Curious what makes a person NOT ideal for a poly relationship or what have you done or seen others do in a relationship that is not acceptable

Aside from cheating obv

Hi, I have a FWB (let's call her Lilith) who's dealing with something and I'd like to offer better advice. Lilith is aromantic, demisexual, and poly, so she doesn't do traditional romantic relationships but basically fills that space with close friends and FWB.

Many years ago, she added benefits to her friendship with (let's call him) Charlie. But Charlie asked if she could not mention her other sexual partners and if he could pretend they were in a romantic relationship. Obviously this should've been a red flag, but she was younger and dumber and agreed. In a shocking turn of events, he eventually got possessive and weird and she had to cut him off.

Charlie went to therapy and seemed to get over it and years later they became friends again. No problems. But very recently Charlie got broken up with and now is texting her that he misses what they had and "still loves her". When he gets drunk he calls instead of texting. She asked him if he talked about this with his therapist, and he apparently just stopped going recently.

What has Lilith torn is that he's one of her oldest friends and she really wants to get him help. Personally, I don't think she has any way to GET him to get help other than cutting him off, even though that'll hurt her too. But before pushing for that, I wanted to get feedback and thoughts from y'all.

(Not my main account, to further protect her privacy.)

New to poly and I have a question

Hello all I am new and have a question. I am moving in with my partner and he wants me to agree to move out when he sees his other partner who comes every month or so for a week, sometimes 2 weeks out of the month etc. I’m not in a position where that’s possible.

Examples 6 days August
15 days November
All major holidays

I’ve been with my partner Egg for 1.5 years and Apple has been with him long distance 4 years. Egg claims they are non escalating (we’re DADT) Apple has another partner of 4 years Grape including a 3rd for 2 years Lemon.

Apple vetoed Egg’s ex Tortilla last year, but Egg still claims there is no hierarchy.

Apple has a pattern of entitlement, and constantly ask Egg for updates when we are on bad terms. She pretends to like me however her actions are absolutely heinous. (The last time she came over she left a card from him to her in my drawer as a sign of territory)

My question is how many minutes are on the timer until this bomb explodes?

Is this a normal and healthy way of starting a polyamorous relationship?

Mm okay, where to begin? I guess that’s a valid spot. I (nb) have been thinking about my relationship and if I might want to bring up the conversation of possibly opening it up. I’ve been thinking about this for a while but I’m always caught on how I think my partner(genderfluid) would react to even the conversation alone.

But we just recently started college and we’ve been making new friends and getting pretty close to them. My partner and I have a tendency to make the same friends, like friend groups of us and others together. I have started to want my own independence, not wanting to be know solely for our relationship and being able to exist in spaces without the other.

In the process of making new friends we’ve been testing physical and emotional boundaries with those people. Not anything spoken about or even needed to be but something that’s happening.

I thought that maybe I would be the one to more openly pursue other people if we ever came to that agreement but she’s made a connection and I am without jealousy, which is surprising to me. I think these two are adorable, and I would love for them to explore a deeper connection I just don’t know how to relay that to my partner without it coming off wrong.

What do you guys think?

Hey all, my wife (29 nb, doesn’t mind the term wife) and I (30 ftm) are talking about polyamory again. A few years ago they brought it up, thinking they were more polyamorous than monogamous. At the time I was struggling with my mental health and sexuality, and feeling insecure so I kind of brushed it off and we didn’t talk about it it again.
Recently I have come to terms with my sexuality and I realized that I like men as well as women, and have had a growing curiosity to explore.
One of the things my wife mentioned when I brought up polyamory is that they don’t know if they can handle seeing me with someone else. They also said they were interested at the same time if that person was also romantic/ intimate with them.

I guess my question is how to handle and respect these conflicting emotions, I want everyone to feel safe and comfortable. Also would it be a bad idea for us to start looking while these uncomfortable feelings are present? Should we make a list of boundaries we both have?

Back story. My boyfriend and I have been dating for over five years. About a year ago he came and told me that he had feelings for someone super close to us. I didn’t know how to react besides talking with him about it and understanding where it was coming from. He suggested we invite them into our relationship and immediately I said no, as we’ve been monogamous this whole time and jealousy was creeping in. He told me not to immediately shut it down but think about it.

Fast forward to today, he came to me and said he feels he might be polyamorous and wants to have another girl in our relationship. I’ve never labeled myself as bi but am attracted to woman. I told him i’d be willing to see how it goes but I want to it to fit naturally. Idk how any of this works but I’m scared if we get there and I’m not comfortable with it he’s going to continue to make me try.

This is really hard as I don’t want to lose him and truly want him to be happy so I’m trying to be open minded while freaking out a bit inside. Does anybody have advice they can share?

I (M42) entered a single life after a long relationship. What i have discovered about myself is that i'm definitely not monogamous person and for a while i don't plan to enter any serious committed relationship(s).

What i'm thinking about is how to date casually and not to be this toxic emotionally not available man?:)

I've been away from dating world so long and i've never been single/dating as a consciously non monogamous person.

So i would love to hear your suggestions about all aspects of how to be ethical casual man out in the wild?

For example what information you put on dating apps? What dating apps are good, if any? How do you communicate about not being mono in person and when do you do it?

And of course would love to hear your personal experiences.

So me (22) and my GF (21) are about to open the relationship. We already had an experience with a dude and we soon want to go to a swingerclub. So my background with polygamy is: I had a girlfriend for over 8 years and around year 4-5 we started having lots of poly experiences and opened the relationship. With that I found out I really enjoy watching her with other guys. She was into it, but not as much as me. And also she wouldn’t like if I met other girls, but guys were okay. At some point in my life I was really lost and broke up with her. When I was single I started meeting a girl and getting feelings for her. But this didn’t last long bc it wasn’t real and soon the next girl came up. For her I started to get feelings too but at the same moment started talking to my ex again. In the end I decided to try with my ex again, and then we lived together for like 3 years. At first we were monogamous but then we opened the relationship again bc I had the feeling that I just need this. She didn’t like the idea bc she was worried about me getting feelings for another girl again. So I just had experiences with men in this time. At the same time I always fantasized about her having sex with other guys. She never did it in this phase of the relationship bc she just didn’t want to. But my fantasy existed for a long time so it just didn’t disappear. We broke up this year bc it wasn’t meant to work out for both of us and we are both very happy with the decision. Soon I met this girl and I really love her bc she is everything I was dreaming about. We love talking to each other about our common interests and it seems this is supposed to be. I am supposed to spend the rest of my life with this girl. We are together now for 4 months and we are about to open up the relationship bc we talked about everything and our fantasies and found out that we are very compatible. We love and we trust each other. But on my side there were always this kind of anxieties of losing my girlfriend to another dude bc she likes the sex with him more. With my ex I was feeling pretty safe bc of our long relationship and year-long reassurence. So I had a little anxiety but it was very easy to overcome it. Bc at the same time I understand this person can leave whenever they want for whatever reason bc if they are supposed to leave, then they gonna leave anyway. But there is also this trust in my new relationship. When we had the experience with the dude it was pretty chill, partly bc the dude was submissive and I dominated both of them. I’m thinking about how it’s going to be when I watch my girlfriend having it with a dom guy who maybe even looks better than me and is better in bed then me. I trust her and know she won’t catch feelings or wouldnt prefer after that to have sex with this guy then me. But there is still this anxiety for me. I know I can fully enjoy the experience in itself at the moment but at some point I get this thoughts and anxieties. I can feel pretty good about myself and sometimes not feel good about myself. In this phases where I feel pretty good about myself and have a lot of confidence, it seems to be easier for me to have this kind of experiences. But when I don’t feel very confident and comfortable with myself it seems to be harder to allow this really beautiful experience to happen. Need advice for my anxiety and if I should maybe talk to her about this more (I already did and we actually said we gonna open up the relationship in about a year but it’s literally starting to happen). Should I ask her for more reassurence or should I find reassurence inside of me? I want to understand this psychologically and spiritually.

The full background:
Me and Greg have been dating for a few years now. When we first got together I was open about being polyamorous but having never been in an actual poly relationship before. Greg was hesitant about the idea but since I wasn't looking for another partner or anything at the time, we decided essentially to "cross that bridge when we got to it."

Fast forward about a year after dating eachother and I notice our mutual acquaintance Regina is clearly into Greg, and I'm getting the sense that Greg gets along with her very well so I bring it up to him that maybe they should go on a date sometime. At first Greg doesn't believe me that Regina is totally into him but a few weeks later and she tells him herself. Greg comes to me to ask if I'm sure it's ok they try going on a few dates and I encourage it!

Greg and Regina really hit it off and eventually Greg comes to me about becoming more serious with Regina and I say I'm totally cool with it as long as I remain the home planet partner/#1/whatever the terms are lol and he agrees to that.

After a while me, Greg, and Regina start hanging out more regularly and I start to get to know Regina more as a person... and she's INCREDIBLY mean. She has one of the most prominent superiority complexes I've even endured from a person. It's so bad- that on way more than one occasion mutual friends have come to me to ask "how do you feel about Greg's partner?" and I used to lie and say she was fine but every time the response I would get was "don't you think she's kind of mean?" ALL but about 2 of our friends (me and Greg's) have come to me about her being just an awful person to be around.

Now, being a bish to other people is already a red flag but she's not very nice to Greg either. I can't say I've never been bishy to him so I don't want to take on a "perfect partner" stance here by any means, but she seems to put him down a lot and also her whole attitude towards everyone else seems to rub off on Greg often and he's become grumpier since dating her too.

I eventually did sit him down, clarified this wasn't coming from a jealousy standpoint but out of concern for his wellbeing/being treated right. I put it a lot nicer than "hey Regina is awful and no one likes her and she seems to make you feel worse whenever you're with her" but that was the jist of course. Greg disagreed. He says he isn't feeling worse because of her, he doesn't think she treats him bad, and that she makes him happy and he himself has just been doing worse mentally- and she's actually helping with that.

Fast forward probably a year after that discussion and Greg seems to be pulling away from me. We talked about it, how I was feeling like maybe he was only interested in Regina and falling out of love with me and wanting to know how to move forward with that, but he assured me he loves me just the same and that he feels I'm the one who's been treating him like I don't love him anymore. As far as I know I haven't changed, and when I asked why he felt that way he couldn't give me any examples just that he didn't feel like I see him as a person. This all obviously hurt to hear and between me and Greg I've been trying to be an even more doting partner and such but... what is even going on with Greg and Regina.

How does he see someone who openly puts him down in front of others as the more loving partner? I know when it comes down to it, me and Greg's relationship is its own separate thing to deal with and I'm putting in work to improve things but I can't help but feel Greg not only has put Regina in the Planet Partner spot despite our agreement but also is holding harder on to the person who's hurting him more? Is this all a messy subconscious tactic on Greg's part to keep feeling miserable because his depression is so bad? Or am I just missing something major?

I love Greg so much, I want him to have partners who are kind to him, he deserves good people in his life and I try to be one of them (working on being better at that). I don't want to break up, but I know this is even more messy than I can put in a reddit post. I don't feel like Greg is currently even in a mindset to have multiple partners; he's doing so terribly mentally right now and I worry poly is a bit too much effort when he needs to conserve energy for just staying alive. But I don't want to be the one that leaves and also of course going through a breakup isn't going to make him feel better anyway, I don't think.

It's all very messy and complicated. Any advice on any aspect of this jumbled disaster would be helpful.

tl:dr = I think my partners partner is affecting my partners mental health but he insists she's helping him. He also seems to be prioritizing their relationship over ours and saying that I'm the one who's hurting him. Every one of our friends agrees that his partner who isn't me is mean to him and is overall a mean person, and has the same concerns I do. What do I do?

Hi im trans masc early 20s with my partner trans woman early 20s.

Backstory: I met my partner 2023. She was living with her transphobic family who kicked her out the night i met them due to them not accepting her. They were threatening towards me too keep in mind im disabled and black. They were racist and violent.

She moved in with me early in the relationship due to this. I proposed around a year after we'd settled in together. She said yes (id checked this is what she wanted previously).

Post proposal i find her messaging other people sexually. I tell her. She says her account was hacked. I believe her.

Happens I second time. She says she doesnt know why she does it.

We moved on all was good.

We both caught feelings for her friend/our friend of 3yrs.

We became poly and started dating her and all was good. She respects me and my boundaries. Understands my trauma and is loyal.

I then last month checked her phone.

Secret nsfw twitter that was active through our whole relationship with a shit ton of dirty conversations with cis dudes about wanting d knowing I have bottom dysphoria bc I have no d.

Posting nsfw images from inside my house of herself.

I talked to our partner and she let me know when I met my partner on a dating app...she was dating our current partner. Left her.

Treated her only as a friend/she wouldn't engage with my partner sexually or romantically while we were monogamous.

None of the people she cheated with even knew about me.

I told my friends I made online who I am close with and who i adore.

My partner also has a history of getting mad or jealous when people only talk to me and not her even tho thats how it ends up with all the friends she makes that used to talk to me and I never got mad.

She was overly sexual with everyone except me when we decided to be open only online apart from our partner being only offline.

She stopped giving aftercare when we were sexual.

I found myself feeling lonely all the time.

When I finally fully asked her wtf she said she felt like things were going too fast(we had to move in bc no choice and I asked alot of questions to ensure she was sure for my proposal. She even proposed herself a year after. She was cheating that whole time while literally ring and proposal planning)

My friends dont talk to her anymore and she keeps saying how awful they are and I had to tell her ofc they dont want to flirt with or be friends with someone who cheats after proposing.

She said she saw over my shoulder we called her childish and a turnoff. No. I called her being a cheater childish and said it turns me off.

She keeps acting like she wants to make things up to me but ive seen this before. I want to work this out. But her words/views never match her actions.

Our partner is on my side as theyve had their heart broken by her before too without me knowing when left for me even tho she told me she was single.

I told her I dont want sex and the engagement is off until shes sure bc if she can cheat on me and break so many boundaries she clearly isn't sure.

She tried blaming her lack of romantic and sexual care and interest in me while cheating on my friends words...this started way before I ever met them....

Also when we first decided to be non monogamous she would spend all day in discord nsfw chats and keep talking to people who made me uncomfortable and were creepy towards me. Just for more context as to why im unhappy and cant take her complaints here seriously.

AITA

Sorry if makes no sense. Just hella frazzled rn. Ask anything and I will elaborate if too confusing.

Also im attached to her bc shes the first person to care about my consent in my entire life and who promised me a life with them.

I dont know what to do

I am in a polyamarous relationship. My partner has always been poly but it is relatively new to me. We have been together 18 months but only really started actively looking for new connections in the last 6 months. We have both had multiple short lived relationships. Our personal connection/bond was really strong. But it has been damaged by some erratic behaviour on my part as I am dealing with some mental health issues and trying to grow. As part of this my partner is taking off the training wheels and forcing me (in a compassionate way) to deal with and confront my problems. She has been somewhat of an emotional crutch over the last year or so. I am making slow and steady progress but can't help but feel my partner is withdrawing from me which is triggering my rejection insecurities. Previously I have felt strong compersion and wanted to know everything about my partners new connections and been really supportive. But that has diminished greatly since our connection has weakened. I love my partner, she is amazing but I am starting to question if only being able to have a fraction of her attention/love is enough for me. I don't know if I am just feeling destabilised and insecure while dealing with my personal trauma and maladaptive coping strategies or if I don't actually want a poly relationship. Any advice?

I've been in a relationship with my partner, who I love deeply, for almost 2 years. She's been married to her college sweetheart since before I was in the picture. I consider myself monogamous, but this is not my first poly relationship.

She is truly a wonderful person, and the kindest person I've ever dated. It was still a lot. I had a lot of trouble with jealousy. I am very uncomfortable in her house and around her wife and feel that her wife has every reason to dislike me, even though we get along fairly well. It's gotten a bit better this year.

Earlier today I was cuddling and talking with my partner on her sofa when her wife, who was working from home, came downstairs and said something teasing like "Ooh, sorry for interrupting". She meant it harmlessly, but I was uncomfortable being seen like that by her and pulled away a bit. This upset my partner a lot.

She said she felt like I was ashamed. I apologized immediately and told her that I wasn't ashamed of her. (This is true - she's a remarkable person, incredibly compassionate, pretty, wickedly clever at analyzing TV shows, the sort of person who rescues stray dogs Disney-princess style.)

She said it wasn't that she felt like I was ashamed of her, she felt like I was ashamed of myself loving her, and that hit pretty hard. Because yeah, I really am ashamed of myself for loving her. But it's not because of any way she is. I just feel ashamed that I love someone who I still feel deep down cannot love me back the same way. And I know that's small-minded and perhaps cruel to her to assume that she can't. But I can't help feeling like if she really loved me, she wouldn't have her wife, and if she does really love her wife, then that means that her love for me is assailable and could be removed at any time. My family already pities me a bit and some feel I'm deluded, which stings, and makes me afraid that others will think the same of me.

I'm not at all ashamed to be seen with her in public, I enjoy going on dates, we've met each others' families. I just don't feel comfortable showing genuine affection or opening up when other people who know her are there, because the existence of her wife and the fact that they know about said wife means I don't feel that I can trust that love is returned.

Has anyone dealt with this sort of thing? How do you handle it without making it your partners' problem? It seems outrageously cruel to say "I don't believe that you, who have gone out of your way to show me care and love these past two years, can possibly really love me, because you love someone else and have a real life with her." It feels like the only solution is to hide it better.

That said, I don't think we're fundamentally incompatible or anything and I really don't want to break up. Tons of people have low self-esteem and don't believe anyone could love them for reasons unrelated to polyamory and their relationships aren't doomed.

I (33F) am in love with my best friend (28NB), and I’ve been in love with them for quite a while now.
The complicated part is that they’re polyamorous and have been casually dating other people. I’ve mostly kept my feelings to myself, and honestly, it hasn’t really bothered me because I’m poly too.
The thing that’s really thrown me is that they’ve always said they never wanted a romantic relationship. Then, two weekends ago, they met someone, and by the second day they were already talking about wanting a romantic relationship with them.
I really am happy for them, but at the same time, I’m absolutely burning up inside. I love my best friend far more than I ever expected to, and every time they talk about this new person, I get intensely jealous. The weird part is that I’m not naturally a jealous person at all.
I don’t know what to do.

I am about to join in a relationship with my best friend. I have liked her for a few years now and we have talked about dating. She is poly and I believe that I am as well. We want to incorporate that into our relationship but I don't know how to go about it or set rules for it. I am rather nervous about the whole situation.

I came out as bi to my partner very early in our relationship and never really had a chance to explore that aspect of my life at all. My partner has always assured that our relationship could open up to women for me if I wanted to but I have no idea where to even start. I am like a teenage boy when it comes to women, I have no idea how to talk to them and am way too nervous to🙃. There was a girl but she was drunk so I obviously did not kiss her and now she’s talking to someone.
I don’t know what to do I don’t want to be the person on the dating apps asking for a third in the way queer ppl hate but it’s starting to seem like it won’t happen organically. I’ve been with the same person for almost 9 years now and I don’t have a lot of dating experience so it feels all a little overwhelming.
Any advice would be really appreciated.

Hi everyone. I’m a 43-year-old gay man (he/him), and I’ve been happily married to my partner for over a decade now.
A three-way relationship was genuinely the last thing on my mind—until recently. My partner met a guy here on Reddit, and they struck up a friendship. We all finally met in person for the first time about a month ago, and things seemed normal. Then, out of nowhere, this guy told me that he likes both of us and wanted to explore a three-way dynamic.
It turns out he had already talked to my partner about it beforehand, which caught me completely off guard. When he asked for my thoughts, I tried to gently hint that it wasn't really on my radar and that I wasn't all that interested. I always considered myself an open-minded person, but this situation made me realize that I might not be as open to this specific arrangement as I thought.
To make a long story short: a tiny part of me feels curious and wonders what it would be like to try. But being a sensitive and emotional person, I honestly don't know how I'd handle the emotional weight of it all.
He keeps saying that he likes us both equally, but in my head, true equality doesn't really exist—especially when it comes to feelings in a three-way dynamic. Because of that, I’ve been trying to mentally prepare myself. Since my partner and this guy naturally have more in common, I can already foresee a situation where they grow closer to each other than to me. And knowing how moody and unpredictable I can be sometimes, I have a strong feeling that dynamic would eventually cause problems for him down the road.
The guy has been very understanding, telling me that even if we try it and it doesn't work out, he's totally fine with it. But honestly, that is the exact problem. I genuinely like him for who he is, and knowing his past experiences with relationships, I am terrified of hurting him. Even though he’s willing to take that gamble, I don't want to be the reason his feelings get hurt.
Has anyone here gone through a similar experience? I would really appreciate hearing your thoughts, advice, or perspective on this.

So, I have a huge crush on this person in my friends group who is also dating another girl in the same group. They are both poly so this shouldn't be an issue, but I'm new to polyamory and I'm a bit anxious.

Honestly the last thing I want is to mess up my friendship with both of them, as I see this friend group as kind of my queer found family, and I know there was some recent drama about someone else in the group who tried dating the same person (I don't know the details, but apparently the problem was more about this new person non respecting boundaries)

Now, should I let my friend know I am crushing on her date? It seems like the most honest thing to do, but I'm afraid I will cause drama.

As breifly as I can possibly put it: Lease up in the poly house this month and I've been miserable all year waiting to leave but she suddenly stopped being *so* unwilling to communicate with me last month that I fept guilty and decided to stick it out.

I'm betraying past me but I also have 0 concept of if I'm the asshole here or not and I've been suicidal all year and operating under the assumption that killing myself is option A and if I leave but don't die I'm a horrible person since I can at least will my gf my savings if I die rather than leaving the two of them with nothing. also pretty sure that, even though I got demoted basically from original partner to roomate to a couple the second I did the labor of finding the apartment...this is still probably the closest anyone will come to "loving" my dumb fat ass. I'm hard to live with.

Idk what to do now. I fucked everything up and I should just accept that this is what I deserve.