0:03

Some of this could have been projecting on my

0:06

part. I know, Jace, we talked about this when

0:08

I started dating someone again when I when like

0:10

the gap year essentially ended and it was like,

0:12

okay, I'm going back into, I guess, the type

0:14

of relationship practice that I know the most. But

0:17

I'm worried that now all my baby boomer

0:19

family members are going to disapprove of me

0:21

again, which is like not true. Like

0:23

I'm not in a family situation where anyone's like

0:26

openly disapproving or mean to me or anything like

0:28

that. Like fortunately, it's been enough years now that

0:30

I think they've just had to kind of get

0:32

over it and deal with it. But there was

0:34

a certain amount of that. Oh, when

0:36

I just have one partner, I can kind

0:39

of bask in the normalcy of

0:41

being a good, normal, productive, successful

0:43

millennial, but the baby boomers can

0:45

finally be proud of not one

0:47

of these weirdo millennials that are

0:49

out there. And so there

0:51

was something about almost feeling like, oh, I'm

0:53

going to I'm going to cast myself out

0:55

of the paradise of normalcy once

0:57

again into being the weirdo who asked to

0:59

explain her relationships to all of my family

1:01

members once more. Welcome

1:05

to the multi-amory podcast. I'm

1:07

Jace. I'm Emily. And I'm

1:09

Dedeker. We believe in looking to

1:12

the future of relationships, not

1:14

maintaining the status quo of

1:16

the past, whether you're monogamous,

1:18

polyamorous, swinging, casually dating, or

1:20

if you just do relationships

1:22

differently, we see you and

1:25

we're here for you. On

1:42

this episode of the multi-amory

1:44

podcast, we're discussing going back

1:46

to monogamy after being polyamorous

1:49

or otherwise non-monogamous. Why

1:51

would someone want to go back

1:53

to monogamy? And what are the

1:55

potential benefits or negative consequences of

1:57

doing so? What should you be asked?

4:00

But the reason why I did is because it

4:02

clearly was the best thing for the relationship that

4:04

I was in and I think

4:06

that that relationship to precedent over others

4:08

it was the person that I was

4:10

living with I guess it was hierarchical

4:13

in that sense and If

4:16

I wanted to continue with that

4:18

relationship monogamy was basically the only

4:20

thing that was going to work

4:22

for it At that

4:24

particular point so we tried not

4:26

monogamy for a while But it was causing a lot

4:29

of hurt and pain and so going back to monogamy

4:31

I think was the best thing for us And

4:33

that's how I've been for like the last

4:36

four or five years and

4:38

it's been fine There were definitely aspects I

4:40

missed, but we'll see if maybe that'll be

4:42

in my life again in the future Sure,

4:44

how about you two? Yeah, okay?

4:46

Let's see my my rap sheet

4:48

with monogamy. I'm sure like like Grew

4:51

up pretty default on questioning monogamous in

4:54

most of my relationships I certainly had

4:56

a fair amount of distress when I

4:58

started First kind of getting

5:00

into relationships a fair amount of distress

5:02

realizing oh like I'm monogamous with this

5:04

person But I'm still attracted to other people oh no

5:07

what does that mean about me? Oh that either something

5:09

wrong with me or something broken about me when

5:11

I first started experimenting with non monogamy I

5:13

think I had a period of like a

5:16

couple years that I call sort

5:18

of my like Experimental years where I think I did

5:20

a lot of back-and-forth You

5:22

know when it came to dating right because I really wasn't

5:24

sure is this really my cup

5:26

of tea or not because? Our

5:29

culture doesn't exactly encourage non monogamous relationships, and

5:31

so it was really hard to sort out

5:33

What do I actually want and what

5:36

is attachment issues? You know what are

5:38

commitment issues or whatever? I think I

5:40

gave my last real hurrah to Intentionally

5:44

chosen monogamy way back

5:46

in I want to say 2012

5:49

this may be the last time I was in an Intention

5:51

monogamous relationship and the circumstances was that

5:53

I just fell head over heels for

5:55

this guy And he checked every single

5:57

box at least seemingly of like ideal

5:59

parts And I had already started to

6:01

head down this road of like I might be polyamorous and

6:03

he was kind of like, oh, come on You

6:06

chicken basically You're

6:09

like, yeah Am I

6:11

am I just a chicken like like this is

6:14

the situation that like all the movies and all

6:16

of my cultures told me Like

6:18

if there's ever a time to choose monogamy, this is the

6:20

one when you're just like totally crazy for somebody Yeah,

6:23

and so I did and and then I hated

6:25

it I just I couldn't do it, you know,

6:27

so when he and I broke up it wasn't

6:29

really a big dramatic breakup for me It was

6:31

much more of a factual like this is great

6:33

and you're great and and I just don't think

6:35

that I can do this So I think that

6:38

was my last intentional hurrah

6:40

with monogamy Jason I

6:42

kind of got accidentally monogamous for like a year

6:44

had the tail end of the pandemic because that's

6:46

just kind of how like Things happened like after

6:49

I went through my big breakup in 2022 When

6:52

you call that monogamous though, like

6:54

again, I know it's

6:56

like de facto monogamy Just

6:58

because the two of you weren't Dating

7:01

anyone else. However, you still had

7:03

in your minds that you could

7:05

date other people still went on some

7:07

dates And I know we had conversations about it,

7:09

right? Like I think we acknowledged it a couple

7:11

times and we checked in about it And I

7:13

think that every time we checked in it was

7:16

very clear of like no This doesn't

7:18

feel like this is like, oh, yeah, we're

7:20

gonna be monogamist now necessarily am

7:23

I getting that right? What's your what's your

7:25

sort of history? Sure. Yeah

7:27

I mean just to answer that question first

7:29

the way that I always describe it to

7:32

people is that being monogamous

7:34

or being non-monogamous polyamorous

7:36

something like that is not about

7:38

the number of partners that you

7:41

have at a given time but

7:43

about how you Expect

7:45

those to behave right like what you

7:47

think is allowed for yourself what you

7:49

think's allowed for your partner An example

7:51

of that is a single

7:53

person might say I'm monogamous

7:57

Meaning that's the kind of relationship that they

7:59

want. That's the the kind of relationship that

8:01

matches their values. And you

8:03

might say, well, no, you're not because you don't have

8:05

any partners. You're a, you're, I don't know, a romantic

8:08

or something. And that doesn't make sense. That's not

8:10

the label that would go with them. So to

8:12

me, it's not about the number of partners. So

8:14

that whole, like we were de facto monogamous for

8:17

this year during the pandemic,

8:19

I'm like, yeah, it's fun, fun

8:21

joke to say, but I don't

8:23

actually, spicy experiments for us really,

8:26

really live and things up. You know what I mean? Right.

8:29

But I don't think that anything actually ever

8:31

changed in terms of either of our values

8:33

or what we expected of each other or

8:36

what we felt like was allowed or not

8:38

allowed in our relationship. I don't think that

8:40

changed at all just because we happened to

8:42

not have any other partners at the time

8:45

to go back and answer your question, dedicate about

8:47

my history with it. Mine

8:50

was somewhat typical in the whole.

8:53

Yep. Grew up just thinking monogamy is the only

8:55

option. That's really the only way to do it.

8:58

And then later in

9:01

college kind of started

9:03

to question some of that, but

9:05

more thinking about it along the

9:07

lines of some amount

9:10

of openness, right? So

9:12

a swinging type lifestyle type

9:14

thing, or at least the

9:16

freedom to be able to flirt with people and

9:19

that that's not out of bounds. So for me,

9:21

it was more of like a loosening of what

9:24

monogamy was, I guess,

9:26

like what counts as monogamy and

9:29

kind of struggling with some of that of

9:31

just like, this makes sense to me.

9:34

And yet a lot of people seem to be

9:36

uncomfortable with it and having some guilt that I

9:38

brought with me, feeling like maybe something's wrong with

9:40

me, that I would want those

9:42

things or that I would think those things are

9:44

okay. You know, had partners

9:46

who were upset that I must not

9:49

love them because I wasn't getting

9:51

jealous of them like they expected me to

9:53

about certain things, or that I would even

9:55

say that I wouldn't mind if they were

9:57

flirting with someone or something like that.

10:00

So had this kind of challenging

10:02

history with that and then fast-forward

10:04

to when Emily and I opened

10:06

up our relationship and in

10:09

talking to family and friends about that

10:11

was when I finally started actually reading

10:13

some of the resources and learning that

10:15

Polyamory was a thing and that people

10:18

did this Here we are

10:20

and for me it was that it was

10:23

that whole like coming home kind of feeling

10:25

of oh my gosh This thing that has

10:27

been kind of inside of me that I've

10:29

felt but didn't think was an option and

10:31

so Did my best to do the

10:33

thing that I thought was the only option? It

10:36

was like oh, this is possible. This

10:38

is this is the right thing for me and there was no

10:40

looking back even if

10:42

it was challenging and you know Emily and

10:44

I have talked about how we Opened up

10:46

at first and then kind of closed back up before

10:48

we opened up again when we were first making that

10:51

transition but for me it was like

10:53

as soon as I found out it was Something

10:55

that was possible. It was like this is

10:57

the one that lines up with my values

10:59

and And just what I

11:01

feel like is right for me And

11:04

so maybe I could do monogamy for a short

11:06

term like we did, but I wouldn't go back

11:08

now So before we dive

11:10

into the body of this discussion

11:13

I just want to give

11:15

a caveat that I like to believe that

11:17

on this show we really strive to be Pro

11:20

relationship diversity and that

11:22

involves being pro monogamy as well something that

11:24

really gets under my skin is seeing

11:26

sometimes other Nominogamy

11:28

content creators really feel

11:30

the need to bash monogamous people or to be

11:32

like oh those toxic monogamous people that are so

11:35

Codependent and unenlightened and so needy and

11:37

I'm like, okay Yeah, sure we can

11:39

unpack some of maybe the toxic messages

11:41

that we get from a default monogamy

11:43

culture and also To

11:46

me I think very intentional good

11:48

healthy monogamy is a part of

11:50

that relationship diversity spectrum So

11:52

when we're talking about people choosing monogamy

11:54

after not being monogamous or choosing to

11:57

go back to my monogamy or choosing

11:59

to close It's not like we're

12:01

seeing as though like we lost someone from the team I

12:03

know Emily you expressed feeling some of that hesitation like

12:05

way back in the day when you chose monogamy

12:08

while you were still hosting This show.

12:10

Oh, yeah I was very

12:12

worried that our audience were

12:14

going to be really upset or say

12:17

like well She shouldn't be on the

12:19

show anymore because she's not representing

12:21

the majority of the people who listen

12:24

to the show things along those lines

12:26

and that Wasn't and hasn't

12:28

been the case which I really appreciate

12:30

from our listeners Nobody has ever reached

12:32

out and said you should

12:34

jump off the show because you jump ship

12:37

on non monogamy and I appreciate that Thank

12:39

you to everyone out there I think

12:41

it's good to have multiple perspectives because I'm

12:43

sure as I think dedeker

12:45

you expressed before we started this episode

12:47

a lot Of people struggle with this

12:50

question and a lot of people will

12:52

at some point go back to Monogamy

12:55

in some way Simply

12:57

because of a bunch of different circumstances

13:00

So I wanted to kind of start out

13:03

with some of those like why would somebody

13:05

want to go back to monogamy and We

13:08

did reference some of these in our recent episode

13:11

449 I just wanted to continue going from there

13:13

and kind of talk about why why would somebody

13:16

want to go back to monogamy? Well,

13:18

can we just start out with the

13:20

obvious that like when we're talking about

13:22

non monogamy like this shit is hard

13:24

Sometimes yeah It's

13:27

hard. It's complicated. It's not easy

13:29

and our culture doesn't make it

13:31

easy And I do think there

13:33

has to be a lot of like emotional steadiness

13:35

I think there's a certain amount of bravery and

13:38

like when I say bravery It doesn't mean that

13:40

people who choose monogamy are not brave But I

13:42

think it's like a particular flavor of bravery that

13:44

it takes to choose a very atypical non normative

13:47

Relationship style and like that's

13:50

tough Yeah, I think

13:52

I found even being

13:54

in situations with friends

13:56

that sometimes like this factor

13:58

of potential jealousy can

14:01

come up and I think that that's because

14:03

it's so ingrained within our society and that's

14:05

something that I saw over and

14:07

over when I was doing some research for

14:09

this episode is this idea of

14:11

jealousy and this idea of, oh, you're going

14:14

to be uncomfortable and so if

14:16

you go back to monogamy, you're not going

14:18

to be uncomfortable anymore and that's

14:21

a plus, that's a positive, you

14:23

know, especially within the context of

14:25

a more hierarchical relationship

14:27

or couples. Yeah, I

14:29

think to go to what Dedeker was saying

14:32

about bravery, I would

14:34

almost say maybe even energy,

14:36

like going against the stream

14:39

of what everyone else is doing,

14:41

right, to swim even perpendicular to

14:43

the current is going to take more energy to

14:46

get less distance than if you just swim with the

14:48

current. So I do think there's

14:50

a certain amount of that, at least at

14:52

first. I think once you've done it long

14:55

enough, that becomes easier, especially as you connect

14:57

with more people and start to build more communities

14:59

and have more resources. But yeah, it's that thing

15:02

like you were saying, Emily, if literally

15:05

everybody in your life or at

15:07

least a vast majority are telling

15:09

you this would be easier if you

15:11

weren't doing this or you wouldn't be struggling

15:13

if you weren't doing this or even just

15:16

the fact that if you're in a non-monogamous

15:18

relationship and you don't have a good

15:21

support network within that and you're having

15:23

trouble, everyone's just going to blame

15:26

the type of your relationship you're in. And

15:28

if you switch back to monogamy and you have a hard

15:30

time, no one's going to tell you

15:32

it's because you shouldn't be doing monogamy. They're going

15:34

to say, oh, that's- Just because relationships are hard

15:37

or whatever. Yeah, there's, oh, relationships are hard. Oh,

15:39

you'll get through it. They'll be a lot more

15:41

encouraging. And like, I think that sucks that that's

15:43

the reality, but it is a reality. And I

15:46

do think there's a certain amount of practicalness to

15:48

accepting that and admitting that and saying, yeah, maybe

15:51

I would like non-monogamy, but I just

15:53

don't have the energy to fight against

15:55

the current that way. And

15:57

I want to get more support from- Family

16:00

or my friends and I can get that if

16:02

I monogamous like I get that. Yeah.

16:04

That's interesting because I do think our

16:06

sort of accidental monogamy gap year that

16:08

you and I have one sees it.

16:10

Did it help me too A guess

16:12

for the first time in a long

16:14

time to see some of the benefits

16:16

that come along with monogamy when you're

16:18

night and really trying And for me,

16:21

a lot of it I think had

16:23

to do. With. Social. Acceptance

16:25

and social ease Some of this could be

16:27

have been projecting on my part. I node

16:29

Chase. We talked about this when I started

16:31

dating. Someone again When I when like the gap

16:34

year essentially ended, it was like okay. I'm going

16:36

back into I guess the type of

16:38

relationship practice that I know the most.

16:40

But. I'm worried that now my baby.

16:42

Boomer family members are going to disapprove

16:44

of me Augustus and for sang. Which.

16:47

Is like not true. Like I'm not in a

16:49

family situation where anyone's like openly disapproving or mean

16:51

to me or anything like that. like. Fortunately, it's

16:54

been enough years now that I think that's just

16:56

had a clinic get over it and deal with

16:58

it. But there was a certain amount of that.

17:00

Oh, When. I just have one partner.

17:03

I. Can kind of bask in the

17:05

normalcy of being a good, normal,

17:07

productive, successful millennial that the baby

17:09

boomers can finally be. Prouder of

17:11

not one of these weirdo millennials.

17:13

That are out there. And so there

17:16

was something about. I. Don't know, I

17:18

feel like I'm really parting the veil on this

17:20

one into like my inner psychology There was something

17:22

there about almost feeling like oh I'm going up

17:24

and a cast myself out of the paradise of

17:26

normalcy. Once. Again into being the

17:28

weirdo who has to her relationships to

17:30

all of my family members once more.

17:33

Yeah. that's really interesting i think for

17:35

a lot of people just from

17:37

practical standpoint it is easier to be

17:40

monogamous especially when you are in

17:42

the midst of a big wife's are

17:44

in session i've heard of people

17:46

closing the relationship back up when they're

17:48

pregnant or when they're about to

17:50

have a baby that just in terms

17:53

of like the time that it

17:55

takes to see other people or to

17:57

be exploring the possibility of new

17:59

relationships They just don't have time

18:01

to do that with like a new

18:03

kid or if your job is really

18:05

ramping up in some way or

18:08

you're in the midst of your

18:10

PhD or something along those lines

18:12

that it's just really not practical

18:14

to be non-monogamous and so therefore

18:16

they're choosing monogamy during that point

18:18

in their lives. That's

18:20

one of those ones that I always will

18:22

bring up the question though and we can

18:24

talk about this more in the second half

18:26

when we get into the questions to ask

18:28

yourself when you're trying to make that decision

18:31

but just that yes, again, it's on the

18:33

one hand maybe it would be

18:35

easier and feel like yeah, I'm also going to

18:37

get more support in having a kid or doing

18:39

something like that if I go back to officially

18:42

being monogamous but

18:44

just to remind everyone that there is

18:46

this whole world of relationship anarchy and

18:48

building your own types of relationships where

18:50

maybe it is yeah, we're going to

18:52

have a kid, we're going to stop

18:55

dating, maybe we have existing relationships and

18:57

make it clear just we're not going

18:59

to be as available for the next

19:01

I don't know, several years, maybe 18

19:03

years, I don't know, right? I

19:05

mean not really but maybe just to be

19:08

honest and clear and those partners might say

19:10

yeah, okay, let's change our relationship

19:12

to something else. They might say no, that's not

19:14

going to work for me. They might

19:17

have some option there but just to point out that

19:19

there are ways to still get

19:21

those same things without it having to

19:23

be the only way to

19:25

get this is to be monogamous. Like there's

19:28

multiple ways to build your own

19:30

relationships and be non-monogamous and I think that

19:32

will be a recurring theme through all of

19:34

this is which pieces are

19:36

monogamy specific and which are just

19:39

wanting to do some kind of

19:41

non-monogamy differently. Absolutely. I

19:44

do think sometimes it is the case

19:47

that a person is non-monogamous for a

19:49

time in their lives but they always

19:51

know that they're eventually going to want

19:54

to settle down and become monogamous. I

19:56

know JS you've referenced on the show

19:58

a few times. a relationship

20:00

that you had where that was the case.

20:03

And it was probably kind of nice,

20:05

I'm assuming, to have that knowledge so

20:08

that it didn't come out of nowhere.

20:10

Oh yeah, this person is finally gonna

20:13

settle down now and become monogamous. Well,

20:16

in that particular situation, it

20:18

wasn't that someday I'm going to settle down

20:21

and be monogamous. It was that someday I

20:23

wanna have a kid. And

20:25

that doing that matters more to

20:27

me than my relationship structure. And

20:29

so if monogamy ends up being

20:32

the way that's easier for me to do that, that's

20:34

what I'm gonna do. So it wasn't quite

20:36

the same, because if it were someone just

20:38

saying, yeah, I'm gonna do this for now,

20:40

and someday I'm gonna settle down and be

20:42

monogamous, personally, I

20:44

might say, yeah, let's not

20:46

then. I don't wanna do that. If

20:49

you think of this as this non-real

20:53

temporary thing, that just doesn't line

20:55

up with my values about doing

20:57

non-monogamy. Even if you did

20:59

make that choice, if it's kinda entering in from

21:01

that, of like, I don't take you seriously, I

21:04

just, I don't wanna be in a relationship with that.

21:07

In this case, it was a little bit different because it

21:09

was more like for her, having

21:12

a kid was the thing. And

21:14

it's just how can I find a way to do

21:16

that? And I'm open to it being non-monogamous if that

21:18

works out. But at the end

21:20

of the day, that's the priority. And

21:22

it's a subtle difference, but for me,

21:25

that's what made the difference. And it was

21:27

still really hard and sad when she did

21:29

make that decision to start just

21:31

trying to pursue monogamous relationships to that

21:33

end. That was still really

21:35

hard and sad, but it wasn't like,

21:37

I'm so betrayed, or, oh, you've lied

21:40

to me, or whatever, because I understood

21:42

why. Yeah. Yeah,

21:44

that same thing happened to me. I think, gosh,

21:46

this is ages ago, but

21:48

yeah, where I think he, we only ended

21:50

up dating maybe a couple months at most.

21:53

It wasn't a very long relationship, but I

21:55

think he was new to non-monogamy, but I

21:57

think did great at it as far as the whole, like, hit.

22:00

his experience of me having other partners, right?

22:02

Like he actually did fantastic

22:04

at it and was very upfront

22:06

about like he is really motivated in like

22:09

having a family and settling down someday.

22:12

And I think the non-monogamy was just a question

22:14

for him. And then yeah, ultimately

22:16

he eventually was the one who was

22:18

like, yeah, I think I can only really envision doing

22:20

that monogamously. So I don't think this is going to

22:22

work. And yeah, very similar experience, right?

22:24

It was sad. I was really disappointed, but it,

22:27

but at least it was, I don't know,

22:29

I guess I would have preferred that than

22:31

to someone trying to drag themselves through a relationship

22:33

that he didn't think was going to work for them

22:35

or maybe pretending or

22:38

maybe waiting for five years of

22:40

investment to happen and then being like, Hey,

22:42

actually peace out. I'm going to go be monogamous.

22:44

So swings and roundabouts, as the Brits say.

22:47

One of the ways that people

22:49

turn back to monogamy is often

22:51

if a partner gives them an

22:54

ultimatum and says, sorry, it's either

22:56

me or non-monogamy and that's it.

22:58

And you have to be monogamous

23:00

with me or else I'm leaving.

23:03

Or they just meet someone who

23:05

ultimately they realize, Oh yeah, I

23:07

do want to be monogamous with

23:10

this person and I'm going to

23:12

leave non-monogamy for them. And

23:14

that we're going to get into a little bit more in

23:16

the second half of this episode. But I

23:19

do think that that ultimatum one is

23:21

a really tough place to be in.

23:23

And that's a big decision that you

23:25

have to make. And

23:27

super common also. I mean,

23:30

I think, I know I've

23:32

experienced that ultimatum is a harsh word.

23:34

Sometimes it's not always delivered that

23:36

harshly, but functionally it's

23:39

just the term, right? It's the terms that are

23:41

on the table. I've been put in that situation.

23:43

I've known many other non-monogamous people have been put

23:46

in that situation. I've had a lot of

23:48

non-monogamous clients come to me for

23:50

help dealing with that situation. You

23:52

know, I just, I started dating someone and actually

23:55

it's really working out well and there's

23:57

really good chemistry and I actually really enjoy

23:59

this relationship. and I don't want to lose

24:01

it, this person wants to be monogamous and helping

24:03

someone sort out is it worth

24:05

it? Is it worth it to take

24:07

that risk? That's the question

24:09

for sure. So I

24:12

tried to find statistics out

24:14

there on how many

24:16

people turned back to monogamy after

24:18

being non-monogamous for a period of

24:20

time and it's like it

24:22

doesn't exist. There were some really

24:25

kind of bullshit stats that were thrown

24:27

around. We didn't even want to

24:29

really get into those because there was nothing

24:31

specifically saying that they were true or where

24:33

they came from. We couldn't find

24:36

any sources. Yeah, no sources

24:38

particularly, but I was really

24:40

shocked at the amount of people

24:42

on the polyamory subreddit, for instance,

24:44

who had this question or

24:46

who grappled with this question of

24:48

does anybody go back to monogamy

24:51

after being non-monogamous? And

24:53

on the polyamory subreddit, I was mentioned a

24:55

couple times, which thank you. See,

24:57

famously, as I said. Exactly.

25:00

But yeah, there were quite a

25:02

few people on there that said,

25:05

yes, I absolutely have gone back

25:07

to monogamy and then gone back

25:09

to non-monogamy, for instance, and it just sort

25:11

of depends on the season in my life.

25:13

And I think that makes a lot of

25:15

sense. And I think, Dedeker,

25:18

you referenced one of these already, but

25:20

what are some potential benefits that you

25:22

may get from going back to monogamy?

25:25

Yeah, for sure. If I think about right

25:27

now in this moment, it was like you

25:29

have to be monogamous instantly. I think probably

25:32

the biggest relief would be the social

25:34

stuff for me, is that

25:36

just our culture is built

25:38

to support monogamy institutionally, emotionally,

25:40

socially, culturally, all of these

25:42

things. Like this idea

25:44

that monogamy is the default relationship,

25:47

sometimes even the idea that we

25:49

are genetically, naturally meant to be

25:52

monogamous. There's a lot

25:54

of research out there that also suggests maybe otherwise,

25:56

right? Evolutionary psychology is a

25:58

sticky landmine of a... field of

26:01

study sometimes. But, you

26:03

know, it's so deeply ingrained that sometimes

26:05

just that, just having a relationship style

26:08

that does not go against the current

26:10

can help make your life

26:12

easier. And now this is

26:14

something that also stacks because like, let's

26:17

say you are openly

26:19

in a queer relationship and

26:21

that already has a certain amount of

26:23

difficulty existing in culture. And then if

26:26

you're also trying to be openly like

26:28

Namanagabus, then that adds another layer of

26:30

social difficulty sometimes or social judgment. You

26:32

know, sometimes choosing also a

26:34

non-mainstream form of relationship can

26:37

then exponentially increase the stigma

26:39

you experience in other areas of your

26:41

life if you belong to other marginalized

26:43

identities. And so sometimes if you're already

26:45

exhausted from having to deal with

26:47

that, choosing a more mainstream

26:49

relationship can help ease some of

26:51

the burden of that. Another

26:54

potential, right, I guess to take

26:56

Dedeker's situation of you have to

26:58

be monogamous now. What are the

27:00

silver linings you could find to

27:02

this? Potentially having more time and

27:04

energy to work on other projects

27:06

or other types of friend relationships

27:09

rather than spending as much time dating or

27:11

trying to meet new people or whatever. I

27:14

could see that as a benefit. However,

27:16

again, just to go back to

27:18

my experience, I've kind

27:20

of done that anyway while

27:22

still being non-managamous, but I just haven't

27:25

had as much interest in dating recently.

27:28

But if that doesn't mean I want to

27:30

tell Dedeker, hey, you shouldn't date. In fact,

27:32

I'm like, no, yeah, go for it. That's

27:34

awesome. Please, please date. To me, those two

27:36

don't have to go together, right? I don't

27:38

need to be monogamous in order to not

27:41

have to prioritize dating. I

27:43

think that for me earlier on, that

27:45

might have felt different because especially early

27:48

on there can be that sense of

27:50

my partner's dating more than me. That

27:53

means I feel less secure

27:55

in this relationship. There's that kind of jealousy feeling

27:57

of I might lose them to one of these

27:59

other people. people, so I need to

28:01

be dating other people as well, or

28:03

maybe it's just feeling competitive, or getting

28:05

your self-worth from having these other relationships.

28:07

There's a whole lot of psychology that

28:09

can go on there, but I think

28:11

for me earlier that would have been

28:13

harder, whereas having done this

28:15

for a while and specifically having been

28:17

in the relationship with Thetaker for quite

28:20

a while, there is more of that

28:22

sense of, yeah, there are seasons. That's

28:24

what my therapist would always say. He's like,

28:27

it's all about seasons. This could

28:29

be a season where you're dating less, and there can

28:31

be a season where you're dating more. It could be

28:33

a season where you're working more, a season

28:35

where you're traveling more, where

28:37

you're working a normal job versus when

28:40

you're freelance. All sorts of things

28:42

like that, that there can be seasons in your life,

28:44

and I think that gets easier to

28:46

see as you get older

28:48

and also as you've been doing something

28:50

longer, whether that's your job or your

28:52

relationship or whatever. I

28:55

did find when I was non-monogamous

28:57

that that kind of was all-encompassing

28:59

for that period of my life.

29:02

It really took up my time in

29:05

a way that nothing

29:07

else could break into that as

29:09

much, and I think that was

29:11

because I was just starting out

29:13

at it, but I was

29:15

focused on dating. I was focused on

29:17

all of my relationships. I was focused

29:19

on creating stuff for this podcast, and

29:22

that became the focus of my life,

29:25

and I think that if people are

29:27

really interested in other things or have a

29:29

lot of other projects in addition to that,

29:32

it's really difficult to do both at

29:34

the same time and put your full

29:36

energy into it. I do

29:38

think that as time goes on and you

29:40

get better at it, it becomes a little

29:42

bit easier. You don't have to put so

29:45

much focus on only that, but

29:47

if a person doesn't ever

29:49

move into that stage of

29:52

non-monogamy, then it's understandable

29:54

that they're like, I'm sorry, this just takes

29:56

up too much energy and time and effort.

30:00

I can't see past that, so I need to

30:02

pull back in some way. Yeah,

30:05

it's entirely possible that you might have

30:07

that experience, go back to monogamy and

30:09

some number of years later, go

30:12

back to some form of non-monogamy. And

30:15

it's not so tumultuous and doesn't take

30:17

so much effort that time. That's entirely

30:19

possible too that you've had that, those

30:21

years to background process, maybe get

30:23

more comfortable with yourself, build

30:25

up more of a support network for it. Who knows

30:28

what, right? A lot of factors that go into it.

30:31

But I've often given that

30:33

analogy of when you first

30:36

start being non-monogamous or polyamorous,

30:39

it can kind of be like you're resetting

30:41

to when you very first started dating at

30:43

all. And if you think

30:45

back, for most of us at least, yeah,

30:48

when you first started dating, it's like all

30:50

you ever thought about was, who do you

30:52

like, who likes me, who am I going

30:54

to date? All

30:56

that sort of gossipy stuff from whatever,

30:59

middle school, high school, all of that. In

31:03

a certain way, you're kind of going back

31:05

because you're having to relearn those dynamics, at

31:07

least somewhat. It's not maybe quite as extreme as

31:10

back then. But I do

31:12

think there's an element of it and

31:14

that, yeah, maybe that is too

31:16

much to handle for right now. That's

31:19

entirely possible. And

31:21

finally, I found a lot of people

31:23

discussing the fact that

31:25

there is a lot of destabilization

31:27

that can happen emotionally and even

31:29

physiologically. That's something that Irene Mourning

31:32

talked about a lot in her

31:34

book when she was on the show. And

31:37

if you go back to monogamy,

31:39

I do think that that stabilization

31:41

can sort of come back to

31:43

you, especially if you're

31:45

opening up an existing relationship

31:47

that may be coming back

31:50

to monogamy. It

31:52

just doesn't add as much

31:54

tumultuous challenge as trying

31:56

something completely different, trying to change your

31:58

paradigm, trying to... to completely

32:01

figure out how to adjust and

32:03

move through this new lifestyle that

32:05

you're totally unfamiliar with. So I

32:08

do think that for a lot of people going

32:10

back to monogamy, it's just easier. It's just what

32:13

many of us are taught. This is the way

32:15

that it should be. So it's just

32:17

gonna be simply easier for you in a lot of ways.

32:20

A flavor I wanted to bring in that I don't think

32:22

we've quite touched on yet, and it

32:24

is related to that dating piece and like

32:26

all the energy that goes into dating. Like

32:28

I've met some people maybe

32:31

they've been in a monogamous relationship for a

32:33

long time and maybe they're opening up or

32:35

they're newly entering a non-monogamous relationship and they're

32:38

really excited by the idea of dating. Like,

32:40

wow, like, oh, you know, I get to

32:42

date at this life stage and I get

32:44

to meet people and go out and have

32:47

fun and explore these different hobbies and interests

32:49

and stuff like that. And then I've met

32:51

some people where the idea of

32:53

having to date is like, oh God, I

32:55

thought I was done with this. I thought

32:57

I'd found the person that worked for me.

32:59

I don't wanna go out there and like

33:02

try to find other people to date. I

33:04

don't want to, because dating takes a lot

33:06

of energy, right? And it's a freaking drag

33:08

sometimes. So that piece I totally get that

33:10

for some people that's something that monogamy opens

33:12

up for them is like, I don't even

33:14

have to think about going back

33:16

on the meat market again or

33:18

think about any of those dynamics. Totally.

33:21

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40:01

And we're back. So the

40:03

reason why I wanted to do this

40:05

episode is because a friend of mine,

40:08

a coworker who I've known for many

40:10

years and who I've known to be

40:12

polyamorous for the entire time that I've

40:14

known him, quick clarification, I

40:17

asked this person if it was

40:19

okay to talk about this on

40:21

the show and he said absolutely

40:23

that this is probably a thing that could

40:25

help a lot of people to discuss this. So

40:28

just putting it out there that I got permission

40:30

to talk about it here. He

40:33

came to me because he just

40:35

started dating a person they've been

40:37

dating for maybe three or four

40:39

months. And he is just

40:41

completely head over heels for her

40:44

in a way that he says that

40:46

he never has been with anyone before.

40:48

He tends to be fairly aloof in

40:50

his relationships. It takes a long time

40:52

for him to call a person a

40:55

partner or a girlfriend, but

40:57

he really enjoys many of the

40:59

aspects of non-monogamy is fairly kinky

41:01

things along those lines. But with

41:03

this person, he's like, I

41:06

could see myself being monogamous with

41:08

her. She's really the only one

41:10

that I'm thinking about right now.

41:12

Anytime I'm with other partners, I would rather

41:14

be with her. I

41:16

want to call her my

41:18

girlfriend now. I am in love

41:21

with her. I want to do little things for her.

41:23

So many things that

41:25

just I think really rocked his world

41:27

in terms of shifting this

41:29

narrative that, oh, I'm just going

41:31

to be kind of this fun

41:33

aloof, non-monogamous guy to I'm really

41:36

head over heels for this

41:38

person. And he was like,

41:40

I really am worried because I feel like

41:42

I'm going to become monogamous with her. And

41:44

I just don't know if that's the right

41:46

call, the right decision. But everything

41:49

in my body and everything in my emotions

41:51

is telling me, yeah, I should go do

41:53

that. And she's listened to

41:55

our show. She has also

41:57

done some research, stuff like that. But

42:00

I think that for her, she's

42:02

also struggling with the

42:04

idea of dating other people and

42:07

struggling a little bit with the idea

42:09

that he dates other people just because

42:11

I think that she would also rather

42:13

be monogamous with him. So

42:15

all of those things together caused me

42:18

to really want

42:20

to talk about this with the two

42:22

of you and do a whole episode

42:24

on this because so many

42:26

people will go back to monogamy for all

42:28

of the reasons that we talked about, but

42:31

this specific one I think does

42:33

still happen more often than maybe

42:35

we even realize. And

42:37

to me it sounds like a big

42:40

case of NRE. There's a lot to

42:42

take in in this story. You

42:45

could even say there's far too much to take in here.

42:48

More to find that can ever be found,

42:50

really. Yeah, yeah. Boy. The word

42:52

we're saying is monogamy is just part of the circle of life,

42:54

you know? You have a season here, a season there. I

42:56

don't know if that's actually what we're saying about

42:59

this particular story here because if

43:01

I could just kind of start off with a few thoughts that

43:03

came to mind and then maybe we can go from there. But

43:06

one is that, yes, this sounds like

43:08

NRE. This sounds like

43:10

a new relationship that's very exciting.

43:13

But I do think it's worth noting that

43:16

this person has been dating

43:18

and has been non-monogamous for quite a

43:20

while and that for him this

43:22

is the first time he says

43:24

that he's feeling this level of whatever

43:27

it is. And I think

43:29

that that's worth taking a moment

43:31

to acknowledge and kind of celebrate.

43:33

And just my personal beliefs about

43:36

life and whatever, I don't

43:38

think that that is some magical

43:41

sign from the cosmos that this is

43:43

the one or whatever, which we tend

43:45

to go there when we're in those

43:47

feelings of feeling like this is

43:49

profound and has bigger reaching meanings than

43:51

anything else. But at

43:53

the same time, this is profound in

43:55

that you can feel this thing that

43:57

maybe you thought wasn't accessible to you.

44:00

That's cool. And I do think

44:02

that's worth celebrating and acknowledging that.

44:04

Whether we put meaning on it

44:06

or make decisions during it, then

44:09

I'm going to be a little bit hesitant, but

44:11

I don't want to like squash the coolness of

44:14

the fact that he's feeling that. Yeah. I

44:16

mean, it sounds to me like the best

44:18

parts of NRE, which is, I mean, maybe

44:21

this sounds kind of mercenary, but it's like

44:23

at the very least, you're getting a really

44:25

great free high, a free body high.

44:28

For sure. And I

44:30

think that fact scared him

44:32

a little bit. And that makes

44:34

sense. Feeling those feelings for

44:36

the first time, it is super overwhelming.

44:39

And it's not always great because you're

44:41

like, what is this? This is a

44:43

bit much. Parts of it are wonderful,

44:45

but parts of it are super overwhelming.

44:48

And we have talked before. I think

44:51

it's been a while since we've really

44:53

talked about the brain chemical side of

44:55

NRE or new relationship energy or Twitter

44:58

pated feeling or whatever, falling in love, whatever

45:00

you want to call it. But that

45:02

there is a little bit of

45:04

a negative side in that our brain chemicals

45:06

are also suppressing the hormones

45:09

that let us feel comfortable, which

45:11

can lead to that kind of sort of

45:14

addictive behavior where I really want to be

45:16

with this person. I feel amazing when I'm

45:18

with this person, but it also means you

45:20

feel this kind of shitty withdrawal when you're

45:23

not with that person. Yeah. And so, again,

45:25

to reiterate caution about

45:27

putting too much meaning onto the feelings

45:30

is that, like, yes, it's great and

45:32

it's cool and it means there's something

45:34

here worth paying attention to, but also

45:36

that feeling of when I'm

45:39

with other people, I just really wish

45:41

I was with her instead is probably

45:44

that lack of serotonin

45:46

that's letting you feel comfortable and settled. So

45:48

just to kind of be aware that there's

45:51

all sorts of brain chemistry stuff going

45:53

on here. Right. So to not feel like, oh,

45:55

my partners have been shitty all along. Not that

45:57

I think he's saying that, but you know. I

46:01

mean, I never want to discourage someone

46:03

from finally seeing that they're in a

46:05

bad relationship if that's been the case,

46:07

right? So like for your coworker, if

46:09

you genuinely are realizing, oh

46:11

my God, all these other relationships I've been in

46:13

have been horrible and you're able to corroborate that

46:16

with multiple other people, like you have your friends

46:18

coming forward or also like, yes, yeah, dude, those

46:20

have all been bad relationships and like maybe that's

46:22

something to consider. And also... I

46:24

don't think that's what's going on here, but yeah. Sure,

46:27

I get you. And also, yeah, I want

46:29

to corroborate what Jason said that like

46:31

to a certain extent this sounds like,

46:33

yeah, the system is operating as it

46:35

is supposed to. And

46:38

in my many, many years of being non-monogamous, like, yeah,

46:40

I've had those experiences where like I'm in NRE with

46:43

someone and that I'm with a different partner and like

46:45

I'm still, my brain is still churning thinking about

46:47

the other partner. And for me, it's about

46:49

like, okay, well, okay, yeah, that's exciting. I

46:51

know, I get it. I'm going to very

46:53

intentionally bring myself back and like try to be present with

46:55

my partner here and now and just kind

46:57

of look forward to the next time that I

46:59

see this other person until that

47:02

eventually changes because it always

47:04

changes, right? All NRE changes.

47:07

It doesn't necessarily mean that it goes away or

47:09

that it turns into boredom or that you suddenly

47:11

wake up and then you're like, oh, no, I

47:13

don't like this person anymore. But it just, it

47:15

always changes. And again, from a chemical

47:17

physiological side, those new relationship energy,

47:19

brain chemicals last anywhere from as

47:21

little as six months up to

47:23

like a year and a half

47:25

or so, I think is kind

47:28

of what the science says. They

47:30

do eventually fade. That's why always

47:32

on the show, we encourage people, hey, if you're

47:34

in the first 12 months of NRE with someone,

47:37

don't sign anything. You

47:39

know, don't sign a rental agreement. Don't

47:41

sign adoption papers together. Maybe don't even

47:44

sign a shared cell phone plan

47:46

or whatever. Just

47:48

cool your jets. Enjoy the free high.

47:51

Enjoy all the lovey-dovey wonderful feelings and the good

47:53

sex and everything that's a part of that,

47:55

but don't necessarily make big

47:58

life-altering decisions. And

48:00

I think in the case of your friend,

48:02

because of the fact that like he has

48:04

identified as non-monogamous for so long, and then

48:06

this one person suddenly makes him want to change that,

48:08

then I'm like, okay, it doesn't mean

48:11

like squash out all your NRE, but maybe just wait.

48:13

That's okay, just wait. You know, you don't have

48:16

to pull your heart out of it completely, if

48:18

anything, like really you should be trying to stay

48:20

vulnerable and open because yeah, like Jay said, I

48:22

think that's a really great development to lean into

48:24

that. But maybe just wait and see, you know?

48:28

Yeah, that's what I said

48:30

to him as well. And just

48:32

the reality that yes, you may

48:34

feel really incredible with this person,

48:36

but if you do leave

48:39

non-monogamy for them, there's always the

48:42

potential that they are never going

48:44

to want you to go back

48:46

to non-monogamy. And so being able

48:48

to date other people may just

48:50

be off the table for the

48:52

rest of your time with that

48:54

person. And that's big,

48:57

that's a huge lifestyle change. And

48:59

especially when the NRA fades, it's

49:02

like, wait a minute, what have I just

49:04

gotten myself into? If I

49:06

tell this person, oh yeah, I just want to be

49:08

monogamous with them, but all of a sudden

49:10

I realize, shit, I really do

49:12

want non-monogamy or I do want the

49:14

option to date other people and

49:17

that's not there anymore, that's pretty

49:19

difficult. That's a harsh reality to

49:21

face. I think

49:24

a helpful question to ask though is, yeah,

49:26

so I think it is important to recognize

49:28

that that like your interest in other people,

49:30

your attraction to other people who are not

49:33

your monogamous partner, that

49:35

may not go away for you. Like that may come

49:37

back at some point, you know?

49:39

And honestly, even very monogamous

49:42

people still experience attraction to

49:44

other people, still experience fantasy

49:46

about other people. So like to a

49:49

certain extent, all of us, whether we're

49:51

monogamous or not, have

49:53

to ask ourselves, how do

49:55

I cope in those situations? When

49:57

I'm fantasizing about someone else, when I develop a

49:59

little crush with,

50:01

you know, the person I

50:04

go to class with or whatever, when I find myself

50:06

attracted to somebody else, how will

50:08

I cope with those situations? And

50:10

there's a lot of different coping

50:12

mechanisms, right? Everything from I have

50:14

a particular narrative about like my commitment

50:17

to this relationship, you know, and about,

50:20

you know, how attractive I find my partner. And so it's

50:22

kind of like really doubling down on that narrative and making

50:24

sure that that narrative is kind of really healthy and strong

50:26

within me. Like that's how I'm going to cope all

50:29

the way up to maybe I'll bring

50:31

it up again with my partner. Like maybe the way I cope

50:33

is I'm going to have to be honest with my partner

50:35

about, hey, actually now I'm

50:37

thinking about exploring Namanagami again and

50:40

like understanding how that may land

50:42

in the relationship. So I

50:44

think it's about that when I work with clients

50:46

who are struggling with this, I find asking that

50:49

how question and thinking

50:51

about coping mechanisms is a little bit more

50:54

helpful because even

50:56

if you're super happy being monogamous and if you're

50:58

just like, wow, like I'm so glad I made

51:00

this choice to be with this person, there's

51:03

still going to be something you're going to have to deal with

51:05

when it comes to your attraction to other

51:07

people or fantasy about other people, because that's

51:09

something that most of us

51:11

experience. One other

51:13

thing that's really worth considering here and

51:15

Emily brought this up is that thing of

51:18

you may never be able to go

51:20

back to dating other people as long as

51:22

you stay in this relationship. And

51:25

the thing I wanted to bring up is specifically when

51:28

you're having those kinds of conversations while

51:31

you're in NRE, like

51:33

while you have all of that rosy

51:36

sparkly glow, the Vaseline

51:38

filter on the lens, when

51:41

you're looking at this person, all of that stuff, one

51:44

of the things that this causes is for

51:46

us to essentially to be bad at understanding

51:49

what the other person is saying because

51:51

we want to project what we think they

51:53

are or what we hope they are on

51:56

to what they're actually saying. And

51:58

so I know I know that there are

52:01

some people out there who are very pro

52:03

this idea of when you

52:05

start a new serious relationship, even if you

52:07

want to open that up and be polyamorous,

52:10

you should be closed for a while

52:12

first. I personally

52:14

don't agree with that, but I know there are people

52:16

who are really in support of that way of doing

52:18

things. The thing is there's

52:20

a big difference between both partners

52:22

very clearly saying, yes, we

52:25

want to do this, let's be monogamous

52:27

for a while first with

52:29

the intention to open up after roughly

52:31

X amount of time. What

52:33

I see happen more often is

52:35

this thing of the person who really wishes

52:38

they could be non-monogamous with this person saying,

52:40

okay, I guess you're not super comfortable

52:42

with non-monogamy, so sure, let's say it

52:45

will be monogamous because I really want

52:47

to be with you, and then

52:49

we could revisit this someday. The other

52:51

person's like, okay, maybe. What

52:54

you hear is, oh, they said, yeah, we're going

52:56

to revisit this someday. What

52:58

they heard was, I want

53:01

to be monogamous with you, maybe

53:03

someday we might talk about that, but we probably won't

53:05

do it. You've both heard

53:07

very different conclusions from this, and you can

53:09

end up in this situation that is, I

53:12

would say, more common than most people would

53:14

like, which is where you

53:16

end up in this somewhat long-term relationship

53:19

where both people just keep hoping that

53:21

the other one's going to change their mind

53:23

about this pretty fundamental thing about their relationship.

53:27

You can end up stuck on either side. Either

53:29

you're stuck in this non-monogamous relationship where one person's

53:31

always kind of hoping we

53:33

would stop doing this, or the

53:35

other way around, where you end up monogamous and one

53:38

person's always kind of hoping that we

53:40

would go back to some kind of non-monogamy because

53:42

they're really not that happy with this. I

53:44

would say just so much

53:47

extra caution because your NRE is clouding

53:49

your ability to really hear each other

53:51

clearly. Kind of

53:53

along those same lines, I think

53:56

when you're in NRE, it's difficult

53:58

to see the person. for

54:00

who they 100% truly are and

54:02

clearly you're going to Learn

54:05

things about people the more that you get to

54:07

know them But it's really

54:09

easy to put somebody up on a

54:12

pedestal if you're falling head over heels

54:14

for them right off the bat You

54:16

may be like this person's perfect They

54:18

have no flaws and that

54:21

may just not be truly the case and

54:23

so you may find that you're a little

54:25

bit more Incompatible than

54:27

you previously thought once that NRE

54:30

starts to fade and then if you're

54:32

in a monogamous relationship You're like well

54:34

crap this person isn't exactly who I

54:36

thought that they were when I had

54:38

those rose-colored glasses on Not

54:40

that you know, they're not great all of

54:42

those things But you may find that the

54:44

relationship isn't exactly as perfect as you once

54:46

thought it was and that's true Even if

54:48

you were both monogamous the whole time, right?

54:50

That's worth clarifying. That's not Non

54:53

monogamy here that the Gottman say that all the time

54:55

But like when you're picking a life partner,

54:57

you're just picking which set of perpetual problems

54:59

Can you deal with which sounds so

55:02

negative? I promise that the way I see

55:04

it is much more hopeful than the way that

55:06

they phrase it But it really is about there's

55:08

always going to be incompatibilities There's always going to

55:10

be something that annoys you and

55:12

it really is about I think learning for

55:15

yourself what can I tolerate and

55:17

what is acceptable or not and Sometimes

55:21

it's the same with you know When you're

55:23

kind of debating whether to choose

55:25

a non-monogamous relationship or a monogamous one

55:27

It's kind of just like which set of problems do

55:29

you want to deal with which set of problems? Do

55:31

you feel like you're more cut out for dealing

55:34

with which set of problems? Do you feel like

55:36

you have a better support network for dealing with

55:38

because there's gonna be some problems regardless. There

55:41

always is yeah so

55:43

if you Ultimately do decide

55:45

that you want to become monogamous

55:47

again I want to talk

55:50

about how to do that in the

55:52

most respectful and responsible way possible because

55:55

I know for myself

55:57

I ended a relationship

56:00

when I was becoming monogamous again, I

56:02

think I did it okay. But

56:05

I think I probably could have

56:07

telegraphed that possibility more than I

56:10

did, and that was

56:12

really hard and really sad and

56:15

really difficult to say goodbye

56:17

to a person that I really cared about

56:19

because I was going

56:21

to be monogamous again with my partner. So

56:24

let's talk about some better ways to

56:26

go about that. Yeah, so

56:29

again, we're coming from a

56:31

point of assuming that you're

56:33

monogamous, you're dating multiple people, and you're

56:35

deciding to be monogamous with one person.

56:37

And so that means that there is,

56:39

for lack of a better term, some

56:41

collateral damage that may happen in the

56:43

sense that you need to cut off

56:45

some relationships in order to be

56:48

monogamous. That may not be the

56:50

situation that everyone out there is facing when they're dealing with

56:52

us, but that's primarily the thing that we're

56:55

talking about, is that you do need

56:57

to prepare for potential pain, hurt,

57:00

blowback, from telling

57:03

other partners that you are leaving them

57:05

to become monogamous with somebody else. And

57:08

of course, everyone's probably going to respond

57:10

to that differently. It's going to be different depending

57:12

on the context of the relationship. Some people may

57:15

take it really well. You know, it may be

57:17

like, okay, yeah, well, you know, this

57:19

is always a casual thing or whatever, so totally get

57:21

it. Maybe I'm a little bummed, but that's okay.

57:23

And some people may be extremely hurt and betrayed.

57:27

And I think the reason why some people may

57:29

not respond to this very well, outside of

57:31

kind of, I think all the predictable reasons of

57:33

breakups suck and being dumped sucks, and especially

57:35

if it's being dumped for the sake of

57:37

somebody else really sucks. And that's just painful

57:40

on a human level. And

57:42

also, a lot of non-monogamous

57:44

people, sometimes their number one fear

57:46

is, my partner is going to

57:48

leave me in order to be monogamous with somebody

57:50

else. And so when that actually

57:52

happens, for some people, that can be a

57:55

nightmare coming true. And so quite

57:57

understandably, the reaction...

58:00

may be negative. It's

58:02

true. It's making me

58:04

think back to some of the

58:06

experiences I had where I was

58:08

dating someone who, you know, I

58:11

was their first non-monogamous relationship and,

58:13

you know, they had a lot of questions

58:16

and kind of struggled getting into that. And

58:18

then eventually, in a couple different situations I'm

58:20

thinking of, ended up breaking

58:22

off our relationship not too long

58:24

after starting to date someone

58:26

new who also was

58:29

more monogamous leaning. And

58:31

in both those cases, their reasoning was not,

58:33

I'm doing this because I want to be

58:36

monogamous with this person. That's not the reason

58:38

they gave me. It was just, I

58:41

want to end our relationship. And

58:44

I'm honestly a little bit torn

58:46

about if I would have

58:48

rather known it's because I want

58:50

to be monogamous. Because in a way,

58:52

that would have helped me feel a

58:54

little bit more like, okay, this isn't

58:56

about me and I can be a little bit

58:58

angry with you about this. Right? You

59:01

can just for myself. So you're allowed to be more angry?

59:03

Yeah, like I'm allowed to be more angry about this.

59:07

And that maybe that helps me process

59:09

it actually versus trying to pretend like,

59:11

oh, no, it's not that. It's

59:13

just, you know, this is just isn't

59:15

working out for me. I don't know. For

59:18

a while I see them then continue to date this other

59:20

person who I know wants to be

59:22

more monogamous. I just don't, I don't

59:24

know. I'm torn about it. I kind of feel like,

59:27

again, going back to my example of

59:29

the person who ended our relationship, not

59:32

even because she started a new monogamous

59:34

one, but just because she wanted to

59:36

start pursuing monogamous relationships in

59:38

the interest of building a family and having kids.

59:41

That I'm like, we also had

59:43

a longer history in that relationship. We've been

59:45

together for several years by that point. So

59:48

maybe there's that factor too. But I guess I

59:50

just, I feel like it did help to just

59:52

know that. Right? Even though

59:54

I was still sad in all of those cases,

59:56

but it just felt cleaner

59:59

somehow. And I could be a

1:00:01

little bit annoyed with her about that decision, even

1:00:03

though I do get it and I, you know,

1:00:05

care about her and want the best for her

1:00:08

and we still get along fine whenever we're in

1:00:10

touch. So it's not like anything really long lasting

1:00:12

bad happened there. I just

1:00:14

kind of would prefer that over trying to

1:00:16

pretend that's not the reason. And I think

1:00:18

we might do that out of this sense

1:00:21

of, oh, I'm failing at this if I go back to

1:00:23

monogamy. So I don't want to give that as the reason.

1:00:25

I just don't know how to have a good sales pitch

1:00:28

for you saying throw your partner, your ex

1:00:30

partner a bone so that

1:00:32

they can be mad at you and maybe get over

1:00:34

it a little bit faster. No, here

1:00:36

it is, Detiger. I think that it's

1:00:38

more that you are owning the fact

1:00:41

that you're acknowledging, hey, I get

1:00:43

that this is shitty. I

1:00:45

get that this sucks and I am acknowledging

1:00:47

and owning my part in this and

1:00:50

that I'm making this decision that is ultimately

1:00:52

going to hurt other people. And

1:00:55

being able to do that and say that to

1:00:57

someone is like, okay, well, good. I'm glad that

1:00:59

you get that. I'm glad that you, I don't

1:01:01

know. You're just so spiteful. No,

1:01:04

but that's good though. No, it's good. I

1:01:06

agree. I totally 100% agree. It's just

1:01:08

your delivery was funny. Well,

1:01:10

that's how I talk. But yeah,

1:01:12

I think it's also important to give

1:01:14

your partners the courtesy of breaking up

1:01:17

with them in person. Maybe

1:01:20

if you're not proximal to them, then

1:01:22

fine. That's more difficult if

1:01:24

you're long distance. But

1:01:26

if you can do it in person and say

1:01:28

like, hey, I'm making this decision.

1:01:31

I really apologize. This

1:01:33

is really tough for me. But ultimately,

1:01:35

I think the monogamy is going to be the better

1:01:38

option for me. I think

1:01:40

that is a mature and brave thing to be

1:01:42

able to do and say. Yes.

1:01:44

And I do think it's worth acknowledging

1:01:46

because we're talking about understanding that you

1:01:48

will hurt people by this decision. And

1:01:50

that's true a lot in

1:01:52

relationships. We do have to accept to

1:01:55

a certain extent that we will hurt

1:01:57

people by being in relationships with them

1:01:59

because Sometimes we're going to get out

1:02:01

of those relationships or we're going to do the

1:02:03

wrong thing while we're in them or like that's

1:02:05

just an inevitable fact. Yeah, I

1:02:07

just want to clarify also that it would be

1:02:10

the same if the situation were reversed that if

1:02:12

you were deciding, no, I can't be

1:02:14

monogamous with this person, you would be hurting that

1:02:16

person most likely. You know, it's

1:02:18

not, yeah, not to try to guilt trip

1:02:20

one particular decision. Totally. Yeah, absolutely. It's

1:02:24

worth accepting a certain amount of that.

1:02:27

And I think that's part of my

1:02:29

pitch for, like Emily said, you know,

1:02:31

being honest with them as much as

1:02:33

you can and being clear about that

1:02:35

you're making this decision and why you're

1:02:37

making it while also understanding that no

1:02:39

matter how well you explain it, they

1:02:41

will probably be mad at you, they

1:02:44

will probably be upset, and

1:02:47

they kind of should be and that's okay.

1:02:49

Like that's going to be part of their

1:02:51

processing this and you're probably going to

1:02:53

be sad and feel bad about it. But that's also

1:02:55

part of processing this. And I think that's true with

1:02:58

any kind of breakup, whether

1:03:00

it's monogamous or non-monogamous or whatever, but just

1:03:02

kind of accepting some of that and not

1:03:04

trying to think, oh, there's going to be

1:03:06

some way that I can do this that

1:03:09

will avoid that. I think that's

1:03:11

how we get into sort of weird dodgy, unclear communication.

1:03:13

And I've been guilty of this many times in my

1:03:15

life. Yeah, I do

1:03:17

feel like whenever breakups are happening, the

1:03:20

lengths we will go to desperately to not

1:03:22

be seen as the bad guy. Yeah,

1:03:25

yeah. I think it's sometimes I think it's less about

1:03:27

hurting someone. I mean, not like sure. Sometimes it doesn't

1:03:29

feel good to have to hurt somebody else. But I

1:03:31

think the bigger part of it is not wanting to

1:03:33

be seen as the bad guy. Yeah,

1:03:36

I get it. That's tough. I do

1:03:38

think that you should give time,

1:03:40

especially if you do want to try

1:03:42

to transition that relationship into a friendship

1:03:44

or something else. Like, give it a

1:03:47

minute. If you're hurting someone, you need

1:03:49

to give them time to mourn and

1:03:51

yourself time to mourn. And

1:03:53

I do think that there is always the possibility

1:03:56

that they're not going to want anything

1:03:58

to do with you after the fact. It

1:04:00

is always possible, yeah. That's

1:04:02

their prerogative. That's okay too. To

1:04:05

bring this a little bit back to the

1:04:07

specific situation you brought up, Emily, of

1:04:09

your friend who just started dating this new

1:04:11

person somewhat recently, I will say

1:04:14

that if you've been

1:04:16

dating someone new and you break up

1:04:18

with me because you want to be monogamous with them,

1:04:20

and I'm like, you

1:04:22

met this person three months ago, I'm

1:04:24

going to be a lot more, feel

1:04:26

a lot more betrayed by you from

1:04:29

this decision of just feeling like, oh, so I

1:04:31

was always meaningless to you. Then

1:04:34

if you'd been with this person, say, for a year,

1:04:36

and it's kind of like, okay, I'm debating

1:04:39

this, you know, and I think I'm

1:04:41

going to make this decision, and you know, this is hard,

1:04:43

I'm still going to be upset, I'm still going to feel

1:04:45

hurt, and I'll probably still be a little bit mad at

1:04:47

you as part of my processing, but I

1:04:49

just think the degree of that's going to be different if

1:04:51

this is a brand new relationship where suddenly you found someone

1:04:53

you want to be monogamous with and you leave me instantly,

1:04:56

that's going to feel shittier. And

1:04:59

also it goes along with what we were

1:05:01

saying about, yeah, this sounds like NRE don't

1:05:03

make those sorts of life altering decisions while

1:05:06

you're under the influence of that as much

1:05:08

as you can help it. Totally.

1:05:11

So what's our conclusion here? I

1:05:15

mean, what did we learn today, everyone? What

1:05:17

did we learn? I'm at this point

1:05:19

having been in this field, this field

1:05:21

of relationships for so long now, I

1:05:24

don't care what freaking type of relationship that

1:05:26

you choose to be in, just be kind,

1:05:28

be honest, have

1:05:30

integrity, be careful, be

1:05:33

intentional, go slow, and

1:05:37

be cool, be cool, kids. Yeah,

1:05:40

cool. Be excellent to each

1:05:42

other. So cool. Be excellent to each other. Exactly.

1:05:45

Right? Yeah. Exactly.

1:05:48

It's okay. Whatever you want to

1:05:50

do is okay. But just, I think,

1:05:52

think about the ramifications of your decision.

1:05:54

If you can go to 30,000 feet

1:05:58

and look down and look... past

1:06:00

the NRE, look out

1:06:03

towards maybe potentially many,

1:06:05

many years of your life and what

1:06:07

that's going to look like if you

1:06:09

choose to make such a big decision

1:06:11

in shifting

1:06:13

your relationship status or shifting the types

1:06:16

of relationships that you want to be

1:06:18

in. And just also

1:06:20

understand that there are no clear-cut,

1:06:22

100% sure answers when it comes to,

1:06:27

well, basically anything, but especially

1:06:29

with relationships, right? That

1:06:32

this isn't something where if you just weigh up the right

1:06:34

things, you will 100% make the

1:06:36

right decision. There's always

1:06:38

a little bit of guesswork. There's always

1:06:41

risks. And also we always change over

1:06:43

time and so does everyone else. So

1:06:45

I would maybe encourage considering all

1:06:47

these things, but also letting yourself off

1:06:50

the hook a little bit about needing

1:06:52

to make the right decision, because that

1:06:55

doesn't exist. For all

1:06:57

of you out there, we hope you enjoyed this

1:06:59

episode. And our question for the week, which is

1:07:01

going to be on our Instagram stories is, have

1:07:03

you ever left non-monogamy

1:07:05

and gone back to monogamy? And

1:07:08

how did that go for you? We want

1:07:10

to hear what your answers are to this

1:07:12

question and see how many of you out

1:07:14

there have gone through this specific scenario. Because

1:07:17

I think it's probably more prevalent

1:07:19

than maybe we even realize. And

1:07:22

the best place to share your thoughts with

1:07:24

other listeners is in the episode discussion channel

1:07:26

in our Discord server, or you can

1:07:28

post in our private Facebook group. You

1:07:31

can get access to these groups and

1:07:33

join our exclusive community by going to

1:07:35

multiamory.com slash join. In

1:07:37

addition, you can share with us

1:07:40

publicly on X, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok,

1:07:42

et cetera. This

1:07:45

story is created and produced by Jace

1:07:47

Lundgren, Dedekir Winston, and me, Emily Matlack.

1:07:49

Our production assistants are Rachel Shenowork and

1:07:51

Carson Collins. Our theme song is Forms

1:07:53

I Know I Did by Josh and

1:07:55

Anand from the Fractal Cave EP. The

1:07:58

full transcript is available on this episode. episodes

1:08:00

page on multi-emory.com.