My Only One

Gawd. I've been talking with various friends in their 40's, 50's and 60's lately and I swear, we are still a lot like teenagers when it comes to being in relationship. You know, silly and inexperienced. Everyone is still horny and seeking sex and love and trying to balance their needs for both freedom and security and creative self expression. You'd think we'd be better at relationship after practicing at it for three decades.The issues I've currently been discussing with my friends are:

jealousy as manipulation;
sexual possession, or the perceived right to the sexual exclusivity of a partner;
the socially constructed dream of finding our "one and only"

I relate to these issues based on my own life experience.

Looking at jealousy as manipulation I've experienced this from both sides (manipulating a partner due to my own jealousy and being manipulated by a partner due to their jealousy) and it's very tied up with sexual possession for me.

When my husband (dh) and I opened our marriage to responsible non-monogamy/polyamory I found myself burdened with an array of ideas that came from the socially constructed belief systems that I had been raised with. I had accepted these beliefs without any real awareness and I found that they were severely influencing the way I behaved in relationship. I was intending to live my life based in a new paradigm but was functioning from the same old one.

Non-monogamy was something we we familiar with but the polyamory started in my mind and expanded into our conversations and first into my heart, then dh's. We had a long time dear female friend who became a lover. The sex was hot and fun and we all loved each other. We always engaged in sex as a threesome so if I was gone off to work, it was expected that there would be no sexual play going on between the two of them while I was gone. When we were together, I called the shots. If I wanted sex, then it happened (of course, only if they wanted it to, but they always did.) The three of us might be blissfully engaged in sex but when I was done, we were all done. Me calling the shots seemed normal and natural to me. At the time I didn't see my behavior as selfish and controlling. Dh went along with it and our friend was pretty quiet about her frustrations. She would voice little peeps here and there but mostly she just accepted however I, or dh, orchestrated things. Maybe she complained more than I was aware of and I just didn't hear her, or maybe I made light of what I was hearing. Mostly she dealt with what she didn't like with a joke and a laugh that made light of it. I don't know. I've reflected on why this behavior seemed OK to me and it goes back to the ideas I held about relationship. He was my husband and therefore I had the exclusive rights to his sexuality. We were a couple and this was about making things work for us (me) first and foremost. I loved her and considered her well being too, and I depended on her not doing anything that wasn't right for her. But bottom line for us as a couple was that we (I) decided what worked best for us (me) and this was paramount.

When considering possession and the right of sexual exclusively, what this meant was that when we stepped outside of the monogamous box, whenever one or the other of us said stop, we stopped. There is an old poly rule of only moving as fast as the slowest person and we tried to abide by this rule. Today, I still think there is merit to this rule, but it is used and abused with indiscretion. Ultimately I find it's place in part of the old monogamous paradigm that we pay too much tribute to. I subscribed to the idea that my husband was there to please me first and foremost and that that was just the way it SHOULD be. I didn't feel unloving in this attitude, I just didn't question the validity of my position...for awhile. And of course I still do subscribe to the gentle caring and nurturing of our lover's heart, but that is different than partners demanding and expecting to always have their wishes agreed to in the form of what their partner will and will not do.

There were of course other elements at play here--such as my kink tendency to top and be the queen and have to others at my beck and call. It's an appropriate way to play of course when all agree and truthfully I think this is a lot of what was going on with us, without it being directly addressed.

I like that position but I'm also working on letting go of ego and control so sometimes I'm moving in two different directions at the same time. As a side note, I like to top from the bottom. Nothing fits neatly into a strictly labeled box in my world.

In the beginning we had a rule that the two of them didn't play without me. Later, when I had begun the process of evaluating my possessive stance on my husband's sexuality I loosened up and gave him permission to be sexual with her without me, within the boundaries of no oral sex or penetration. Part of this agreement included us talking openly and clearly about every detail of their togetherness in my absence. Besides being motivated by my own personal self-growth I was also setting up my position in our relationship for the future when I might have a partner with whom I wanted to experience some alone time with, separate from my husband.

I never told her about our new agreement and boundaries, mostly because even though I had given my permission due to the reasons stated above, I was still very frightened about it actually happening. Also, dh told me that he had no desire to be with her sexually without me present and this comforted me. I believe he being partially, sincerely true. The other part of the truth was that they played sexually together, alone, for some time without telling me. They kept to the rules of dh's and my agreement (no oral sex and no penetration). During this time, dh and I would have these heart to heart talks and I would encourage him to be sexual with her without me, he would decline and adamantly deny that he had any interest in going there.

Kinda weird huh? There are so many reasons that it came down this way for us and FEAR was attached to every one of those reasons. One big thing that was going on was that we were so in love with each other, finally finding each other at the ages of 39 and 43 after years of struggling and suffering in relationships. We were the perfect couple in so many ways. We had each found our one and only, our soul mate and we were risking A LOT, venturing into this world of responsible non-monogamy/polyamory. dh was in a position he didn't know how to handle very well. He found the reality of loving and desiring another woman who wasn't me, untenable. Also, the fact that he was falling in love with her was something he couldn't even look at, let alone accept. He accepted that he loved her of course but he was in love with me. We had been living the socially constructed dream of finding our one and only, the dream that most of us have been spoon fed our entire lives and the dream that many people never attain. And here we were, jeopardizing this dream. So he choose to go into denial about it, acted unconsciously and refused to admit to himself, to me, or to her, what was going on for him. This is deep stuff with painful triggers that alarm the ego that death is imminent.

I remember once when we were talking on the phone and she called him her lover. Those words coming out of her mouth felt so threatening to me and my ego blew up in full force. Lover was just a way too intimate word to describe their relationship. That word held a relational position in his life that I was simply not willing to share. I said nothing to her but confronted him. Would you call her your lover? "Hum," he says, knowing just how to appease me. "Lover...no I wouldn't call her my lover." What would you call her then? "Well, I don't know...friend who I fuck, fuck buddy, sex partner..." He came up with various labels that worked for me. That man was my haven, my safe space. He always knew how to comfort me and offer me the security I was looking for, even if it meant lying to me.

Truthfully, he wasn't so much lying to me as he was lying to himself. He didn't know the truth for himself because he was too afraid to look at it. He didn't know how to look at it. Besides, his ego told him that he was going to be blown to smithereens. My ego was afraid too, and with rightful cause. The truth is fucking powerful and it will annihilate whatever is not real. I was afraid too but I kept preparing for the truth to have it's way with us.

I've come to understand that one of the most valuable commodities that dh and I offered one another in the beginning of our relationship was safety and security. We found each other and saved each other and were now recuperating in each others arms and having a lot of fun and adventure in the process. We were were a strong pair-bond from the beginning--good medicine for the other.

When she couldn't bare to carry the deception any longer, lovergirl let the cat out of the bag in regards to her and dh's secret time alone in sexual play. I was once again talking to her about dh's admonitions that he had no desire to be with her sexually without me present. She of course, knew this to be untrue and finally refused to keep her mouth shut. It wasn't like they had a overt agreement to deceive me, they had never even discussed it. Talk about a no talk rule--these two were the king and queen of that game.

Another part of what was going on was that dh was afraid of me being with someone separate from him. If he wasn't doing it, he would be in a better position to deny me the right to do it. He was always willing to share me (as his possession) if he was a part of the loving sexual fun, but he was so not ready to look at and start working on his jealousy and abandonment issues. Most of this was not conscious manipulation, but manipulation it was. As open and truthful and loving as we were all attempting to be, we were playing a game that was very shrouded from our true awareness.

We worked through much of the emotional snafu and things continued as usual. Well, let me take that back. Soon thereafter, for reasons that serve as a digression as to the purpose of this post, we took a temporary hiatus from the sexual part of our triad while our loving friendship continued. I actually forget all the convoluted details as well as the exact time-line but eventually we started sharing sexually again and this time I was really striving to maintain conscious awareness and stretch myself in truth even more. I was willing, and wanted her to be his "lover". I was willing and wanted the two of them to have time alone to play together sexually with the no oral sex and no penetration rule lifted. I was definitely pushing my boundaries and it felt good. Scary, but good. I was feeling my fear and releasing it.

During all of this time I had no other lover that I was interested in. Even though the three of us were a sexual triad, she and I weren't physical lovers, we played with him, together. I knew I wanted another male lover but I rarely found myself attracted to other men except for friendship. Occasionally I would be sexually attracted to someone but for most men, the prospect of being in relationship to a married woman isn't all that attractive. Most of the people I come into contact with are monogamously minded, especially when it comes to establishing a relationship with someone, and I wasn't out looking for sex. Most single men (and women) are looking to meet and fall in love with their one and only. I had a couple of playmates, men who were dh's friends who I loved as friends and who were willing to play a little with the both of us but that's all that ever came my way. Well yes, there have been a few men here and there that were interested in me but it was never mutual until...well, I'll leave that for now.

So our triadic sexual union started back up and even though the door was open for their playing alone together, it didn't happen for awhile. They weren't desperately seeking to experience time alone and the opportunity didn't organically unfold for awhile. We all enjoyed the three of us together and when the time presented itself, they would go for it.

Once, after an intimate and heart opening talk between the three of us, I left to do something. When I came back she disclosed to me that dh had asked her to be his girlfriend. This was one of those sweet moments of him opening and claiming her has is lover/girlfriend, with her permission of course, making a declaration and voicing the truth of their connection and relationship. I was pissed. Ego flare. I thought he should have discussed it with me first. I confronted him/them and we all had to process it for awhile. This was my perceived right of possession in play. If I wasn't his only, I was certainly his number one and I thought he should run any and everything that had to do with his heart, pass me first.

Another time she and I were talking on the phone and she mentioned her desire to have a private conversation with him. This pushed more of my buttons. I didn't understand, or like, her need talk with him alone--why would that be necessary? Talk with him privacy about what I asked. I was very enmeshed in not only the need to know everything but the need to be a part of everything as it happened. To be in control. Of course this really doesn't make sense considering I was encouraging them to be alone together sexually, but it wasn't about logic. This was about me learning release the illusion that I possessed not only my husband's sexuality, but also his heart and his right to have relationships independent of me. Sheesh. This was hard. It's embarrassing to remember just how possessive I once was. But I try to have compassion now for my mindset then. I've done a lot of work on myself. I had a lot of moving the muck of social conditioning to trudge through. dh was always humble (well usually), always apologetic and always willing to see things my way. I liked pushing myself but I didn't like being pushed.

I am a pretty insightful person and tend to operate a bit ahead of the curve (in some areas anyway) in my social circle. I've been known to drag us all out on a limb hovering above the unknown and then egg everyone on to jump. I'm usually willing to jump in first too. In taking on this leadership role it often makes sense to follow my lead, listen to me and heed to my opinions, my interpretation of the rules, and how things are, or should be. Problem is, I'm often just barely a half-step ahead of my fellow adventurers and I'm often fairly fucking clueless myself. Kinda like the blind leading the blind. But if I'm the one instigating the moving and shaking...

To be continued...But isn't there just something in this song that resonates with all of us? You are my only one. That spoon fed dream is deeply embedded I'd say.