About 7 years ago I began a relationship that, for the first time in my life, made me think "Happily ever after" could be a real option. What was different? Well, among other things, we decided to have an open or polyamorous relationship. A few years later that relationship ended, and I was devastated, but the path I had started down was one I could not go back on.
(To be honest, I've yet to see a couple who's first poly relationship survives more than a few years. I believe polyamory is the human default, but since our culture indoctrinates us to a different standard from birth, the transition back to poly is usually very difficult. Combined with that lack of support from most people, and the fact many poly people live closeted emotional lives as a result, it can be too traumatic a challenge for most relationships to deal with long term. That's my opinion.)
During that relationship we each had other partners, jealousy was sometimes an issue, and admittedly one I had more difficulty learning to deal with. She and I lived together and called each other boyfriend and girlfriend, but I never thought of any other partner as "secondary," the typical poly term for a less important partner. That kind of polyamory is called "hierarchical," which is basically a ranking system for partners. It never felt right to me. I find it degrading and humiliating.
Since that relationship, I've had several relationships of various kinds. On a couple occasions, I've been pressured to used the word girlfriend to describe a partner's status in my life, but for some reason I really disliked that. I honestly thought it was some inner voice telling me this relationship must not be as important as I think it is.
Over time, I began to develop a variety of intimate relationships that are healthy and mutually supportive. I dated one woman for a brief period and soon we realized we were incompatible as romantic and sexual partners, we both almost wrote the relationship off. But over time we have because intimate friends, she is now one of the closest friends I've ever had. We are not romantic or sexual, we are just us. But there is no doubt that our closeness is seen as a threat to most of the people either of us date now.
To someone with a monogamous agenda, who seeks to follow the "relationship escalator," a friendship as close as ours must seem to contain some type of intimacy that they think they should be entitled to because they are romantic and sexual with one of us. On the other hand, neither she nor I ever seem to feel threatened by any new romantic or sexual partners the other may have, we feel secure in our relationship with each other. Because we don't view relationships as competitive or hierarchical, there's no need for jealousy, we each get some needs fulfilled from each other, and other needs fulfilled by other people.
I have very close relationships now with a number of people that include a range of intimacy types -- emotional, romantic and sexual. None of them are the same, but each is in its own way mutually fulfilling. Though I have many intimate relationships, I still consider myself single, at least in terms of the accepted cultural norm.
I have all the things one would expect from a monogamous partner, romance, sex, emotional support, commitment, and, above all, love, in fact I have more of those things, because I get them from multiple people. Yet the term "polygamous" still didn't seem to accurately describe me, because I'm not seeking a girlfriend or wife, I'm simply open to new, fulfilling, intimate relationships, in whatever form they may take, whenever they come along.
Recently, my former girlfriend, the one I talked about in the beginning, introduced me to the term "Relationship Anarchy." Its a relatively new term in the social/romantic/sexual lexicon. It is a form of non-hierarchical polyamory, and it turns out, it much more accurately describes my relationship style.
This may seem like a small thing to some people, but to me its not. For the first twenty-three years of my dating life, I struggled to find happiness with a partner. I would meet someone, fall in love, everything would seem great. But inside I thought there was something wrong with me. Despite being totally enamored with my partner, I would meet other people I was interested in romantically or sexually. I wouldn't act on those feelings, but it felt like I was cheating myself and them. In my heart and mind it seemed arbitrary that I was supposed to not feel these feelings for one person simply because I already had them for another. Why not?
For a long time, I thought I was broken. Then I began to recognize a pattern in my life. I would meet someone, date them monogamously, and over time I would slowly become less and less fulfilled. There would be nothing wrong with the relationship, only it wasn't fulfilling me anymore. We would break up and I would be happy again, I would begin dating different people, supposedly looking for the one person I would "commit to," and the cycle would begin again. I was only happiest when I was "single" but had intimate relationships without the normal restraints monogamy puts on outside relationships.
Understanding this about myself is what eventually lead me to agree to a poly relationship (she brought it up first.) I figured it would give me the ability to develop those other intimate relationships, as I found them, with freedom, and to some extent it did (being poly, despite what most people thing, actually limits dating options dramatically, as most people are only interested in eventually having a monogamous relationship.)
Functionally, the outside world saw me as a normal guy with a girlfriend. A few people knew I had a second partner "on the side," and they assumed that my girlfriend was more important to me than my secondary partner. But they were wrong. When the second relationship ended, I was was devastated. In fact, the way in ended still bothers me now, years later. I have regrets as much about that relationship as I do with my former girlfriend.
Since then, I enter any potentially intimate relationship with a declaration that I am not monogamous, and that if the potential new partner seeks that from me, we had best remain only "friends." For a monogamous person, the status of "friend," usually has specific limitations, primarily sex, but not always, or only under specific circumstances. This is just fine for me, because I can respect other peoples boundaries, and still allow a relationship to develop organically.
By no longer identifying as poly, I also remove the idea of the potential for someone to gain the status as my "primary." That isn't how I work. All my relationships are important to me for different reasons, and none supersedes the others in all instances. Of course, since this "new" term requires some explaining to virtually everyone, it also means I have to do so with anyone who seeks to get involved with me, but in a way, I've been having that conversation for years.
All that aside, it feels pretty refreshing to know I'm not alone in my relationship style, I'm not broken or whatever. I'm just being my authentic self, finally, after many years of trying to force myself into a mold that didn't fit. Happily ever after is a reality now for me, not because I found "the one," but because I am the one, I am able to be truly myself now, and that is what makes me happy.
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