I'm a gay woman in my thirties who is in a wonderful non-monogamous marriage with my wife. We've been married a little over a year and while we both have equal rights in terms of who/how we're "allowed" to date, my wife has always been way more "active" in that department and that's just fine with me. However, while I've found this whole stay-at-home to be surprisingly relaxing and grounding for me, she's going haywire not being able to meet new potential dates. She's got so much pent up energy and she's been spending a ton of her time talking to new folks on OkCupid, Tinder, etc. and, I don't know, it almost feels like an obsession at this point. Plus I'm having trouble taking her excitement over these digital connections as seriously as I would take her excitement about IRL connections. Does my wife need to cool her online flirtation jets? Do I need to be more supportive of her endeavors?

Honestly, neither needs to happen. Your wife doesn’t need to cool her jets and I don’t think you need to be more “supportive”; at least not in the sense of understanding why she feels the need to make many new connections. Your wife is probably just processing her response to the quarantine and the inability to interact with people how she normally would in her own way. This quarantine is a lot to handle for all of us and we’re all trying to cope with not having human interaction to the degree that we did before it started.

You don’t have to support her eagerness to interact with new people but you can support her autonomy to choose how she spends her time and with whom doing what. My partners often do things I don’t understand or wouldn’t choose to do but I still understand their freedom to do those things. We must remember that our partners are different people with different dating and relating preferences and motivations than we have. So what you think her behavior means is actually based on what it would mean if you were doing that but she’s a different person. One of my favorite quotes by Anais Nïn says “We don’t see things as they are, we see things as WE are.” Try asking her why she enjoys these new online connections and the answer might surprise you and offer some understanding.

Also check in with yourself to see if what is bothering you under the surface about her behavior is maybe feeling like she doesn’t enjoy spending so much time with you and that’s what’s fueling her online flirting frenzy. It’s possible that your irritation with this stems from feeling like the reason she is seeking so many others is that she isn’t as happy just being with you as you are just being with her. And if the amount of time she spends online interacting with others leaves little time for the two of you to connect, communicate your concern to her and ask for some couple time. Sometimes when we live with a person, we take for granted that we’re getting quality time with them simply because they are always there. It’s important to be intentional in our nested partnerships, too.

It’s also perfectly ok for you to create boundaries around yourself in regards to these new connections. You can ask her to share a little less information with you about these connections or ask to only be made aware of a new connection when she feels it has the potential of becoming a substantial relationship.

So cut both yourself and your wife some slack. These times are challenging to navigate for all of us, emotions and tensions are riding high, and everyone is doing the best they can to deal. And MOST importantly, stay safe during these uncertain times.

Evita “LaVitaLoca” Sawyers (She/Her) is a black, queer polyamory/nonmonogamy educator, speaker and coach residing in San Diego with her husband and children. Subject of the documentary “Poly Love”, she is passionate about helping people navigate the transition from monogamy to non-monogamy and avoiding the common beginner pitfalls. A frequent contributor to Black & Poly online magazine, she’s also been featured on several podcast including “Inner Hoe Uprising” and “Tickle.Life” and was interviewed by Vogue Williams for her Irish special on Monogamy and Non-Monogamy. She’s also the creator of “Today’s Polyamory Reminder”, daily snippets of wisdom for living non-monogamously.

Guest Columnist Evita Sawyers soothes a polyamory-discordant couple during quarantine!