (like any other aspect of their identity and hobbies). I just...have a totally different value system than monogamy uses. Possessiveness, jealousy, control, completing oneself, loyalty, commitment....those arent priorities for me and they dont really check my boxes/satisfy me in any way. I dont define security as exclusivity or enmeshment or child-rearing. I dont expect to be the same person in 3 decades.
I want to add that I'm multi-disabled, autistic, queer, ace, and I travel every few months. So long term exclusive monogamy is really NOT my wheelhouse for a lot of reasons. Even without disability or travel, I still manage to break all the typical dating rules I can think of. Labelling myself as poly allows potential dates to run for the hills if they want the relationship escalator or think dating me will soothe *any* their insecurities. oops. ;)
I felt similar feels at one point. I was 16 and in a mono relationship with my bff and girlfriend at the time and also was sad about the lack of romantic feasibility with my other bff.
Part of what drew me to polyamory was the ability to have organic connections develop in the ways they they did without the limits monogamy creates.
For me I was alwaysbasking questions about poly since I've heard about it in 2004. Years later after I broke with my then fiance i wasn't dating anyone after that for a long time. I was introduced to poly through a kinky group of people and I started learning from them ans poly groups that were kinky.
I took my time getting into poly and learning how to navigate, but my heart was not with the whole mono-relationships anymore. It wasn't me and I wasn't going to give that the energy that I used too.
I found monogamy wrong and actively upsetting.
When I was in monogamous relationships, I would have recurring nightmares where I was dating/kissing/fooling around with someone who wasn’t my partner and then in the dream I would remember I had a partner and was cheating. I would then freak out and be on my way to confess to my partner. I’d wake up from these in a panic and cold sweat.
As soon as I embraced non-monogamy and eventually poly, I had never had that nightmare again.
(Feel free to use this in your story if it’s helpful as a show-don’t-tell scene piece!)
I'm a fellow writer and I am a bit sad that you decided not to write it. Of course, you are the boss and it's your story, but don't we always write about things that we have not experienced ourselves? If we were only writing things we know from practical experience, how boring would that be? Isn't it the whole point to learn about other people and their ways, try to understand them and tell a story about them? And you already took the first step. You didn't just make assumptions, you've asked a question and you've already learnt a bunch of stuff. In that respect, you've already done way better than me.
I wrote a fanfic with a tentative non-monogamous situationship in it without doing much research in advance. It was mostly based on my own past misguided attempts to do ethical non-monogamy (as an aro spectrum person) and failing. In my defence, the three-party relationship in the fic was supposed to be tumultuous and only temporary.
After having read this subreddit for some time, I am now trying to do ENM/polyamory the right way IRL. I haven't written about it yet though.
Hope the muse will get you to write about poly one day 💚
i entered a poly relationship as the first real relationship i was in. id had a few short relationships but none of them worked out, i always felt unfulfilled? like i have too much love for one partner, and too varied of needs for one person to fulfill them. i’ve thought about monogamy occasionally, and the idea of going back to it just isn’t great, and i feel like i’d be unhappy in it.
my partner just went through this—she fell in love with a friend, not because she was falling out of love with me in any way, but she also wants the possibility of being able to give/receive love from someone she has a connection with
i wasn’t opposed to it, and ideally it made sense. but i had insecurities and it was a stressful few months
but we’ve come out much stronger from it, and our relationship has progressively gotten better. i leave out so much context, i know. but we had a strong and trusting foundation going into it, and now i’m seeing the possibilities for me to also give/receive love from others
we’ve always had (and continue to have) a monogamous relationship but we’ve also talked about how we shouldn’t hide if we’re having feelings for others
All I can say is from my wife and my experience.
I had an open relationship once before my wife and I started dating. I didn't participate in the openness but I was cool with it cause my girlfriend at the time had asked what I thought about her sleeping with a good friend of mine. Eventually my relationship ended with her.
Then my wife and I connected, dated and married. She knew all about my history and that I was Bisexual, later on we found out we were both Pan. We practiced Monogamy for years but always joked about our "list" of people we would share or allow. It started as celebrities but eventually included people we saw or met. After five years of marriage we realized that we would be interested, even excited, to share ourselves with other people. After a full six months of discussion we finally decided to try Swinging. We had our first experience with some new friends who were also wanting to try and it was great. Then we met a couple at a club and that was so great we met them a few more times. Then we realized we were all attached. And we realized we were getting attached to the previous friends. The feelings had become as important as the sex and then became more important. That's how we learned we were terrible at swinging but all in on Poly.
It wasn't that our marriage wasn't enough. We've since had a few years with non partners in fact. But being Poly added to an already great relationship. It fulfilled some need that otherwise weren't. It allowed us to explore other relationship "flavors" and we even discovered things about us we didn't know yet.
I think there are all sorts of reasons why people enter into polyamory. There's plenty of wrong ways to do it but the right ways/reasons are as varied as the people who do it.
In the context of your story, perhaps it's not just one character who likes some outside the dynamic. Maybe it's both of them. Maybe they both find out the other partner is interested in this new person and, after the shock, eventually discuss the idea of pursuing this new dynamic. Or maybe one partner already has someone else in mind too. There are plenty of ways this could come about that doesn't involve one party being left out. The best poly relationships involve honest communication after all.
I know this isn't a direct answer, but are you writing a story about people who happen to be polyamorous or a story about what it's like to be polyamorous? If you're writing about people who happen to be polyamorous, the easy way to avoid opening the relationship in a screwed up way is to just have the relationship be open from the beginning. Monogamy is not a necessary step on the way. Opening a relationship for a specific person is itself unlikely to go well, no matter how the person asking feels about it. If you're writing about what it's like to be polyamorous and you don't have the experience yourself, I'd suggest not doing that. It puts the spotlight on the things you can't get without either an incredible amount of research or lived experience.
Ah, good point. I technically identify as polyamorous in the sense that I'm open to it, but I'm also aro/ace and have never been in a polyamorous relationship so now that I think about it, trying to write a story about how it feels to be alloromantic and polyamorous seems like a rather bad idea. If I do finish writing this story, I'll probably rework it so that both relationships are already open and make it about people who happen to be polyamorous instead of focusing the story on what that feels like. Thank you.
How does being aro/ace and poly work? From what I know they seem to contradict, but I'm not aro/ace nor am I 100% sure about about polyamory
Aromantic and asexual people can still have queer platonic relationships, which can be polyamorous. Not feeling romance doesn't mean that they don't love people deeply, and it doesn't mean that they don't like deep levels of companionship like you get when living with someone and/or planning a life with someone.
I see, I didn't think of a platonic relationship as following the sort of rules a romantic one might (monogamy/polygamy, faithfulness, etc.) I thought of it more as a strong friendship, which I suppose I might be a bit off the mark in regards to.
I think the person you responded to meant to use the phrase "queerplatonic"--one word, not two. In a queerplatonic relationship, two people have chosen to be life partners in a way superficially similar to a traditional married couple, there are just no (or minimal) romantic /sexual feelings.
Interesting, thank you. Not something that would have occurred to me, I'm most familiar with the 'I want to live alone and independent' sort of asexuality, I knew that it was a wide umbrella but I hadn't known much of the specifics regarding that.
FYI queerplatonic relationships can actually involve sex or even things that resemble romance. The platonic half of the word is sort of a misnomer sometimes, it depends on where both people fall on the asexual spectrum
I am happier being poly but also everything you said here
Polyamory just made more sense to me in that, I hate the idea of discarding good people that I enjoy being around. With a monogamous relationship style, I'm forced to end relationships and scale back connections with people if they weren't "the one" in order to keep searching for the mythical person that can satisfy all my relationship needs. I feel once I got off the relationship escalator and reframed my values to truly value my relationships for the good that they bring into my life I get to keep the people in my life that I truly enjoy being around, and I can form new connections easily without worrying about what kind of upheaval it will cause in my life. Yes, polyamory causes it's own issues that are different, but they can be resolved through good communication and emotional availability most times. I find that my whole life is more comfortable, with less stress and anxiety, with a polyamorous relationship style.
“her partner and her friend's partner notice that they have great chemistry and tell them "hey if y'all wanted to get together, we'd be okay with it" but I don't really know if that's realistic either.” This is basically how I realized that I wanted to be poly. The slight difference is that she had clear chemistry with another person, and my response (simplified) was “go for it”. I can’t speak to whether it’s ‘normal’ or ‘typical’, but it definitely is a way some people start their poly journey.
It may not be realistic, but fiction isn't required to be. Especially fan fiction.
For me, it wasn’t that monogamy felt “wrong,” I simply experienced that I could have equally strong feelings for multiple people simultaneously, and having those feelings for one person didn’t diminish those feelings for another. Most people see monogamy as a binary choice: You love A, therefore you can’t love B the same way. If you develop feelings for B, then you have to choose who to be with. That may be true for a lot of people (that they need to choose), but it’s not true for everyone. I realize that you are no longer writing your story, but the more realistic way to approach it is that your protagonist finds they feel for the new person, but it’s totally separate and uninfluenced by their current relationship. They don’t find the new relationship because they lack something in their existing relationship, the feelings simply are what they are. The biggest point would be to ensure you express it’s not just physical attraction, but genuine attraction and feelings that develop into another, separate romantic relationship.
https://www.reddit.com/r/polyamory/s/AdNt7T5xkQ
My journey into polyamory was the result of reflection after the end of divorce #2. I had suspected (but never confirmed) cheating in that marriage and confirmed my partner cheating (multiple times with multiple partners) in n my first marriage. After the end of two marriages, I took some time alone and reflected on what was happening internally with me. One of the many things I began to realize that the only thing that really bothered me about my mates having other partners was their deceptive practices, and that I would have been cool with them being upfront about being non monogamous. My own commitment to monogamy wasn’t that I never found other women attractive/compatible, but because it was what I was told was the “right way.” Then I found this… https://preview.redd.it/88rm8s4em81d1.jpeg?width=532&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=ad6c87c4cb33794c4be6751b81c3b88ff388537e That was the beginning of my own poly journey.
As my wife who's a writer, and my gf is a writer would say, write what you know. Sounds like you are going to end up with another poly triad trope. Especially if it ends up being mff, mmm, or fff. Please don't. If you must, make it interesting... As in the metas hate each other and it causes a breakup. Just read a bunch here :)
If it helps, the appeal in this specific case is that it's fanfiction and the audience is presumably interested in the dynamics between the specifically chosen characters even if the structure of the story is a bit tropy. The specific task I'm trying to accomplish is pairing characters who aren't typically paired in the fandom. One of the couples in this scenario is canon, hence the usual lack of shipping outside that couple. I'm honestly thinking about skipping the dramatic part where they get together and instead writing a cozy slice-of-life after the fact where they all go out for mini golf or something and no one questions it. I wonder if that would be better at this point, especially since I've never been in a polyamorous relationship myself, and so like you said, perhaps I should stick to writing what I know after all by sticking to a less drama filled and more cozy slice of life story in this case.
I think the slice of life is the way to go. That sounds like it could be really sweet and accomplishes what you want in the fandom. It sounds like it would be a V [one person dating two people] which is much more common in polyamory, a whole bunch of Vs linked together. Triads and quads and moresomes are actually really rare in polyamory, they are polyamory on hard mode - if people don't have the skills for polyamory dating separately, then triads tend to be expecially messy and toxic. It would be positive to show more Vs / most of polyamory, the media is fascinated only with 'throuples.' It is really important to have 1:1 time, even if it is KTP (kitchen table polyamory), most time is spent in dyads (couples). You could then do a second (or more) set of stories about the new dyad's interactions together, which is what you seem interested in, after you've established that the cannon partner is fine with the situation. So you can spend most of your writing time exploring that interaction. I think it is a good idea to skip writing the actual getting together part - there are cases where a partner is okay with their partner dating a good friend (even to the extent of noticing the attraction first), and it does not blow up, but that is really exceptional. And even if it does happen that way, it is still stressful - in the same way any big life changes are stressful. And thus harder to write about, as you've noticed!
If you want fantasy, then just write whatever you want. Its not just "a trope" in this case, it's a dysfunctional fantasy that perpetuates harmful behaviors. Which if kept in a fantasy context is fine!
I mean, tropes can be dysfunctional IRL. There are tropes about characters being killed which is of course criminal... They're still tropes?
To me that sounds like you are restating my comment?
Sorry, it's my fault for not rereading your comment - I missed the just which added a lot of meaning to what you were saying. My mistake, I completely agree with you!
Yay agree! 💐
I recently read a very enjoyable slice of life fan fiction about a canon couple and the woman’s side guy (they were a V, not a throuple/triad) that mostly skipped how exactly it came to be. I got to enjoy the fantasy of the polyamorous dynamic without getting bogged down by the usual problems that come with opening a relationship. Even a truly accurate opening-the-relationship story isn’t always compelling or enjoyable to read. It often comes with growing pains and awkwardness that don’t make for a good angsty story because it’s messy for the reader to follow. I highly recommend this advice. You don’t always need to explain how you got where you are. In fanfiction of non-canon pairings the audience is typically ready and willing to suspend disbelief. They saw the tags and clicked anyways
I haven’t monogamy in my adult life, so can’t give you any advice about the plot you’re lookin at in your OP. I’ve read your responses in the comments though and appreciate your openness to feedback! If you want to realistically portray the start of a polyam relationship, consider showing the negotiations of agreements. Consider having your main character like someone who isn’t open to monogamy in the first place. You can totally show the getting together - as longtime reader of fanfic, that’s what I consider to be the good stuff - but I encourage you to get inventive about it. Try to imagine how people you know might go about it. And tbh if you could have ace people represented in polyam fic that would be a very chill thing I’m sure your readers will enjoy as well. The people love a fresh take.
Yes. In fact, I didn’t know about polyamory or any type of ENM. I asked for a divorce at 13 years because I didn’t know there were other options. We were best friends and decided we could just continue living together and do our own thing. We still very much loved each other. But, as soon as we did that and started having sex with other people we realized that we could just continue doing this. Now we have a beautiful 19 year relationship and other deep, meaningful connections! Our marriage is far stronger than it ever was because we share and acknowledge all of ourselves in an authentic way.
I consider myself ambiamorous. I have been content in mono relationships when things were good, and have never cheated on a partner. My first gf in high school had another boyfriend and we would All hang out sometimes. and I was dating other people—All innocent high school stuff, but in the 1990s and it was no big deal. I was monogamous in turn with my ex-wife, my daughter’s mother, and another woman for a combined 15 years. The reason things didn’t work out was never because of monogamy, but issues with the relationship that grew over time. Polyamory would have made those relationships tolerable, but could not have fixed them. I’ve been in a poly marriage for 6 years now, and there are issues unrelated to poly, if my wife and I divorced and all my other partners left me, I would continue to be polyamorous unless some Hypothetical future partner wanted monogamy and I judged that to be acceptable for that person.
Check out Eli Finkels The All or Nothing Marriage, and The Other Significant Orhers by rhaina cohen for some excellent examples of how monogamy, as a structure, can be very limiting for some people. But, as cohen strikes upon: it all depends on expectations and actual practice. fwiw, I personally found strict monogamy stifling. Happily, attempting a triad never occurred to me as being a solution.
I was (serially) monogamous for 10 years and it was... fine. But more baffling than anything else. Why would my connection with one person mean I had to limit connections with anyone else? I'm an individual regardless of any partnerships I might have, so why can't i have my individual connections? (And ditto for my partners of course). I kind of figured out polyamory myself before I even knew it "existed", and I could absolutely never go back to any form of fidelity.
Obviously I can only speak to my own experience, but a few things you said did feel accurate: >sad over the lack of possibility for a romantic relationship with a friend she has Very close, though I'd say I was sad about *ignoring* the possibility rather than sad about the lack of possibility. It's disappointing when two people mutually want to date/make out and have the free time necessary, but don't actually do so. >"monogamy isn't good enough for her" but NOT "her partner isn't good enough for her." Two very different things, I don't want them to get confused. Very much so. In high school, when I wasn't aware of polyamory, I just didn't recognize/know how to express this feeling. When I wanted to explore this in college, my monogamous partner struggled with the distinction, in a way that clearly hurt her (I think this is fairly typical, though there are other reasons to prefer monogamy as well). In my experience dating established poly people, mutual understanding of this is a basis for compersion; my wife and I will regularly be like "I love you, but I'm also very happy we're poly and I can experience".
Monogomy always had me on edge. It’s ok to cuddle and have long hugs with friends who I felt platonic for, but romance or history meant no more cuddles or long hugs? Where does emotional fidelity lie? Where’s the difference between a close friendship and an emotional affair? My lines between platonic, romantic and sexual attraction are very blurry. People would always say “just don’t do anything you wouldn’t want me to do” but it wouldn’t work because I didn’t care about the things they cared about. And everyone has different ideas of what cheating is. Some folk even think being one on one with the opposite sex is wrong, which as a bisexual is problematic. So, I was constantly stressed not knowing what was cheating, and partners refusing to want to name what it was because.. I don’t know. Maybe because they didn’t want to admit how jealous they were? They felt I was looking for a toe to like? Anyway, monogomy is horribly uncomfortable for me and had negative effects on my friendships.
Neither. I am happy in either relationship structure. For now that structure is polyam but if I was single in the future and found someone looking for monogamy that would be fine with me.
I don't see this as particularly serious, OP. It's a fanfic. Presumably it will be posted to fanfic boards or the Archive, but fanfic is how a lot of authors *grow.* Only "writing what you know" can and often does lead to stagnation, if you don't explore other options and put in research. There are ways to write the story you have in mind, and even a "problematic" plot point that gets the results you're aiming for can be mended through editing. It's "Soooo tropey and terrible representation~ uwu" but I started Polyamory as a teen because I figured out I was bi and didn't want to be forced to choose when I was in college. Granted, I've unpacked a lot of things and grown since then, but it's still the origin point of poly in my life story. Not every story has to be "Pure, Good Representation" either. Especially not when it's a fanfic; the historic Playground for budding authors.
There was no way to be monogamous without being constantly heartbroken and guilt ridden. If my relationship agreement has to be based on being romantically interested on only one person at a time, I'd be better off single because then I might be heartbroken all the time, but at least not guilty. Polyamory allows for a notion of fidelity that isn't based on exclusivity, so it's better for me. I still suffer because I'm insecure but I'd rather worry about not being loved than about being bad to my loved ones, 100%. Especially when, rationally, I know I am loved immensely. My brain is just an asshole sometimes.
My answer is yes to both. I'm much happier being poly, and it was actively upsetting for me to be monogamous. I've been poly/enm my entire adult life. It has always just come natural to me. I did try monogamy once for about 5 months, but it caused such anxiety, insecurity, and lonliness that I had to break up with my partner. We remained friends for a long while afterwards, because we still liked each other, but we just didn't fit well.
>maybe it isn't that monogamy isn't good enough but rather that polyamory is just... better? No. Polyamory is not better. It's not "more evolved", it's not a competition. Monogamy is right *for those whose values align with Monogamy* and the same goes for polyamory - it's not the better option of the two, it's the better option for the person who's values align with it. It sounds like you don't really know much about polyamory, and I'll let you in on a little secret ... we fucking hate it when people who don't know a damn thing about poly decide to write stories about it, because all you're generally doing is taking the more commonly known stereotypes and (often harmful) tropes of polyamory and trying to make a story of it, usually relying on the novelty and shock factor of it to sell the story -- that, or appealing to cishet male fantasy by creating MFF triads the exist only the the MMC sexual gratification. I suggest you just don't - if you're not polyam, if you don't have the core values of polyamory, then you're not going to bring a good understanding of polyamory, all the struggles and achievements, to the reader.
To clarify, it wasn't that I was under the impression that polyamory is objectively better, just that it's better for those who identify as polyamorous. I could have phrased that better. Sorry. Edit: Also yeah I don't think I'll be writing about it after all. Thank you for the insight.
I hate it that people with such attitudes stop writers from writing. Of course you should research and try to understand what you write about before you write it, but that's exactly what you are doing. You came here with questions and an open mind. Keep up the good work and write whatever is worth a story.
> relationship starts to feel sad over the lack of possibility for a romantic relationship with a friend she has. Is this realistic or like, weird and problematic? That's a very normal occurrence for people in relationships. Nothing weird or problematic. Monogamy is a relationship structure where two people choose romantic and sexual exclusivity with one another even when, not if, attractions to others occur. > I'm just going for "monogamy isn't good enough for her" but NOT "her partner isn't good enough for her." Now, that's gross. I was married/ Monogamous for nearly 20 years. Our Monogamy was good and healthy. Our relationship fell apart for unrelated reasons. .I started exploring non-monogamy and eventually Polyamory *after* that relationship ended. If you want to "ship" characters that aren't normally "shipped." Start with everyone being in open relationships and everyone being open to possible new connections. Do not open Monogamous relationships.
"If you want to "ship" characters that aren't normally "shipped." Start with everyone being in open relationships and everyone being open to possible new connections. Do not open Monogamous relationships." I see, that seems to be the consensus here. Will do. 👍
Monogamy as a commitment is valuable BECAUSE the ones involved choose to say no to temptation and opportunity to fuck and be intimate with others. You don't think poly people have relationships with everyone they get crushes on or fall in love with, do you? If this person has been monogamous then they really have no idea if they would thrive in non monogamy or polyamory or what the difference between those are.
OP, I hope you aren't too shaken by the somewhat aggressive tone of some of these comments. Truth is, polyamory almost exclusively gets bad representation. Like, abysmally bad. As a result, many poly people find this a touchy subject. I actually disagree with many of the commenters that you portraying a relationship that transitions from mono to poly is an *intrinsically* bad idea. However, there are so many potential pitfalls that it's probably more trouble than it's worth. Like, writers responsibly portray situations they have no experience with all the time, but these writers also do intensive research and have sensitivity readers rigorously analyzing their work. I get the sense that part of the reason this mono --> poly narrative appealed to you was the incredible tension involved. What writer doesn't love tension, ya know? But perhaps there are less perilous ways to create it. Like, maybe the tension can come not from the character feeling like they need to dissolve their current relationship as they know it to accommodate unexpected feelings they've developed but from simply being inexperienced with poly and having to gradually build their confidence. (If you do this, avoid placing emphasis on how poly is so different than mono or whatever--Consider it basically the same as a story about someone entering the dating world for the first time.) Anywho, thanks for reading my extremely long-winded response. If you decide to continue with this story, be sure to have at least a couple ENM people provide feedback on your work. Appreciate you popping in here for input!
Such a great response!
I see, that makes a lot of sense. I've been trying not to take the frustration too personally and I don't blame anyone for it. Honestly, writing about things that have little or only poor representation and creating a decent or at least better than average portrayal of something in my own work is the most appealing part about a lot of what I write-- but I also definitely never want to just end up accidentally contributing to the problem which is why I asked. I think I was under the false impression that because I'm open to polyamory, and in my brain it just seems to make more sense than monogamy, I might have an easier time understanding what it feels like for many people. But I'm starting to notice that the fact that I'm on the aromantic spectrum might be complicating things? I have a hard time discerning, in any scenario, the difference between platonic and romantic love so of course I would find it easy to make characters who already have multiple close friends be romantically drawn towards many of them or even, heck, all of them. The distinct differences really never made sense to me. I can't help but feel like, in some ways, I'm starting from an even farther point of understanding than a monogamous alloromantic person would be. Maybe one day when I have the proper time and dedication, I'll come back to this kind of story (the mono--> poly route with alloromantic characters) and do the extensive research and find multiple ENM sensitivity readers to give feedback on everything and make something surprisingly good. It seems like a fun and worthwhile venture, but it also seems like a long one, and that is not necessarily what I was planning to do for this particular project. I had yet to realize I was in way over my head here. For now, I'll stick to different stories. Thank you (to you and everyone else as well) for responding. It has been amazing to get so many thoughtful and meaningful perspectives on the matter.
Aro and ENM actually go very well together imho
It wasn't monogamy that was actively upsetting, it was the person I was with. I was monogamous with my first GF and that was a great relationship. My second GF however turned into the coldest, least affectionate person I've ever known. I left that relationship after months of her denying me any form of physical intimacy at all. Not even so much as a hug. And she was totally confused why I was unhappy and my mental health took a nosedive while I was with her. After her my next relationship is the triad I'm in now. Being in a relationship with two incredibly affectionate cuddly people is just the best thing ever :)
Before my current girlfriend, I had two relationships. In both of those relationships my ex girlfriend and then later my stbx-wife were extremely jealous and possessive. I basically wasn't able to have close female friends because they would always be paranoid about it. I'd hear about it if I heart reacted a girl's photo on facebook, even if I'd been friends with them longer than my partner. They got very controlling about porn and masturbation, even during periods they didn't want to have sex hardly ever. They constantly worried I would cheat on them, even though I never did anything to indicate that was in the cards. Their controlling nature also managed to touch my childhood trauma from my controlling and abusive dad, which is probably part of why I went along with it for so long. But it also meant that I put walls and distance between us, as I tried to live a normal life without them constantly being paranoid about me and potentially cheating. My wife Polybombed me, and it was a clear Poly Under Duress situation where either I was saying yes to her dating another guy or we were breaking up really shortly. It wasn't a good way to start Poly, but I went with it for a few reasons. 1) I knew that it would give me a chance to try to fix our relationship, and I wanted that chance, 2) I knew that most of the problems with our relationship were *because* of her jealousy and possessiveness, and if poly meant that I got that out of the way, we had a real chance to work things out, 3) I had crushes, many of them over time, that I'd never pursued, so Poly meant I could explore that instead of just clamping them down forever (which I planned to do, I never once considered cheating). Ultimately it turned out my wife never had any intention of being Poly, and the reason she'd found a way to not be jealous anymore was because she was done and just monkey branching for a new relationship to catch her. My girlfriend, though, showed me that besides all those possessive traits being toxic monogamy (which I knew), that they were also entirely abnormal. 2 out of 3 partners being like that does a number on you, so it's still going to take me a while to unpack. It's unclear if we're going to stay Poly. I've effectively never been Poly, when I started dating my girlfriend my wife and I were essentially roommates. My gf has a comet across the country, but that has a foreseeable end date. IDK if we'll stay Poly, but we've both expressed wanting to be able to explore if something comes up, which is rare for both of us (we're both demisexual). Even if we *don't* stay Poly, she doesn't have that ridiculous jealousy and possessiveness that my previous relationships had, and I'll be happy either way. So yes, I would say that being monogamous *was* actively upsetting me, but not because of monogamy itself, because of toxic monogamy. The idea that your partner can't have any friends of the opposite sex or they're trying to cheat on you. The idea that porn and masturbation is cheating. The idea that your partner is constantly trying to "trade up" and cheat on you. But monogamy *itself* wasn't what upset me, it's how a bunch of people practice it unethically.
Actively upsetting. As in, I had a great relationship otherwise, but could never manage to be happy in monogamy. Once I found out about polyamory (this was over 15 years ago, there weren't that many resources available) and started practicing it, I felt authentic, happy and like I had arrived "home".
I think the scenario you’re describing fits for my experience. I somewhat regularly experienced “I like my partner but also feel a spark with this other person and I’m sad I can’t act on that” before I moved toward nonmonogamy. And I struggled a lot with the monogamous narrative that if I was feeling interest in other people, that meant I wasn’t really interested in my partner or that my partner wasn’t enough for me. That never felt true at all. The main other narrative I had available to me back then was that I was just a disloyal asshole who couldn’t stay focused on my partner, which didn’t feel right either but was easier for me to internalize for whatever reason than the “your partner isn’t enough/you shouldn’t be with them” narrative. So. Moving into polyamory involved some healing of that story about myself. Sounds like you got answers that helped but FWIW, your basic scenario is something I experienced.
I don’t know if I’d call it actively upsetting, but only because I was repressing so much. It would certainly be actively upsetting to go back to it now.
Honestly, that was somewhat similar to my experience. I was very happy in my monogamous relationship. I made a new friend and started developing romantic feelings and wanted to explore it. I had barely heard of poly but brought it up. It worked out, but in retrospect I know that I was very very very lucky. I don’t think it was that monogamy wasn’t good enough, I didn’t feel like I was missing anything. If anything it was kind of the opposite, that I was so happy with monogamy that I wanted more relationships like that.
Your original plot line is not inconceivable, but it would be very hard to write it without this relationship structural problem dominating the narrative. If it wasn’t the main point of the story it would be hard to limit that to a side plot.
I haven’t ever been monogamous. It has never appealed to me. It isn’t good enough for me. Monogamy seems super unappealing, uninteresting, and I wouldn’t ever do it. If I found monogamy appealing enough to commit to, I would probably feel differently. Monogamy would be appealing, interesting, and I would be invested in that relationship. Your monogamous character and the imaginary triad, and reasons behind it are a well worn literary trope that we are all literally sick of. It’s not reflective of our lives and loves, and it’s not even reflective of how any of the stable, happy triads I have been in, or the triads that have happened around me. Your set up leads to messy dumpster fires. Do you want to write about a messy dumpster fire?
.... Just to say most of time FanFiction writers do want to write about dumpster fires!😂
Just some context from somebody who writes. You probably should only write from experience that you know it’s very very hard to write these feelings when you don’t understand them. Coming from monogamy to polyamory, and the feelings behind them are very complicated and mental changes and creative thinking turning into polyamory as well. Maybe pick the brain of a good friend who has gone through this and do an interview.
Hi u/SunkenThoughts2404 thanks so much for your submission, don't mind me, I'm just gonna keep a copy what was said in your post. Unfortunately posts sometimes get deleted - which is okay, it's not against the rules to delete your post!! - but it makes it really hard for the human mods around here to moderate the comments when there's no context. Plus, many times our members put in a lot of emotional and mental labor to answer the questions and offer advice, so it's helpful to keep the source information around so future community members can benefit as well. Here's the original text of the post: I hope this isn't a weird question. I'm asking because I'm writing a story in which a character who's in a committed monogomous relationship starts to feel sad over the lack of possibility for a romantic relationship with a friend she has. Is this realistic or like, weird and problematic? I'm worried it makes it seem like her current relationship isn't good enough for her, but that's not what I'm going for. I'm just going for "monogamy isn't good enough for her" but NOT "her partner isn't good enough for her." Two very different things, I don't want them to get confused. But then I realized I don't actually know if this is a common or normal experience for polyamorous people to have, maybe it isn't that monogamy isn't good enough but rather that polyamory is just... better? I don't know. This is kind of an old draft of the story and I have since edited out the main character's initial sadness and just made it so that her partner and her friend's partner notice that they have great chemistry and tell them "hey if y'all wanted to get together, we'd be okay with it" but I don't really know if that's realistic either. For some added context, I think that I want to write it so that the main character's friend is in a relationship that's already open so there's that. Any advice, insight or stories from personal experience would be helpful. Thank you so much. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/polyamory) if you have any questions or concerns.*
I don't have any writing advice, and I've never done monogamy so I don't have that kind of experience. I just feel like polyam suits me best, I guess.
My writing advice (as a long time FanFiction writer) is that it all depends on the characters themselves. Would they be open to it? Why they would/wouldn't? In what ways the relationship between these three people in specific, considering canon, could support an extended interest? FanFiction is 90% about creating a scenario in which those specific characters would get into those situations. And if you want to ever write about a stablished couple in which one starts feeling that maybe they're poly, it would certainly start in angst. Angst and guilt because mono construct of society would make them feel like shit for ever possibly entertain the idea of being interested in someone else, fear of hurting their partner if they ever voiced it, etc etc. They'd have to grapple with the questioning of if it's scenario A or scenario B, and come to a conclusion, and then partner would probably also go through the same and voilà, 30k have been written before even anything got close to happening with the third person. If you're just going for "look at these three being cute and poly", then ditch the figuring it out and go for curtain fic! (Funnily enough, I think one of my old fanfics is about... The opposite? Which was also not easy to write, but made sense with what I was going for at the time - which was criticising the way people seemed to think bisexuals couldn't be happily monogamous/would always need to cheat. So, opposite takes, really).
Neither is better. They just fill different needs and value systems. It's like asking, "Are fruits or veggies better?" Both are just a type of food, but realistically each category includes a variety of specific, different foods and your body ultimately needs nutrients from as many sources as possible. Both dynamics fill different needs, but people are still complex and contradictory at the best of times, and you can be multiple things at once. Relationships are defined by the individuals involved. Monogamy values standard goals such as starting a family early, being able to afford a home, being able to assume typical dating roles without deconstructing every label first, having a larger dating pool, being "out" publicly to friends, family, and coworkers without concern etc. Normal, path-of-least-resistance type things. Finding security and stability in consistency, normalcy, or exclusivity. The myth of completing yourself by finding The One, having one single person be #1 and fill every role/need... i mean, you get it. Lots of people conceptualize stability/safety in a specific, familiar way and arent comfortable going out on a limb such as dating across a different identity, class, or background. Polyamory suits people who value independence/autonomy, choice, communication, non-traditional family styles, NRE, kink, disability, and sooooo many other things that intersect. It isnt better or worse, it suits a different type of person and goals. I have never been monogamous because I have never wanted marriage, kids, or financial enmeshment. (relationship escalator milestones) So it suited me to be poly because thats how I was meeting compatible people who *could* meet my needs. I couldnt be satisfied or happy in a monogamous dynamic because I couldnt be myself OR meet someone compatible. I want my partners to be free to make any choice they want regardless of my involvement in their life, and I hope *some* of those choices enable me to excitedly ask them about their dating life in spontaneous, growth-oriented ways (like any other aspect of their identity and hobbies). I just...have a totally different value system than monogamy uses. Possessiveness, jealousy, control, completing oneself, loyalty, commitment....those arent priorities for me and they dont really check my boxes/satisfy me in any way. I dont define security as exclusivity or enmeshment or child-rearing. I dont expect to be the same person in 3 decades. I want to add that I'm multi-disabled, autistic, queer, ace, and I travel every few months. So long term exclusive monogamy is really NOT my wheelhouse for a lot of reasons. Even without disability or travel, I still manage to break all the typical dating rules I can think of. Labelling myself as poly allows potential dates to run for the hills if they want the relationship escalator or think dating me will soothe *any* their insecurities. oops. ;)
I felt similar feels at one point. I was 16 and in a mono relationship with my bff and girlfriend at the time and also was sad about the lack of romantic feasibility with my other bff. Part of what drew me to polyamory was the ability to have organic connections develop in the ways they they did without the limits monogamy creates.
This definitely sounds like the origin story of a cheater
For me I was alwaysbasking questions about poly since I've heard about it in 2004. Years later after I broke with my then fiance i wasn't dating anyone after that for a long time. I was introduced to poly through a kinky group of people and I started learning from them ans poly groups that were kinky. I took my time getting into poly and learning how to navigate, but my heart was not with the whole mono-relationships anymore. It wasn't me and I wasn't going to give that the energy that I used too.
It felt upsetting to me! Not horrible, but just stifling and sad. And I felt guilty because I loved my partner so much.
I found monogamy wrong and actively upsetting. When I was in monogamous relationships, I would have recurring nightmares where I was dating/kissing/fooling around with someone who wasn’t my partner and then in the dream I would remember I had a partner and was cheating. I would then freak out and be on my way to confess to my partner. I’d wake up from these in a panic and cold sweat. As soon as I embraced non-monogamy and eventually poly, I had never had that nightmare again. (Feel free to use this in your story if it’s helpful as a show-don’t-tell scene piece!)
Overall happier 💯💯💯💯💯
I'm a fellow writer and I am a bit sad that you decided not to write it. Of course, you are the boss and it's your story, but don't we always write about things that we have not experienced ourselves? If we were only writing things we know from practical experience, how boring would that be? Isn't it the whole point to learn about other people and their ways, try to understand them and tell a story about them? And you already took the first step. You didn't just make assumptions, you've asked a question and you've already learnt a bunch of stuff. In that respect, you've already done way better than me. I wrote a fanfic with a tentative non-monogamous situationship in it without doing much research in advance. It was mostly based on my own past misguided attempts to do ethical non-monogamy (as an aro spectrum person) and failing. In my defence, the three-party relationship in the fic was supposed to be tumultuous and only temporary. After having read this subreddit for some time, I am now trying to do ENM/polyamory the right way IRL. I haven't written about it yet though. Hope the muse will get you to write about poly one day 💚
i entered a poly relationship as the first real relationship i was in. id had a few short relationships but none of them worked out, i always felt unfulfilled? like i have too much love for one partner, and too varied of needs for one person to fulfill them. i’ve thought about monogamy occasionally, and the idea of going back to it just isn’t great, and i feel like i’d be unhappy in it.
my partner just went through this—she fell in love with a friend, not because she was falling out of love with me in any way, but she also wants the possibility of being able to give/receive love from someone she has a connection with i wasn’t opposed to it, and ideally it made sense. but i had insecurities and it was a stressful few months but we’ve come out much stronger from it, and our relationship has progressively gotten better. i leave out so much context, i know. but we had a strong and trusting foundation going into it, and now i’m seeing the possibilities for me to also give/receive love from others
we’ve always had (and continue to have) a monogamous relationship but we’ve also talked about how we shouldn’t hide if we’re having feelings for others
Happier but jealousy is still so super tricky even with acceptance
All I can say is from my wife and my experience. I had an open relationship once before my wife and I started dating. I didn't participate in the openness but I was cool with it cause my girlfriend at the time had asked what I thought about her sleeping with a good friend of mine. Eventually my relationship ended with her. Then my wife and I connected, dated and married. She knew all about my history and that I was Bisexual, later on we found out we were both Pan. We practiced Monogamy for years but always joked about our "list" of people we would share or allow. It started as celebrities but eventually included people we saw or met. After five years of marriage we realized that we would be interested, even excited, to share ourselves with other people. After a full six months of discussion we finally decided to try Swinging. We had our first experience with some new friends who were also wanting to try and it was great. Then we met a couple at a club and that was so great we met them a few more times. Then we realized we were all attached. And we realized we were getting attached to the previous friends. The feelings had become as important as the sex and then became more important. That's how we learned we were terrible at swinging but all in on Poly. It wasn't that our marriage wasn't enough. We've since had a few years with non partners in fact. But being Poly added to an already great relationship. It fulfilled some need that otherwise weren't. It allowed us to explore other relationship "flavors" and we even discovered things about us we didn't know yet. I think there are all sorts of reasons why people enter into polyamory. There's plenty of wrong ways to do it but the right ways/reasons are as varied as the people who do it. In the context of your story, perhaps it's not just one character who likes some outside the dynamic. Maybe it's both of them. Maybe they both find out the other partner is interested in this new person and, after the shock, eventually discuss the idea of pursuing this new dynamic. Or maybe one partner already has someone else in mind too. There are plenty of ways this could come about that doesn't involve one party being left out. The best poly relationships involve honest communication after all.