Also, I Can Kill You With My Brain
Posted on January 23rd, 2007 in Polyamory
I posted over on the poly community at LiveJournal asking for a bit of advice on dealing with feelings in relation to Jack seeing other people. You can read about it here and it’s going to be fairly relevant to this post. Also I got heaps of awesome advice, so check it out 
Anyway, let talk about balance, ‘fairness’, and comfort zones when it comes to relationships.
In response to one comment over on the LJ board, I started thinking about my expectations of myself and of Jack when it comes to poly and I broke it down like this:
I expect that I should have the same comfort levels, be OK with the same things, and generally be just like Jack when it comes to poly. Of course this only applies to poly because when it comes to tastes in food, clothing, body art, or what have you, I think it’s perfectly fine to be different from him.
Just not when it comes to poly.
That’s pretty dumb. Like forcing myself to eat mashed potatoes, which I find more vile than eating mud, just because Jack happens to love them a great deal. That doesn’t make a lot of sense. In reality we just eat a lot of rice around here or I cook potatoes for him and have something else myself.
So why can I not translate that into poly. See, I have been beating my head against the wall to try to be OK with the same things that Jack is OK with. I mean, it seems vastly unfair for me to say NO to something that he would say YES to if I asked.
Not because Jack is disagreeable, or even cares. I mean, he’s so accommodating he would drop the entire poly thing in a heartbeat if I asked him. He would even go so far to let me keep at it and just remain mono so that I never have to feel yucky and uncomfortable. He loves me so much that he would just do those things and not even resent me for it because I come first in his world. Gawd I am one lucky woman.
Rather than take advantage of his good nature, I really want to find the best possible way for us to both get what we want. He wants to be able to see other people, I want to not feel like vomiting whenever he gets close to sleeping with someone.
My comfort zone happens to dictate that I need to get to know a person a little bit before I allow them to get naked with the most important person in my life. At least for the time being. Who knows how long that will last. I might decide after it happens that I was prepared for something FAR more horrifying than reality. The rules are fluid, we can change them again if my comfort zone becomes different.
The only other thing I can think of that constantly causes me waves of nausea is this:
Curiosity+Asking Questions=Getting Answers I Really Don’t Wanna Hear
I hate knowing, I hate not knowing, what the hell am I supposed to do? Jack cannot just refuse to tell me because in our relationship that is a huge NO-NO. He would never agree to it lest he later be accused of lying and perhaps earn himself a brand new rectal opening. Nope that will not fly. I have managed to cure myself of snooping through IM archives, because it just makes me feel gross. However, when he goes out with someone, I end up asking him all sorts of questions because I can’t frickin help myself. Of course he tells me the truth and then we are back at the bad place where SG feels ill. It’s totally NOT cool.
“Just stop asking then dumbass” you all say. But HOW? I like to know what is going on with Jack, with the people he is seeing. I like to know what stage of the game they are at.
One thing that might work is if Jack would stop giving me WAY too many details. I mean, I am glad that he had a naughty chat with Miss SoAndSo but I really don’t want to hear that she masturbated for him on her web cam. I think he’s just afraid that something will come out later and I’ll turn on him like a pit bull with lipstick and growl “You NEVER told me THAT!” I don’t blame him for trying to avoid that at all costs. He loathes having to hide or keep anything from me, and vice versa. It’s just not something we do.
How on earth do you find some balance? Does it get easier as you go along?
*Sighs*
January 24th, 2007 at 4:40 pm
I believe I mentioned this before, but I went through something very similar.
After months of issues, I finally made the decision to shift the context into an area I understand very well: domination. I told her she would just have to deal with it.
And she has. In large part because she knows I won’t hide anything from her, even if I decide not to tell her all the details.htt
But more importantly, it gave her a concrete way of dealing with it. For her, the worst part was not knowing how to act. She was left uncertain, which is the worst place to be when you’re already dealing with insecurity issues.
Her feelings didn’t go away. But now she was able to deal with them.
Reply To The Above Comment
January 24th, 2007 at 9:15 pm
I agree. You just have to deal with the icky feelings and not put them on your partner.
I’ve been in a poly relationship for two, where both of us are involved with the same women, whom I adore, and I STILL have icky feeligns. It sucks! And I beat myself up just as you do. They aren’t as bad as they were in the beginning and its gotten easier as time goes by to say to myself, “Stop it!”, and then actually stop it.
Forgive yourself for being human.
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January 24th, 2007 at 9:24 pm
D’jaevle,
Yes, you did mention that before in a pervious comment
Thank you again for sharing your experience here.
While I very much like the idea that worked for you, I doubt it would work for us because Jack does not have strong Dominant tendancies. If we had a strong ongoing D/s aspect to our marriage I think that the option you presented would be a very effective solution.
We shall have to muddle through somehow.
Monica,
I believe as well that it will get better as time goes on. I think that once the ball starts rolling I will discover that I’ve been getting WAY more worked up than was totally necessary. Once it’s actually happening I think I will be more fine.
Thanks for the great comments
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