Since I’ve already put my hand on the hot burner more than once I’ve been able to gain some wisdom over the years. When I connect with someone who’s still early on in their polyamory journey, I struggle with trying to decide if I should slap their hand away from the burner so they don’t get hurt or just let them burn themselves so they can learn the same things I’ve had to learn. If I’m being completely honest, I still don’t know where that balance is. You can tell a couple first opening up their relationship to polyamory that triads are hard and people get hurt. You can strongly encourage them to date separately and send them all the resources to unicorn hunting that you can muster up and it doesn’t matter. A triad feels like the safest route for them so they almost never listen. If they already got it in their head that’s what they want, they go for it anyways. I didn’t listen, so why should I expect someone else to? Yup, my first foray into polyamory was a triad. I wasn’t necessarily looking for one but it happened. Guess what? It wasn’t very healthy and people got hurt just like everyone was telling me that’s what would happen. There were some good times, but all the bad things people were telling me would happen, did happen. 

I’m going to drop a list of many of the mistakes (for free) I made on my journey through polyamory. I want to make this list for a few reasons. 1) To remind you that nobody is perfect so don’t be too hard on yourself, 2) As a personal growth exercise to see and acknowledge my mistakes and 3) To maybe plant a seed that might help you avoid some of the pitfalls on your journey.

Ok… Here it goes….

1. Years 1 and 2 – I was in a monogamous relationship that opened up to polyamory. I’ll refer to this as my “primary” relationship although I’m not a fan of that word in general. It’s for clarity in this context. Here are some of the big mistakes in regards to that time period of my journey:
   1. I told my primary partner that I thought it would be weird if they dated someone like me and that just dating someone like me didn’t make sense. I even bordered on an OPP (One Penis Policy) vibe and while it was short lived my brain still went down that path and that was not ok.
   2. I gave my primary all the control because I wanted them to feel safe and secure. Even they admitted further down the journey that this was a bad idea. This meant my connections were anything but organic and were being controlled by an outside source.
   3. We started out with a triad. A very unhealthy one that was fraught with couples privilege. We were toxic af and the epitome of all that is wrong with new polyamorous couples jumping straight into a triad.
   4. I agreed to things that I didn’t really actually agree with. I really blew it here because I was either full of resentment or broke those agreements. Neither of which was healthy or good. 
   5. I should have left that “primary” relationship sooner. Polyamory brought all kinds of bad things to the surface that were swept under the rug since the beginning of our relationship. Despite them trying to be understanding and even be a willing participant in the concepts of non-monogamy, there were many times where I felt like I was just dragging them behind a truck. I should have drawn a line in the sand a lot sooner.
   6. Even when not in a triad, I still let my primary relationship greatly influence my other relationships. I hurt people and toyed with them because I was painfully unaware of how much couples privilege was actually taking place. It makes me sick thinking about what I did to genuinely amazing people in the first few years of my journey.
2. Years 3 to 6 – Here are some mistakes I made outside the scope of opening up a monogamous relationship.
   1. I was in the kitchen table polyamory or bust camp. Over time, I realized it wasn’t reasonable to make it a requirement. It’s not fair to put pressure on people to interact if they don’t want to. Kitchen table polyamory is still a preference but I’ve definitely pulled back on making that any kind of requirement.
   2. I would let NRE catapult me into a space that I wasn’t comfortable with, and then I would have to pull back. This understandably hurts people because it’s scary when you sense a partner pulling back. NRE is dangerous if not managed well.
   3. I let NRE blind me from observing problematic behaviors. This hurt me more than others but I have definitely missed some huge red flags because of pure lustful infatuation with someone. Again, NRE is dangerous if not managed well. 
   4. I have since learned that I’m probably more in the graysexual area, but I would participate in sexual activities before I was ready for 2 reasons: 1) Definitely some toxic masculinity and 2) The polyamorous space is a very sexual one and I’d put pressure on myself to keep up with my peers. This has caused me to get out of sync with partners and nothing good ever happens when you’re out of sync. 
   5. I would bite off more than I could chew. I’d get a wild hair and say “I’m going to take down my walls!” and then end up saturated in connections and finding myself overwhelmed and trying to figure out how to backtrack. While I’ve definitely gotten a lot better with this it’s still something I keep a close eye on.
   6. I would enter relationships with wildcards and not disclose them. Let me explain – I would say to myself in my head: “This is a new situation and I’m not 100% sure how I feel about it but I’ll give it a shot.” and then when the wildcard became a dealbreaker I would take a step back from that connection. More recently, I’ve become very transparent with people if there is a wildcard that I’m not sure about. Unfortunately, I haven’t always been so up front and I’ve hurt people. 

If it’s not obvious by the sheer amount of mistakes I’ve made over the years, I wasn’t lying in saying that I’m human. We all make mistakes no matter how much we try to mitigate them. Nobody gets into a relationship saying “I’m going to try to hurt this person!” Well, at least I hope not.

I’ve been extremely fortunate to still have a connection with most of the people I’ve dated in spite of all my mistakes along the way. This means I was able to get feedback on how my behaviors have affected people and I’m so grateful for that. It would be very irresponsible for me to not at least try to learn and grow from that feedback that has been gifted to me. I’m still going to continue to make new mistakes. Because I’m human. Just like all of us.  

I hope that by my sharing my mistakes from over the years it has helped you in some way. While I will be the first to remind you to not be too hard on yourself, I’ll also be the person to tell you to not give yourself a free pass either. If anything I shared made you question your own behaviors, take a look at them and see if you have some opportunities to be better. At the end of the day, I think that’s what is most important. 

The post Giving Away Free Mistakes! appeared first on Trying To Thrive.

When something, like monogamy, is written into our brain at a young age and for so long, our brains don’t like to let go of that.  Your brain is saying “No!  This is what’s been there and you’re still alive so I’m keeping it!!!!”  Not only were most of us polyamory folks programmed with  monogamy at a young age but a lot of us spent at least some part of our adult lives reinforcing monogamous constructs in our own relationships.

Our brains are quite complex but if we really break down what’s happening in there then it’s really just computation.  Much like a computer, we process data and decide what to do with that data. For example: Imagine someone throws a ball in your direction.  You process the trajectory of that ball and when you calculate the trajectory of that ball and it happens to line up with your face, you throw your arms up to try and stop the ball from hitting you.  Well, you try anyway (sorry if you got the poor reflex genes).  Sometimes our brains are dumb, though.  Have you ever been watching a video where a ball comes straight for the camera and you throw up your hands anyways?  Logically, you know it’s not going to come out of the screen and hit you.  It doesn’t matter and your brain still says “OMG PROTECT YOUR FACE!!!”

That’s because that response is hard coded into your brain (Probably from when you were young and trying to learn to play catch and kept getting hit in the face.)  Your brain is processing:

Projectile + Face = Protect

Now what happens when you watch that video a couple of times and you know what’s coming?  Your reaction changes because you know what to expect.  You start programming new data in your brain:

Projectile + Face = Protect Except When I’m watching this particular video

Let’s take this one step further.  Fast forward a few months later and a friend sends you that same video of the ball coming towards the camera.  You recognize it immediately and you know what’s going to happen but you still jump. Your brain has reverted back to its default original code of:

Projectile + Face = Protect

Eventually, if you watch that same video regularly and with some consistency then over time you will change how you react to it.  Even if it’s been a while since you’ve seen it.  That’s because you will have rewritten your default code (Projectile + Face = Protect) to include the variables of that video (Except When I’m watching this particular video) .  Granted, this is a severe oversimplification of how our brains actually work. 

For the sake of keeping it simple (and nerdy), let’s pretend like our brains handle data like a computer.

Our base code of things like hunger, breathing, reproduction, emotion and similar primal traits are pre-built for us when we’re developing inside of our mothers.  This is basically our BIOS (a joke for the nerds, not important).  The rest of our hard coding is done in the earlier part of our life.  Most of it is authored by the adults in our life, our teachers, our peers, our observations and even inanimate objects.  Since most of us in the polyamory community grew up being fed data about monogamy from a very early age, that is what has been hard coded into our brains.  We’ve literally been taught to process relationships in the context of monogamy.   This is probably why it’s so hard for couples who have been mostly monogamous to all of a sudden open up their relationship.  They are trying to process polyamory variables with monogamous code. Let’s look at a few things that are probably hard coded in us about the context of monogamy at a very early age. 

• Your partner starts to get feelings for someone else = They are a piece of trash human and can’t possibly be in love with you! 
• Your partner won’t give you their passwords = They are obviously hiding something and can’t be trusted!
• You feel jealous = This is your partner’s fault and they are responsible for this!

Obviously these are the toxic parts of monogamy and not all parts of monogamy are bad. However, these things are reinforced as totally acceptable reactions.  Eventually, after time and through the tedious process of deprogramming monogamy and reprogramming for polyamory you might actually end up here: 

• Your partner starts to get feelings for someone else = YAY!!!! 
• Your partner won’t give you their passwords = That is a very reasonable thing.
• You feel Jealous = Let me figure out why I feel this way so I can work on this. 

We are only scratching the surface here.  This is just a few of many ways we process the constructs of monogamy.  

Something I’ve been working through recently is my habit of thinking about my relationships in terms of a relationship escalator (dating, cohabitating, marriage, etc.).  While this works for the monogamous structure and isn’t necessarily bad, it makes navigating multiple relationships simultaneously extremely difficult. My conscious brain knows that I don’t want to be on any kind of relationship escalator but my subconscious was still processing the original monogamous code.  I’d still process my feelings through a filter with questions like these: 

Could I live with this person?  
Are all of our life choices compatible?  
What if they want kids?
Do I see myself with this person in 10 years?

Why would it matter if I could live with this person if I don’t have the intention to live with the people I date?  Well, it’s because it’s still hard coded into my brain that every relationship has to have a particular outcome and be part of a escalator.  After all, we grow up thinking that opening our heart to someone means marriage, the house, kids and dying together.   This type of thinking was preventing me from letting connections grow organically and just be how they are.  I’d be quick to close the door on something if the person didn’t align with what I’d be looking for in a monogamous structure.  All of this processing is happening in the background, and I didn’t put those pieces together until recently when I really started to analyze my patterns.  Now that I’ve recognized the patterns and can work on it, I’m navigating connections with people who I would have otherwise closed off.

Again, deprogramming your brain is HARD.  Unlearning things is HARD.  Especially something that is hard coded from an early age.  Here’s some tips I have on working through the process of deprogramming monogamy from your brain:

• Watch how you react to things and ask yourself “Is the way I’m processing this situation related to my understanding of monogamy?” You may be surprised at how often the answer is yes and doesn’t need to be yes.
• Be patient with yourself.  Reprogramming our brain doesn’t happen overnight.  People spend years in therapy using CBT (Cognitive Behavioral Therapy)  to reprogram their brains.
• Observe your peers who have healthy polyamorous relationships.  Watch closely and your brain will start making other connections just from these observations.
• Read as much as you can about polyamory.  (Like my blog.  I know.  I’m shameless. Ok but for real, there’s lots of great resources out there. A good start is More Than Two )
• Journal through your journey.  Write down what changed for you that day in how you think about polyamory and monogamy.  
• Make a list of all of the things you know about monogamy and what you think you were taught about it.  Now make a contrasting list thinking about how polyamory changes those constructs.  Here is a quick example:
  

These are just some tips but do what works best for you.  Don’t dismiss therapy if needed.  It has worked for lots of people in the polyamory community and can really help you no matter where you are in your journey.  

The post Deprogramming Monogamy appeared first on Trying To Thrive.

When you play RPG’s (Role Playing Games), you generally start out as a level 1 character.  This means you can handle a sword or bow decently but you’re not really equipped to fight much more than some little goblins or a wild boar.  You have to play through a bunch of quests and get life experiences to level up and fight the bigger monsters. The game generally won’t give you any level 30 monster to kill when you’re a level 1. Well… they might.  If you do something really stupid. Like shooting an arrow at a gazebo. Ok sorry, I digress.  

Unfortunately, in real life, the Jealousy Mind Flayer is a level 30 monster and when you start your polyamory journey you’re starting out at level 1*.  You barely get a chance to start your journey and BAM!!! You’re standing there staring at a Level 30 Jealousy Mind Flayer. The scary part is that the Jealousy Mind Flayer (JMF) doesn’t ever actually kill you but instead it stuns you and then it takes control of your mind. It is trying to make you sabotage yourself until you’re alone and sad. These monsters are really twisted.
*Levels may vary 

Like most monsters, the more we know about them and the more we understand them the better equipped we are to fight them.  Here are some examples of ways the JMF will mind-fuck you. 

The JMF makes you believe that the other person your partner is dating is your competition.  In reality, the other person is someone who loves and adores your partner just as much as you and only wants them to be happy. Just like you do.

The JMF makes you believe that if your partner dates someone with a different gender than you, they won’t leave you. In reality, your partner is just as likely to leave you regardless of the person’s gender. 

The JMF will make you believe that it’s the other person that will pull your partner away from you.  In reality, the JMF is making it so you’re the one actually pushing your partner away.  

The JMF will make you believe that you need to hold onto your partner tighter so they can’t get away.  In reality, the JMF is making you suffocate them and not give them room to be free and happy.

The JMF will make you believe that you’re a big giant dumpster fire and you don’t deserve love.  In reality, your partner chooses to be with you because there’s a lot of really great things about you.

The JMF will make you believe that the only reason your partner would want to be with someone else is because they hate you and aren’t happy in their relationship. In reality, your partner simply craves even more love and connection in their life and it has nothing to do with you at all.

The JMF will make you believe that polyamory is the evil force that’s destroying your life.  In reality, it’s the JMF that is the evil force destroying your life.

These are a few examples – but there’s so many ways the JMF will try and destroy you. It is very creative and very insidious! The more information you have about the JMF the better equipped you will be to fight it.  You need to use the power of your mind to overcome the thoughts that the JMF is implanting in your head. Over time, the powers of the JFM will have less of an effect on you. You will gradually become stronger and more confident each time you fight the JMF.  Your emotional intelligence score will shoot up with every successful battle. Be aware, the JMF very rarely ever fully goes away. In fact, you might be coasting along just fine for quite some time and then that jerk shows up and tries to attack you again. However, as you level up on your journey, the JMF stays the same level. After some time and experience, as you’re attacked by the JMF, it will feel less like you’re being dragged over glass shards behind a truck and more like a little bee sting.  

Note: All you hardcore D&D folks. I know the mind flayer actually eats the victims brains and turns them into slaves. This is the Jealousy Mind Flayer. It’s different, ok?

The post The Jealousy Mind Flayer appeared first on Trying To Thrive.