Guest Columnist A.P. Grey talks thought experiments, emotional authenticity & ULTIMATUMS!
Within weeks of meeting Angie (when it seemed like she wanted to be more serious than just dating).. I let her know I was bi and looking to explore poly. She agreed, then changed her mind the next day. Since then, it has been a "can I or can't I" debate - she let me know she has anxiety disorder, and I agreed to be monogamous while she became more comfortable with me and my desire for a more "unconventional" relationship. Now, a year and a half later- we both love each-other but there has been a LOOMING question. She is now giving me an ultimatum- poly or her.... I did my best to put all my cards on the table, but I'm still here and I fear that I can't stay with her and be true to myself.. help?
Dear reader, my sympathy to you both in this challenging pickle. It’s worthwhile to take a moment to be kind to yourselves and recognize the power in being willing to think critically about hard stuff.
Polyamory isn’t easy. It takes a lot of work, both in terms of our honesty with ourselves and also the capacity we have to express that honesty to our loved ones. It requires deliberate cooperation, which demands that our counterparts be legitimately willing to go their own personal distance. Sometimes, that distance doesn’t feel innately necessary given the general standard of coupling that historically defines our society’s sense of what’s not only possible, but also beneficial.
You, reader, feel the reality of the space you want to explore, but obviously Angie has not felt the pull of that sort of curiosity yet, and perhaps she won’t.
My avowal of polyamory has never been about how much love or sex I can have with however many partners – rather, it’s my pursuit of emotional authenticity. We all deserve love BECAUSE of who we are and how we love, not DESPITE any of those things. Polyamory is about my relationship with my own feelings and my desire to get as close to unconditional love as my fallible little mammal nervous system will allow.
What do you want from it? What do you bring to it?
Ask yourself what’s really at stake here. Have you, individually, and as a partner to this particular person, considered the options? What does she rely on that seems threatened by opening up? Monogamous culture embeds within us a fear of scarcity, but we can challenge that narrative. Have you tried thought experiments individually or together?
Are you prepared? If you’re curious about polyamory to explore a fuller range of expression romantically and sexually, have you considered what your personal journey might imply for your capacity to engage in commitment?
Have you two had any of the foundational conversations? Perhaps part of her apprehension is grounded in not understanding what polyam means to you, and where and how you see her fitting into that framework? It’s an ongoing effort to counteract a lifetime of mono-normativity and it’s natural for that to be hard, scary, and require gentleness and a lot of reassurance.
My first response to the concept of an ultimatum is that it represents a lack of accountability on the part of the issuer. It says “I find myself incompatible with these circumstances, but I am unwilling to and/or feel incapable of acting in accordance with my own boundaries”. Emotional responsibility means that a person is willing to do what they need for their own feelings, rather than putting pressure on others to change their behavior (provided that the other person isn’t behaving in a hurtful way). For this scenario, if you were clear about your intentions to explore your sexuality via non-monogamy from the beginning and your partner opted in, that implies acceptance of your terms in good faith. The ultimatum now suggests that she said what she felt she needed to say in order to avoid an immediately negative outcome, but that’s not necessarily authentic to her own best interest, or your combined good as a partnership.
What are your own boundaries? Why are you “still here” as you put it? All relationships require some cost/benefit analysis, and you’ve stayed, too.
To the above end of an honest effort on her part, there are a multitude of resources about how to approach the transition of a closed relationship to a non-monogamous one that offer tools for addressing partners’ needs, especially when there are some known obstacles to overcome. I just want to explicate here that anxiety is a Whole Thing for ALL relationships, yet polyam ones *simply demand* accountability and responsiveness for it. The anxious partner has a lot of work to accept – to first engage in self-regulation, then to ask for help if necessary, which is generally a super uncomfortable and vulnerable moment plagued by shame and other difficult feelings. It sucks...yet, it’s also liberating to simply be real about it, and allow that to act as a litmus test for the kind of capacity anxious folks really need from our significant others.
Beyond that, on your part, and generally for less anxious folks...if the work of acknowledging, sitting with, and being willing to support anxious partner(s) through some common sources of polyam relationship anxiety such as wanting to feel unique and desirable, needing reassurance (sometimes, like...realllly a lot), and feeling prioritized is taxing for you, perhaps you’re better suited to casual dating than polyam partnerships either now as you begin to explore, or even in the long run. Food for thought, and the very best of luck to you both!
A.P. Grey is a renaissance person based in Oakland, CA, where she writes, cooks, dances, and challenges the patriarchal division of labor through radical vulnerability, relationship anarchy, mutual aid, and restorative justice. She admins an online intersectional non-monogamy community, co-hosts an underground dinner party series, and loves the moment when you get to connect individuals who each have exactly what the other needs.